499. Why He Said It

Why He Said It

1Co_16:22 : ’93If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maran-atha.’94

The smallest lad knows the meaning of all those words except the last two, Anathema Maran-atha. Anathema, to cut off. Maran-atha, at His coming. So the whole passage might be read: ’93If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be cut off at his coming.’94 Well, how could the tender-hearted Paul say that? We have seen him with tears discoursing about human want, and thrilling in tender sympathy with human sorrow; but now he throws those red-hot words into this letter to the Corinthians. Had he lost his patience? Oh, no! Had he resigned his confidence in the Christian religion? Oh, no! Had the world treated him so badly that he had become its sworn enemy? Oh, no! It needs some explanation, I confess, and I shall proceed to show by what process Paul came to the vehement utterance of my text. Before I close, if God shall give his spirit, you shall cease to be surprised at the exclamation of the apostle, and you yourselves will employ the same emphasis, declaring: ’93If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maran-atha.’94

If the photographic art had been discovered early enough, we should have the facial proportions of Christ’97the front face, the side face, Jesus sitting, Jesus standing’97provided he had submitted to that art; but since the sun did not become a portrait-painter until eighteen centuries after Christ, our idea of the Saviour’92s personal appearance is all guess-work. Still, tradition tells us that he was the most infinitely beautiful being that ever walked our small earth. If his features had been rugged, and his gait had been ungainly, that would not have hindered him from being attractive. Many men you have known and loved have had few charms of physiognomy. Wilberforce was not attractive in face. Socrates was repulsive. Suwarrow, the great Russian hero, looked almost an imbecile. And some whom you have known and honored and loved have not had very great attractiveness of personal appearance. The shape of the mouth and the nose and the eyebrow did not hinder the soul from shining through the cuticle of the face in all-powerful irradiation.

But to a lovely exterior Christ joined all loveliness of disposition. Run through the galleries of heaven, and find out that he is a none-such. The sunshine of his love mingling with the shadows of his sorrows, crossed by the crystalline stream of his tears and the crimson flowing forth of his blood, make a picture worthy of being called the masterpiece of the eternities. Hung on the wall of heaven, the celestial population would be enchanted but for the fact that they have the grand and magnificent original, and they want no picture. But Christ having gone away from earth, we are dependent upon four indistinct pictures. Matthew took one, Mark another, Luke another, and John another. I care not which picture you take; it is lovely. Lovely! He was altogether lovely.

He had a way of taking up a dropsical limb without hurting it, and of removing the cataract from the eye without the knife, and of starting the circulation through the shrunken arteries without the shock of the electric battery, and of putting intelligence into the dull stare of lunacy, and of restringing the auditory nerve of the deaf ear, and of striking articulation into the stiff tongue, and of making the stark-naked madman dress himself and exchange tombstone for ottoman, and of unlocking from the skeleton grip of death the daughter of Jairus to embosom her in her glad father’92s arms. He was lovely’97sitting, standing, kneeling, lying down’97always lovely. Lovely in his sacrifice. Why, he gave up everything for us. Home, celestial companionship, music of seraphic harps, balmy breath of eternal summer, all joy, all light, all music, he left, and heard the gates slam shut behind him as he came out to fight for our freedom, and with bare feet plunged on the sharp javelins of human and Satanic hate, until his blood spurted into the faces of those who slew him. You want the soft, low, minor key of sweetest music to describe the pathos; but it needs an orchestra reaching from throne to manger, under swing of archangelic baton, to drum and trumpet the doxologies of his praise. He took everybody’92s trouble’97the leper’92s sickness, the widow’92s dead boy, the harlot’92s shame, the Galilean fisherman’92s poor luck, the invalidism of Simon’92s mother-in-law, the sting of Malchus’92s amputated ear. He took everybody’92s trouble.

Some people cry very easily, and for some it is very difficult to weep. A great many tears on some cheeks do not mean so much as one tear on another cheek. What is it that I see glittering in the mild eye of Jesus? It was all the sorrows of earth, and the woes of hell, from which he had plucked our souls, accreted into one transparent drop, lingering on the lower eyelash until it fell on a cheek red with the slap of human hands’97just one salt, bitter, burning tear of Jesus. No wonder the rock, the sky, and the cemetery were in consternation when he died. No wonder the universe was convulsed. It was the Lord God Almighty bursting into tears! Now suppose that, notwithstanding all this, a man cannot have any affection for him. What ought to be done with such hard behavior? It seems to me that there ought to be some chastisement for a man who will not love such a Christ. Does it not make your blood tingle to think of Jesus coming over the tens of thousands of miles that seem to separate God from us, and then to see a man jostle him out, and push him back, and shut the door in his face, and trample upon his entreaties? While you may not be able to rise up to the towering excitement of the apostle in my text, you can at any rate somewhat understand his feelings when he cried out: ’93After all this, ’91if a man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maran-atha.’92’93 Just look at the injustice of not loving him. Now, there is nothing that excites a man like injustice. You go along the street, and you see your little child buffeted, or a ruffian comes and takes a boy’92s hat and throws it into the ditch. You say: ’93What outrageous meanness, what injustice that is.’94 You cannot stand injustice. I remember, in my boyhood days, attending a large meeting in Tripler Hall, New York. Thousands of people were assembled in indignation, and the same kind of audiences were assembled at the same time in Boston, Edinburgh and London. Why? Because of a wrong done to one family on the other side of the sea. ’93A little thing,’94 you say. Ah, that injustice was enough to arouse the indignation of a world. But while we are so sensitive about injustice as between man and man, how insensible we are about injustice between man and God. If there ever was a fair and square purchase of anything, then Christ purchased us. He paid for us, not in shekels, not in ancient coins inscribed with effigies of Hercules or ‘c6gina’92s tortoise or lyre of Mitylene, but in two kinds of coin’97one red, the other glittering’97blood and tears! If anything is purchased and paid for, ought not the goods to be delivered? If you have bought property and given the money, do you not want to come into possession of it? ’93Yes,’94 you say, ’93I will have it. I bought and paid for it.’94 And you will go to law for it, and you will denounce the man as a defrauder. Ay, if need be, you will hurl him into jail. You will say: ’93I am bound to get that property. I bought it. I paid for it.’94

Now, transpose the case. Suppose Jesus Christ to be the wronged purchaser on the one side, and the impenitent soul on the other, trying to defraud him of that which he bought at such an infinite price, and how do you feel about that injustice? How do you feel toward that spiritual fraud, turpitude and perfidy? A man with an ardent temperament rises and he says that such injustice as between man and man is bad enough, but between man and God it is reprehensible and intolerable, and he brings his fist down on the pew, and he says: ’93I can stand this injustice no longer. After all this purchase, ’91if any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maran-atha.’92’93

I go still further, and show you how suicidal it is for a man not to love Christ. If a man gets in trouble, and he cannot get out, we have only one feeling toward him’97sympathy and a desire to help him. If he has failed for a vast amount of money, and cannot pay more than ten cents on a dollar’97ay, if he cannot pay anything’97though his creditors may come after him like a pack of hounds, we sympathize with him. We go to his store or house and we express our condolence. But suppose the day before that man failed William E. Dodge had come into his store, and said: ’93My friend, I hear you are in trouble. I have come to help you. If ten thousand dollars will see you through your perplexity, I will lend you that amount. Here is a cheque for the amount of that loan.’94 Suppose the man said: ’93With that ten thousand dollars I could get through until next spring, and then everything will be all right; but, Mr. Dodge, I do not want it; I will not take it; I would rather fail than take it; I do not even thank you for offering it.’94 Your sympathy for that man would cease immediately. You would say: ’93He had a fair offer; he might have got out; he wants to fail; he refuses all help; now let him fail.’94 There is no one who would have any sympathy for that man.

But do not let us be too hasty. Christ hears of our spiritual embarrassments. He finds that we are on the very verge of eternal defalcation. He finds the law knocking at our door with this dun: ’93Pay me what thou owest.’94 We do not know which way to turn. Pay? We cannot pay a farthing of all the millions of obligation. Well, Christ comes in and says: ’93Here is my name; you can use my name. Your name would be worthless, but my red handwriting on the back of this obligation will get you through anywhere.’94 Now suppose the soul says: ’93I know I am in debt; I cannot meet these obligations either in time or eternity; but O Christ, I want not thy help; I ask not thy rescue. Go away from me.’94 You would say: ’93That man, why, he deserves to die. He had the offer of help, he would not take it. He is a free agent; he ought to have what he wants; he chooses death rather than life. Ought you not give him freedom of choice?’94 Though a while ago there was only one ardent man who understood the apostle, now there are hundreds among us who can say and do say within themselves: ’93After all this ingratitude, and rejection and obstinacy, ’91if any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maran-atha.’92’93

I go a step further, and say it is most cruel for a man not to love Jesus. The meanest thing I could do for you would be needlessly to hurt your feelings. Sharp words sometimes pierce like a dagger. An unkind look will sometimes rive like the lightning. An unkind deed may overmaster a sensitive spirit, and if you have made up your mind that you have done wrong to any one, it does not take you two minutes to make up your mind to go and apologize. Now, Christ is a bundle of delicacy and sensitiveness. How you have shocked his nerves! How you have broken his heart! Did you ever measure the meaning of that one passage: ’93Behold, I stand at the door and knock’94? It never came to me as it did one morning while I was thinking on this subject. ’93Behold, I stand at the door and knock.’94 Some January day, the thermometer five degrees below zero, the wind and sleet beating mercilessly against you, you go up the steps of a house where you have a very important errand. You knock with one knuckle. No answer. You are very earnest, and you are freezing. The next time you knock harder. After a while with your fist you beat against the door. You must get in, but the inmate is careless or stubborn, and he does not want you in. Your errand is a failure. You go away. The Lord Jesus Christ comes up at the gate of your heart, and with very sore hand he knocks hard at the door of your soul. He is standing in the cold blasts of human suffering. He knocks. He says: ’93Let me in. I have come a great way. I have come all the way from Nazareth, from Bethlehem, from Golgotha. Let me in. I am shivering and blue with the cold. Let me in. My feet are bare, but for their covering of blood. My head is uncovered, but for a turban of brambles. By all these wounds of foot and head and heart I beg you to let me in. Oh! I have been here a great while, and the night is getting darker. I am faint with hunger. I am dying to get in. Oh! lift the latch’97shove back the bolt. Will you not let me in? ’91Behold, I stand at the door and knock.’92’93

My text pronounces Anathema Maran-atha upon all those who refuse to love Christ. Anathema’97cut off. Cut off from light, from hope, from peace, from heaven. Oh, sharp, keen, sword-like words! Cut off! Everlastingly cut off! Behold, therefore, the goodness and severity of God; on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness; otherwise thou also shalt be cut off. Maran-atha’97that is the other word. ’93When he comes’94 is the meaning of it. Will he come? I see no signs of it. I looked into the sky. I saw no signs of the coming. No signal of Christ’92s appearance. The earth stands solid on its foundation. No cry of welcome or of woe. Will he come? He will. Maran-atha! Hear it, ye mountains, and prepare to fall. Ye cities, and prepare to burn. Ye nations, and receive your doom! Maran-atha! Maran-atha!

Autor: T. De Witt Talmage