“Despisest thou the riches of His goodness [or kindness] and forbearance and long-suffering; not knowing that the goodness [or kindness] of God leadeth thee to repentance? But, after thy hardness and impenitent heart, treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath, and revelation of the righteous judgment of God” (Rom. 2:4, 5).
WHAT a record of kindness on God’s part, and of hardness on man’s, has been the history of the human family.
The descendants of those who survived the Flood defied God by the Tower of Babel. Those rescued by God’s wonder-working hand from slavery in Egypt rebelled against Him in the wilderness. After recounting God’s great goodness and the multitude of His loving-kindnesses, His pity, His tender sympathy, and how He carried them all the days of old, Isaiah had to say, “But they rebelled and vexed His Holy Spirit” (Isa. 63:7-10).
After all God’s deliverances by judges and kings, and all the warnings by His prophets, Jeremiah says, “They hearkened not, but hardened their neck” (chap. 7:23-26). Ezekiel calls them “impudent children,” “stiff-hearted,” and “rebellious” (chap. 2:3, 4).
Zechariah shows that they had “refused to hearken, and stopped their ears that they should not hear.” “Yea,” that “they made their hearts like adamant” (Zech. 7:11, 12).
Lastly, Malachi speaks of their awful insensibility. After all that Jehovah had done for them, they even questioned the reality of His care for them. “Wherein past Thou loved us?” is their hardened retort to Him (Mal. 1:2).
What will God do next? Well, it was as though He had said, I will answer that impertinent question of yours myself, in Person. Hence we find that Matthew 1 announces a Saviour born. Jesus, “Emmanuel,” “GOD WITH us,” and “God with us” meant “God for us.” “He shall save His people from their sins.” When Jesus came into this world, this one great purpose was before Him. God in grace was to be fully made known to His revolted creature man. The lie of the adversary, that God was against man, must be exposed to the very bottom, and the real truth fully made known.
This was the mission of Jesus here. “The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us... full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). “The only begotten Son, in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him” (vs. 18).
What He said, what He did, what He was, all went to complete that blessed declaration. His life was spent in acts of kindness, and His death crowned all. As another has well expressed it, “He was surrounded by an atmosphere of blessing.” So that where men liked, when men liked, and as often as they liked, they might avail themselves of it. Did He not say that God was “Kind to the unthankful and to the evil?” He did (Luke 5:35). But that was not all. He was Himself, in lowly grace, the perfect embodiment of all the kind things He said and did. “He did kind things so kindly,” for in Him the “kindness and love” of God Himself appeared in absolute perfection.
Wicked men opposed, but they could not draw forth anything from Him that was not perfectly delightful to the heart of God the Father. Peter heard Him reviled and saw Him insulted. How did He meet the affront? Hear the inspired record. “Who when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered, he threatened not” (1 Peter 2:23).
When a benefit was craved for from Him, He looked for no merit, He demanded no recompense. Though He did what no other on earth could do, He did not always get the common civility of grateful thanks for the blessing bestowed. Yet nothing stayed the flow of His gracious kindness. How amazing! How soul-refreshing! In David we get a charming type of this grace. After all that he had suffered of wrong and ingratitude from Saul, David, “the man after God’s own heart,” inquired, “Is there not yet any of the house of Saul that I may show the kindness of God to him?” (2 Sam. 9:3).
But if his kindness was great to Saul’s grandson, how deep his affection for Absalom. Yet his love was met by heartless, hardened hostility. Of Absalom’s end―his sad, sad end―we have all heard, and the bitter tears of a father’s slighted love too. Only a little of the “kindness of God” was found in the heart of David: it was all found in the bosom of Jesus. What, then, must the end be of one who coldly turns from Him, or daringly despises His fervent longings. For no love like His! He wept over those who would not accept it, and went on to the cross to die for the sins of all who would, ―yea, for all, to the end of time, who would find room in their hearts for His love and for Himself.
Has the reader’s heart been won to trust Him yet? If not, beware of being hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. Did it ever occur to you why you can do things now without the least uneasiness, when once they would have alarmed your conscience greatly? Does it not speak loudly of the hardness of heart that is creeping over you, like the gradual effect of a petrifying well?
Perhaps at first your conscience was soothed by a sort of secret intention to abandon your sinful course. This held you; with such good intentions before you, you considered it safe to continue. Now, perhaps, you can go deeper into sin than ever you once considered yourself capable of, and this with no alarm whatever.
The writer was once speaking to a young man in his father’s workshop. He was engaged in replacing some veneer that had been splintered from a piece of old furniture.
After applying the glue and putting the veneer in position, he drove a small tack into it. “What is that for?” the writer inquired. “It is to hold it till it is hard.” “I suppose you can then take the tack away, and it will hold without it?”
“Yes, that is it.”
Now, would you not be wise to take a hint from this as to what the enemy may be doing with you, my reader? How often has some good intension for the future acted like a nail to hold the soul in a course of evil. And this may go on until the heart becomes hardened by it, and the conscience thoroughly seared and deadened. Beware! “Happy is the man that feareth alway: but he that hardeneth his heart shall fall into mischief” (Prov. 28:14). “He that, being often reproved, hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy” (Prov. 29:1).
If you are not willing to be “HARDENED,” be willing to HEARKEN.
“Today, if ye will hear His voice, harden not our heart.”
GEO. C.