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JESUS
CHRIST AND
HIM CRUCIFIED
At the close of
1926 Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones left a brilliant medical career. Early in 1927
he was to become the Minister of Bethlehem Forward Movement Mission Hall,
Sandfields, Aberavon. On February 6th 1977, the 50th anniversary of the
commencement of his ministry, he returned there and preached the following
sermon.
'For I
determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him
crucified'
(1 Corinthians 2:2).
I HAVE a number of reasons for
calling your attention tonight to this particular statement. One of them-and
I think you will forgive me for it-is that it was actually the text I
preached on, on the first Sunday night I ever visited this Church. That is,
not 50 years tonight, but 50 years on the 28th of November last year. My
first visit here was on the 28th November, 1926, and my text at the evening
service - my first evening sermon preached here - was the second verse of
the second chapter of Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians. It was not my
text 50 years tonight, which was my first night here officially as Minister,
for on that occasion my text was 'God hath not given us the spirit of fear;
but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.'
I call attention to it not merely
for that reason, but rather because it is still my determination. It is
still what I am endeavouring, as God helps me, to do. I preached on this
text then - I have no idea what I said in detail, I have not got the
notes-but I did so because it was an expression of my whole attitude towards
life. It was what I felt was the commission that had been given to me. And I
call attention to it again because it is still the same, and because I am
profoundly convinced that this is what should control our every endeavour as
Christian people and as members of the Christian Church at this present
time.
THE
FOUNDATION ATTACKED
Now the Apostle, as you
remember, is dealing in these first chapters with the situation in the
church at Corinth; and he reminds them here of how he first visited them,
because there was no church in Corinth until the Apostle Paul went there and
preached the gospel. The church came into being directly as the result of
his preaching and his teaching. He formed and established a church, and it
was a very great church and a flourishing church. But after a while other
elements came in, and the church was in a very disturbed and unhappy
condition when the Apostle wrote this letter to them. That is why he writes.
He is concerned because some of the things that were being said amongst them
and that were being believed by some of them were, in his opinion, attacking
the very foundations of the gospel itself. So he reminds them of what he
first preached, and how he preached to them, and how he had to do this. And,
as I say, I am calling attention to it because I feel it is equally
important at the present time. I need take none of your time in reminding
you of the state of the world. We are living in a world of crisis and a
world of calamity. You never know what the next news bulletin is going to
bring forth. It is a world which is in a state of collapse in almost every
respect. It is a time of great trouble and perplexity. And the great
question that arises is this: Has the Christian Church anything to say at
such a time? What has she got to say? What is the greatest need of the world
tonight? What is the greatest need of every one of us, of every single human
being? Now it is because I feel that the great Apostle here in these words
deals with and answers those very questions that I am calling attention to
this great announcement, this great proclamation by the Apostle.
A SOLEMN DECISION
You notice that he says that
he determined not to know anything among them save Jesus Christ, and Him
crucified. In other words, it was a decision. It was something he had
determined. It was something quite deliberate; it was not haphazard. His
statement is that, having looked at the whole situation, he came to this
conclusion, this decision, that he was not going to know anything among
them, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. Now there are those authorities
who would have us believe that this happened as a kind of reaction to what
had happened to the Apostle previously in the great city of Athens. Those of
you who are still familiar with the history of the book of the Acts of the
Apostles will remember that Paul went from Athens to Corinth, and that his
work at Athens was interrupted and was not successful. It was there in that
sermon in Athens that the Apostle had quoted some of the Greek poets. So
some of these authorities tell us that Paul, having quoted these Greek
writers and having shown his knowledge of Greek literature and having more
or less failed, said on the road from Athens to Corinth, 'Well, I'd better
not do that again.' And so he decided and determined not to know anything
among them save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Now 1 think that is entirely
wrong. 1 reject that interpretation completely, because, after all, the mere
quoting of some two poets was neither here nor there; it did not affect the
thrust of his message. Paul preached Jesus Christ and Him crucified in
Athens quite as much as he did in Corinth. Indeed, this is what he did
everywhere. He had decided at the very outset of his ministry that this was
to be his great theme, to the exclusion of everything else. This is not
merely a new or fresh decision, it is a repetition of the original decision.
But he reminds them that that is what he had actually done amongst them.
Now he came to this decision
quite deliberately, because he could have done many other things. He was an
unusually able and erudite man. So it was a very solemn decision. Indeed the
Apostle goes further in the next chapter and in chapter 4. In chapter 3 he
puts it like this: 'Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth
to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise' (verse
18), and later he goes on to say that he had deliberately become a fool for
Christ's sake. What he means, of course, by a fool, is a man who is regarded
as an ignoramus by these Greeks. The Greeks were very able people, great
philosophers, and the Apostle knew perfectly well that if he preached only
Jesus Christ and Him crucified and'did not preach philosophy and other
things to them, they would dismiss him as an ignoramus and as a fool. And so
he says, All right, I deliberately became a fool for Christ's sake. So that
is what he is clearly saying here-that he went out of his way, as it were,
and deliberately decided that he would eschew everything else and all other
knowledge; and, in simplicity and as one regarded as a fool and a babbler by
these learned people in Athens and in Corinth, that he would know nothing
among them save Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
He knew, as he has already
told them in the first chapter, that his message was going to be a
stumbling-block to the Jews, and that the Greeks would regard it as
unutterable foolishness. He was a Jew himself and he knew the Jewish
attitude. He knew that this preaching of the cross was a real stumblingblock
to the Jew and that the Greeks regarded it as just nonsense. That a
carpenter in a place like Palestine, by dying on a cross, should be the
Saviour of the worldit was unutterable rubbish! He knew exactly what the
Jews and the Greeks believed. Nevertheless he decided deliberately that he
would go on preaching it, in spite of what they believed about it and the
way in which they regarded it. So let us be clear about this. This is a
deliberate decision. The great Apostle comes to this decision, this
determination, not to know anything among them, save Jesus Christ and Him
crucified.
WHY THIS DECISION?
Well now, the question before
us is this. Why did he come to this decision? Why did Paul decide and
determine to behave in this way? And, if I may say so with humility, why did
I in my small way come to the same decision and the same determination? Or
why am 1, 50 years afterwards, still doing exactly the same thing? I cannot
remember what I said 50 years ago, but I know that the thrust was the same.
The essential message was the same, whatever the particular form, and
whatever the particular details may be. Why did the Apostle come to this
decision? Why should every preacher of the gospel and the Christian Church
today come to this decision? I am convinced that the Church is powerless
today and is ignored by the people because she has not dome to this
decision-because she is doing the exact opposite and is trying to be all
things to all men in a wrong way and in a wrong manner. So I regard it as
very vital that we should be certain as to why the great Apostle decided in
this way. And 1 think he makes it abundantly plain to us as to why he did
so.
THE MODERN ARGUMENT
Today, of course, the view is
almost the exact opposite of this. The argument is that if the Church, the
Christian Church, is to have any impact upon people and is to win the people
to the Church and to Christ, well then, we must of necessity talk about
things in which people are interested. That is the argument. It has been
said throughout the centuries that it is no use going to men and women in
the midst of life with all sorts and kinds of problems and difficulties and
just telling them about Jesus Christ and Him crucified. They simply will not
listen. You will have no impact at all. You will have a little coterie of
people perhaps, but it will have no impact upon people. If you want to
influence people, we are told, and want to affect them and to win them, you
must talk about the things in which they are interested. Well now, there is
nothing new about that. You see that is exactly what they were saying nearly
2,000 years ago when the great Apostle visited Athens and visited Corinth.
They always wanted any man who came to speak, to talk about the things in
which they were interested. You remember we are told about the people in
Athens that they spent their time in doing 'nothing else, but either to
tell, or to hear some new thing' (Acts 17:21). They were very fond of
listening to people, and when Paul came along they said, 'What will this
babbler say?' They were ready to listen. But they always wanted a man to
speak about the things in which they were interested. What were they?
THE LAW
Well,
the people consisted partly of Jews and mainly, probably, of Greeks. What
were they interested in? What did they want Paul to talk about? The answer,
of course, is quite simple. The Jews were always interested in the Law-the
Law given by God through Moses to the children of Israel. And they were
always arguing and debating about this. 'Which is the most important and the
chiefest element in the Law, the first and the greatest commandment?'
Nothing pleased the Jews more than to be arguing about the Law and the
respective merits of the particular commandments. And they were always ready
to listen to a man who talked about the Law.
PHILOSOPHY
The
Greeks-well, we know exactly what they were interested in. As 1 have already
reminded you, the Greeks were primarily interested in what is called
philosophy. 1 suppose in many ways the Greeks were the ablest, the most
intelligent and the most intellectual race of people that the world has ever
known. It was the country which had produced the greatest succession of
philosophers the world has ever known-Socrates, Plato, Aristotle. And they
had all been preaching in Greece before Christ and Paul ever appeared on the
scene and began to present their message. The Greeks were tremendously
interested in this question of philosophy. What does it mean? Well,
philosophy means the attempt to understand life. You see, any intelligent
man in a world like this, seeing the problems and the pain and the trouble,
any intelligent man doesn't go and have a drink to forget all about it. He
says, Why are things like this? What is the matter? Were we meant to be like
this? Can anything be done about it? So these Greek men with their great
minds applied themselves to the study of the problem of life and living;
and, of course, there were rival teachings and rival views. They all set up
their co-called porches, academics if you like-what would now correspond to
our universities and schools and so on-and there were the rival theories.
You read about the Stoics and the Epicureans, and they put forward their
views and argued as to how man might perhaps even arrive at Utopia, a
perfect condition.
CULTURE
But
again, another branch of philosophy was what is called culture. What do they
mean by culture? Well, we all know about this. You have all, 1 am sure,
watched those famous lectures by Lord Clark on the television -
'Civilisation'. Culture! They were expert architects, they built their
magnificent buildings. You can still go and see the ruins in Athens, and it
is worth a visit even to see the ruins-they were such magnificent buildings.
General culture, architecture, monuments, all these things. The same was
true of art. They were interested in art in every shape and form. And they
delighted in them and they discussed them. In addition to that they were
great experts on sport. We get excited about the Olympic Games. We did not
start them, you know. It was they-the Greeks-who started the Olympic Games,
and they gave such names as Marathon races, Olympic Games, and so on. These
were the things which these intellectual people worked out and elaborated.
This was the centre of their interest. They were concerned likewise about
social conditions, about morality and conduct and behaviour and all these
matters. Then, the Apostle came amongst them. He knew that these were the
subjects in which they were interested, and that any man who talked about
any one of these things was not only sure of an interest, but was sure of
keeping his congregation and might even become popular amongst them. Yet,
knowing that these were the things that the people were interested in,
having the ability and the understanding to deal with them, this man
deliberately decided and determined not to deal with any of those subjects.
'I determined not to know any thing among you save Jesus Christ and him
crucified.'
THEY COME TO NOUGHT!
Well now then, the question
is, Why did he decide that? Why did he determine that? And fortunately for
us, he gives us the answer in the sixth verse of this second chapter of
First Corinthians, 'Howbeit', he says, 'we speak wisdom among them that are
perfect: yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world,
that come to nought.' Nought! Nothing! A cipher! Vacuity! Nothing at all!
Why didn't Paul preach philosophy, why didn't he preach politics, why didn't
he preach culture and art and all these things? The answer is, he says, they
come to nothing. Nought! Is he right? Well, let us test. Let us test by what
he says himself in his epistles. Let us test by the history of the world.
What of this question of Law
that the Jews were so interested in? Why didn't the Apostle preach
perpetually on the details and the minutiae of the Law as the Pharisees had
always done? Why didn't he spend the whole of his time in just expounding
the Law? He gives us the answer in many, many places. You have it, for
instance, in the twentieth verse of the third chapter of his great Epistle
to the Romans. 'Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be
justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin'-and nothing
else. The Law will give you a knowledge of sin and it will condemn you. But
it will leave you grovelling in the dust. You have it again in Romans
8:3-'For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh,
God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin,
condemned sin in the flesh.' In other words, the Law was a failure. Nobody
could keep the Law, the Law about which these Jews and experts argued so
much. It could not help men, it simply condemned them. It exposed the need
and the ills, but it left them grovelling in the dust in complete
hopelessness. I did not preach the Law, says Paul, because it could not do
anything for you. It comes to nought. It leaves you in utter helplessness.
And the same thing applies precisely and exactly to all these other
questions. Why did not Paul preach philosophy? His answer is that it all
comes to nothing. He calls it here human wisdom, the wisdom of this world.
Do you know that before Christ ever came into this world, the greatest
philosophers that the world has ever known had already been here? They had
already given us their great teaching. They had put forward their plans and
their proposals for Utopia. But it was all a failure. The statistics-it is
not in the Bible but it is in secular history-the statistics show that the
rate of suicide was higher proportionately amongst the philosophers than any
other single section of the community. Philosophy was failing. It had h ad
its trial. God, as it were, had kept His Son back until human wisdom and
learning had had their full opportunity. And Paul says it has come to
nothing'the world by wisdom knew not God' (1: 2 1).
FAILURE IN
THE OLD WORLD
It is
all very well to raise questions, but you know a great man, Thomas
Masaryk-the man who founded the state of Czechoslovakia after the end of the
First World War-that great leader of Czechoslovakia put it like this: 'The
philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways. The point,
however, is to change it.' The philosophers were very clever in putting
forward different points of view and different interpretations. But that
leaves us where we are. What the world needs is to be changed. And no
philosopher has ever changed this world. No, no! The old world, in spite of
the teaching of these master thinkers and philosophers, was in a terrible
state and condition. What was it? Well, you need not take my word for it,
the Apostle Paul has given us a description of it at the end of the first
chapter of his Epistle to the Romans. This was the state of society. In
spite of Greek philosophy and culture, Roman law and all the politics of the
age, this is how people were living. 'As they did not like to retain God in
their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things
which are not convenient; being filled with all unrighteousness,
fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder,
debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God,
despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to
parents, without understanding, covenant-breakers, without natural
affection, implacable, unmerciful: who knowing the judgment of God, that
they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but
have pleasure in them that do them' (komans 1:28-32). That is how they were
living, instead of according to the great teachings of the philosophers.
Previously Paul has been telling us about the terrible, scandalous, sexual
perversions-. men leaving the right use of the woman and turning to men,
dishonouring their own bodies between themselves. The whole world was a sink
of iniquity. In spite of all the blueprints for Utopia, all the politics,
all the social ameliorations that were being proposed, all the learned
arguing and disputation of the philosophers, that is how they were actually
living. Paul was right. All this comes to nothing. Nought! Failure! Nothing!
Blank!
FAILURE TODAY
And, my
dear friends, as it was true then it is true today, and it has continued to
be true throughout the centuries. People today are interested in the same
things. We express it in different forms, but for 100 years or more people
have been trusting to these things. People have stopped going to chapels and
churches. Why? They have stopped believing the Bible. What do they believe
in? Philosophy. The great philosophers. And you can hear them now whenever
you like on the television and the wireless. Philosophy! Politics! We were
assured that politics was going to change the face of society. It was being
preached here by Ramsay MacDonald and many another when I came here 50 years
ago. This was what was going to put the world right-education, culture. Not
such nonsense, such folk lore and fairy tales as the Bible and the
Scriptures, but new knowledge, science, understanding and philosophy-they
were going to make a perfect world! Now these are sheer facts. But what is
the position? What has it all come to? I am here to remind you that what the
Apostle said in his day is equally true today. It comes to nought. It comes
to nothing. Do not misunderstand me; there are particular benefits that we
have all received and we thank God for them. But face to face with the
problem of man and of life and death and true living and peace and happiness
and joy, they have all completely failed. They have come to nought.
EDUCATION FAILS
Now you need not take my word
for this. Let me give you some quotations which will substantiate my
contention. Take a great man like Tolstoy, Count Tolstoy, one of the
greatest novelists of all times, the author of War and Peace and other
masterpieces. Do you know what he said? Let me read his words to you. 'The
meaningless absurdity of life is the only incontestable knowledge accessible
to men.' The meaningless absurdity of life-that, he says, is the only thing
which is incontestable. But let me give you another. A man called Morris
Ginsberg, who is an expert on sociology and political matters today, wrote
quite recently: 'Modern psychological theories expose the naivety of the
assumption which earlier theories have taken for granted, namely, that
intellectual advance will be necessarily reflected in improved human
relationships.' That was the assumption of our fathers, grandfathers and
forefathers. They assumed that intellectual advance would of necessity be
reflected in improved human relationships. Is that so? Has it happened? Are
human relationships better? This was the assumption: give people knowledge
and intellectual advance, and human relationships will be better. But come,
last year, 1976, was the centenary of the birth of a man called Albert
Mansbridge. And I refer to Albert Mansbridge for this reason. Here was the
man who started the Workers' Educational Association-the WEA. I do not know
whether WEA classes are popular here now; they were very popular 50 years
ago, and many people had left the churches and the chapels believing they
were going to find salvation in the WEA classes. What had Albert Mansbridge
said? He started these WEA classes in 1903 and what he said was this-and he
really believed it, there was never a more honest man, or a more earnest and
sincere man; he really believed it and he made sacrifices for it-'If enough
effort', he said in 1903, 'was put into the education of the workers, then
the main social problems of this present age would solve themselves.' That
is what he believed, and thousands believed it with him. If only people put
an effort into education and if only the masses of the people were educated,
the main social problems of the age would solve themselves. They put it into
practice and men really believed that if only we could all be educated we
would solve all our problems. What has it come to, my friends? Are there no
social problems in Aberavon, Port Talbot, tonight? Are they much less than
they were 100 years ago or 50 years ago? 1 leave you to answer the question.
MORAL INABILITY
Come,
let me give you another-Professor Arnold Toynbee, a great historian,
published his massive History of the World in 10 volumes, eventually 12
volumes. His last book bore the title Mankind and Mother Earth and was
published last year. Now here is a man who spent a lifetime studying the
human condition, trying to understand life and the world from the standpoint
of history, not merely as an academic exercise, but because he wanted to
make a contribution. He wanted things to be better and to be improved. But
this is what he said in his last book, when he was an old man: 'There is a
morality gap in the development of mankind. Man constantly extends his
physical power over the environment, but he is unable to improve his social
arrangements correspondingly; still less to subdue his destructive passions.
Technology is the only field of human activity in which there has been
progression.' That is Arnold Toynbee. He was not a Christian; he was a
humanist. He did not believe this gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
He was a man who believed in these various ideas-philosophy and so on-but he
maintains that the only development that there has been is in the realm of
technology. We can certainly land people on the surface of the moon, but are
we living any better? Has there been corresponding advance in the matter of
man's social arrangements? Do we know how to subdue man's destructive
passions? Oh, the brilliant technology of the last few years, conquering the
force of gravity, landing men on the surface of the moon! Marvellous,
wonderful! Has it lessened the destructive capacity of man and the
destructive desires of man? Well, 1 ask you to look around you, read the
newspapers, listen to the bulletins on the news. These men, who are not
Christians at all, by simply viewing the facts and facing them squarely have
come to the conclusion that it all comes to nought.
NO ANSWERS
I end
with a quotation from Mr. Aldous Huxley. Here was a brilliant man, a
brilliant novelist, who believed in what is called Scientific Humanism for
so many years and wrote about it in his novels. He came to teel that that
was not the answer and then he turned to mysticism and became a Buddhist.
But still he was not satisfied, and if you read his biography you will find
that he said this at the end of his life.-Now again, here is a man who
really was concerned about men and women and life and living. He wanted to
live a better life himself. He wanted the world to be a better place. He was
appalled at the two world wars, the making of the atomic and the hydrogen
bombs. He was aghast at it all, and had spent a lifetime trying to
understand it. But this is what he said at the end of his life-'It is a bit
embarrassing to have been concerned with the human problem all one's life
and that at the end one has no more to offer by way of advice than "Try to
be a little kinder".' After all the brilliant philosophy and scientific
reasoning, this is all he has got to tell us: 'Try to be a little kinder.'
TOTAL BANKRUPTCY
These
men who were going to solve the problemseducation, knowledge, culture,
philosophy, politics, and who were going to put the world right, -this is
what they have to admit at the end. Well now, you see, they are but
confirming what the great Apostle tells us in the sixth verse of this second
chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians. He says: 'I've got a
wisdom, but it isn't a wisdom of this world-the thing you want me to be
talking about. Why am 1 not talking about it? I'll tell you. It comes to
nothing. It's a blank, it's a cipher. It leaves you at the end with nothing
at all. Just "try to be a little kinder"' What a bankruptcy! What a complete
failure!' And this is what the world needs to be told tonight, that all it
has trusted to, and the men it has trusted have led them
to the present chaos, and have nothing to offer us, and have no hope. They
make promises, but who believes them? They do not believe them themselves.
They have been falsified. They are baffled, they are bewildered, they do not
know where they are. It comes to nothing. Blank. Cipher. Vacuity. Complete
hopelessness. Final despair. Well there, my friends, 1 have taken the
trouble to take you through all that, because the negative is important.
People will not listen to the gospel until they have seen through the
fallacy of everything else, and the final uselessness of everything else.
But I cannot leave you on a negative. Let me come to the
positive. 'I determined not to know anything among you' - none of those
things. Why not? - 'but Jesus Christ and him crucified.' Why does he preach
this? Why should every preacher of the gospel preach this? Why should the
Church today be telling the whole world that we need to be told about this
-Jesus Christ and Him crucified? Why did Paul determine to preach this?
A GREAT
COMMISSION
Here are some of the answers.
The first was, he had been commanded to preach that. He had been given a
commission to preach it. You remember the story? Saul of Tarsus, the
Pharisee, the persecutor of Christians, going down from Jerusalem to
Damascus breathing out threatenings and slaughter, going to exterminate the
Christians. Suddenly he saw the light, and the face, and the voice which
said, 'Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? ... It is hard for thee to kick
against the pricks.' 'Who art thou Lord?' he said, and he was told, 'I am
Jesus whom thou persecutest.' And he was given a great commission. He had
become a new man, and the commission was this, that he should be a minister
and a witness. Christ, the risen Christ, told him on the road to Damascus
that he was to be a preacher of this gospel and that he was to proclaim Him
and Him crucified to the people. So the Apostle determines not to know
anything among them because that is what he was called to preach. You know,
this is a matter of common honesty. The great Apostle says elsewhere, 'I am
an ambassador for Christ.' What is the business of an ambassador? Is it to
voice his own opinions? Is it to say what he thinks? Well, if he does so, he
is a very bad ambassador. The ambassador's job is to convey the thinking and
the point of view of the country that has appointed him and which he is
representing. He may disagree with it entirely, but it does not matter. The
business of the ambassador is to deliver the message which has been given to
him, to hand on this commission, whatever it is. And Paul says, I have no
choice about this; that's what He told me to say: I'm not here to give you
my theories and my ideas, he says. I am determined simply to preach what He
gave me. You notice, those of you who still read his epistles - and if you
do not, you know, you are missing the greatest literature in the whole world
- he talks about the deposit, the deposit that had been given to him, the
dispensation of the gospel. 'I delivered unto you first of all' - What? What
I thought and what 1 had worked out philosophically?
Oh no! 'that which I also received.' Revelation! The commission! The
commandment! So simple, ordinary, common honesty dictated that the Apostle
should preach the message that he had been sent and commissioned to preach.
THE
TESTIMONY OF GOD
But that is not the only
reason by any means. Why did Paul only preach this? Well, he tells us again.
'And 1, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or
of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God.' Later on he puts
it like this: 'God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit
searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God' (verse 10). Why
did not Paul preach politics and art and culture and philosophy? It is
because he has a message about the deep things of God, the testimony
of God. He says, 'You know, what 1 have preached to you was not man's
ideas about the world and about life, but God's ideas!' How can we
waste our breath and our energy in preaching human ideas that come to
nothing, when we have here what has been revealed to us, namely, God's view
of it all? My dear friends, aren't you rather tired of listening to men-the
most learned men-on the television, the wireless, and everywhere else? They
are very clever and expert at putting their points of view, and they speak
with a rare dogmatism, making statements that they cannot prove and verify.
Aren't you getting rather tired of listening to what men have to say? What
is the greatest need in the world tonight? The greatest need of the world
tonight is this: What has God got to say about it all? Here is the
question. Why is the world as it is? We have had two world wars in one
century, haven't we? We had had one when 1 came here 50 years ago; we have
had one since. We all know about these bombs. We have seen the breakdown of
society. What is the matter? We know that acts of Parliament cannot put us
right. We have had many of them, and they are tumbling out one after
another, but the problems seem to increase instead of to lessen. What is the
matter with the world? What is the matter with man? What is the matter with
every one of us, individually and separately? You know, my friends, there is
only one satisfactory answer to that question. It is God's answer! It is
God's answer! Why is the world as it is? The answer, according to the
Bible-Paul preached it everywhere-is this: that though God had made a
perfect world, and had made man in a perfect condition and put him into
paradise where there were no problems and no difficulties, man's world is as
it is tonight because man in his folly and his arrogance rebelled against
God. He pitted his own mind against God. He did not care what God said. 'Ah,
this is what I say', he said, -and he brought chaos upon himself, he was
driven out of the garden, and he has been out there ever since, trying to
get back. He cannot get back and his world is in a muddle and in chaos. But
God has given us the explanation. Why have we had the two world wars? Why
may we have another? Why is society collapsing before our eyes? Why the
immorality and the vice, the confusion, the unhappiness, the drug addiction
and the alcoholism? Why the mounting social and moral
problem? What is the explanation? Here it is. It is the only answer-man
estranged from God.
THE WRATH
OF GOD
But not only that. Man is
under the wrath of God. This is what Paul preached. You remember how he puts
it in writing to the Romans: 'I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for
it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the
Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God
revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by
faith.' Then he goes on, 'For'-because-'the wrath of God has [already] been
revealed against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold [down]
the truth in unrighteousness' (Romans 1: 16ff.). He says, That is why 1 am
proud of the gospel. That is why 1 am so glad to preach it, and consider it
an honour to preach it. It is because it is the only hope for people who are
under the wrath of God.' And you know, my friends, this is the
trouble with the world tonight. This world of ours is under the wrath of
God. It is the only explanation of this 20th century. In spite of all our
education and culture and philosophy and politics and all that we have done,
the world is in an increasing muddle. Why? Well, because God hates the way
the world is living. He has always said so. God said through an Old
Testament prophet 'There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked' (Isa.
57:21). And this is the explanation of the world tonight. You can have a
pocket full of money, you can have knowledge, you can have learning, you can
have anything you like. But 'There is no peace, saith my God, to the
wicked'-and they haven't got it! They have the money, many of them, and the
learning and the knowledge, but they haven't got peace. 'The way of
transgressors is hard' (Prov. 13: 1 5)-and it is! Look at your modern world.
It is hard, it is unhappy. The world is so unhappy that it has to turn to
drugs and to alcohol. Men cannot go on without them, they are in such a
desperate condition. Why is this? It is God's wrath upon us. God is not
blessing us and God will not allow us to be happy if we continue in a state
of rebellion against Him. As He demolished the tower of Babel, He is
demolishing our towers of Babel, the things in which we put our faith
and our trust. The things that were the confidence of the VictoriansGod has
smashed them. Man shall not be happy while he is a rebel against God. The
wrath of God has been revealed from heaven. It has been revealed tonight,
and it is the only explanation of the state of the world at this moment.
HAVE YOU
LISTENED?
I have something much
profounder to preach to you than politics. The politicians do not understand
the state of the world tonight; they are fumbling. All their prophecies have
been falsified. And all those who put their faith in these things do not
know where they are. Poor H. G. Wells, with all his morals and his
scientific knowledge! Do you know the title of his last
book?-Mind at the end of its tether. He did not understand it, he did
not know what was happening. But the answer is that God looks down with
displeasure upon us. He has made us; we are not our own; we are His
creatures, and we were meant to live to His glory and to His honour. Until
we do, we will never know peace, we will never know happiness, we will never
know joy. 'I didn't preach those other things to you,' says Paul, 'because 1
have the testimony of God to preach to you. 1 wanted to tell you about the
deep things of God.' This analysis of God on the human situation-aren't you
ready to listen to it? Aren't you tired of the vain speeches of men? My dear
friends, have you listened to God's diagnosis of your condition and the
condition of the whole world?
GOD'S
SOLUTION
But again, I thank God that
He did not stop at the negative-and 1 must not. That is God's diagnosis of
the state of affairs. But, thank God, Paul was able to preach to them God's
solution to our problems. Where everything else has failed to provide a
solution, Paul says, 'We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the
hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory' (verse
6). This is the solution. Are you hopeful about the future? Are you happy
about the future prospects? What do you feel, if you do look ahead to the
remainder of your life and on to your death? What have you got? Is there any
hope? There is none! But, you know, here - and this is why Paul preached it
and determined not to know anythin 9 else-here is God's plan for the
salvation of the individual and of the whole world. God's plan of salvation,
prepared and ordained before the very foundation of the world, but now put
into practice.
What is this? What is God's
plan for this world? Well, you see, it is the exact antithesis of all human
proposals. The world is always waiting for some great man-great men of
history. And if there is any crisis, we hope a great man is going to emerge.
Have you read these journalists? They often say this. This always happens,
you know, when we face a terrible crisis, 'the great man' always appears on
the scene and they mention the great men. This is the way the world always
looks at this. Is that God's plan? Thank God it isn't. 'I determined not to
know anything among you, save Jesus Christ.' Who is this? Well, He is
a man, Jesus of Nazareth, a carpenter-a great man! Well, is this the answer?
No, says Paul, listen! You must know who He is-'which none of the princes of
this world knew'. They thought He was only a man - 'for had they known it,
they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.' Here is God's
solution. My dear people, this is why I rejoice in this gospel. It is the
only answer. 'God so loved the world that he gave' - a great philosopher? a
great politician? - 'he gave his only begotten Son', Jesus of
Nazareth,
the Lord of glory. Paul, as I reminded you, came to this
realization on the road to Damascus. He had regarded this Jesus as a
carpenter and had dismissed Him and derided Him. He had blasphemed Him. But
on the road to Damascus, he discovered that the despised Jesus is the Lord
of glory, the second Person in the blessed Holy Trinity, and that He had
been in this world because God His Father had sent Him. This is God's way of
salvation.
It is the great message of
the incarnation, and it is literally the only hope. Everything man does is a
failure. But God has sent His own Son-the miracle, the mystery, the marvel
of the incarnation, a little babe was born in a stable in Bethlehem! Why was
He born in a stable? 'Because there was no room for them in the inn.' Oh,
the people with money had booked the rooms! They are not going to turn out
because a poor pregnant woman on the verge of giving birth to a baby has
arrived. Why should they give up their rooms? They were as selfish then as
people are today-pushing themselves forward in the queue, asserting their
rights, not caring about anything as long as they are all right. A babe was
born in a stable amidst the straw and the lowing of the cattle, a little
helpless babe, and they put Him into a manger. Who is this? The Lord of
glory!
Veiled
in flesh the Godhead see!
Hail, the incarnate Deity!
This is what Paul preached.
'God bath visited and redeemed his people.' God has come into time. God has
sent His own Son. He had raised great prophets, great servants; they had all
failed. But now He sends His only Son. So Paul preached Jesus Christ to
them, showing them that He was none other than the eternal Son of God and
the Lord of glory. This was proved by His miracles. It was proved by His
life and by His teaching, His perfect example. But above all it was proved
by His conquest over all the devils and everything that assails man. It was
proved by His conquest of the tempest, the raging of the sea, the storm-the
Lord of creation! And supremely it was proved by His glorious resurrection,
when He even burst asunder the bands of death and arose triumphant over the
grave. Jesus Christ!
My friends, are you
interested in this Person? Do you know that God has intervened about our
state and about our condition, and that He has come in the Person of His own
Son? God has come in the flesh, 'in the likeness of sinful flesh and for
sin'. Talk about Plato and Socrates? No, no! When I can talk about Jesus
Christ, 1 cannot talk about them. Why talk about men when you can speak of
the Lord of glory? That is why he determined not to know anything among them
but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. And this addition is
essential-the cross, Calvary, this thing that is a stumbling-block to the
Jews and utter foolishness to the Greeks. All right, you say, miracles are
all right; but He died in utter weakness. Why didn't He come down and save
Himself He died an ignominious death, a death of shame, and they buried Him
in a tomb. Why emphasize 'Him crucified'? And the Apostle tells us.
He tells us, 'We preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling-block
and unto the Greeks foolishness, but unto them which
are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of
God.'
BE
RECONCILED TO GOD
What does it mean? Let me
hurriedly summarize it. Your greatest need and mine-the greatest need of the
whole world-is to be reconciled to God. Nothing can avail us but that
we are reconciled to God. All our troubles are due to the fact that we are
aliens and rebels and, as 1 say, under the curse and the wrath of God. Man's
supreme need is to be right with God and to be blessed by God. How can it
happen? Here are my sins and they come between me and God. 1 cannot get rid
of them. What 1 have done 1 have done, and if 1 spent an eternity trying to
erase my sins 1 cannot do it.
Not the
labours of my hands
Can fulfil Thy law's demands;
Could my zeal no respite know,
Could my tears for ever flow,
All for sin could not atone:
-it
is impossible! -
Thou
must save, and Thou alone.
And He has done it in
Jesus Christ and Him crucified. The meaning of the death on the cross is
this: God, being holy, cannot pretend that He has not seen sin. He is a just
and a righteous and a holy God, and He has said that 'the soul that sinneth,
it shall die.' 'The wages of sin is death'-and it is evident in the modern
world.
Very well, how can 1 be
reconciled to God? What can be done about my sins? God has said He must
punish them. His righteousness demands it. But if He punished my sins, it
would be the end of me. I would go to eternal death. But God has planned a
way, and He planned it before the very foundation of the world. He sent His
own Son, spotless, pure, undefiled, who had never broken an iota of the Law,
who had given His Father complete obedience. God sent Him to the cross and
He laid our sins upon Him. 'He bath made him to be sin for us, who knew no
sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.' 'God was in
Christ' - in and through Christ, and particularly on the cross -
'reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto
them' (2 Cor. 5:21,19). Or as Peter puts it, 'who his own self bare our sins
in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto
righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed' (1 Pet. 2:24). My dear
friends, the only way of being reconciled to God is to know that Christ has
died for your sins, borne your punishment, borne your guilt. In Him you are
reconciled to God. And so Paul preached Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
GOD'S POWER
AT WORK
And then, to round it
off-Paul preached this, and nothing else, because it is the only thing that
works. Nothing else works. We have seen the failure. This works. This is
the power of God, as well as the wisdom of God. And as the Apostle says,
'Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of
man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him' (verse 9).
'Jesus Christ and him crucified.' Why? Because it works, and because of the
things that it gives us. What does it give us? It gives me a knowledge of
sins forgiven. What a wonderful thing it is to have your conscience cleared!
You may have done terrible things, and you cannot forgive yourself, and you
are afraid to die-and rightly so, because when we die we all have to stand
before God in judgment. How can I get rid of these sins? How can 1 know my
sins are forgiven? There is only one answer. It is in Jesus Christ and Him
crucified. 'Being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our
Lord Jesus Christ' (Romans 5: 1). What a wonderful thing it is to know that
your sins are forgiven!-that you can put your head on the pillow and not
worry as to whether you will ever wake up or noty You know that you are
right with God; you are at peace with God; nothing can ever separate you
from the love of God. My friends, have you got peace? Have you got peace of
conscience? Are you ready to face death? Are you ready to face judgment?
This is the only way. But it is given to us: 'the things that are freely
given to us of God' (verse 12).
This is Christianity. Not an
exhortation to you to go home and turn over a new leaf and try and live a
better life. No, no! Come as you are-without money and without price.
Only
believe, and thou shalt see
That Christ is all in all to thee.
It is the gift of God. 'By
grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift
of God' (Eph. 2:8). So you have forgiveness, peace with God, reconciliation
with God, peace within, an understanding of life, a new outlook, a new
understanding of other people. You have got a new life in you. And you begin
to know joy that the world can never know and never has known, a joy that
will hold and last whatever may be happening to you. Paul in writing to the
Romans says, 'We glory in tribulations also.'
When all
things seem against us,
To drive us to despair,
We know one gate is open,
One ear will hear our prayer.
A VISION OF
GLORY
And, above it all, a vision
of a glory that is to come. This old world-it is in terrible trouble, and
according to the teaching of Christ and this man Paul it is going to get
worse and worse. 'Evil men will wax worse and worse.' 'There will be wars
and rumours of wars.' Christianity has never promised to make this old world
perfect in that way and to banish war. That is not Christianity: that is
humanism. Christianity says that while men and women remain rebellious
against God, the misery will increase and things will become terrible. But
the Christian, the man that believes in Jesus Christ and in Him crucified,
knows that a part of God's plan is this: that at some future date (we do not
know when) God is going to send His Son, Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory,
back to this world again. And He will come riding the clouds of heaven,
surrounded by the holy angels; He will come conquering and to conquer . He
will judge the whole world in righteousness. All the evil and sin and the
chicanery and the dishonesty and the foulness of the perversions, and the
way people are living today, it will all be dashed to a lake of perdition,
and all who have belonged to it and who have rejected this message. He will
purge the whole universe of it all, and there shall be a 'new heavens and a
new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.' The Christian is not afraid of
life, he is not afraid of death. He knows that there is a glory. Christ at
the end of His life came to His disciples and said, 'Let not your heart be
troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are
many mansions: if it were not so, 1 would have told you. 1 go to prepare a
place for you. And if 1 go and prepare a place for you, 1 will come again,
and receive you unto myself; that where 1 am, there ye may be also' (John
14: I ff.). This is it. Whatever happens to us, whatever this old world may
do, if they let off their bombs and if hell rages, it does not matter!
Nothing 'shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in
Christ Jesus our Lord.'
That is why Paul determined
not to know anything among them, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. He had
come to know this blessed Person. He had begun to receive of the riches of
His grace, these things that God had prepared for them that love Him-and he
was rejoicing in them. It had worked! It is a power! He had been a miserable
sinner, a Pharisee, self-righteous, self-contained, religious, moral, but
miserable. But now he knows a joy unspeakable and full of glory, and he is a
master of his fate. He looks and longs for this great day, when his Lord of
glory shall come and every eye shall see Him, and those that have believed
in Him shall be changed into His likeness. Their very bodies shall be
changed and they will live with Him and reign with Him, and spend their
glorious eternity with Him. That is why Paul preached Jesus Christ and Him
crucified, to the exclusion of everything else. It had worked in his life.
It had made a new man of him. It had given him all this.
MEN MADE
NEW
But it had not only done it
to Paul; it had done it, you know, to some of these people in Corinth.
Listen to this in chapter 6. 'Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not
inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor
idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with
mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor
extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of
you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the
name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God' (6:9ff.). Here were
men, now members of the church at Corinth, who once had been dock labourers
an 'd other things in the dock yards and in the harbour at Corinth. They
were drunkards, they were revilers, - they were all these things. Great
philosophy had been preached. It did not touch them! They were
there-besotten drunkards, guilty of all these offences and these
obscenities. Nothing could touch them. Nothing could improve them. Neither
philosophy, nor politics, nor sociology, nor education, nor anything! But
such were some of you! You are no longer that. You have been washed.
There is
power, power, wonder - working power,
In the precious blood of the Lamb.
The preaching of Jesus Christ
and Him crucified 'in demonstration of the Spirit and of power' had raised
these men up. It had renovated them and they were saints adorning the church
of God.
I cannot refrain from saying
it. This not only works with Paul, it not only worked with these people in
Corinth, it has worked in this very room in Sandfields, Aberavon. 'Such were
some of you.' I could name them to you. Some of you have heard their names.
Did you ever hear of a man called William Thomas, otherwise known as Billy
Fair-play, Billy Staffordshire? He spent a lifetime in drunkenness,
fighting, debauchery, hopelessness-until he was 77 years of age. But one
night in this very building he became a new man, he was washed, he was
sanctified, he was justified. He became a saint. And Mr. E. T. Rees and I
here had the great privilege of seeing him going from time to eternity with
the face of an angel, shining, and holding out his arms evidently to this
Lord of glory, who was waiting to receive him. What nothing else could do,
Jesus Christ and Him crucified had done to him-and he was only one of many.
I could mention them to you. I must not do so, but I could go on for hours,
telling you of men and women with whom everything had failed, but who,
believing in Jesus Christ and Him crucified, had started a new life. And you
know at this moment they are in the glory everlasting. They have been
looking down upon us. We are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses.
NOTHING
ELSE MATTERS
Men and women, is Jesus
Christ and Him crucified everything to you? This is the question. It is a
personal matter. Is He central? Does He come before anything and everything?
Do you pin your faith in Him and in Him alone? Nothing else works. He works!
1 stand here because 1 can testify to the same thing.
E'er
since, by faith, I saw the stream
Thy flowing wounds supply,
Redeeming love has been my theme,
And shall be till I die.
'God forbid that 1 should
glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is
crucified unto me, and I [crucified] unto the world' (Gal. 6:14).
My dear friends, in the midst
of life we are in death. This is not theory; this is personal, this is
practical. How are you living? Are you happy? Are you satisfied? How do you
face the future? Are you alarmed? Terrified? How do you face death? You have
got to die. Think of the people who were here 50 years ago. They are no
longer here. Most of them have gone. We are all moving. 'Here have we no
continuing city'; but can you say, 'we seek one to come'? Are you fixed
entirely upon Him-Jesus Christ, Lord of glory, Son of God, Saviour of the
world, Jesus Christ and Him crucified? My dear friends, nothing else matters
finally but this. All else will come to nought. This Place has been much
more affluent than it was when I was here. We had men here, you know,
earning 37/6d. of the old money per week, but they were great saints. They
have gone on to the glory. You have more money. You have had many things
which were not here then. But it will all come to an end. You cannot take
any of these things with you when you come to die. 'Naked came 1 out of my
mother's womb, and naked shall 1 return thither' (Job 1:21). What will you
have when that end comes? You will have nothing, unless you have Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. And having Him, you will be able to say with
Charles Wesley- we have already been singing it-
Thou,
O
Christ, art all I want;
More than all in Thee It find; ...
Plenteous grace with Thee istfound,
Grace to cover all my sin;
Let the healing streams abound,
Make me, keep me pure within.
Jesus Christ and Him
crucified! Do you know Him? Have you believed in Him? Do you see that He
alone can avail you in life, in death, and to all eternity? If not, make
certain tonight. Fall at His feet. He will receive you, and He will make you
a new man or a new woman. He will give you a new life. He will wash you. He
will cleanse you. He will renovate you. He will regenerate you and you will
become a saint, and you will follow after that glorious company of saints
that have left this very place and are now basking in the sunshine of His
face in the glory everlasting. Make certain of it, ere it be too late!
- O
Lord our God, how
can we thank Thee that in a world of darkness and of sin and
of shame there is this one and only light still shining, Jesus Christ
and Him crucified. God, open the eyes of all who do not know Him and
have not seen Him. Have mercy. Unstop deaf ears. Open blind eyes. God
save the people. Awaken them to their need and to the perfect provision
that Thou hast made in the Son of Thy love, the Lord of glory. And unto
Thee and unto Thee alone shall we give all the praise and all
the honour and all the glory, both now and for ever. Amen.
© Lady
Elizabeth Catherwood and Mrs Anne Desmond
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