THE HEART OF MAN AND THE HEART OF GOD
[p. 357] THE HEART OF MAN AND THE HEART OF GOD
Genesis 8:20 - 22; Psalm 10:6 - 13; Romans 10:6 - 13
My subject in seeking to present the gospel tonight is hearts: what people say in their hearts first, and then what God says in His heart. The phrase “heart of God” is not so frequent in the Scriptures literally as might be imagined, although the Scriptures are full of the thought of the love of God; but the heart of God is stressed somewhat in the early chapters of the Bible — a very interesting matter — and set down alongside the human heart, the heart of man. Both are spoken of in the same passages. I wish to speak of God’s heart particularly, but in order to arouse interest and conscience to work, I would allude to the word in Romans, which enjoins what is not to be said. What is not to be said. Quoting from the book of Deuteronomy the apostle conveniently cites “the righteousness which is of faith” and regards it as the speaker. The Spirit of God uses such methods regarding impersonal dealings to speak. He says, ‘The Scriptures preach the gospel’. In the very early days before there was anything said about the evangelist, it is said, “And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham”, Galatians 3:8. It is an important word in regard to the Bible, and a word which encourages the circulation of the Bible; for the Scriptures preach the gospel according to that passage; and so the apostle Paul in writing to the Romans, cites a section of the book of Deuteronomy as saying to the people what they should not say in their hearts. He goes on to say a good deal about the heart afterwards, but the righteousness which is of faith begins by preaching certain things as said in [p. 358] the heart — that they are not to be said. There are those here now listening, maybe resolving, or saying something to themselves in their hearts, and this scripture comes to me conveniently to warn as to what should not be said at this time. This is a meeting for the preaching of the gospel and the thoughts of hearts should be in accord with the meeting, so that the righteousness which is of faith would rebuke many things that are not to be said in our hearts.
Some young man says in his heart, ‘I have come here just to please someone else’. Somebody else says, ‘I will be glad when the meeting is over, for I have not the slightest intention of being impressed with anything that is said’. That is the language — saying in your heart — that is prohibited. Many are the sayings like it. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked” — or incurable; Jeremiah 17:9. If you give rein it will say all sorts of things — things that are utterly irrelevant, utterly wrong, utterly wicked, and destructive to the soul.
So that the righteousness which is of faith prohibits, at the very outset, all such talkings in the heart. God is here challenging our hearts. He says that He has a right to speak to us. He is our Creator. He commands all men as a Creator. He has a right to do it. He “now commandeth all men every where to repent”, Acts 17:30. This is His prerogative and He uses it, not in an arbitrary or hard way, but in love. For what can be more kindly, if you see a person going down over a waterfall in a little boat, than to shout most imperatively, most urgently, to him. That is what God is doing. He has the right to do that. He has a creational right to do it, and He has the moral right. It is the right of love that He exercises. So, as I said, it is the righteousness of faith speaking, and we are enjoined as to what we are not to say in our hearts in this verse in Romans 10.
[p. 359] That is one of the things I have mentioned, and there are many like them.
Another may say, ‘Well, I have been invited to come to this meeting, and I have come. I am not sorry I have come, I am not against the gospel. I am interested, but I am determined in my mind that I am not going to believe yet’. That is prohibited by the righteousness which is of faith.
Another says, ‘I have in mind to be a christian. My parents are christians, and so are my brothers and sisters, but to confess the Lord is more than I could undertake until I get out of school. After I am out of high school I will venture to put my trust in Christ, and confess Him’. That is prohibited, too — determination only to believe in the distance. It is suitable now, because God is commanding you now to repent, saying you are saved by the righteousness of faith. Many other things, as I said, are apt to be said in the hearts of persons sitting in this audience. The righteousness which is of faith simply and authoritatively forbids you saying these things. I shall come back to this passage. I only refer to this as a sort of warning so as to bring conscience into action; for nothing can be done tonight unless conscience is at work. The righteousness of faith addresses conscience. Man has a conscience and that means that God can use it to convict, and so the righteousness which is of faith authoritatively speaks and forbids anything being said in the heart that will militate against what is presented tonight in the way of the gospel.
Now, as I said, God in this remarkable passage is presented as saying things in His heart. He had taken notice earlier of the conduct of men. He had allowed them to live on after Adam’s fall. Adam had been driven out of the garden. He had allowed men to live on and many of them lived long lives, and evil fermented and increased, and all flesh corrupted its way on the earth, and it says, “It grieved him at his heart”, Genesis 6:6.
[p. 360] And the Spirit of God says at the same time, “that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”, Genesis 6:5. That was the history of every day. If there had been newspapers we should have had the usual items of news. Generally these items refer to man’s evil heart. What seems to have most relish with people is that very thing — the corruption that flows out from a man. The Lord says, “There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man”, Mark 7:15. And what defiles in these times of the newspapers is what comes out of man, and there can be no doubt that there was much of that kind although there were no newspapers. But men had tongues, and women had tongues, and men and women talk, and they love to talk of the evil. We may be sure that the conversations were generally of evil. The Spirit of God takes notice of all these things and says, “That every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”. Genesis 6:5.
It was only evil every day, and God felt it. We must not picture God as anyone very different from ourselves. Of course “God is a spirit” John 4:24, “dwelling in unapproachable light; whom no man has seen, nor is able to see”, 1 Timothy 6:16. But yet He is in some sense like us — sin apart, of course. But He is in some sense like us even in His abstract Being. The apostle Paul says, “we are the offspring of God” Acts 17:29, and he builds up on that an important point which should preclude men from being idolatrous. If we are His offspring we ought to have some little conception of God. The early chapters of Genesis say and prove that, for they speak of God as if He were something like ourselves, that is in the heart. Moreover, “he repented”. Genesis 6:6. It brings God down very near to man, that He takes cognisance in that way, and feels as a [p. 361] righteous person ought to feel. Indeed He would enlist all righteous persons to feel with Him. He has one man there — He had Enoch walking with Him for three hundred years. Was it nothing to God that He had such a man, such a companion as Enoch amidst all universal wickedness? Enoch sympathises with God, and then presently Noah comes on the scene, and he too is a righteous man. He would feel the terrible corruption that was current. He felt it in a measure as God felt it. Noah walked with God. He was righteous in his generation. His name signifies that God, in some measure, had comfort in him. His name signifies rest, but God attaches great value to those who are righteous, and who think with Him. He draws us with Him into the current of His thoughts. He gathered Enoch into this current. He was so pleased with Enoch that He said, “I want you for ever” and He translated him. He was pleased with Noah, too. He did not translate him, but He employed him to do great exploits. He employed Noah and gave him a big order, and that order meant salvation. He was a righteous man, and we are told that in Noah’s day, according to Peter, the Lord Jesus went in Spirit and preached to the spirits who were disobedient in Noah’s time. They were not in prison then, but they were in prison in Peter’s time. And he says the Lord Jesus went and preached to them (see 1 Peter 3:19). He preached to them so that they should not be in prison. He had a medium. God had called Noah to His side in those days. He was called a “preacher of righteousness”, 2 Peter 2:5. Enoch was not called that. Enoch pleased God, and God liked him, and He took him. Noah was also pleasing, but he was trustworthy; God says, ‘I can leave you here, and give you a big order’. He was to build the ark. That is to say there was Christ in the mind of God on man’s side. That is the idea. Noah built the ark, and we are told that he was “a preacher of righteousness”.
[p. 362] The effect of his preaching was this. Peter says Jesus went to preach to those disobedient people in the days of Noah. I do not suppose that there was any meeting like this in those days, but I have no doubt about it that there was preaching, and preaching by the best of preachers, by Christ and the Spirit. “By which also he went and preached”, 1 Peter 3:19 we are told. That is how the matter stood. Before that God’s heart was grieved, grieved every day, and when we come to this passage that I have read, we are told that this man Noah was a type of Jesus, having come through the flood. What wonderful experiences he had had! One loves to ponder on it. He prepared an ark for the saving of his house. What sights he would have seen in those dreary days of the flood if he looked out from that window and saw the unsaved perishing in the deluge! They had seen him build, they had heard him preach, but they were careless and neglected the gospel. They were disobedient and were lost. Is there anyone here careless as to what I am saying? Disobedience is at the bottom of it. The Lord Jesus is coming with His mighty angels to take vengeance on those who know not God and who do not obey the gospel (see 2 Thessalonians 1:7,8). God forbid that there be anyone here disobedient to the gospel. The antediluvians were disobedient, yet the preaching went on for years by the best of preachers — Christ in the Spirit through Noah — and what scenes could be beheld as the windows of heaven were opened, as the fountains of the great deep were broken up and the earth became covered with water and the highest mountain over-topped with the flood.
The population of the antediluvian world must have been large. Think of the millions of people who came under the judgment of God at that time. It is not a question of a myth. There is nothing more established for faith than the deluge. “Them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ”, 2 Thessalonians 1:8.
[p. 363] God forbid that anyone here should be careless to the gospel. It is disobedience. It is callous. Paul says, “I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision”, Acts 26:19. Most of us here can say the same. We have not been disobedient. We have received the Holy Spirit who is given to those who obey Christ.
Do not be disobedient to the divine call! Jesus is here tonight, as He was when Noah preached. It says, He “preached peace to you which were afar off”, Ephesians 2:17. And so He is tonight preaching through me here to you. Will you be disobedient? The preaching goes on in spite of your disobedience, but the time will come when the preaching will cease. There will be no more preaching — no more salvation for you. Man’s days shall be one hundred and twenty years. God lengthened out the period of grace and the preaching went on through all those years. Peter tells us that Christ went in the power of the Spirit in which He was raised from among the dead. He went and preached to those who were disobedient. Noah witnessed all that and those terrible indescribable scenes that were there seen of those myriads of the lost. Let the word ‘lost’ sink into your heart if you are rebellious. What a terrible word! The apostle Paul says, “if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost”, 2 Corinthians 4:3 and he explains that “The god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them”, 2 Corinthians 4:4. Satan is doing that. He did it in those antediluvian days. He blinded the eyes of the lost, so that they should not believe the faithful testimony of the preacher of righteousness, and hence their part in the overwhelming judgment that overtakes them. Having all that experience, Noah comes out on a renewed earth. He took of every clean fowl.
[p. 364] and every clean beast and built an altar and offered to God. That is to say, we have Christ now typically coming forward on man’s side. Earlier God had undertaken the matter when Adam sinned. He made clothes for Adam. It is not God doing something, it is man doing something, and that is one side of the gospel. The Saviour is on our side. The Lord Jesus has taken His place in the likeness of men. “There is ... one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus”, 1 Timothy 2:5. How well the power of the Spirit of God operating in christians enables us to glory in the thought that the Saviour of mankind is Himself a Man. And so it is that Noah acts for himself. God will not do this for him, Noah acted for himself; as Jesus coming into this world, He considered for this world. “Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life”, John 10:17. He lays down His life for the sheep, and He draws out the affections of His Father. It is Christ as a Man on our side. So Noah acts for himself, and he takes of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and builds an altar and offers to Jehovah a sacrifice — a burnt-offering. And we are told, “Jehovah smelled the sweet odour”, Genesis 8:21. Let any convicted sinner here (if there is one, and I hope there is), convicted by what I am saying, know that you have got to do with God. The Lord Jesus has stepped in and taken all your guilt, and taken your place before God, and has drawn out the love of God for Himself. “Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life”. John 10:17. But He has appeased God. He has satisfied God in regard to us. The Man is on our side. Enoch did not do this; Adam did not do this; no man undertook all this earlier. Noah is the first to undertake this. He is a beautiful type of Christ as acting before God on behalf of men. Now he appeased, he satisfied God as it were. In this offering he typified Christ Himself. “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time” 1 Timothy 2:5,6 — [p. 365] a testimony to be rendered in its own time. It has been rendered here tonight — the effect of that wonderful sacrifice of Jesus on our side. It is said that “God ... raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory; that your faith and hope might be in God”, 1 Peter 1:21. God is so pleased with Him, that He raised Him from the dead. Paul says He raised Him by His own glory. He also says He raised Him by His power. The glory of God the Father was brought into action so as to raise Jesus. How pleased He was with Him! What does His glory mean but His love? The infinite satisfaction that Jesus gave and drew out for God, as He lay in death, He “was raised again for our justification”, Romans 4:25. You see what I have in mind, what God said in His heart. He says, “I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth”, Genesis 8:21. ‘But I am not going to be hampered by that; I have another Man’. Noah was typical of Christ and he pleased God. There was an odour that went up from that man in his offerings, and God says this in His heart — would that we could take that in.
What a good time God had at that period! What a season of enjoyment He had anticipating all that Jesus would be to Him. What enjoyment He had! He says, ‘I will not be affected any more by what is going on in man’s heart, I will go on with my own heart’. God has great thoughts for Himself and He is going on with what is in His own heart. He had smelled a sweet odour and He had enjoyed the thing. Let us not deny God enjoying it. There is constant history in heaven if I am enjoying it. Occasions of divine enjoyment are rising constantly on earth and God sees everyone enjoying them. If there is a soul who repents here tonight, that gives enjoyment in [p. 366] heaven. I have not said that history is made in heaven. As soon as you repent you begin to make history for yourself, for the history of God is made on earth. He has fresh enjoyment when one sinner has repented. But in those early days we see how He was going on with Himself. He did not wish Noah to know. He said the whole thing to Himself. You must understand that God in the absolute is enough in Himself, but also in the relative as comes out here, He is enough in Himself. But then He takes man on, and this beautiful odour He smelt. He is going on with Himself and His own heart, and He says, “While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease”, Genesis 8:22. It is in type what is called the reconciliation of the world. That is what is in mind here — that God has taken the world on, in another way. He had not smelt an odour before. The reconciliation of the world — that is Noah. But oh! how infinitely more the pleasure Jesus has occasioned to God in holy sacrifice for sin that God “should be just, and justify him that is of the faith of Jesus”, Romans 3:26. It is the question of belief. He says, “While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease”. God said that hundreds of years ago, and it is running on to this very night. Down here in these southern latitudes you see it. “While the earth remaineth”. When God scattered the races He scattered them over the face of the whole earth. Let us not think that these southern islands were not known to Him. This wonderful edict of God was made in His own heart with Himself, with His own hands, seedtime and harvest. Every gospel meeting is both. Seedtime is that someone perhaps for the first time received the gospel. Harvest is someone who has received it before, makes a confession now. That is [p. 367] the idea. Then there is cold and heat, for after a confession, of course, we may be sure that the cold will come. It is the cold that becomes the confirmation of the testimony, you see. As seed begins to germinate the cold blast comes. One could illustrate, but there is no need. We all understand these cold blasts of circumstances, but they are only intended to strengthen our belief. It is like the frost that comes down in the winter weeks. The snow as it falls on the winter wheat is intended to give it a better crop. So it is that God has in His mind as the seed of the gospel is received into the heart. The cold will make the better crop. As he goes through it with God, presently the sun shines with power in early spring, and the fruit comes abundantly. And the believers say, ‘That cold is winter, and the heat is summer’. But the summer comes first in the second mention. Summer and winter — that is the result is in summer. And then, day and night, meaning that the christian has experiences every day. It is a succession of days and nights. God has delight in every day and every night of, the true christian. He has enjoyment constantly, so while the earth remains He says in His heart that this is what is to be current. ‘I like that very much’, if you will understand my saying so — God conversing with Himself in His own heart. What a subject! Indeed it is put into effect. It holds solidly. Down here in these southern latitudes, God has seedtime and harvest. Maybe someone will come forward and make a confession of Christ now, possibly the result of the message received years ago. Many a winter has passed over you. You have not had much of a time. Many receive the gospel lightly and shallowly, and the winters come and they have a poor time of it. You would never think that they had any light, but in the time of summer when the Spirit of God is hovering about in warmth, many a one is seen confessing Christ in a gospel meeting — [p. 368] there is no better place. You are surrounded by an evangelistic spirit. It is summertime, if you will understand. It is a time of opportunity. May I not call you to confession? God is calling you to confession. Christ is calling you. That brings me to Romans 10 where the righteousness of faith is speaking. It tells you what not to say, “Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down from above:) or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.)” It is infidelity to question that Christ is in heaven. The righteousness of faith forbids you questioning that. You will never be saved if you keep on questioning. You must believe. “What saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved”. Thou, speaking to some person. Myriads of persons have been individualised in this way by evangelistical appeals. And the summertime came — they confessed the Lord then — that is the fruit. That is the Lord Jesus. They confessed Him with their mouth, they believed in their heart that God raised Him from the dead, and they were saved. “Thou shalt be saved”. The meaning is that you shall be saved. You are in the way of it. That is the way of salvation. It is a question of the heart. Now, so as to equalise my admonition, I call attention to these things in Psalm 10. First of all he says, “He hath said in his heart, I shall not be moved”. That is the first thing he says as regards his heart. Some of you are just hardening your hearts to what I am saying, putting them away from you, and thinking that things will be all right. “I shall not be moved”. That is what the wicked man says. He says this in his heart. But what folly to say that I What can he do in the [p. 369] swelling of the Jordan? see Jeremiah 12:5. What can he do when death comes to him? Shall he not be moved? He shall. What can he do, for it is folly to harden your heart, and say, “I shall not be moved: for I shall never be in adversity”? What a foolish thing to say. That is what the wicked man says. Anyone saying that is a wicked person. You are in company with the wicked man in this Psalm. Consequently he says, “He hath said in his heart, God hath forgotten”. There never was a lie greater than that, that “God hath forgotten”. God requires what is past. The believer can speak about forgetting, because God has spoken about forgetfulness With regard to men, but never in regard to the wicked man. God has spoken about forgetting the former ways of the believer — “Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more”, Hebrews 8:12. That is what God says to the believer. The wicked man says God has forgotten, as if He is a man like himself. God requires what is past. There is not a sin forgotten for the wicked person — every bit will stand up against him at the great white throne. The dead will be judged according to what is in the books. God keeps books. He keeps them so that He forgets nothing.
And then thirdly, in verse 13, he says, “Thou wilt not require it”. It is another lie. Man is deceiving himself and being deceived. They “shall be punished with everlasting destruction”, 2 Thessalonians 1:9.
May God help us now if there are any under exercise, to say in your heart what the righteousness of faith would indicate. That is, believe that God raised Christ, and confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord. That is the way to salvation. That is the sure way of salvation, and it is a question of the heart. May God help any with any little conviction. It is a heart matter, and the matter will thus be settled. It is a question of the heart. There is a beautiful word in Romans 10:11, if there is any exercise,
“[p. 370] For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed”, and again, verse 13, “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved”. He “is rich unto all that call upon him”.
I do urge you to call in truth of heart upon Him. He is rich towards you. We have proved it.