LAW AND GRACE
The Apostle Paul, in writing to the Ephesians, says, “By grace are ye saved”, Eph 2: 8. If it is by grace we are saved, then it is most important to understand what grace is. Naturally we do not like grace, because it makes everything of God and nothing of us. We do not want to be made nothing of. But before we understand the grace of God, we have to come to this, to be made nothing of. Grace, I repeat, makes everything of God. If we are saved at all, God must get the glory of it; we shall never be able to credit ourselves with it.
I have read this beautiful passage in order to show you what grace really is. We get a picture of it in the story of the good Samaritan. But I want to show you first what leads to its coming out. A lawyer starts up with the question, “What shall I do to inherit eternal life?” He merely stood up to tempt the Lord; he had no sense of need in his heart. Mark the words of his question, “What shall I do?” I dare say you have heard the story of the lady and her physician. The physician was a very religious man, though unconverted. You know, people may be religious without being saved. There are different sorts of sinners: there are drunken sinners and sober sinners, and there are religious sinners and irreligious sinners, and so on; but still they are sinners; they are unsaved. Well, the lady said to her physician as they were conversing one day, ‘There is just this difference between your religion and mine, doctor: yours is a religion of two letters - d, o; mine is a religion of four letters d, o, n, e’. ‘Do’ and ‘done’, just the opposite. The first represents works doing something to gain salvation; the other speaks of what is already accomplished; the one is law, the other grace. I pray God it may be discovered to you that all is done, you are not asked to do anything. All His claims have been met and you have simply to rest in what has been accomplished.
The lawyer says “What shall I do?” The Lord refers him to Exodus, chapter 19. “What is written in the law?” I think people forget how the law was introduced. Listen, “And mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire: ... and the whole mount quaked greatly”, v 18. That is how the law was introduced that law which the lawyer summed up so well. “How readest thou?” the Lord asked. Well, he was a good reader; you could not have found a better.
The Lord was asked this question when on His way to Jerusalem to suffer. He was going there to die. He was going there to do a work by which alone you and I can be saved. If ever you get to heaven it will be by what Jesus did, and by that alone. On His way up He was asked all sorts of questions by all sorts of people who crossed His path. This lawyer is one of them. In replying to him the Lord, as it were, says, If it is doing with you, you must turn to the law. What is written there? And the lawyer answers well; he was a good reader, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself”. He knew the law. If he wanted to know about the doing, there it was, “this do, and thou shalt live”. Yes, but where is the man that has done it? Can you point out one who has loved God with all his heart, and his neighbour as himself?
The Lord does not say, This do and you shall go to heaven or have eternal life, but “live” - that is, live here on earth. Why do people die? You will have to die some day, but why? It is not natural to die, it is natural to sleep; you do not go upstairs to die in the same way that you would go upstairs to sleep. You have stood by your dying friends, perhaps, and you have seen that it is not natural to die. Death comes through sin. “The wages of sin is death”, Rom 6: 23. The reason people die is because they are not fit to live here. You know not but that you may die to-night. Perhaps you hope to go to heaven when you die. I am not speaking of Christians now; as a matter of fact some Christians will not die at all. I am speaking of those who are unconverted. You hope to go to heaven. Mark it, you die because you are not fit for earth, and yet you hope to go to heaven! What a strange thing! How can you think of going to heaven to live with God, when you are not fit for life on earth? I am not shutting the door of heaven to you, but I want you to understand that that is not the way you can enter in. It is a solemn subject. God may stop the beating of your heart this moment. If you leave this world as not fit to live here, do you think you are going to live with God? Certainly not.
People do go to heaven, but on what ground? You must look that question in the face. Some of you are playing fast and loose with your souls. You are like the man who was bringing home to England a very valuable stone. He used to bring it on deck to show his fellow-passengers. How they envied him! He used to throw it up and catch it as you might a ball. How beautiful it was! How it sparkled in the sunshine! But he was playing with it. One of the passengers said, ‘Man, you will throw that up once too often and lose it’. ‘Oh, no, I shall not’, he replied; ‘I am too good a catch’. However, one day, as he was doing this, the ship gave a lurch and he lost his balance, and overboard went the precious gem. You say, What a fool! So he was; but what are you doing, and that with your precious soul? Your soul is not saved, and if you died to-night you would be damned. That is plain talking. Do not play fast and loose with your soul.
I well remember once going through a village in Kent giving away books; I was on my way to catch the train to go to another place to preach, but did not know my way to the station, and the time was nearly up. I saw a statelylooking gentleman coming along,and stepping up to him I enquired my way. ‘Come with me and I will show you’, he answered. We walked along together, chatting about the weather, the crops, and so on, but I had something in my heart I wanted to speak about of more importance than crops - the welfare of his soul. At last he said, ‘I will show you a place where five roads meet; you will not see such a thing as that every day’. This, of course, was interesting in its way, but I turned the conversation by saying, ‘I would like to ask you one question: What is your way to heaven?’ He stopped, drew himself up, and said, ‘My way to heaven is to do your duty’. He was on the ‘do’ line. I looked at him and answered, ‘“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbour as thyself”. Have you done that? That is your duty’. He bowed his head as he replied, ‘I cannot say that I have done that’. ‘No’, I rejoined, ‘you have broken down there, but look away up to heaven; there is the Lord Jesus, who, when here, loved God with all His heart and His neighbour better than Himself, and such neighbours, too! He is your only hope’. Just think of it. There was an intelligent man going to meet God on the ground of having done his duty. At the first statement of his duty he has to own that he has failed in it. And you, my readers, have not loved God with all your heart and your neighbour as yourself. You know you have not. It is no use going on that line. You love yourself better than your neighbour; I can prove it to you in five minutes. I will suppose you have got a neighbour next door to you, and you live very neighbourly. She gets a letter from a lawyer telling her that a rich uncle has died and left her £500, and that if she goes to C-- on a certain day she is to receive it. Now, when she comes and tells you that, would you be just as pleased as if the letter had come for you? I think you will say, No. Then that shows that you love yourself that much better than your neighbour. The fact is, we love ourselves, and we neither love God with all our heart, nor our neighbour as ourselves. You will never get to heaven by doing your duty.
There is only one thing that can open the door of heaven the blood of the Lamb. It is the work of Christ and not your law-keeping that can take you there. If you could keep the law, it would only entitle you to life here. But you know you have sinned, and sooner or later are going to die. You have now notice to quit, and you may go at any moment. You cannot deny that fact.
As men we would like to live here, but you are not fit to live here, and yet you expect to go to heaven! You do not want to go to hell, and as you cannot stay here you think you would rather go to heaven; but if you could, of the three, you would rather remain on earth. This will not do.
I want to show you the necessity of the atonement. I want to show you that your works will never take you to heaven; if they were good enough for that, you would not be taken from the earth. It is only through the atoning work of Christ that you can enter heaven.
The lawyer says, “who is my neighbour?” as much as to say, Show him to me, and I will love him as myself. He should have owned, I can never do that, but instead of this, “he, willing to justify himself”, asks this question, and the Lord in reply gives him the story of the good Samaritan. He draws a picture, so simple that a child can understand it. I believe it is really a picture of Himself.
He begins with, “A certain man”. Now I want you to see that this man is a picture of yourself. He “went down”. It is very simple, but very terrible; it is what has happened to you since the day you came into the world. Your story is told in one word: “down” is the word; it is a downward path. If there is an unconverted person here, I do not stop to ask whether you are religious or respectable; in any case these words describe your path. “He went down”. You know your path has been a downward one. When you were a little child, for instance, your conscience was tender; since then it has been getting harder and harder.
He went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, from the city of peace and blessing to the city of the curse. Unsaved soul, yours is a downward path; you are going down to the pit, your back is turned upon God, your face is hellward, and yet you are saying, I hope to get to heaven when I die! How can you, if you are going the downward course, and have not been arrested? The further you go, the faster you go, like a stone rolling down a hill.
He fell among thieves. The devil is the thief; he has robbed man. God made man upright, but oh, what a wreck he is! Look at him now, oftentimes worse than a beast. He has indeed fallen among thieves and has been left “half dead”. They wounded him and threw him in the gutter, as many a poor sinner has been thrown down in the mud. ’Tis then the Saviour seeks him. Wondrous grace! If there is one here saying, I am that man; I have tried to be better, but here I am, a poor wounded creature, half dead, I must give it all up, the Saviour draws near to you; He seeks such. “By chance there came down a certain priest that way”.
I think the priest represents the law; the priest did nothing for him. If he had spoken, he would perhaps have told the man to keep the law. Then the Levite comes and looks on him. What would he have said if he had spoken? In modern language, Be baptised; take the sacrament, &c. Quite right in their place, but they will not save you. How can a poor man who has lived in sin be saved by being baptised and taking a piece of bread from a minister's hand? The Levite represents ritualism, but ritualism cannot save you.
“But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was”. Jesus, the Son of God, came down. When you speak of a journey, there is a purpose in it. The blessed Lord gives us the purpose of His journey in one verse: “the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost”. Here is a Saviour! From whence did He journey? From the heights of glory down into this world of sin and sorrow. Blessed be His name! Linger over it; it will bring joy to your heart. I see myself in this picture, and you may see yourself, and rejoice in it. This blessed Man has drawn near to me, and I want you to realise it, poor hopeless soul! Is there one hear saying, I have tried to turn over a new leaf. I have tried to be good and serve God, and it has all ended in failure? Are you saying that? Let me tell you the Saviour looks upon you; there is love and compassion in His eyes. He drew near to him; he came where he was, he looked upon him, he pitied him. He does not say, You do your part and I will do mine. No, he draws near and puts his hand upon him. Will you let the Lord put His hand upon you? You who are trying to be good and fail in it what will He do for you? The moment the Samaritan put his hand on that poor man he said, I will do all for you. He made himself responsible for him ever afterwards. This is what the Lord does: He makes Himself responsible until He gets us home to heaven.
Why does it say “a certain Samaritan”? I think it means the man had no claim upon him. We read, “the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans”, John 4: 9. He could not say, I am a Jew; come and help me. Ah! dear friend, we have no claim upon the Son of God. He came unsought; not a voice was heard. Never had a cry gone up from this earth to God, Send Thy Son to save us! No, it came out of the heart of God that He should come. He took, as it were, that Treasure and gave Him up that He might save us! He “came where he was”. I like that. The Lord give us the joy of it! He saw him, looked on him, had compassion on him, drew near to him. He draws near to you, my friend. I think I hear Him say, I will do all for thee from now until I get thee home to heaven. Will you let Him do everything for you? That is grace.
He does three things for him: he binds up the wounds, he pours in the oil, and he pours in the wine. “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life”, John 3: 16. That is a beautiful bandage.
What is the oil? The efficacy of the work of Christ applied to the conscience by the Spirit. There could have been no healing apart from that work. Jesus suffered on the cross in order that He might pour the oil into your wounds. Is there a troubled soul here? Let Him pour in the oil. Do you know what they do at sea? I have seen many a storm. When the sea is very rough, and there is danger of its breaking over the ship and swamping her, they have a method of putting an oil-barrel in a certain position and allowing the oil to run out slowly on to the water, and this to a great extent smoothes its surface. Is your soul troubled like the troubled sea? Let the Lord as the Good Samaritan pour the oil in, and there shall be a great calm.
There was a poor woman in Luke 7 who came to the Saviour; the tears were rolling down her cheeks on to His feet. Oh, my sins! Oh, my sins! There she was in trouble, and the Saviour pours in the oil. “Thy sins are forgiven”. “Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace”, vv 48, 49. That is the “oil”. Thank God, I know what the oil is!
Listen, here is another scripture: “their sins and iniquities will I remember no more”, Heb 10: 17. NO MORE, NO MORE. Precious drops of oil! God will remember them no more. He says so.
I remember preaching the gospel in a village in Essex: there was no church or chapel in the place. Right opposite to me in the meeting sat a woman. I saw she was troubled. I said to her after the preaching was over, ‘Well, mother, how is it with you?’. ‘Oh’, she replied, ‘I have not got peace’. I spoke a few words, but could not stay long with her, for I had to go to another village for the night. Next morning, as I was sitting reading my Bible, the Lord said to me, ‘Go over to that other village and visit’. I closed my book and started off. When I reached the village I knocked at the first door I came to. A young woman opened it, saying, as she did so, ‘Have you heard what has happened? This morning, as mother was sitting at breakfast, she was taken with paralysis. We took her upstairs, and she has been crying out ever since, O Lord, send the preacher to me with words’. I went upstairs, and as I stepped inside the bedroom she turned her face towards the door and said, ‘Have you words for me?’ I replied, ‘Yes, thank God, I have; the Lord Jesus says this to you, Thy sins are forgiven, thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace’. ‘She was with my Master in spirit, and turning her eyes away from me, she said, ‘Lord, I do thank Thee for beautiful words’. She looked away from me; I was only the signpost to point her to the Saviour. She was looking up into His face and praising Him for the oil He had poured in. Will you let Him pour in the oil? “Thy sins are forgiven … Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace”. I do pray God that that may be sounding in your chamber yonder to-night. “Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more”. No more. What does that mean? That they were remembered when God laid them on Him. He cried with a bitter cry, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”, Matt 27: 46. He died that we might have the oil.
Now, what is the wine? That is the best of it. The wine is the love of the Son of God; the joy of His love is wine. Wine in scripture always means joy. You will never get any true joy till you know that Jesus loves you. It is like the good Samaritan saying to the poor Jew, I love you. That is the wine. “The Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me”, Gal 2: 20. Loved me, a wretch like me! Does He love me? Yes, He does.
Three blessed sunbeams, gilding all I see;
Three tender chords, each full of melody;
Three healing leaves, balm for my agony.
WHO.
He lovéd me - the Father's only Son;
He gave Himself, the precious, spotless One;
He shed His blood, and thus the work was done.
LOVED.
He loved, not merely pitied. Here I rest:
Sorrow may come, I to His heart am pressed,
What should I fear while sheltered on His breast
ME.
Wonder of wonders! Jesus loved me
A wretch, lost, ruined, sunk in misery!
He sought me, found me, raised me, set me free.
My soul, the order of the words approve
Christ first, me last; nothing between but love.
Lord, keep me always down - Thyself above.
‘Nothing between but love’. That is the wine. I tell you what, dear people: we know what earthly love is, God has implanted that in our breast; but natural love brings sorrow, divine love brings joy. You remember, mother, when you lost that child, how you sorrowed and sorrowed, how you followed it to the grave, you stood beside that grave, then you went home and looked at the chair in which it used to sit. The father forgot his sorrow after a while, but you could not forget; and when you had put the other children to bed you would go and open the drawer and look at the little shoes and the clothes it used to wear, and the tears would steal down your cheeks. Why did you sorrow so? Ah! there is nothing like a mother's love. All that sorrow was because of human love. It is of God, you know. But I would like you at such a moment to pillow your head on the Saviour's breast. No rude hand of death can interfere with the love of Jesus. I don’t know how you get on in sorrow without Him. I pity you! To whom do you turn in your sorrow? It is a sweet thing to know His love and to know that nothing can take Him from you. Your heart can never be bereft of that love.
Then let me say to you, dear believers, hold things here lightly; do not grasp them tightly, or it will cause you sorrow. “Lay hold on eternal life”. Let your heart go to heaven before you get there yourself. Let your heart be entwined around that blessed Person with whom you are soon going to be for ever.
The Good Samaritan desires to draw near to you, dear troubled soul, and to put His hand on you and to say, I love you. He would pour in the oil and the wine. The wine is the joy of His love.
And what does he do next? He first cured him. Did he then say, I have done all this for you, and now you must get on the best way you can? Oh, no; he puts him on his own beast. It is not as some people tell us. That the Saviour does His part, and we have to do ours. Our part? What is our part? Our part is to let Him do all for us.
Does he say, I have cured you, now go back to Jerusalem and behave yourself? That is not grace, it is not the fulness of grace. He does not stop with curing him, he sets him on his own beast. The same power, he says, that carried me shall carry you. For us it is the power of the Spirit; that is the power in which the Lord went through the world. If He has cured you He will carry you.
I knew a woman who said, ‘I have such a bad temper, I know it would not do for me to confess Christ: I should be sure to break down if I did’. That is just what the devil tells people. Much he cares about the honour of Christ! He likes to keep souls from confessing Him. I took out my pencil and tried to stand it on end. ‘There’, I said, ‘I am as helpless as that pencil. I am as powerless to-night apart from Christ as I was the first day I was converted’. What we want is power, and that Christ gives.
Well, she confessed Christ, and when I went to see her again she had a beaming face. She said, ‘Oh, I have been getting on wonderfully; it seems as though the children were different and everything else’. She had been looking to the Lord and He had given her power.
He “set him on his own beast”. Will you let the Saviour carry you? He first cures, then carries you.
Then he takes him to an inn. The moment a man is converted this world is turned into an inn to him. We have an inn here, a home there. If I were staying at an inn in this place, you might ask me how I was getting on. How do you like your quarters? Oh, I should say, it is a very good stopping-place, but I am hoping to be at home soon. We are going to be off directly. He “brought him to an inn”. He made a stranger of him.
Do you know who the host is? The Holy Ghost. The Lord said just as He was going away, speaking of the Father, “He shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever”, John 14: 16. Every Christian is committed to the care of the Holy Ghost.
And what next? “Whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come again I will repay thee”. I am coming back to fetch him. The man was cured, carried, cared for, and called for. Thank God for the last! The precious Saviour, the Son of God, is coming to fetch us. Christ shall do it all. I am not looking to die. I may fall asleep, but I am not looking for that, but for the One who has cured me, carried me, cared for me, and will call for me. How many of you would like Him to come to-night? Would you like to hear His voice? Every Christian on the earth will be caught up. “The dead in Christ shall rise first; Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them” - a glorious company - “to meet the Lord in the air”, 1 Thess 4: 16, 17.
Where will you be when He comes? He will shut the door then. On which side of the door will you be? There are only two sides, inside and outside, the saved side and the lost side, heaven’s side and hell’s side. “They that were ready went in with him: ... and the door was shut”. When He comes the door will be shut. That will settle it for ever. “Lord, Lord, open to us!” - piercing cry! - only gets the answer, “I know you not”, Matt 25: 10. If you do not accept the precious grace of the Lord Jesus Christ now, He will shut that door upon you then and say, “I know you not”, and you must spend that awful eternity of woe in the lake of fire. Oh, God grant that you may accept His grace now and let Him cure you, carry you, care for you, and then at His coming He will call for you. What does this story say? It is the Lord saying, I will do all for you.
Now let us go on to the other verses. “A certain woman named Martha received him into her house”. She loved the Lord and she received Him. “And she had a sister called Mary, which also sat at Jesus’ feet, and heard his word”. Look at these two women. Martha says, I will care for Him. Mary says, He shall care for me. Mary understands the good Samaritan. Martha lives not very far from the lawyer. I do not say she is the same as the lawyer, because she loved the Lord and he did not. All the trouble we get into as Christians is through not letting the Lord do everything for us. I put a question to you: Have you the sense in your soul that God - your Father - will do the very best thing for you? Just let that question come home: Have you the sense in your soul that the Lord Jesus, your precious Saviour, will do the very best thing for you?
I said to a little girl in a house where I was staying, ‘When you were getting up this morning did you wonder where your breakfast was to come from, or whether you would have any at all?’ She looked at me, and smiled at the idea of such a thing. Of course she did not. That was because she had confidence in her parents’ care and love. What would you think if your children fretted about such things? It is a splendid luxury to trust God. There is not a single good thing that He will withhold from you, not a single thing that is good. Martha says, I will care for Him; then she breaks down.
A legal person is always fault-finding. May the Lord give us a deeper sense of His grace! “Dost thou not care that my sister hath left me to serve alone?” He says, “Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her”. What is the good part? She sat at His feet and heard His word.
This helps us to understand Romans 7. There we get the two husbands, the Law and Christ; the first husband demands, the second husband supports. There is a great difference between demand and support. It is through the death of Christ we are delivered from the first husband. We are become dead to the law. What for? That we should be married to another. Martha was not separated from the first husband. She says, I will do; that is law, and with the additional demand of the love of Christ. His love makes the obligation the more terrible. Mary says, I am married to another. He shall undertake for me.
Are you going through the day like this: Lord, do Thou support me; I am afraid of myself, I cling to Thee? Do you not think He will support you? He will. There is not a bit of fruit to God unless He does. “Thou also hast wrought all our works in us”, Isa 26: 12. When the test comes Mary can do the right thing at the right time. The Lord bless His word to you.
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