The Spurgeon Series 1855 & 1856. Charles H. Spurgeon
Saviour’s obedience and blood
Hide all my transgressions from view.
There is not a sin against me in God’s book: they have all been for ever obliterated by the blood of Christ, and cancelled by his own right hand. I have nothing to fear; I cannot be condemned. “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect?” Not God, for he has justified, not Christ, for he has died. But if I am justified, who made me so? I say — “And has made me what I am.” Justification from first to last, is of God. Salvation is of the Lord alone.
5. Many of you are sanctified people, but you are not perfectly sanctified; you are not redeemed altogether from the dross of earth; you have still another law in your members, warring against the law of your mind; and you always will have that law while you tabernacle in faith; you never will be perfect in your sanctification until you get up yonder before the solemn throne of God, where even this imperfection of your soul will be taken away, and your carnal depravity rooted out. But yet, beloved, there is an inward principle imparted; you are growing in grace — you are making progress in holiness. Well, but who made you have that progress? Who redeemed you from that lust? Who ransomed you from that vice? Who compelled you say farewell to that practice in which you indulged? Can you not say of Jesus, “And has made us!” It is Christ who has done it all, and to his name be honour, and glory, and praise, and dominion.
6. Let us dwell one moment on this thought, and show you how it is that it can be said that Christ has made us thus. When did Christ make his people kings and priests? When could it be said, “And has made us kings and priests to our God?”
7. 1. First of all, he made us kings and priests, virtually, when he signed the covenant of grace. Far, far back in eternity, the Magna Charta of the saints was written by the hand of God, and it needed one signature to make it valid. There was a stipulation in that covenant that the Mediator should become incarnate, should live a suffering life, and at last endure a death of ignominy; and it needed only one signature, the signature of the Son of God, to make that covenant valid eternally, and “ordered in all things and sure.” I think I see him now, as my imagination pictures the lofty Son of God grasping the pen. See how his fingers write the name; and there it stands in everlasting letters — “THE SON!” Oh sacred ratification of the treaty; it is stamped and sealed with the great seal of our Father in heaven. Oh glorious covenant, then for ever made secure! At the moment of the signature of this wondrous document, the spirits before the throne — I mean the angels — might have taken up the song, and said of the whole body of the elect, “And have made you kings and priests to your God”; and could all the chosen company have come into existence, they could have clapped their hands and sung, “Here we are by that very signature constituted kings and priests to our God.”
8. 2. But he did not stop there. It was not simply agreeing to the terms of the treaty; but in due time he filled it all — yes, to its utmost jot and tittle. Jesus said, “I will take the cup of salvation”; and he did take it — the cup of our deliverance. Bitter were its drops; gall lay in its depths; there were groans, and sighs, and tears, within the red mixture; but he took it all, and drank it to its dregs, and swallowed all the awful draught. All was gone. He drank the cup of salvation, and he ate the bread of affliction. See him, as he drinks the cup in Gethsemane, when the fluid of that cup mingled with his blood, and makes each drop a scalding poison. See how the hot feet of pain travelled down his veins. See how each nerve is twisted and contorted with his agony. Behold his brow covered with sweat, witness the agonies as they follow each other into the very depths of his soul. Speak, you lost, and tell what hell’s torment means; but you cannot tell what the torments of Gethsemane were. Oh! the deep unutterable! There was a depth which couched beneath, when our Redeemer bowed his head, when he placed himself between the upper and nether millstones of his Father’s vengeance, and when his whole soul was ground to powder. Ah! that wrestling God-man — that suffering man of Gethsemane; Weep over him, saints — weep over him, when you see him rising from that prayer in the garden, marching forth to his cross; when you picture him hanging on his cross six long hours in the scorching sun, overwhelmed by his Father’s passing wrath — when you see his side streaming with gore — when you hear his death shriek, “It is finished,” — and see his lips all parched; and moistened by nothing except the vinegar and the gall, — ah! then prostrate yourselves before that cross, bow down before that sufferer, and say, “You have made us — you have made us what we are; we are nothing without you.” The cross of Jesus is the foundation of the glory of the saints; Calvary is the birthplace of heaven; heaven was born in Bethlehem’s manger; had it not been for the sufferings and agonies of Golgotha we would have had no blessing. Oh, saint! in every mercy see the Saviour’s blood; look on this Book — it is sprinkled with his blood; look on this house of prayer — it is sanctified by his sufferings; look on your daily food — it is purchased with his groans. Let every mercy come to you as a blood-bought treasure; value it because it comes from him; and evermore say, “You have made us what we are.”
9. 3. Beloved, our Saviour Jesus Christ finished the great work of making us what we are, by his ascension into heaven. If he had not risen up on high and led captivity captive, his death would have been insufficient. He “died for our sins,” but he “rose again for our justification.” The resurrection of our Saviour, in his majesty, when he burst the bonds of death, was to us the assurance that God had accepted his sacrifice; and his ascension up on high, was a type and a figure of the real and actual ascension of all his saints, when he shall come in the clouds of judgment, and shall call all his people to him. See the God-man, as he goes upward towards heaven, behold his triumphal march through the skies, while stars sing his praises, and planets dance in solemn order; behold him traverse the unknown fields of ether until he arrives at the throne of God in the seventh heaven. Then hear him say to his Father, “I have finished the work which you gave me to do; behold me and the children you have given me; I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course; I have done all; I have accomplished every type; I have finished every part of the covenant; there is not one iota I have left unfulfilled, or one tittle that is left out; all is done.” And listen, how they sing before the throne of God when thus he speaks: “You have made us kings and priests to our God: and we shall reign on the earth.”
10. Thus have I briefly spoken upon the dear Redeemer’s doings. Poor lips cannot speak better; faint heart will not rise up to the height of this great argument. Oh! that these lips had language eloquent and lofty, that they might speak more of the wondrous doings of our Redeemer!
Crown him! crown him!
Crowns become the Saviour’s brow.
11. II. Now, secondly, THE SAINT’S HONOURS: “and have made us kings and priests to our God.” The most honourable of all monarchs have ever been esteemed to be those who had a right not only to royal, but to priestly supremacy — those kings who could wear at one time the crown of royalty, and at another the mitre of the priesthood, who could both use the censer and hold the sceptre — who could offer intercession for the people, and then govern the nations. Those who are kings and priests are great indeed; and here you behold the saint honoured, not with one title, or one office, but with two. He is made not a king merely, but a king and a priest; not a priest merely, but a priest and a king. The saint has two offices conferred upon him at once, he is made a priestly monarch and a regal priest.
12. I shall take, first of all, the royal office of the saints. They are KINGS. They are not merely to be kings in heaven, but they are also kings on earth; for if my text does not say so, the Bible declares it in another passage: “You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood.” We are kings even now. I want you to understand that, before I explain the idea. Every saint of the living God, not merely has the prospect of being a king in heaven, but positively, in the sight of God, he is a king now; and he must say, with regard to his brethren and himself, “And have made us,” even now, “kings and priests to our God; and we shall reign upon the earth.” A Christian is a king. He is not simply like a king, but he is a king, actually and truly. However, I shall try and show you how he is like a king.
13. Remember his royal ancestry.