“AS in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man,” was the declaration of one who, besides possessing wisdom beyond all others, also wrote by the Spirit of God; and it is therefore not only the verdict of Solomon, as having learned the truth of it from close observation and experience, but also the announcement of the Spirit of God to the heart of man. (Proverbs 27:1919As in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man. (Proverbs 27:19).)
Hence, my reader, when you see the outcome of the heart of another, be it in its most repulsive form, you see only the unsightly fruit of that which has its roots in your own heart.
Whatever distinctions there may be socially or naturally, whatever may be the varied results in outward conduct and ways, through training, education, and favorable influences, or the reverse, still, just as in all alike, from the highest to the lowest, from the most moral to the most degraded, there are the seeds of death and physical decay, so equally is there in all the different classes of society, the one common source and spring of evil in the human heart; the outcome in one single reflection, as in a mirror, or (to use the figure adopted in the Proverbs) as in clear water, the image of each and all.
And yet man has to do with a God who searches the heart, who looks deeper down than the surface, who cannot be deceived by the outside appearance, however fair and beautiful. A God, too, of absolute holiness and purity, in whose presence no evil can ever be allowed, but who must judge and punish sin. Yes; in the presence of this holy God all must stand. Every moment as it flies past is hurrying each of us on to the time when he or she must be manifested in that unsullied glory, where He who is Light “will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts.”
This is a solemn truth to be awakened to, and if there were no further truth to tell, we might well exclaim, “Who then can be saved?” Yet it is this very thing, this most humbling truth, that there is no goodness in man, that in his nature he is evil and corrupt, that “every imagination of the thoughts of his heart” is “only evil continually”— that is the occasion for the gospel to be brought to him. This gospel reveals to us God’s purpose and desire to have man happy in His presence, and fit to enjoy His glory—yea, even to have him in His own house as a son and heir; also the wonderful means that He has devised, and the mighty and blessed work that has been accomplished to effect this end.
Only infinite love could ever carry out this purpose, and only at infinite cost to Himself could it be accomplished; but, blessed to tell it, “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” None other but that blessed One could be found able to meet the condition of man; which, as we have seen, was not only that he had sinned, but that he was, in the springs of his being, evil and sinful. Therefore one must be found who, though truly a man, should be free from all sin, either actually committed, or any taint of evil in his nature. In God’s own beloved Son made flesh we have such an one revealed as our Saviour. The gospel presents Him to us as the “Lamb of God.” “Without blemish, and without spot.” “He knew no sin.” “In Him was no sin.” But He “suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God;” and also He was “made... sin for us... that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”
In Him “God condemned sin in the flesh.” And the reader of this is either “in Him” or in his sins. If you have not bowed to the truth of God about yourself, but are covering over that which is essentially evil, or trying to improve that which is absolutely corrupt, or, it may be, treating with indifference and affected scorn the whole truth of the matter, you are treasuring up in store for yourself a fearful harvest of just judgment and wrath. You are shutting yourself out forever from the joy and glory unfading of the mansions of light, and throwing yourself into the abyss of remorse and despair.
If, on the other hand, you cast away all confidence in yourself, and draw near to God in your true character of a helpless, ruined sinner, He will assuredly justify you; for “Christ died for the ungodly,” and God justifies the ungodly. (Romans 5:6, 4:5.) He will no longer look at you as in your sins, or as a condemned child of Adam; but as a believer in His Son, and a sharer in the blessed results of the glorious work of the Son of God; and you will have the divine assurance of God’s word, that “there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:11There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. (Romans 8:1).)
S. M. A.