but what was that in comparison of the patience of Christ towards us! Think how he bears with sinners under their convictions, and waits to be received into their hearts. Sometimes they think to shake off their convictions by rushing into the cares or pleasures of the world. Sometimes they attempt to drown Christ's knockings by their prayers, humiliations, almsgivings, and other religious duties. Sometimes they give a dilatory answer: Go thy way for this time— I have put off my coat, and how shall I put it on? At other times they presume to give a flat denial: Who is the Lord that I should obey his voice!-Depart from me, for I desire not the knowledge of thy ways. To keep a beggar waiting at our door for one day, or even one hour, would be a reproach to us: yet how many of us have kept Christ waiting at the door of our hearts, reproving, threatening, entreating, promising, not only for one hour or one day, but for many years! Has he not often said to us in effect as to the church of old: Open to me, my sister, my love; for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night! Cant. v. 2. It is indeed a wonderful patience that can bear with such repeated slights, so many repulses and provocations, and not so resent them as to give us up entirely to our own depraved hearts, and suffer us to reap the fruit of our doings! Such wonderful forbearance is not owing to the want of power to execute his anger, but to a power over his anger. His arm is not so short that it cannot reach us, nor his hand so feeble that it cannot strike us. His standing at the door is voluntary, and not constrained: it results from his sovereign good pleasure, not being willing that any should perish whom the Father hath given unto him, but that they all should come to repentance. This throws a lustre upon the character of Christ as Mediator, being a merciful as well as faithful high-priest, and adds to his manifestative glory man. as the supreme Jehovah. Thus the reason rendered by the divine Being for his wonderful forbearance towards the sons of Jacob was, I am God, and not Moses kindles into wrath at the rebellion of the people committed to his charge: Jonah does "well to be angry;" and Zechariah says in haste, " I will not feed you: that which dieth, let it die." But Christ standeth at the door, and knocketh. The same motive which induced him to shed his blood for sinners, induces him also to exercise patience towards them. 4. It implies more than patience, even constancy and perseverance. Though the persons at whose door he knocks returns him no answer, nay, though they return him an unkind answer, yet he still stands at the door. He may not knock so frequently, yet he will repeat his visits. It is observable, that those who have got rid of their convictions, silenced the voice of conscience, and sunk into an unthinking and unfeeling state, yet could not attain to this but by slow degrees; and even their carnal ease and rest is sometimes disturbed by fresh alarms, and renewed knockings, and these perhaps very loud and terrible ones. The Lord acts towards the sinner as if he were loth to leave him, and give him up. How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? Shall I deliver thee, Israel? How shall I make thee as Admah? Shall I set thee as Zeboim? My heart is turned within me : my repentings are kindled together. Hos. xi. 8. Christ is not only represented in our text as knocking, but standing at the door as one that is unwilling to be denied. Therefore will the Lord wait, that he may be gracious unto you; and therefore will he be exalted, that he may have mercy upon you. He is really gracious in himself, and not more so at one time than at another; but he waits the fittest time to display his mercy, when it will be most for his glory and our good, when he will be most honoured by it, and we most surprised with it. Hence he is said to keep mercy for thousands, even for thousands who despise and reject it; and if he had not done so, multitudes would not have obtained mercy who now have obtained it. Owing to this divine forbearance it is that we now stand on praying ground-that we are this instant out of hell! 5. All this must be considered as the fruit of free and unmerited grace. Here we have a remarkable and undeniable instance that God's thoughts are not as our thoughts, nor his ways as our ways. When injured and offended, we find it difficult to pass by the affront: when overtures of reconciliation are rejected, we are seldom dispose to renew them, especially if the opposite party were most or altogether to blame. But it is otherwise with the great God! We are for war, but he is for peace: we begin the quarrel, but he puts an end to it. He seeks us before we seek him, and continues to seek, notwithstanding the slights we put upon him. Well may the word "behold" be prefixed to our text. It is as if he had said, 'Wonder, oh heavens, and be astonished oh earth! Let it be considered as a singular instance of my grace and love; let it be remembered in time and to all eternity; I, the justly incensed God, the affronted and abused Saviour, whose laws they have broken, whose mercy they have despised, whose blood they have trampled upon, and whose wrath they have deserved-yet I stand at the door and knock! I have often done it before, and now do it again: I do it this day-this hour-in this sermon! I am now calling to you by my word, and knocking at the door of your hearts. Notwithstanding all your ignorance, obstinacy and unbelief, I still persist in my gracious design, and would fain win those to a compliance, from whom I have met with so many neglects and denials.' Oh, there is much of grace in that word: I stand! It seems to imply that he continues his work with patience, watchfulness, and lioly resolu tion. 6. Yet Christ does not say, I shall or will stand, but only, I stand. This supposes that his patience with impenitent sinners will at length be exhausted, and the day of his forbearance come to an end. Behold, now is the accepted time, this is the day of salvation-Even to day, if ye will hear his voice. But as the morning cometh, so also the night. A standing posture is a departing one; and if we continue to refuse, he will not always continue to entreat. Oh think of this, ye grey-headed sinners! Think of this, you who have stifled many convictions, and are going on still in your trespasses! God will not suffer himself to be utterly defeated and disappointed in his purposes: if his mercy be not exalted in your salvation, his justice will be glorified in your destruction. It shall be said of every impenitent sinner at last, as it is said of Babylon: I gave him space to repent, but he repented not. Behold, I will cast him into great tribulation. Patience abused turns to fiercer wrath, like oil that encreases the flame. If Christ now knocks at the door of our hearts in vain, we shall hereafter knock at the door of heaven in vain. There is a time coming, oh sinner, when farther calls will not take place, and those which are past will render thee more inexcusable. Because I have called and ye refused, I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded; but ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof; I also will laugh at your calamity, I will mock when your fear cometh ; when your fear cometh as a desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you. Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me. Of all sinners, those who enjoy the means of grace are the most inexcusable, because they not only abuse them, but harden themselves against them. Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye. Prov. i. 24-28. Acts vii. 51. II. Improve the subject. 1. Let those who attend the gospel consider the cause of those frequent convictions and painful impressions that are made upon their minds by it. They are not from themselves, for men naturally seek their ease; nor from Satan, for it is his interest that the goods should be in peace; but from the holy Spirit of God; and whether they end in salvation or not, they will be made to answer some important end. When the word comes with power, and lays hold of the conscience of a sinner, this is Christ passing by, and knocking at the door and if we listen not to his voice, it will rise up in judgment against us another day. 2. May some poor sinner be persuaded this day to open to Christ, and give him the full possession of his heart; saying, Come in, thou blessed of the. Lord: why standest thou without! Then will salvation be come to that house, to that heart. Now that Christ is knocking at the door of your hearts, do you knock at the door of mercy. Pray also that he who knocks would put in his hand by the hole of the door; then will your bowels move, and you will arise and open unto him. Cant. v. 4, 5. 3. What reason have we all to admire the infinite condescension of the Lord Jesus Christ! Oh how great is thy goodness: how great is thy beauty! It is a wonderful mercy even to have Christ at the door, but greater still to have him in the heart. Happy those who truly know this the time of their visitation, and whose convictions end in saving conversion to God! If any man hear my voice, says this heavenly stranger, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. |