0350. A UNIVERSAL CHALLENGE.

A UNIVERSAL CHALLENGE.

"Who can say, I have made my heart clean?" (Pro_20:9).

This clearly implies that-

1. The heart needs cleansing. "If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves" (1Jn_1:8). The heart is deceitful above all things. There is none that doeth good, no, not one. "They that are in the flesh cannot please God" (Rom_8:8). The carnal mind is enmity against God.

2. No man can make his own heart clean. "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? Not one" (Job_14:4). Outward reformation is but the whitening of the sepulchre, ornamenting a charnel-house, painting the dead. "Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again." That which is born of the flesh is flesh.

3. The Lord alone can cleanse the heart. "There is nothing too hard for the Lord." "Create in me a clean heart, O Lord, and renew a right spirit within me" (Psa_51:10). "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (1Jn_1:8-9). The heart may be cleansed as a fountain, like the stream at Jericho, by the putting in of the new cruse of the Spirit, with the salt of the Word of God (2Ki_2:20-21).

Autor: James Smith