"If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin; but now they have no cloak for their sin."—John xv. 22.

WHEN the venerable Simeon clasped the infant Savior in his arms, he said to Mary, his mother," Behold this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel, and for a sign that shall be spoken against." In prophetic vision, he looked through the long vista of distant years, saw that to multitudes, in every age, Christ would be a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence; that the preaching of his gospel would try the hearts and form the characters of men, and whilst it would be to some the means of raising them to mansions in the skies, it would be to others the means of sinking them low in the world of despair.

The Jews, to whom the words of the text were first addressed, were a people highly favored of God. Blessings innumerable had been lavished upon them. To them were committed the oracles of God. To them pertained the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises. A long succession of prophets had been raised up to declare to them the messages of heaven, and point them in the way of obedience and eternal life. Jehovah, himself, dwelt in the midst of them, as their glory and defence, and shed over their Goshen a heavenly light; whilst all the world around was sunk in the deepest darkness of heathenism. These high and distinguished advantages they had often and greatly abused, and by their abuse of them had incurred great guilt. Yet our Savior declares in the text, that they had not had sin;

that is, their sin had been small, comparatively nothing, if he had not come and spoken to them. Their former privileges, great as they were, dwindled into nothing in comparison with those which they enjoyed in the miracles, the instructions, and perfect example of the great Teacher. Their former light was darkness, compared with the light that shone upon them from the Sun of Righteousness, and consequently their sin, in the abuse of former mercies, was nothing in comparison with that of which they were guilty in making light of Christ and rejecting the claims of his gospel. This was a sin of such deep and peculiar enormity, that Christ, overlooking, as it were, their former sins, fixes upon this as the only one which they had ever committed. "If I had not come and spoken to them, they had not had sin; but now they have no cloak for their sin." They had heard Christ preach the gospel, but did not embrace it; and this greatly enhanced their guilt, and rendered their condition far more alarming than it would otherwise have been. And this is true of all who hear the gospel without cordially embracing it.

The sentiment, then, suggested by the text, and which I desire at this time to impress on your minds, is this:

When sinners hear the gospel they are in a solemn and critical

situation.

We might give an impressive illustration of this subject by considering the nature of the truths which the gospel contains. They are truths which respect the Almighty God, and the eternal destinies of men. They cannot be rightly contemplated, even by beings not immediately concerned in them, without feelings of the deepest and most solemn interest. Were we mere spectators of the scenes which the gospel unfolds, it would indicate a very bad state of mind, not to be impressed and moved by them.

But we are not mere spectators; we are actors, and most deeply interested in the great things revealed in the gospel. The eternal destiny of our souls is at stake. The gospel does not allow us to contemplate its truths without being affected by them. It comes to us from heaven. It comes clothed with heaven's power, to form us vessels of mercy, fitted unto glory; or vessels of wrath, fitted unto destruction. It does not make known to us the character of a God with whom we have nothing to do; it brings us into the presence of that infinite Being whose government is universal; whose eye is over us in all our ways, and who will treat us in another world according to the character we sustain in this. It does not hold up to our view the spectacle of a lost world as a mere matter of curiosity; it assures us that we belong to the number of the lost, and with them are going to the bar of final judgment. It does not reveal a Savior, on whose person and character we may coldly speculate; it suspends our immortal happiness on a cordial reception of that Savior. It does not simply remove the curtain from the eternal world, and disclose to our view a heaven and a hell, as places of mere fiction; it assures us that we are going to the eternal world,— that in heaven or in hell we are

to dwell forever, according as we receive or reject its messages of grace. This renders the hearing of the gospel a very serious business. This throws a grandeur and an awe around the services of the sanctuary, that may well bid us beware with what feelings we enter this holy place, and engage in its ministrations. Consequences of everlasting moment are pending; the work of judgment and of mercy is going on, the effects of which will be as lasting as our being and as solemn as eternity. And it is from a consideration of these effects that I wish to show that hearing the gospel places sinners in a solemn and critical situation. For,

I. In the first place, it lays them under immediate obligation to embrace it. The gospel is worthy of all acceptation. It is a system of truth which needs only to be understood in order to commend itself to every enlightened conscience. Even those who have been most unwilling to submit to its authority, have been obliged to acknowledge its excellence. The most severe and sceptical examination of it has never been able to detect anything wrong in its doctrines or unreasonable in its precepts.

Now, assuming the fact that men are free moral agents, we say that as soon as they hear and understand the gospel, they are under obligation to embrace it. A bare knowledge of duty always binds the conscience to a performance of it. So the common sense of men decides. The parent considers his child bound to obey his commands as soon as he understands them. The magistrate regards the laws as binding on the subject as soon as they are published. And God always considers men as under obligation to obey his will as soon as it is made known. No allowance is made for indisposition. Whether they have a heart to obey or not, they are under eternal obligation to do what they know is right; and all do know, who have the bible in their hands, that it is right for sinful men to repent and obey the gospel. This is the command of God; this is the dictate of con- . science, and no excuse for delaying obedience can be justified either at the bar of God or of conscience.

I am aware that the want of a disposition, or a right heart, is often urged as an excuse for not obeying the divine commands. But does the parent regard this as absolving his child from obligation to obedience? or the magistrate the subject? Admit that unwillingness, or the want of a right temper of mind, frees men from their obligations to obey, and you put an end to all government and to all restraint. The sensualist could plead it, and indulge without remorse or fear of punishment, the vilest passions. The thief and the assassin could plead it, and range unrestrained through your streets in quest of plunder and of blood. The fact is, obligation to obedience depends on a knowledge of duty, and not in the least on a disposition to perform it. Accordingly the apostle declares, that to him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin. To know our duty is to be under obligation to do it. There is not in the wide universe an exception to this rule. The moment the Lord Jesus speaks, there is

no longer any cloak for sin. The moment the commands of God are known, they are binding. Publish the command, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thyself;" and it instantly becomes obligatory on every one that hears it. Publish the command, "Repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ ;" and every sinner is laid under obligation to repent and accept the Savior. Propose the terms of mercy revealed in the gospel, and all are bound, by obligations from which they can never escape, immediately to embrace them.

2. Hearing the gospel places sinners in a solemn and critical situation, because it renders it necessary for them either to receive or to reject it. When the child knows the will of its parent, he must obey or disobey. And when sinners know what God requires of them, they must be either willing or unwilling to yield obedience. There is no middle course. The commands of their Sovereign are made known; they understand them, and now the only alternative is, either to obey or disobey. There is no possibility of assuming neutral ground. They are forced to a stand, and must either submit to, or rebel against the acknowledged authority of God, their Savior. And certainly, than such a situation none more solemn can be conceived, this side the eternal world. Here is an immortal being, a lost sinner, to whom proposals of mercy are made, and the question to be decided is, shall he accede to them and live, or reject them and die; one or the other he must do.

The attitude of indifference or neutrality he cannot take. The command is positive: - Repent, believe, take up the cross, follow Christ. These duties, binding as they are on every living man, as soon as he understands them, demand feeling, action, effort. Indifference, then, is disobedience; neglect is transgression. To stand still when the command bids you go forward; to do nothing when God calls you to action, is as truly resistance to his authority, and as distinctly marks you a despiser of his grace, as open defiance or positive rebellion. Here is no room for exemption, none for neutrality. For or against the Savior, the friends or the enemies of Christ, we must be; and whether we will be the one or the other is necessarily decided by us, whenever the proposals of the gospel are proclaimed in our hearing.

3. Hearing the gospel places sinners in a solemn and critical situation, because it is to all who hear it, a savor of life unto life, or of death unto death. It always hardens or softens the heart; prepares for heaven, or fits for hell. It is impossible to hear the great truths of the gospel without being essentially affected by them— without receiving impressions that will last forever.

It is a common and just remark, that we are the creatures of habit. We are the pupils of every object around us. The works of creation, the events of providence, our fellow men, our common enjoyments and daily occupations; and above all, the great truths of the bible, are constantly operating to form our characters, and prepare us for our future and everlasting state. Whether these things shall