I WANT to speak of the solitude of the sinner, and the solitude of the Saviour. I should like to say to you at the very beginning, the day, is coming when you will be left alone. Today you are surrounded by the things of this gay scene―your pleasures, friends, and business―but mark, the day is coming when you are going to be left alone. I know that solitude is not pleasant. Men don’t like it. But, my friend, whether you like it or not, the day is coming when you will be left alone, and, when you are left alone, God is going to speak to you. He is going to speak to you about your sins. The question that will come up for settlement between your soul and God will be the question of your sins. You forget them, and I have no doubt you like to forget them. Is not that what you are trying to do? But God does not forget your sins―those about which you boast, and those that would bring the crimson blush to your cheek―all your sins have gone down in God’s Book. The recording angel in heaven makes no mistakes. Your sins, man, have all gone down in God’s Book.
But we have good news for you. Thank God for the gospel, the story of redeeming love.
“Though thy sins be red like crimson,
Deep in scarlet glow,
Jesus’ precious blood can make them
White as snow.”
Oh, glory to His name, His blood has cleansing power. Yes, friend, though your sins may be as black as hell’s midnight, the precious blood of Jesus can wash them all away. If you come to God in the day of grace, there is blessing for you, mighty and eternal. But, man, if you miss it in time, if you keep from the presence of God in time, if the question of your sins be not settled in time, that question will come up in eternity. Then there will be no Saviour to bid, thee welcome to His pierced side, no pardon there, no cleansing blood, nothing for you in that day but blackness, darkness, damnation, destruction, yea, the second death.
Oh, friend, wake up to the reality of these things. Look around you, and see the danger that surrounds that soul of yours. We have read that “Jacob was left alone.” Jacob was a great sinner, and he was a vagabond. He had sinned against his brother. You have sinned against God, and your sins have made you a vagabond from the presence of God. Jacob was a vagabond, and it seemed as if the sin which had been committed many years ago, was just about to bring upon him retribution. His brother, the one against whom lie had sinned, was coming towards him with four hundred men. That plunged poor Jacob into a terrible plight. He saw the judgment coming, and he remembered his sins. It filled his soul with dismay. He was the subject of soul-trouble.
Where is the Jacob of to-night? Look back on those sins of yours. As you think of them, don’t they make you shudder? Those dark sins, they will come forth, and they will hound you to the judgment of God. Your sins are behind you, and the judgment is before you. It may be, friend, that before tomorrow morning’s sun rises that soul of yours may have been plunged into the midst of eternal judgment. Oh, you know it may be so. If you die in your sins you will be damned through all eternity. It may be that you are just about to drop over into those dark depths. Thousands are rushing headlong to perdition today, as fast as the devil can drive them. Oh, man, are you among that company? God save you! and bless you! and bring you down to the feet of the Saviour!
But in his distress what did Jacob do? He sent a present to his brother. He thinks the present will appease his brother’s righteous indignation. You have found out that there is something wrong between your soul and God, and you are afraid to meet God. And what have you been doing? You have been gathering together your presents―your prayers, your Bible-reading, your sacrament-taking, your class attending, all the good things that you have done, and you think that they will come between your soul and the stroke of divine justice. My friend, you are making a tremendous mistake. Your present is no good, man. It will not satisfy the righteous claims of the God with whom you have to do. Your good works will not screen you from the righteous justice of a sin-hating God. Jacob was not set at rest by the present he sent before him, he was not satisfied, and now he is left alone. Oh, business man, forget your business tonight, never mind the money bags and the markets, look off this poor scene, think not of time, but think of eternity. Get alone with God. There is something of more importance than money-making, and that is that soul of yours. Think of your soul. When soul-trouble came upon Jacob he sent away his wives and children too, and he was left alone. Forget your friends, and just think of your sins, and get alone in God’s presence. You can be alone with God, in this place, with all those people around you. Forget the people around you, and speak to God about your sins, and let God speak to you.
When Jacob was left alone, I read, “There wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day.” Very likely God has been wrestling with you too, to break down your pride, and your will. Oh, friend, has not God been wrestling with you? He wants to bring you to the low place that He may bless you. Go down at the feet of the Saviour, and there you will find joy and peace for your soul.
All through that long night God wrestled with Jacob, and has not the wrestling been a dark night to you? Not one ray of light for you. Why? Because you won’t give in to the One who wants to bless you. Jacob gave in at last. Jacob the wrestler was crippled. It may be that God has crippled you. You have found out that it is high time you yielded to the Saviour. And when Jacob gave in, the day began to dawn. And so it will with you if you give in. The first gray light of the dawning day will break in upon that soul of yours. When you give in to God who would bless you, He will dispel the gloom of the dark night by the light of His own love.
Then we find that crippled Jacob, began to cling to the One who had crippled, him. And he said, “I will not let thee go except thou bless me.” Oh, friend, is that the way you are talking? I like to hear a sinner talk like that. If you talk like that, no doubt about it, He will give you the blessing. Jacob went down to the low place. Go down into the guilty sinner’s place, my friend. God says to Jacob, “What is thy name?” A straight question that. What is thy name, sinner? Oh, guilty man, what is thy name? Jacob told out the truth. “My name is Jacob.” What did that mean? It means a supplanter, and a schemer. He tells God the whole truth. Will you do the same? You are a sinner, ungodly and guilty. I have no need to tell you that. Your own guilty conscience tells you that. Oh, friend, go down into the place of confession, and don’t hold out any longer. God does not want to send you away without the blessing. Those people, whose pride is so great that it will not let their backs bend, do not get the blessing. Take the low place, and God will bless you there. I read, “And he blessed him there.”
But God did something else. He changed his name. And He said, “Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel.” Israel means “a prince of God.” What a mighty change. Some of us have got that. We have been taken out of the place of poor sinners, and now we belong to the royal family of heaven, and we are going to bask in the sunshine of the love of the blessed God throughout eternity. Do you think we deserve it? Ah no, friend, we deserve the solitude of hell’s darkness forever. But hallelujah, through Jesus’ precious blood we belong to yonder scene, and we want you to belong to it too. Oh, friend, get alone in the presence of God, and there you shall learn the mighty love of His heart, and you shall know the power of the cleansing blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.
But what a solemn thing for the sinner to be left alone in eternity. A young fellow lay dying. The darkness of eternal night was settling about his soul, for he was a Christ rejecter. With his latest breath he cried, “Oh! mother, don’t leave me alone now.” But much as that mother loved her boy, she had to leave him, and alone into the darkness of hell’s gloom he passed. Oh, friend, will you go like that? Into darkness, into despair, where no mirth or joy shall ever shine? Woe, woe, woe, solitude and eternal judgment!
But God wants not that to be your destiny. God wants to bless you, and He has proved His desire for your blessing. He can bless you because the Saviour has been alone. If the Saviour had not been alone, there would have been no blessing for thee. Where was He alone? He was alone on Calvary. He could say, “All ye shall leave me alone.” But not only did the people leave Him alone, but, friend, God forsook that blessed One on the cross. He had to cry, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Jesus was left alone, amid the darkness, and the raging of Calvary’s tempest. Why? That you might be saved. Yes, Jesus tasted the bitterness of death that you might be saved. He went to the cross, dear friend, that you night be blessed. Christ died for the ungodly (Rom. 5:66For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. (Romans 5:6)). Think of the love of the Saviour’s heart, and the mighty grace of God that could lead Him to the cross, to die in thy room and stead. He drank the cup of God’s wrath. There, the work was done, and the judgment is passed and over. His speechless suffering came to an end, and the sinner’s Saviour now lives in glory, raised from the dead as the proof of God’s perfect and eternal satisfaction in His work. That blessed Saviour will no more be alone, He is going to have a blessed company of redeemed ones around Him throughout eternity. Will you be there?
There is room for you in yonder blessed scene. Oh, come, the Saviour bids you come. The One who died is now upon the throne. He calls you to His blessed side. He has got the grace of God for you. Forgiveness, joy, peace, and eternal rest He will bestow. God, speaking by His servant, says, “Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins; and by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses.” Do you belong to the “all that believe” company, friend? Can you say, Through the death and suffering of the Lord Jesus Christ I have salvation. I have been alone with God and the question of my sins has been settled. And now I can look into the glory, and see the Man who died for me upon the throne, and that He is the measure of my clearance from all the judgment. And now, my face is upon the glory, and the joy, and the rest, and the home where my Saviour waits. Can you say that? God grant that every sinner in this place may be able to say that. “Believe on the lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:3131And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. (Acts 16:31)).
J. T. M.