“O Lord, revive Your work” (KJV)
Our hearts have, during the last few weeks, been full of joy and
gratitude at the good news which has come across the sea from the land of
the West. We hear that one of the most extraordinary religious
awakenings has taken place in the United States. As many as fifty
thousand persons are reported to have been added to the churches there in
one month. There never has been known, since about a hundred years ago,
in the days of Jonathan Edwards, such a thorough shaking throughout the
length and breadth of the land, in religious matters. Now, what is there
standing in the way of Great Britain, that we should not see the same?
Why may not every Christian in England pray for the same? Why shouldn’t
he work for the same, and why shouldn’t we have it at last?
There is one curse in America that we do not have, we call no men slaves;
but, if even there, the great work of God’s Spirit has been carried on,
we have at least one more probability why we should have the like. Only
let us strive in prayer, let us labor diligently, and the day shall yet
come when we shall see a great revival, when the name of our God shall be
glorified, and His Churches shall be greatly increased.
It is on that subject I shall address you tonight, from the well known
words in the prayer of Habakkuk, “O Lord, revive Thy work” (KJV).
It is very clear that there are three truths taught in our text:
1. Salvation is God’s work.
2. God’s work of grace sometimes need reviving.
3. No one can revive God’s work but God Himself.
I. The Great Salvation which God has sent into
the world is entirely His own work.
Whether it be in the mass or in the individual, there is no true religion
except it comes from above. A thousand mistakes have been made about
this matter; and there is but one way of proving this truth, which is so
explicit as to deny every error. Some say that religion is, in part at
least, the work of ministers. Certain men, gifted with peculiar powers,
conferred on them by ordination, are set apart to the office of the
regular ministry; and when they read certain prayers, or when they
preach, it is supposed that there is in them a special measure of power
by which the Church and the world are blessed.
Yes, my brethren, God does make use of His ministers to establish His own
work; but no so-called “minister” ever yet had power to intermingle with
God’s work. We may be the instruments, just as Milton’s pen was the
instrument for writing “Paradise Lost,” but the pen might as well claim
the authorship of that wondrous poem as any of us claim the slightest
iota of glory in the work of salvation. God, from first to last, must
have, and shall have, all the glory–neither minister, nor evangelist
shall share in it. There will be a curse and a blight on that man’s
labor who does not always stand behind his Master, and declare that
without Him he can do nothing.
There is another phase of error which also is opposed to this truth. I
believe that many of my brethren, of whom I am now about to speak, do not
see the tendency of certain doctrines they preach; but there are some
preachers who teach doctrines, which, when refined, come to this, “That
man is to help God in the work of salvation.” I do not care who the man
is who says that, he is in error. Man, when he is moved by the Holy
Spirit, and empowered by Him, may help as an instrument in his own
salvation after he has been revived; but the first work of conversion is
altogether irrespective of man, as to its channel. God the Holy Spirit
stimulates the sinner who is “dead in transgressions and sins.” He asks
of the sinner neither “will” nor “power,” but, finding him without
anything, He gives him everything. “Salvation comes from the Lord”
alone. Jonah learned that truth in the belly of the fish, and if some
preachers I know were sent to a place like that, they might learn it too.
A little more trouble with the soul, a little more deep experience, would
make them come out with this grand old truth, that is sometimes called
Calvinism, but which, after all, is only Christianity in its bold, naked
form: “Salvation comes from the Lord.”
We call that man an agnostic who says that the world was not created by
God; but he is worse than an agnostic who takes away the glory of
salvation from God. If I wished to choose one out of two sins, the sin
of denying God’s glory in creation, or in salvation, I would prefer to
deny, against my senses, that God created the world, rather than deny
that God saves souls. If I must commit a sin, let me commit the lesser
one; for it surely is the greatest guilt to try to steal the brightest
jewel in the crown of God, and that is the jewel of the glory of man’s
salvation.
No, my hearers, you may criticize this doctrine if you will; but there
it stands, and you must confess its truth, or else, denying it, you will
be forced to find it true in this life, or in the next. Salvation is
God’s work, from the very first holy desire that is breathed into the
sinner, till the last dying wish with which he enters into Heaven. God
shows the sinner his need; he neither could nor would know his need
unless God showed it to him. It is the Holy Spirit who gives the sinner
an insight into the all-sufficiency of Christ; he would never understand
that unless he were taught of the Spirit. It is, then, the Spirit who
touches the will, influences the conscience, guides the sinner out of
himself to Christ Jesus, who saves him; and after that, it is still all
of God. He who was the Alpha must be the Omega. He must work all our
works in us, or we shall never see God’s face with acceptance. Of this I
am persuaded, if I should even get my feet on the golden threshold of
Paradise, and my finger on its pearly latch, unless I had all-sufficient
grace to take the last step, I should die and perish on the, very doorway
of Heaven. Every Christian should say,
“Grace led my roving feet
To tread the Heavenly road;
And new supplies each hour I meet
While pressing on to God.”
“Grace taught my soul to pray,
And made my eyes overflow;
Twas grace that kept me to this day,
And will not let me go.”
But without grace from God, there is no salvation; for “Salvation comes
from the Lord” alone. This doctrine, I hope, we are all ready to
receive.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
