CHRIST’S MOTIVE AND OURS – Charles Spurgeon
CHRIST’S MOTIVE AND OURS
“For your sakes.” 2 Corinthians 8:9. “For His sake.” Philippians 1:29. The true test of any action lies in its motive. Many a deed that seems glorious is really mean and ignoble because it is done with a base intention, while other actions, which appear poor and paltry, would, if we truly understood them, be seen to be full of glory and beauty due to a noble purpose. The mainspring of a watch is the most important part of it; the spring of an action is everything. My sermon from these two texts will focus on the motive that inspired Christ’s redeeming work and the motive that should inspire our service for Him. He did all for our sakes—we should do all for His sake. Fix your attention, then, chiefly not on the deed, but on the motive that is its root. The less self there is in any effort, the nobler it becomes. A great work, undertaken and completed for selfish motives, is much less praiseworthy than the feeble endeavor put forth to help others. Selfishness is, perhaps, the worst of all meanness, but spiritual selfishness is the form of evil most to be dreaded. With Christ, there was no self-seeking. Not for Himself did He come to earth—not for Himself did He suffer.
He lived for others and died for others. “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you, through His poverty, might be rich.” In this glorious unselfishness, Christ is not only our Savior, He is also our Example. As He did not live for self, we, too, must learn to deny ourselves and live like He did. It is in living and acting, “for His sake,” that we shall most truly “follow His steps.” We are often told, in these days, that we should live for the good of others, and we ought to heed the call. But there is so little in our fellow men to call forth the spirit of self-sacrifice that if we have no higher motive, we shall soon become tired of our efforts on their behalf. The true way is to live for Christ, and then, “for His sake,” seek to save our fellow men. With such a constraining power, we shall not be weary in well-doing, for though men may fail us, and frequent discouragement may meet us in our toil, our impelling force will always be the same. As we whisper it to ourselves again and again, “for His sake,” we shall be made strong to do or to suffer. If you thus go forth to the service of each day, “for His sake,” realizing that He, “for your sakes,” gave Himself to toil and agony, and even to death, you will daily grow into sympathy with Christ. His divine compassion for men will take hold upon you—you will be lifted up above the life of the world, and as you go about doing good, you will be able to touch the sorrow of the earth with a tender hand. You will grow like He whom you serve.
I have heard of a man who lived in a certain town and, while he lived, was greatly misunderstood. It was known that he had a large income, yet he lived a miserly life, and loud were the murmurs at the scanty help he gave to those around him. He stinted himself in many ways and hoarded his money. But when he died, the popular verdict was reversed, for then the motive of all his economy was manifested. He left his fortune to build a reservoir and an aqueduct to bring a constant supply of pure water to the town where he had been despised and misunderstood! This was the chief need of the people, and for a long time they had suffered much from drought and disease because of the scanty water supply. All the years that they had misjudged him, he was silently and unselfishly living for their sakes. When they discovered his motive, it was too late to do anything for him further than to hand down to future generations the memory of his noble and generous deed. But we can do much, “for His sake,” who has brought to us the living water and who, though He died for us, is now alive again and will live forevermore. If He thus loved me, and lived for me, nothing that I can do is too much for Him— “When often, like a wayward child, I murmur at His will, Then this sweet word, ‘For Jesus’ sake,’ My restless heart can still. I bow my head and gently led, His easy yoke I take— And all the day, and all the way, An echo in my heart shall say— ‘For Jesus’ sake!’”
Without dwelling on the immediate connection of the words which I have chosen from two familiar and beautiful verses, I would, with these two texts, weave a fabric of love. See what Jesus did for us and then think what we can do for Jesus. “For your sakes” Christ did His deeds of love. “For His sake” we are called upon to live and labor among the sons of men. May His love enkindle ours!
The Motive of Christ’s Work
First, let us consider THE MOTIVE OF CHRIST’S WORK. “For your sakes.” As many of you as have believed in Christ Jesus may know that, “for your sakes,” the Lord of Glory stooped to be a suffering, dying Man. In meditating on the motive that moved the Lord Jesus to come to your rescue, consider first the august Person who undertook your salvation and died, “for your sakes.” He was God. “He thought it not robbery to be equal with God.” He made the heavens. “Without Him was not anything made that was made.”
The angels delighted to do Him homage! Every seraph’s wing would fly at His bidding—all the host of Heaven worshipped at His feet. All the powers of Nature were under His control. He needed nothing to make Him glorious—all things were His and the power to make more than all! He might truly say, “If I were hungry, I would not tell you: for the world is Mine and the fullness thereof.” Hymned day without night by all the sacred choristers, He did not lack for praise. Nor did He lack for servants—legions of angels were always ready to do His commands, hearkening unto the voice of His word. It was this God, this Ever-Blessed One who was, from eternity, with the Father, and in whom the Father had infinite delight, who looked upon men with the eye of love! He that was born in Bethlehem’s manger was the Infinite as well as the Infant. And He that lived here, the life of a peasant, toiling and suffering, was that same God who made the heavens and the earth, but who deigned to be Incarnate for our sakes.
Well might Isaiah, in his prophetic vision, proclaim the royal titles of the “Child” who was to be born and the “Son” who, in the fullness of time, would be given to us and for us—“The government shall be upon His shoulder: and His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” Let this Truth of God sink into your souls, that it was God who came from Heaven, “for your sakes.” It was no inferior being, no one like yourselves, but it was very God of very God who loved you with an everlasting and infinite affection!
I have often turned that thought over in my mind, but I have never been able to express it as I have wished. If I were told that all the sons of men cared for me, that would be but as a drop in a bucket compared with Jehovah, Himself, regarding me! If it were said that all the princes of the earth had fallen at some poor man’s feet and laid aside their dignities that they might relieve his necessities, it would be counted condescending kindness—but such an act would not be worthy to be spoken of in comparison with that infinite condescension and unparalleled love which brought the Savior from the skies to rescue and redeem such worthless rebels as we were! It is not possible that all the condescension of all the kind and compassionate men who have ever lived should be more than as a small grain that could not turn the scale compared with the everlasting hills of the Savior’s wondrous love!
Think, too, of the insignificant clients on whom all this wealth of affection was poured. As you remember the Person who came here, “for your sakes,” and then, wonderful stoop! consider who you are—who we are—for whose sakes He died, do not our hearts melt at the thought? Brothers and Sisters, if we truly know ourselves, we have a very poor opinion of ourselves when compared with Christ! Humility has been rightly said to be a correct estimate of ourselves. What were we but the most insignificant creatures? If our whole race had been blotted out, there need have been no gap in the creation of God, or if there had seemed to be a void for a moment, He had but to speak the word and myriads of creatures, prompt to obey His will, would have filled up the space! How was it that Jesus, the Son of God, should suffer for such insignificant worms—such insects of an hour as we are? But we are not only insignificant, we are also wicked. “We have sinned with our fathers. We have committed iniquity, we have done wickedly.” Even the Lord’s children have to confess, “All we, like sheep, have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way.” But, oh, wonder of love, they can add, “and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all!”
Christ’s Suffering for Our Sakes
As sinners, we deserve nothing but God’s thunderbolts, yet, trusting in His dear Son, we receive nothing but His mercy! Having desperately sinned and broken all His commandments, if He had said, “Perish forever, you guilty rebels,” He would have spoken only the sentence that strict justice required. Instead of that, He said to His Only-Begotten, “You shall die that they may not die. I will take You, My Son, My Isaac, and offer You upon the altar of sacrifice that through Your death men may live.”
This is, indeed, a marvel of grace! This must be one of the things the angels desire to look into! Our thoughts cannot compass this wondrous work, nor can our words describe it! Many of us, also, were not only sinful, as the whole race is, but we were peculiarly sinful. Some of us feel inclined to dispute with Saul of Tarsus for the title, “chief of sinners.” It will always remain a wonder to me that the Son of God should have condescended to die for me. Were you a drunkard and has the Holy Spirit shown you that Jesus died for you? And are you now rejoicing that you are washed in His precious blood? Were you one of the women who, like Mary Magdalene, were rightly called sinners? And have you, like she, washed your robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb? Then you are constrained to exclaim with wonder and gratitude— “Depth of mercy, can there be Mercy still reserved for me? Can my God His wrath forbear? Me, the chief of sinners, spare?”
I fancy that I hear one and another of you adoring God’s matchless mercy and saying, with wonder and surprise, “Is it really true that mercy is brought to me by God’s own Son? Could nothing less than the death of the Only-Begotten save my sinful soul? Did He condescend to die for me? Well may I admire the grace thus manifested and raise my glad song of thanksgiving to Him who has done such great things for me!” Each of us can see some peculiarity in his own case. Some of us have not offended so grievously in outward conduct as others have done, but, then, we had better instruction in our childhood and, consequently, our sins were doubly heinous, for we sinned against light and knowledge! Some of us have had to violate our conscience terribly in order to sin as we have done. It may be that some of you lived 40 or 50 years as unbelievers, and yet, at last, you were brought to bow at the dear feet that were pierced for you. Oh, I am sure you bless His name that ever He shed His blood for you—and I dare say you feel as I do, sometimes, that none in the Glory Land will be able to raise such a song of adoring gratitude as you will when all Heaven shall ring with the grand chorus of those who have been redeemed from among men! Thus, we have considered, first, the august Person who accomplished the great work of our redemption. And, secondly, the poor sinful creatures for whose sake He suffered. Now let me invite you to consider the wondrous work which this master motive inspired.
The Sacrifice of Christ for Our Sakes
“For your sakes” God became Incarnate—the Son of God took into union with Himself our nature—without which He could not have suffered and died. We read concerning Him, “Being found in fashion as a Man, He humbled Himself.” If we had never heard of that fact before, our ears and hearts would be astonished at the words! At the end of each clause I feel inclined to pause, and say, “Look! Look! Was there ever such a wonder as this—the Infinite became Incarnate! He ate and He hungered! He drank and He thirsted! He needed to be housed from the wintry storm, but He ‘had not where to lay His head.’ He wanted human sympathy, but, ‘all His disciples forsook Him and fled.’ He was the ‘Man of Sorrows, and acquainted with grief,’ and all, ‘for your sakes.’” The words that follow our text tell us that, “He became poor.” You know that, in this world, the poverty of a man is usually reckoned in proportion to the position of affluence from which he has come down. One who was born a pauper is not relatively so poor as the man who was once a king, but has been reduced to beggary, for in the one case there is no experience of the luxury which riches can command, and in the other no adaptability to the shifts and privations of those who have always been in poverty. When the Christ of God, the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, was forsaken by His Father, deserted by His friends, and left alone to suffer, “for your sakes,” that was the direst poverty that was ever known!
The Ultimate Sacrifice for Our Sakes
See your Lord beneath the olives of Gethsemane! Bloody sweat falls to the ground as, being in an agony, He prays more earnestly—“If it is possible, let this cup pass from Me”—but it must not pass from Him. “For your sakes” He must drink it! “For your sakes” every bitter drop must be drained! Then see Him as He stands, without an advocate, before Herod, Pilate, and Caiaphas—“taken from prison and from judgment.” Mark His sufferings as they hound Him through the streets of Jerusalem, along the Sorrowful Way! Behold Him as, at last, they fasten His hands and His feet to the cruel wood and lift Him up ‘twixt earth and Heaven, to suffer the death of the Cross! Let those who will, depreciate the sufferings of Christ—I believe there was in the God-Man, Christ Jesus, an infinite capacity for suffering and that His body, so wondrously formed, was able to endure and did endure, infinitely more than human thought can imagine—while, at the same time, the sufferings of His soul were the very soul of His sufferings! Well did the Spirit-taught poet, Joseph Hart, write— “Much we talk of Jesus’ blood, But how little’s understood! Of His sufferings, so intense, Angels have no perfect sense. Who can rightly comprehend Their beginning or their end? ‘Tis to God and God alone That their weight is fully known.” All this Christ suffered, “for your sakes.”
A Call to Live for Christ’s Sake
What love and gratitude ought to fill your heart as you think of all that Jesus bore on your behalf! If you had a wife who, when you lay sick, watched you with such anxious care that she undermined her own health and brought herself down to the grave through her devotion to you, oh, with what love you think of her, that she should suffer even unto death for your sake! If you were ever delivered from a watery grave, and the brave fellow who rescued you, himself, sank back into the water and was drowned, you can never forget his noble self-sacrifice, but you will always cherish his memory, for he died for your sake! There is a story I have often read, of an American gentleman who was accustomed to go frequently to a tomb and plant fresh flowers. When someone asked why he did so, he said that when the time came for him to go to war, he was detained by some business and the man who lay beneath the sod became his substitute, performed his duty, and died in battle. Over that carefully-kept grave, he had the words inscribed, “He died for me!” There is something melting in the thought of another dying for you—how much more melting is it when that One is the Christ of Calvary! Why, you feel, “Here is One of whom I never deserved anything, taking my place! Here is One whom I have badly treated and against whom I have offended—yet He suffered for me—He took my place, He bore my sins, He died for me! Therefore I will live for Him. I will love Him. I will give myself wholly and unreservedly to Him and to His blessed service.” “For your sakes” Christ died. If you believe that, you cannot help loving and serving Him! It is an old theme which I am bringing before your minds, but it is the grandest theme that ever inspired a mortal tongue, or stirred a human heart!
A Call to Serve Christ for His Sake
I want you who love the Lord to consider, next, the comprehensive motive for which He worked the wondrous work which I have so imperfectly described—“For your sakes.” I would have you remember that everything He was and everything He did was, “for your sakes.” “For your sakes” the midnight prayer upon the bleak mountain’s side. “For your sakes” the scoffing and the jeering that followed Him wherever He went. “For your sakes” the agony in the garden. “For your sakes” the flagellation of the Roman lash. “For your sakes” He gave His back to the smiters and His cheeks to them that plucked off the hair. “For your sakes” the shame and the spitting. “For your sakes,” He “became obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross.” Say it, my Brothers and Sisters!
Let your hearts say it now and wet the words with tears—“For our sakes He suffered all this.” Think of Him for a moment as He is taken down from the Cross. In fair white linen, they wrap that blessed body, covered with its own blood. I think I see Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, and Joseph of Arimathea, looking on that poor mangled frame. Those dear eyes, once so bright with love, now closed in death. Those wonder-working hands that multiplied the loaves and fishes, now stiff and cold. And those blessed feet that trod the sea, now all lifeless. O Joseph, and you, Mary, this was for you—“for your sakes”! But also for mine and for the sake of all my Brothers and Sisters who are resting by faith on that finished sacrifice! They laid the dear body in Joseph’s new tomb, the virgin sepulcher wherein never man had lain, and there they left our great Champion sleeping a while in the darkness of death. As He lay there, it was “for your sakes.” Yes, and blessed be His name, when the appointed morning came, He lived again, the stone was rolled away from the sepulcher, and He came forth from the tomb! It was, “for your sakes,” He rose. The 40 days He lived on earth were “for your sakes.” And when from off the brow of Olivet He ascended to His Father’s right hand, it was, “for your sakes.” He said to His disciples, “I go to prepare a place for you.” There, seated on His Throne of Glory, He holds the scepter and rules all worlds, “for your sakes.” There as an Intercessor, He pleads with God, “for your sakes.” There is not a gem in His crown but it is there, “for your sakes.” There is not a jewel on His breastplate but it is there, “for your sakes.” From head to foot, He is what He is, “for your sakes.” And when He shall come a second time—as soon He will—to judge the world in righteousness, and to “gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of Heaven to the other” to usher in the reign of truth and establish His Throne forever, it will be all, “for your sakes,” who have believed on His name! “For all things are for your sakes, that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving of many redound to the glory of God.” We might thus continue, but we will not.
May God make this thought burn in your heart—All that Christ has done for us is for our sakes! I suppose it is because we are such fallen creatures that these considerations do not move us as they should. Granite is wax compared with our hearts! Oh, that we did but feel the fire of Jesus’ love! Like coals of juniper which have a most vehement flame, our hearts should burn within us while we talked of that dear love which brought Him to the grave and took Him from the grave to the heavens—and shall bring Him back from the heavens to take His people up to be with Him where He is and to live with Him forever!
Having meditated on the motive which moved Christ in the work He accomplished for us, let us consider THE MOTIVE WHICH SHOULD INSPIRE ALL OUR SERVICE FOR HIM—“For His sake.” This second text is in the Epistle to the Philippians, first chapter, and 29th verse. “Unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on Him, but also to suffer for His sake.” What are we that we should be allowed the high honor of suffering, “for His sake”? It is a great privilege to do, or to be, or to bear anything for Him. Our suffering can never be worth a thought when compared with His—and any sacrifice that we could offer, “for His sake,” would be small, indeed, when contrasted with the infinite sacrifice that He has already made for our sakes. If you are rejoicing in the fact that Christ died for you, it will be very easy to prompt in your hearts the desire to do something, “for His sake.”