I have said that as pretexts the three explanations were
unsatisfactory. When a man pleads a previous engagement as a reason
for not accepting an invitation, nine times out of ten it is a
polite way of saying, 'I do not want to go.' It was so in this case.
How all these absolute impossibilities, which made it perfectly out
of the question that the three recreants should sit down at the
table, would have melted into thin air if, by any chance, there had
come into their minds a wish to be there! They would have found
means to look after the field and the cattle and the home, and to be
in their places notwithstanding, if they had wanted. The real reason
that underlies men's turning away from Christ's offer is, as I said
in the beginning of my remarks, that they do not care to have it.
They have no inclinations and no tastes for the higher and purer
blessings.
Brother, do not let us lose ourselves in generalities. I am talking
about you, and about the set of your inclinations and tastes. And I
want you to ask yourself whether it is not a fact that some of you
like oxen better than God; whether it is not a fact that if the two
were there before you, you would rather have a good big field made
over to you than have the food that is spread upon that table.
Well then what is the cause of the perverted inclination? Why is it
that when Christ says, 'Child, come to Me, and I will give thee
pardon, peace, purity, power, hope, Heaven, Myself,' there is no
responsive desire kindled in the heart? Why do I not want God? Why
do I not care for Jesus Christ? Why do the blessings about which
preachers are perpetually talking seem to me so shadowy, so remote
from anything that I need, so ill-fitting to anything that I desire?
There must be something very deeply wrong. This is what is wrong,
your heart has shaken itself loose from dependence upon God; and you
have no love as you ought to have for Him. You prefer to stand
alone. The prodigal son, having gone away into the far country,
likes the swine's husks better than the bread in his father's house,
and it is only when the supply of the latter coarse dainty gives out
that the purer taste becomes strong. Strange, is it not? but yet it
is true.
Now there are one or two things that I want to say about this
indifference, resulting from preoccupation and from alienation, and
which hides its ugliness behind all manner of flimsy excuses. One is
that the reason itself is utterly unreasonable. I have said the true
reason is indifference. Can anybody put into words which do not
betray the absurdity of the position, the conduct of the man who
says, 'I do not want God; give me five yoke of oxen. That is the
real good, and I will stick by that.' There is one mystery in the
world, and if it were solved everything would be solved; and that
mystery is that men turn away from God and cleave to earth. No
account can be given of sin. No account can be given of man's
preference for the lesser and the lower; and neglect of the greater
and the higher, except to say it is utterly inexplicable and
unreasonable.
I need not say such indifference is shameful ingratitude to the
yearning love which provides, and the infinite sacrifice by which
was provided, this great feast to which we are asked. It cost Christ
pains, and tears, and blood, to prepare that feast, and He looks to
us, and says to us, 'Come and drink of the wine which I have
mingled, and eat of the bread which I have provided at such a cost.'
There are monsters of ingratitude, but there are none more
miraculously monstrous than the men who look, as some of us are
doing, untouched on Christ's sacrifice, and listen unmoved to
Christ's pleadings.
The excuses will disappear one day. We can trick our consciences; we
can put off the messengers; we cannot deceive the Host. All the thin
curtains that we weave to veil the naked ugliness of our
unwillingness to accept Christ will be burnt up one day. And I pray
you to ask yourselves, 'What shall I say when He comes and asks me,
"Why was thy place empty at My table"?' 'And he was speechless.' Do
not, dear brethren, refuse that gift, lest you bring upon yourselves
the terrible and righteous wrath of the Host whose invitation you
are slighting, and at whose table you are refusing to sit.