“How long have you known the Lord?” said a friend of mine, to an old man in Staffordshire. “About three weeks, sir; but I have been for forty years sewing fig leaves together.”
There is a good deal expressed in those few words. Thousands are employed in the same profitless work as our poor old Staffordshire friend. Yes; thousands are occupied in the useless business of sewing fig leaves together. The man who is seeking to save his soul by means of rites and ceremonies, ordinances and sacraments, church-going and chapel-going, is just sewing fig leaves together. So also, the man or woman who is building upon prayers, fastings, and alms deeds, is sewing fig leaves together.
All these things may be, and many of them really are, very good in their right place. But as a ground for the soul to rest upon for pardon and peace—as a title wherewith to draw nigh to a holy and righteous God—as a foundation on which to build for eternity, they are, in very truth, but sewing fig leaves together; and all who trust to them will find them to be so when alas! it will be too late.
But let us turn, for a moment, to the third chapter of Genesis, and look at the first attempt ever made, in this world, to sew fig leaves together. “There is nothing new under the sun,” and we may see in Adam’s apron of fig leaves the very earliest figure which scripture gives us of man’s righteousness in every shape and form—the very earliest type and illustration of all human effort to cover the sinner’s moral and spiritual nakedness, from the day of man’s fall in the garden of Eden, down to the present moment.
No sooner had man eaten the forbidden fruit, than his eyes were opened. But oh! what an opening! What a discovery! He found out that he was naked. He became possessed of a conscience of good and evil, and this selfsame conscience made a coward of him. “The eyes of them both were opened and they knew that they were naked.” Sad, sad opening! Sad discovery! They had listened to the serpent, and this was the result. Discovered nakedness! A coward conscience! Up to this, they had lived in happy innocence, blissful ignorance of evil. They knew only good. But, now all was changed. They had gained the knowledge of their own nakedness and lost the true knowledge of God.
And what then? How did they seek to meet their new condition? Just like the old Staffordshire man. “They sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons.” Reader, mark this: “They sewed.” It was their work, not God’s. He never set a single stitch in the apron. It was man’s work from beginning to end. This stamped its character. It was impossible that the work of a ruined creature could ever lift him out of the ruin into which he had plunged himself. He might work in the ruin, but he never could work himself out of it. Hence we find that the very moment “ they heard the voice of the Lord God, walking in the garden in the cool of the day, Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God, amongst the trees of the garden.” They dared not trust their fig-leaf apron. It did not even satisfy themselves. How then could it screen them from the searching gaze of a righteous God? It was “weak and beggarly.”
“And the Lord God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou? And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.” Think of this! “I was naked.” Had he forgotten the apron? It would seem so. Ah! it was of no use; indeed he completely ignored it.
Thus it is ever. All human efforts prove valueless, when the testing time, the trial-moment, comes. Nothing will stand but God’s own work; and Adam’s apron was not that. It was man’s work and not God’s; and we may rest assured that nothing will, nothing can avail—nothing can give peace but that which is of God. There is not beneath the canopy of heaven, this day, a soul possessing true peace who is resting on, or looking to human efforts of any sort or description. In order to possess true, solid, divine peace, the soul must be resting simply on that which is absolutely and entirely of God.
Now, of this latter we have the earliest figure in the coats of skin which the Lord God made for Adam and his wife. There was this weighty difference between the apron and the coat, that God never set a single stitch in the former; and man never set a single stitch in the latter. That was wholly of man, and therefore could not avail: this was wholly of God, and therefore could not do otherwise.
Oh! that men would but ponder those early lessons of the apron and the coat. They are full of holy instruction for us. We may rest assured they have a voice for every age, and a special voice for the present moment. Christendom is studded, from one end to the other, with the manufactories of fig-leaf aprons. Millions of hands are employed in the miserable work; and those aprons may do well enough until that moment arrives when the voice of God must be heard, and their utter worthlessness will be found out when it is too late. “I heard thy voice; and I was afraid; because I was naked.”
What utterances! The voice of God! Fear! Nakedness! Beloved fellow-sinner, we beseech thee to think of those things. Think of them now. Say on what art thou leaning? To which art thou trusting? Man’s apron or God’s coat—which? Oh! which? Do not put this question aside. Look it straight in the face, this living moment. Come to the point now. Thou hast delayed long enough; delay no longer. Consequences of present and eternal moment hang on thine answer to this great question.
Say, then, dear friend, art thou trusting, in any way, to thine own works, or art thou reposing, in perfect confidence upon that precious blood of Christ that cleanseth from all sin? Examine thy foundations closely and rigidly. Look well to thy title-deeds. It will be unspeakably awful to find out, when too late, that thou hast been building on human rubbish, instead of building upon the Rock of ages.
Hearken to the following magnificent passage, and may the eternal Spirit interpret and apply it to thy precious soul. “Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation; he that believeth shall not be confounded.” Isa. 28:1616Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste. (Isaiah 28:16) Pet. 2:6.
Here is thy ground. God has laid the foundation. He does not ask thee to add to it, but simply to lean upon it; to trust to it; to believe in it. And if thou wilt only believe in Jesus, thou hast the word of Him who cannot lie to assure thee that thou shalt never be confounded, world without end.