March 1943
No man is a sinner because he is a skeptic or a critic; he is a skeptic or critic because he is a sinner. There is a skeleton in the closet somewhere. “THY heart is not right in the sight of God.” It is easy to say that some one else has sinned. It is not so difficult to say, “All have sinned.” But hardest of all is to say, “ I have sinned.” Heart Trouble Notice next, “Thy HEART is not right in the sight of God.” Simon’s trouble was heart trouble. It was not head trouble. He-was smart enough. We live in a land of collegers, but “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God’M l Cor. 2:14), and the only difference between an edu cated and an uneducated sinner is that the educated sinner uses longer words to expose his ignorahce of eter nal truths. They told us a few years ago that education would wipe out crime. Today we have schools on al most every other corner, but the peni tentiaries are filled with criminals, most of them of school age and many of them college trained. -The real trouble is heart trouble, and we have been treating the symptoms instead of the disease. “Thy HEART is not right in the sight of God.” Simon’s trouble was not financial; he had money, but what he needed was “without money and without price.” We have been told that an equal distribution of wealth would solve our ills. But if it were dis tributed^ equally, a few people would have most of it again by the end of the week. Peace and power from above cannot be purchased. “Thy HEART is not right in the sight of God.” Something must be done about that! Again, so far as I know, Simon was a moral man. Morality is good enough in its place,, but it will not take us to heaven. .You may be an honest, sin cere, upstanding, outstanding gentle man, but so was Nicodemus, and he needed to be born again. You may be “good-hearted” as men measure it, but is your heart right with God? And Simon had a reputation. People said, “This man is the great power of God.” Think of having that said about you, and yet, all the while, your heart is not right with God! Our Lord told us that men would prophesy and cast out devils and do wonderful works in His name, and yet would hear Him say, “Depart,” “I never knew you” (Matt. 7:23). Mind you, people did not rate Simon a bad man, but exactly the contrary; they thought he had the power of God. We are dealing with no small fry here. This man had a name all
Making It Personal Observe, first, how personal this is: “THY heart is not right in the sight of God.” Everywhere I go, I find sinners criticizing the Bible and preachers, churches and Christians and spiritual things in general. I never waste time ■ answering their charges, for that is not their real trouble; those charges are only alibis, smoke screens to hide their true condition. Ever since Adam blamed Eve and Eve blamed the ser pent, man has been “passing the buck,” seeing the mote and forgetting the beam. Some time ago a man came out of one of Europe’s great art galleries. As he passed the door, he said contemptu ously, “There’s nothing in there worth looking at.” The old doorkeeper replied very politely, “If you please, sir, the pic tures are no longer on trial, but the spectators are!” So when men revile the things of God, they only show up themselves. If a street urchin went to hear Fritz Kreisler and came out complaining, that would be no reflection on Kreis- ler. The trouble with the critic of the gospel is in himself: “THY heart is not right in the sight of God.” * If you are trying to justify yourself by condemning the preachers, you only expose your own sinful heart. Hypocrites in the church? Of course there are. One doesn’t have to be a pastor for a week before he discovers that. But why pick out the poorest specimen in the church to hide behind, and even then he is bigger than your self or else you couldn’t hide behind him! The man who knows how to run a church is always the fellow who never tried it. For one man digging potatoes, there have always been a dozen sitting bn the fence telling how to dig potatoes. It would be amusing if it were not so pitiful, when earnest Christians are denying themselves laboring in the midst of sin and when missionaries are living from hand to mouth and preachers are struggling on pitiful sal aries giving out the gospel, to watch some armchair philosopher, who never cared whether the world went to hell or not, complaining about hypocrites in the church while he goes on to hell to live with hypocrites forever. , Ah, friend, if you are in the seat of the scornful, the trouble is YOU. “THY heart is not right in the sight of God,” and you had better learn to sing with the colored folk, “Not the preacher nor the deacon but it’s me, O Lord, Standin’ in the need of prayer.”
THY HEART IN THE SIGHT OF GOD [Continued from Page 85] have some bugs. Shall we put out the light? No, swat the bug and let the light shine! Under the preaching of Philip, the Samaritans turned to the gospel, and Simon the sorcerer went along with them. He had no saving faith; he was an opportunist and decided he had better ride the bandwagon while it went by. You will observe that even Philip had false converts. That was no fault of his. He could not read Si mon’s heart; so he baptized him along with the rest. One morning Sam Jones met a drunkard who had been attending his meetings. v “Mr. Jones,” said the derelict, “I’m one of your converts;” “ You must be one of mine,” said Sam, “ for I see that you’re hone of God’s.” But Peter and John came down to Samaria, and Simon Peter met Simon the sorcerer who wanted to buy the power of the Holy Spirit for his own selfish use. He is not alone in this matter. There are thousands today who would like to secure the blessings of God on their own terms. If salva tion could be bought for a hundred dollars,' practically everybody would get it. But it is free; so most people go to hell. Likewise the power of God’s Spirit cannot be p u r c h a s e d ; it is neither earned nor learned. Unless we come repentantly and humbly to Calvary for salvation and to Pentecost for the Spirit’s empowering, we have neither part nor lqt in this matter. Spiritual power cannot be secured on our terms; it is the gift of God on His terms. Nor is it reached merely by hours of ago nizing. The filling of the Spirit is the privilege of every believer; he is al ready indwelt by the Spirit and may be filled as he yields himself to God. So Simon the apostle looked at Simon the sorcerer, and by th'e Holy Spirit he analyzed his case and diag nosed his condition and prescribed treatment in no uncertain terms. For, although Simon was a professing Christian and baptized, he was just a crooked imposter, still in the gall of bitterness and the bond of iniquity. And the whole trouble is summed up in our text: “Thy heart is not right in the-jsight of God.” Perhaps it will lend force to this terrific pronouncement to emphasize certain words in it: “THY heart is not right in the sight o f , God ” ; “Thy HEART is not right in the sight of God” ; “Thy heart IS NOT RIGHT irt the sight of God” ; , “Thy heart is not right IN THE SIGHT OF GOD.”
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