"I went by the field of the slothful, and by the vineyard of the man
void of understanding; And, lo, it was all grown over with thorns, and
nettles had covered the face thereof, and the stone wall thereof was
broken down. Then I saw, and considered it well: I looked upon it, and
received instruction."--PROVERBS 24:30-32.
No doubt Solomon was sometimes glad to lay aside the robes of state,
escape from the forms of court, and go through the country unknown. On
one occasion, when he was doing so, he looked over the broken wall of a
little estate which belonged to a farmer of his country. This estate
consisted of a piece of ploughed land and a vineyard. One glance showed
him that it was owned by a sluggard, who neglected it, for the weeds had
grown right plentifully and covered all the face of the ground. From
this Solomon gathered instruction. Men generally learn wisdom if they
have wisdom. The artist's eye sees the beauty of the landscape because
he has beauty in his mind. "To him that hath shall be given," and he
shall have abundance, for he shall reap a harvest even from the field
that is covered with thorns and nettles. There is a great difference
between one man and another in the use of the mind's eye. I have a book
entitled, "The Harvest of a Quiet Eye," and a good book it is: the
harvest of a quiet eye can be gathered from a sluggard's land as well as
from a well-managed farm. When we were boys we were taught a little
poem, called, "Eyes and no Eyes," and there was much of truth in it, for
some people have eyes and see not, which is much the same as having no
eyes; while others have quick eyes for spying out instruction. Some look
only at the surface, while others see not only the outside shell but the
living kernel of truth which is hidden in all outward things.
_We may find instruction everywhere._ To a spiritual mind nettles have
their use, and weeds have their doctrine. Are not all thorns and
thistles meant to be teachers to sinful men? Are they not brought forth
of the earth on purpose that they may show us what sin has done, and the
kind of produce that will come when we sow the seed of rebellion against
God? "I went by the field of the slothful, and by the vineyard of the
man void of understanding," says Solomon; "I saw, and considered it
well: I looked upon it, and received instruction." Whatever you see,
take care to consider it well, and you will not see it in vain. You
shall find books and sermons everywhere, in the land and in the sea, in
the earth and in the skies, and you shall learn from every living beast,
and bird, and fish, and insect, and from every useful or useless plant
that springs out of the ground.
_We may also gather rare lessons from things that we do not like._ I am
sure that Solomon did not in the least degree admire the thorns and the
nettles that covered the face of the vineyard, but he nevertheless found
instruction in them. Many are stung by nettles, but few are taught by
them. Some men are hurt by briers, but here is one who was improved by
them. Wisdom hath a way of gathering grapes of thorns and figs of
nettles, and she distils good from herbs which in themselves are noisome
and evil. Do not fret, therefore, over thorns, but get good out of them.
Do not begin stinging yourself with nettles, grip them firmly, and then
use them for your soul's health. Trials and troubles, worries and
turmoils, little frets and little disappointments, may all help you if
you will. Like Solomon, see and consider them well--look upon them, and
receive instruction.
As for us, we will now, first, consider _Solomon's description of a
sluggard_: he is "a man void of understanding"; secondly, we shall
notice _his description of the sluggard's land_: "it was all grown over
with thorns, and nettles had covered the face thereof." When we have
attended to these two matters we will close by _endeavoring to gather
the instruction which this piece of waste ground may yield us_.
First, think of SOLOMON'S DESCRIPTION OF A SLOTHFUL MAN. Solomon was a
man whom none of us would contradict, for he knew as much as all of us
put together; and besides that, he was under divine inspiration when he
wrote this Book of Proverbs. Solomon says, a sluggard is "a man void of
understanding." The slothful does not think so; he puts his hands in his
pockets, and you would think from his important air that he had all the
Bank of England at his disposal. You can see that he is a very wise man
in his own esteem, for he gives himself airs which are meant to impress
you with a sense of his superior abilities. How he has come by his
wisdom it would be hard to say. He has never taken the trouble to
think, and yet I dare not say that he jumps at his conclusions, because
he never does such a thing as jump, he lies down and rolls into a
conclusion. Yet he knows everything, and has settled all points:
meditation is too hard work for him, and learning he never could endure;
but to be clever by nature is his delight. He does not want to know more
than he knows, for he knows enough already, and yet he knows nothing.
The proverb is not complimentary to him, but I am certain that Solomon
was right when he called him "a man void of understanding." Solomon was
rather rude according to the dainty manners of the present times,
because this gentleman had a field and a vineyard, and as Poor Richard
saith, "When I have a horse and a cow every man biddeth me good morrow."
How can a man be void of understanding who has a field and a vineyard?
Is it not generally understood that you must measure a man's
understanding by the amount of his ready cash? At all events you shall
soon be flattered for your attainments if you have attained unto wealth.
Such is the way of the world, but such is not the way of Scripture.
Whether he has a field and a vineyard or not, says Solomon, if he is a
sluggard he is a fool, or if you would like to see his name written out
a little larger, he is a man empty of understanding. Not only does he
not understand anything, but he has no understanding to understand with.
He is empty-headed if he is a sluggard. He may be called a gentleman, he
may be a landed proprietor, he may have a vineyard and a field; but he
is none the better for what he has: nay, he is so much the worse,
because he is a man void of understanding, and is therefore unable to
make use of his property.
I am glad to be told by Solomon so plainly that a slothful man is void
of understanding, for it is useful information. I have met with persons
who thought they perfectly understood the doctrines of grace, who could
accurately set forth the election of the saints, the predestination of
God, the firmness of the divine decree, the necessity of the Spirit's
work, and all the glorious doctrines of grace which build up the fabric
of our faith; but these gentlemen have inferred from these doctrines
that they have to do nothing, and thus they have become sluggards.
Do-nothingism is their creed. They will not even urge other people to
labor for the Lord, because, say they, "God will do his own work.
Salvation is all of grace!" The notion of these sluggards is that a man
is to wait, and do nothing; he is to sit still, and let the grass grow
up to his ankles in the hope of heavenly help. To arouse himself would
be an interference with the eternal purpose, which he regards as
altogether unwarrantable. I have known him look sour, shake his aged
head, and say hard things against earnest people who were trying to win
souls. I have known him run down young people, and like a great steam
ram, sink them to the bottom, by calling them unsound and ignorant. How
shall we survive the censures of this dogmatic person? How shall we
escape from this very knowing and very captious sluggard? Solomon
hastens to the rescue and extinguishes this gentleman by informing us
that he is void of understanding. Why, he is the standard of orthodoxy,
and he judges everybody! Yet Solomon applies another standard to him,
and says he is void of understanding. He may know the doctrine, but he
does not understand it; or else he would know that the doctrines of
grace lead us to seek the grace of the doctrines; and that when we see
God at work we learn that he worketh in us, not to make us go to sleep,
but to will and to do of his own good pleasure. God's predestination of
a people is his ordaining them unto good works that they may show forth
his praise. So, if you or I shall from any doctrines, however true, draw
the inference that we are warranted in being idle and indifferent about
the things of God, we are void of understanding; we are acting like
fools; we are misusing the gospel; we are taking what was meant for meat
and turning it into poison. The sluggard, whether he is sluggish about
his business or about his soul, is a man void of understanding.
As a rule we may measure a man's understanding by his useful activities;
this is what the wise man very plainly tells us. Certain persons call
themselves "cultured," and yet they cultivate nothing. Modern thought,
as far as I have seen anything of its actual working, is a bottle of
smoke, out of which comes nothing solid; yet we know men who can
distinguish and divide, debate and discuss, refine and refute, and all
the while the hemlock is growing in the furrow, and the plough is
rusting. Friend, if your knowledge, if your culture, if your education
does not lead you practically to serve God in your day and generation,
you have not learned what Solomon calls wisdom, and you are not like the
Blessed One, who was incarnate wisdom, of whom we read that "he went
about doing good." A lazy man is not like our Saviour, who said, "My
Father worketh hitherto, and I work." True wisdom is practical: boastful
culture vapors and theorizes. Wisdom ploughs its field, wisdom hoes its
vineyard, wisdom looks to its crops, wisdom tries to make the best of
everything; and he who does not do so, whatever may be his knowledge of
this, of that, or of the other, is a man void of understanding.
Why is he void of understanding? Is it not because _he has opportunities
which he does not use_? His day has come, his day is going, and he lets
the hours glide by to no purpose. Let me not press too hardly upon any
one, but let me ask you all to press as hardly as you can upon
yourselves while you enquire each one of himself, Am I employing the
minutes as they fly? This man had a vineyard, but he did not cultivate
it; he had a field, but he did not till it. Do you, brethren, use all
your opportunities? I know we each one have some power to serve God; do
we use it? If we are his children he has not put one of us where we are
of necessity useless. Somewhere we may shine by the light which he has
given us, though that light be only a farthing candle. Are we thus
shining? Do we sow beside all waters? Do we in the morning sow our seed,
and in the evening still stretch out our hand? for if not, we are
rebuked by the sweeping censure of Solomon, who saith that the slothful
is a "man void of understanding."
Having opportunities he did not use them, and next, _being bound to the
performance of certain duties he did not fulfil them_. When God
appointed that every Israelite should have a piece of land, under that
admirable system which made every Israelite a land owner, he meant that
each man should possess his plot, not to let it lie waste, but to
cultivate it. When God put Adam in the garden of Eden it was not that he
should walk through the glades and watch the spontaneous luxuriance of
the unfallen earth, but that he might dress it and keep it, and he had
the same end in view when he allotted each Jew his piece of land; he
meant that the holy soil should reach the utmost point of fertility
through the labor of those who owned it. Thus the possession of a field
and a vineyard involved responsibilities upon the sluggard which he
never fulfilled, and therefore he was void of understanding. What is
your position, dear friend? A father? A master? A servant? A minister? A
teacher? Well, you have your farms and your vineyards in those
particular spheres; but if you do not use those positions aright you
will be void of understanding, because you neglect the end of your
existence. You miss the high calling which your Maker has set before
you.
The slothful farmer was unwise in these two respects, and in another
also; _for he had capacities which he did not employ_. He could have
tilled the field and cultivated the vineyard if he had chosen to do so.
He was not a sickly man, who was forced to keep his bed, but he was a
lazy-bones who was there of choice.
You are not asked to do in the service of God that which is utterly
beyond you, for it is expected of us according to what we have and not
according to what we have not. The man of two talents is not required to
bring in the interest of five, but he is expected to bring in the
interest of two. Solomon's slothful was too idle to attempt tasks which
were quite within his power. Many have a number of dormant faculties of
which they are scarcely aware, and many more have abilities which they
are using for themselves, and not for Him who created them. Dear
friends, if God has given us any power to do good, pray let us do it,
for this is a wicked, weary world. We should not even cover a
glow-worm's light in such a darkness as this. We should not keep back a
syllable of divine truth in a world that is so full of falsehood and
error. However feeble our voices, let us lift them up for the cause of
truth and righteousness. Do not let us be void of understanding, because
we have opportunities that we do not use, obligations that we do not
fulfil, and capacities which we do not exercise.
As for a sluggard in soul matters, he is indeed void of understanding,
for _he trifles with matters which demand his most earnest heed_. Man,
hast thou never cultivated thy heart? Hast the ploughshare never broken
up the clods of thy soul? Has the seed of the Word never been sown in
thee? or has it taken no root? Hast thou never watered the young plants
of desire? Hast thou never sought to pull up the weeds of sin that grow
in thy heart? Art thou still a piece of the bare common or wild heath?
Poor soul! Thou canst trim thy body, and spend many a minute at the
glass; dost thou not care for thy soul? How long thou takest to decorate
thy poor flesh, which is but worm's meat, or would be in a minute if God
took away thy breath! And yet all the while thy soul is uncombed,
unwashed, unclad, a poor neglected thing. Oh it should not be so. You
take care of the worse part and leave the better to perish through
neglect. This is the height of folly! He that is a sluggard as to the
vineyard of his heart is a man void of understanding. If I must be idle,
let it be seen in my field and my garden, but not in my soul.
Or are you a Christian? Are you really saved, and are you negligent in
the Lord's work? Then, indeed, whatever you may be, I cannot help saying
you have too little understanding; for surely, when a man is saved
himself, and understands the danger of other men's souls, he must be in
earnest in trying to pluck the firebrands from the flame. A Christian
sluggard! Is there such a being? A _Christian_ man on half time? A
Christian man working not at all for his Lord; how shall I speak of him?
_Time_ does not tarry, DEATH does not tarry, HELL does not tarry; Satan
is not lazy, all the powers of darkness are busy: how is it that you and
I can be sluggish, if the Master has put us into his vineyard? Surely we
must be void of understanding if, after being saved by the infinite love
of God, we do not spend and be spent in his service. The eternal fitness
of things demands that a saved man should be an earnest man.
The Christian who is slothful in his Master's service _has no idea what
he is losing_; for the very cream of religion lies in holy consecration
to God. Some people have just enough religion to make it questionable
whether they have any or no. They have enough godliness to make them
uneasy in their ungodliness. They have washed enough of their face to
show the dirt upon the rest of it. "I am glad," said a servant, "that my
mistress takes the sacrament, for otherwise I should not know she had
any religion at all." You smile, and well you may. It is ridiculous that
some people should have no goods in their shop, and yet advertise their
business in all the papers; should make a show of religion, and yet have
none of the Spirit of God. I wish some professors would do Christ the
justice to say, "No, I am _not_ one of his disciples; do not think so
badly of him as to imagine that I can be one of them." We ought to be
reflections _of_ Christ; but I fear many are reflections _upon_ Christ.
When we see a lot of lazy servants, we are apt to think that their
master must be a very idle person himself, or he would never put up with
them. He who employs sluggards, and is satisfied with their snail-like
pace, cannot be a very active man himself. O, let not the world think
that Christ is indifferent to human woe, that Christ has lost his zeal,
that Christ has lost his energy: yet I fear they will say it or think it
if they see those who profess to be laborers in the vineyard of Christ
nothing better than mere sluggards. The slothful, then, is a man void of
understanding; he loses the honor and pleasure which he would find in
serving his Master; he is a dishonor to the cause which he professes to
venerate, and he is storing up thorns for his dying pillow. Let that
stand as settled--the slothful, whether he be a minister, deacon, or
private Christian, is a man void of understanding.
Now, secondly, LET US LOOK AT THE SLUGGARD'S LAND: "I went by the field
of the slothful, and by the vineyard of the man void of understanding;
And, lo, it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the
face thereof." Note, first, that _land will produce something_. Soil
which is good enough to be made into a field and a vineyard must and
will yield some fruit or other; and so you and I, in our hearts and in
the sphere God gives us to occupy, will be sure to produce something. We
cannot live in this world as entire blanks; we shall either do good or
do evil, as sure as we are alive. If you are idle in Christ's work, you
are active in the devil's work. The sluggard by sleeping was doing more
for the cultivation of thorns and nettles than he could have done by any
other means. As a garden will either yield flowers or weeds, fruits or
thistles, so something either good or evil will come out of our
household, our class, or our congregation. If we do not produce a
harvest of good wheat, by laboring for Christ, we shall grow tares to be
bound up in bundles for the last dread burning.
Note again that, if it be not farmed for God, _the soul will yield its
natural produce_; and what is the natural produce of land if left to
itself? What but thorns and nettles, or some other useless weeds? What
is the natural produce of your heart and mine? What but sin and misery?
What is the natural produce of your children if you leave them untrained
for God? What but unholiness and vice? What is the natural produce of
this great city if we leave its streets, and lanes, and alleys without
the gospel? What but crime and infamy? Some harvest there will be, and
the sheaves will be the natural produce of the soil, which is sin,
death, and corruption.
If we are slothful, _the natural produce of our heart and of our sphere
will be most inconvenient and unpleasant to ourselves_. Nobody can sleep
on thorns, or make a pillow of nettles. No rest can come out of an
idleness which lets ill alone, and does not by God's Spirit strive to
uproot evil. While you are sleeping, Satan will be sowing. If you
withhold the seed of good, Satan will be lavish with the seed of evil,
and from that evil will come anguish and regret for time, and it may be
for eternity. O man, the garden put into thy charge, if thou waste thy
time in slumber, will reward thee with all that is noisome and painful.
"Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee."
_In many instances there will be a great deal of this evil produce_; for
a field and a vineyard will yield more thistles and nettles than a piece
of ground that has never been reclaimed. If the land is good enough for
a garden, it will present its owner with a fine crop of weeds if he
only stays his hand. A choice bit of land fit for a vineyard of red wine
will render such a profusion of nettles to the slothful that he shall
rub his eyes with surprise. The man who might do most for God, if he
were renewed, will bring forth most for Satan if he be let alone. The
very region which would have glorified God most if the grace of God were
there to convert its inhabitants, will be that out of which the vilest
enemies of the gospel will arise. Rest assured of that; the best will
become the worst if we neglect it. Neglect is all that is needed to
produce evil. If you want to know the way of salvation, I must take some
pains to tell you; but if you want to know the way to be lost, my reply
is easy; for it is only a matter of negligence:--"How shall we escape if
we neglect so great salvation?" If you desire to bring forth a harvest
unto God, I may need long to instruct you in ploughing, sowing, and
watering; but if you wish your mind to be covered with Satan's hemlock,
you have only to leave the furrows of your nature to themselves. The
slothful asks for "A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of
the hands to sleep," and the thorns and thistles multiply beyond all
numbering, and prepare for him many a sting.
While we look upon the lazy man's vineyard let us also peep into the
ungodly sluggard's heart. He does not care about repentance and faith.
To think about his soul, to be in earnest about eternity, is too much
for him. He wants to take things easy, and have a little more folding of
the arms to sleep. What is growing in his mind and character? In some of
these spiritual sluggards you can see drunkenness, uncleanness,
covetousness, anger, and pride, and all sorts of thistles and nettles;
or where these ranker weeds do not appear, by reason of the restraint of
pious connections, you find other sorts of sin. The heart cannot be
altogether empty, either Christ or the devil will possess it. My dear
friend, if you are not decided for God, you cannot be a neutral. In this
war every man is for God or for his enemy. You cannot remain like a
sheet of blank paper. The legible handwriting of Satan is upon you--can
you not see the blots? Unless Christ has written across the page his own
sweet name, the autograph of Satan is visible. You may say, "I do not go
into open sin; I am moral," and so forth. Ah, if you would but look, and
consider, and search into your heart, you would see that enmity to God
and to his ways, and hatred of purity, are there. You do not love God's
law, nor love his Son, nor love his gospel, you are alienated in your
heart, and there is in you all manner of evil desires and vain thoughts,
and these will flourish and increase so long as you are a spiritual
sluggard, and leave your heart uncultivated. O, may the Spirit of God
arouse you; may you be stirred to anxious, earnest thought, and then you
will see that these rank growths must be uprooted, and that your heart
must be turned up by the plough of conviction, and sown with the good
seed of the gospel, till a harvest rewards the great Husbandman.
Friend, if you believe in Christ, I want to peep over the hedge into
_your heart_ also, if you are a sluggish Christian; for I fear that
nettles and thistles are threatening you also. Did I not hear you sing
the other day--
"'Tis a point I long to know"?
That point will often be raised, for doubt is a seed which is sure to
grow in lazy men's minds. I do not remember reading in Mr. Wesley's
diary a question about his own salvation. He was so busy in the harvest
of the Master that it did not occur to him to distrust his God. Some
Christians have little faith in consequence of their having never sown
the grain of mustard-seed which they have received. If you do not sow
your faith by using it, how can it grow? When a man lives by faith in
Christ Jesus, and his faith exercises itself actively in the service of
his Lord, it takes root, grows upward, and become strong, till it chokes
his doubts. Some have sadly morbid forebodings; they are discontented,
fretful, selfish, murmuring, and all because they are idle. These are
the weeds that grow in sluggards' gardens. I have known the slothful
become so peevish that nothing could please them; the most earnest
Christian could not do right for them; the most loving Christians could
not be affectionate enough; the most active church could not be
energetic enough; they detected all sorts of wrong where God himself saw
much of the fruit of his Spirit. This censoriousness, this contention,
this perpetual complaining is one of the nettles that are quite sure to
grow in men's gardens when they fold their arms in sinful ease. If your
heart does not yield fruit to God it will certainly bring forth that
which is mischievous in itself, painful to you, and injurious to your
fellow-men. Often the thorns choke the good seed; but it is a very
blessed thing when the good seed comes up so thick and fast that it
chokes the thorns. God enables certain Christians to become so fruitful
in Christ that their graces and works stand thick together, and when
Satan throws in the tares they cannot grow because there is no room for
them. The Holy Spirit by his power makes evil to become weak in the
heart, so that it no longer keeps the upper hand. If you are slothful,
friend, look over the field of your heart, and weep at the sight.
May I next ask you to look into _your own house_ and home? It is a
dreadful thing when a man does not cultivate the field of his own
family. I recollect in my early days a man who used to walk out with me
into the villages when I was preaching. I was glad of his company till I
found out certain facts, and then I shook him off, and I believe he
hooked on to somebody else, for he must needs be gadding abroad every
evening of the week. He had many children, and these grew up to be
wicked young men and women, and the reason was that the father, while he
would be at this meeting and that, never tried to bring his own children
to the Saviour. What is the use of zeal abroad if there is neglect at
home? How sad to say, "My own vineyard have I not kept." Have you never
heard of one who said he did not teach his children the ways of God
because he thought they were so young that it was very wrong to
prejudice them, and he had rather leave them to choose their own
religion when they grew older? One of his boys broke his arm, and while
the surgeon was setting it the boy was swearing all the time. "Ah," said
the good doctor, "I told you what would happen. You were afraid to
prejudice your boy in the right way, but the devil had no such qualms;
he has prejudiced him the other way, and pretty strongly too." It is our
duty to prejudice our field in favor of corn, or it will soon be covered
with thistles. Cultivate a child's heart for good, or it will go wrong
of itself, for it is already depraved by nature. O that we were wise
enough to think of this, and leave no little one to become a prey to the
destroyer.
As it is with homes, so is it with _schools_. A gentleman who joined
this church some time ago had been an atheist for years, and in
conversing with him I found that he had been educated at one of our
great public schools, and to that fact he traced his infidelity. He said
that the boys were stowed away on Sunday in a lofty gallery at the far
end of a church, where they could scarcely hear a word that the
clergyman said, but simply sat imprisoned in a place where it was
dreadfully hot in summer and cold in winter. On Sundays there were
prayers, and prayers, and prayers, but nothing that ever touched his
heart; until he was so sick of prayers that he vowed if he once got out
of the school he would have done with religion. This is a sad result,
but a frequent one. You Sunday-school teachers can make your classes so
tiresome to the children that they will hate Sunday. You can fritter
away the time in school without bringing the lads and lasses to Christ,
and so you may do more hurt than good. I have known Christian fathers
who by their severity and want of tenderness have sown their family
field with the thorns and thistles of hatred to religion instead of
scattering the good seed of love to it. O that we may so live among our
children that they may not only love us, but love our Father who is in
heaven. May fathers and mothers set such an example of cheerful piety
that sons and daughters shall say, "Let us tread in our father's
footsteps, for he was a happy and a holy man. Let us follow our mother's
ways, for she was sweetness itself." If piety does not rule in your
house, when we pass by your home we shall see disorder, disobedience,
pride of dress, folly, and the beginnings of vice. Let not your home be
a sluggard's field, or you will have to rue it in years to come.
Let every deacon, every class-leader, and also every minister enquire
diligently into the state of the field he has to cultivate. You see,
brothers and sisters, if you and I are set over any department of our
Lord's work, and we are not diligent in it, we shall be like barren
trees planted in an orchard, which are a loss altogether, because they
occupy the places of other trees which might have brought forth fruit
unto their owners. We shall cumber the ground, and do damage to our
Lord, unless we render him actual service. Will you think of this? If
you could be put down as a mere cipher in the accounts of Christ, that
would be very sad; but, brother, it cannot be so, you will cause a
deficit unless you create a gain. Oh that through the grace of God we
may be profitable to our Lord and Master! Who among us can look upon his
life-work without some sorrow? If anything has been done aright we
ascribe it all to the grace of God; but how much there is to weep over!
How much that we would wish to amend! Let us not spend time in idle
regrets, but pray for the Spirit of God, that in the future we may not
be void of understanding, but may know what we ought to do, and where
the strength must come from with which to do it, and then give ourselves
up to the doing of it.
I beg you once more to look at the great field of _the world_. Do you
see how it is overgrown with thorns and nettles? If an angel could take
a survey of the whole race, what tears he would shed, if angels could
weep! What a tangled mass of weeds the whole earth is! Yonder the field
is scarlet with the poppy of popery, and over the hedge it is yellow
with the wild mustard of Mahometanism. Vast regions are smothered with
the thistles of infidelity and idolatry. The world is full of cruelty,
oppression, drunkenness, rebellion, uncleanness, misery. What the moon
sees! What God's sun sees! What scenes of horror! How far is all this to
be attributed to a neglectful church? Nearly nineteen hundred years are
gone, and the sluggard's vineyard is but little improved! England has
been touched with the spade, but I cannot say that it has been
thoroughly weeded or ploughed yet. Across the ocean another field
equally favored knows well the ploughman, and yet the weeds are rank.
Here and there a little good work has been done, but the vast mass of
the world still lies a moorland never broken up, a waste, a howling
wilderness. What has the church been doing all these years? She ceased
after a few centuries to be a missionary church, and from that hour she
almost ceased to be a living church. Whenever a church does not labor
for the reclaiming of the desert, it becomes itself a waste. You shall
not find on the roll of history that for a length of time any Christian
community has flourished after it has become negligent of the outside
world. I believe that if we are put into the Master's vineyard, and will
not take away the weeds, neither shall the vine flourish, nor shall the
corn yield its increase. However, instead of asking what the church has
been doing for this nineteen hundred years, let us ask ourselves, What
are we going to do now? Are the missions of the churches of Great
Britain always to be such poor, feeble things as they are? Are the best
of our Christian young men always going to stay at home? We go on
ploughing the home field a hundred times over, while millions of acres
abroad are left to the thorn and nettle. Shall it always be so? God
send us more spiritual life, and wake us up from our sluggishness, or
else when the holy watcher gives in his report, he will say, "I went by
the field of the sluggish church, and it was all grown over with thorns
and nettles, and the stone wall was broken down, so that one could
scarcely tell which was the church and which was the world, yet still
she slept, and slept, and slept, and nothing could waken her."
I conclude by remarking that THERE MUST BE SOME LESSON IN ALL THIS. I
cannot teach it as I would, but I want to learn it myself. I will speak
it as though I were talking to myself.
The first lesson is, that _unaided nature always will produce thorns and
nettles, and nothing else_. My soul, if it were not for grace, this is
all thou wouldst have produced. Beloved, are you producing anything
else? Then it is not nature, but the grace of God that makes you produce
it. Those lips that now most charmingly sing the praises of God would
have been delighted with an idle ballad if the grace of God had not
sanctified them. Your heart, that now cleaves to Christ, would have
continued to cling to your idols--you know what they were--if it had not
been for grace divine. And why should grace have visited you or me--why?
Echo answers, Why? What answer can we give? "'Tis even so, Father, for
so it seemed good in thy sight." Let the recollection of what grace has
done move us to manifest the result of that grace in our lives. Come,
brothers and sisters, inasmuch as we were aforetime rich enough in the
soil of our nature to produce so much of nettle and thistle--and God
only knows how much we did produce--let us now pray that our lives may
yield as much of good corn for the great Husbandman. Will you serve
Christ less than you served your lusts? Will you make less sacrifice
for Christ than you did for your sins? Some of you were whole-hearted
enough when in the service of the evil one, will you be half-hearted in
the service of God? Shall the Holy Spirit produce less fruit in you than
that which you yielded under the spirit of evil?
God grant that we may not be left to prove what nature will produce if
left to itself.
We see here, next, _the little value of natural good intentions_; for
this man, who left his field and vineyard to be overgrown, always meant
to work hard one of these fine days. To do him justice, we must admit
that he did not mean to sleep much longer, for he said--"Yet a little
sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep." Only a
little doze, and then he would tuck up his sleeves and show his muscle.
Probably the worst people in the world are those who have the best
intentions, but never carry them out. In that way Satan lulls many to
sleep. They hear an earnest sermon; but they do not arise and go to
their Father; they only get as far as saying, "Yes, yes, the far country
is not a fit place for me; I will not stay here long. I mean to go home
by-and-by." They said that forty years ago, but nothing came of it. When
they were quite youths they had serious impressions, they were almost
persuaded to be Christians, and yet they are not Christians even now.
They have been slumbering forty years! Surely that is a liberal share of
sleep! They never intended to dream so long, and now they do not mean to
lie in bed much longer. They will not turn to Christ at once, but they
are resolved to do so one day. When are you going to do it, friend?
"Before I die." Going to put it off to the last hour or two, are you?
And so, when unconscious, and drugged to relieve pain, you will begin
to think of your soul? Is this wise? Surely you are void of
understanding. Perhaps you will die in an hour. Did you not hear the
other day of the alderman who died in his carriage? Little must he have
dreamed of that. How would it have fared with you had you also been
smitten while riding at your ease? Have you not heard of persons who
fall dead at their work? What is to hinder your dying with a spade in
your hand? I am often startled when I am told in the week that one whom
I saw on Sunday is dead--gone from the shop to the judgment-seat. It is
not a very long time ago since one went out at the doorway of the
Tabernacle, and fell dead on the threshold. We have had deaths in the
house of God, unexpected deaths; and sometimes people are hurried away
unprepared who never meant to have died unconverted, who always had from
their youth up some kind of desire to be ready, only still they wanted a
little more sleep. Oh, my hearers, take heed of little delays, and short
puttings-off. You have wasted time enough already, come to the point at
once before the clock strikes again. May God the Holy Spirit bring you
to decision.
"Surely you do not object to my having a little more sleep?" says the
sluggard. "You have waked me so soon. I only ask another little nap."
"My dear man, it is far into the morning." He answers, "It is rather
late, I know; but it will not be much later if I take just another
doze." You wake him again, and tell him it is noon. He says, "It is the
hottest part of the day: I daresay if I had been up I should have gone
to the sofa and taken a little rest from the hot sun." You knock at his
door when it is almost evening, and then he cries, "It is of no use to
get up now, for the day is almost over." You remind him of his overgrown
field and weedy vineyard, and he answers, "Yes, I must get up, I know."
He shakes himself and says, "I do not think it will matter much if I
wait till the clock strikes. I will rest another minute or two." He is
glued to his bed, dead while he liveth, buried in his laziness. If he
could sleep forever he would, but he cannot, for the judgment-day will
rouse him. It is written, "And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in
torment." God grant that you spiritual sluggards may wake before that;
but you will not unless you bestir yourselves betimes, for "now is the
accepted time"; and it may be now or never. To-morrow is only to be
found in the calendar of fools; to-day is the time of the wise man, the
chosen season of our gracious God. Oh that the Holy Spirit may lead you
to seize the present hour, that you may at once give yourselves to the
Lord by faith in Christ Jesus, and then from his vineyard--
"Quick uproot
The noisome weeds, that without profit suck
The soil's fertility from wholesome plants."