GOD’S CURE FOR MAN’S WEAKNESS – Charles Spurgeon
GOD’S CURE FOR MAN’S WEAKNESS
“Out of weakness were made strong.” Hebrews 11:34.
Some kinds of weakness are of God’s appointment and necessarily incident to manhood; they are not sinful, and therefore we may continue to be subject to them without regret. In reference to such weaknesses, it may be that after beseeching the Lord even thrice to remove them, it may be for our good that they should remain. For then, in place of removing the weakness, God may give us the reply, “My grace shall be sufficient for you.” This is a case of our weakness being made strong, and there are many of God’s saints who daily experience this blessed privilege. They are weak and continue weak. They have infirmities which they once wished to have removed, but now they are content to bear. For now, they are of the same mind as the apostle—they glory in their infirmity because, when they are weak, they are strong.
But, dear friends, there is another kind of weakness which is sinful; a weakness that springs not from nature, but from fallen nature; not from God’s appointment, but from our sinfulness. Out of this, we should desire to be delivered. We cannot pray for strength in sinful weakness, but must earnestly plead for strength to come out of it and to be made strong. This seems to me to be the particular blessing which faith is said to have obtained in the text: “Out of weakness were made strong.” It is the inestimable privilege of many Christians to be strong in weakness when the weakness is only one of infirmity, but it is an equally precious gift to be made strong out of weakness when that weakness is of a sinful kind.
Looking around the church at large, with as impartial an eye as we can summon, we are afraid that for the most part, it is nowadays comparable to a huge infirmary rather than a camp filled with brave soldiers. Both ministers and private members of the church are generally weak in one way or another. They are living but sickly; they are working for God, but in a feeble, inefficient manner. If I look upon the camps of the Lord’s enemies, whether Puseyite or Broad Church, I see intelligence and vigor so apparent that I am apt to think that never was error more earnest, more active, and more intense than right now. There is a reality about the efforts of our opponents which may well alarm us. And when I look to the camp of the Lord Jesus Christ, I lament a predominant lukewarmness, a lack of enthusiasm, and a deficiency in force, which, if it does not betoken a departure from God in heart, certainly indicates great feebleness in the vital parts—producing comparative weakness in all the parts.
I desire this morning to speak to those who are weak; weak where they ought not to be, and who feel a growing tendency to rest content in that weakness. I would stir up those who are beginning to imagine that weakness is the normal and proper state of a Christian, that to be unbelieving, desponding, nervous, timid, cowardly, inactive, and heartless is, at worst, a very excusable thing. I want, if God wills, to show to the sinfully weak ones that their condition is not proper at all. I want to show that it is a work of faith to lift us out of it, not to help us in our evil weakness, but to deliver us out of it and to make us strong, reversing our present condition by enabling us to be mighty in the work of God.
Since the text teaches that faith is the grand cure for spiritual feebleness, I shall, first, cite a few cases of cure. In the second place, I shall analyze the remedy. In the third place, I shall endeavor to administer it. And in the fourth place, I shall say a word of praise to the Physician who prescribes it.
I. Cases of Cure
At the outset, we have said that faith is the cure for spiritual weakness, and I have to mention cases of cure. I shall not now cite cases from the Old Testament of bodily cures worked by faith, though I might mention Hezekiah, who, being sick unto death, was restored to life by faith in God’s promise, and his period of existence was lengthened 15 years. In the apostolic times, it was through faith that many sicknesses were made to fly before the healing touch of the apostles. That power of healing has probably become extinct or is lying dormant in the church, yet there are still indications that faith has some power in that direction.
I cannot but think that when honest John Wickliffe, raising himself up in the bed of sickness, said to the monks who surrounded him, expecting him to die and tempting him to recant, “I shall not die, but live to declare the wicked deeds of the monks,” I cannot but think that his faith had much to do with his cure. Had he been a man of a timorous, wavering frame of mind, his sickbed might have been his deathbed, but the vital forces were all thrown into energetic action by the mental energy of his faith, and the crisis was safely passed.
I do not know how far faith may still operate upon the bodily frame, for there is certainly an intimate connection between the soul and the body. Those wondrous cases recorded in the life of Dorothea Trudel of Zurich indicate the singular power of faith to assist in the cure of the body by its calming influence on the mind. That admirable woman, who has but just departed this life, became the founder of a hospital in which cures were worked mainly by the means of prayer and faith—cures that have been substantiated in the best possible manner, namely, by her enemies dragging her before the law courts of Zurich for practicing medicine without a diploma, when she proved that the only medicine used was directing the mind to Christ, and proclaiming the gospel, by which a holy calm spread over the mind and the body derived manifest benefit.
Such cases, and others which we have noticed, go to show that if we had more faith in the living God, it might sometimes be possible for the soul to overmaster the body, so that out of weakness, we might still, in Hezekiah’s fashion, be made strong. These hints are not, however, to the point and relate rather to a theory than to the revealed truth of God.
That faith strengthens Christians has been proven often in the history of the church. The church’s weakness springs mainly and mostly from a lack of faith in her God and in the revelation which God has entrusted to her. When men believe intensely, they act vigorously. When their principles penetrate their very souls and become precious to them as life itself, then no suffering is too severe, no undertaking is too laborious, and no conflict too heroic. They will enter upon impossibilities, laugh at them, and overcome them when once they know of a surety that the principles which move them are most certainly from God.
This seems to me to be the great work which Luther did in his day under God the Holy Spirit’s power. He brought back the church to the strength of faith, and then her whole force returned. The man knew very little of the truth of God, but upon the doctrine of justification by faith, he was as clear as the sun at noonday, though he was half a Romanist in most other respects. But this one all-important thing he did for the church—he made her believe in God and in God’s truth with a vigorous decision which had almost ceased among men.
Though he knew not all the weapons of the divine armory, yet the one he did know, he wielded with such bravery of faith and such tremendous dogmatism that his resolute soul shamed others into steadfastness. See the man as he goes into Worms, defying a host of devils, though they were as many as the tiles on the roofs of the houses. See him standing up in the Diet of Worms, alleging that he could not retract, so help him God! See him in his earlier days, nailing up his theses upon the church doors as sailors nail their colors to the mast or tearing the Pope’s bull in pieces and casting it into the fire!
As men resolved on conquest break down the bridges behind them and render retreat impossible, it was the man’s faith in God that helped him do great exploits, and the church learned from him to believe that “God everywhere has sway, and all things serve His might.” When the church once more believed firmly, her spirit returned to her, and like a giant refreshed with new wine, she recommenced her race.
In the modern revival under Whitefield and Wesley, the restoration of faith was the source of restored strength. Those brothers, differing in doctrine as they did, had this point in common, namely, that they were intense believers in the indwelling power and presence of the Holy Spirit in the church. Men had been disputing and trying to prove or disprove everything. Sermons were frequent upon such topics as whether there was a God or not.
Now you never find Whitefield or Wesley wasting time over such matters; they were so full of God’s Spirit, and could see Him so clearly everywhere at work, that they felt no need of proving it. While men were discussing whether the Scriptures were inspired, and men were writing books on the evidences, these men preached the gospel, and infidelity fled before them.
An age destitute of spiritual life generally amuses itself by trying to prove what is not worth proving or wasting its energy upon external things to the neglect of the inward; an age spiritually alive takes itself to the Lord’s work and treats all doubt as folly and sin.
II. Analyzing the Medicine
The subject is so wide that I must confine myself to one instance, and shall speak of the medicine as it would be mixed and compounded for a man struggling at very dreadful odds against a gigantic system of evil. He is very weak, but through faith, he becomes strong. One of the first ingredients of faith’s medicine is a sense of right. Everybody admits that when a man is sure that right is on his side, he finds strength in that belief. Even if two men are going to court with one another, the one who knows that his case is founded upon justice enters the court with much more strength of mind than he who is conscious of several flaws in his suit, and only trusts to the blessed uncertainty of the law.
There is truth in the old saying that “a good conscience is the best armor.” It is not of very great use in a real battle, for unfortunately, bullets have no respect for saint or sinner, but when in the way they are pretty sure to kill anybody who stops them. But a good conscience is of the utmost value in the battle of principle. A man who cannot argue, yet knows he is right, will somehow stand his ground.
Faith: A Source of Strength
He says, “My opponent has more wit than I have; he understands logic better than I, but I know I am right.” And to know you are right necessarily gives you strength. Faith is a belief in the rightness of that which God reveals, a trusting in its truth, and who does not understand that a man who believes, therefore becomes strong? A second ingredient is heavenly authority. Everybody knows that a man who is naturally weak will often act very bravely when he has authority to back him. Let the Christian combatant feel—as feel he will when he has faith—that he is armed with divine authority, and you will not wonder if from a dwarf he rises to a giant. “This,” he says, “is not my quarrel; I believe it to be God’s war—the truth of God which I maintain at such hazards is no dogma of my own invention, it is God’s own offspring; God has sent me to fight for it—God puts the words into my mouth.” A man, thus conscious that he has a mission from heaven, cannot be afraid; he must be mighty; and when a man feels, in addition to that, that God’s decree appoints him to accomplish a certain end, that God’s promise declares that he shall succeed, and that from the eternal nature of truth it cannot sustain defeat—then surely he stands like a rock in the midst of the billows, and he cannot waver, he casts all thought of fear to the winds.
Mixed with this is a consciousness of heavenly companionship, which makes the believer courageous. Many a man who would have been afraid to go to battle alone has marched along very cheerily because of the many thousands who are hurrying to the same battle. The Christian feels that he has the companionship of his God and Savior. Jesus’ name is “Emmanuel, God with us.” The best of all is that God is with us. If we suffer, Jesus suffers in one of His members; if we are slandered and reproached for Jesus’ sake, it is the cross of Christ which we are carrying, and Jesus bears it with us. We hear the more than angel whisper, “Fear not, I am with you.” Come then, let us sing as we march onward—
“If on my face for Your dear name,
Shame and reproach shall be,
I’ll hail reproach and welcome shame,
If You remember me.”
In addition to all this, faith has an expectation of supernatural help. Faith hears the wheels of providence working on her behalf. Mohammed, in his earlier career, though his faith was but mere fanaticism, yet gave great courage to his men by the daring things which he said and did; as he threw the handful of dust into the air, he believed that his foes were blinded, and his soldiers won an easy victory; he declared that he heard the noise of angels’ horses as they came to the fight, and no sooner had he thus spoken than every man grew brave. Now the Christian, not in imagination, but in spiritual fact, can hear the wings of angels flying to the rescue of divine truth. Here I see today the hand of a man, but I see also with it the wing of an angel. God works for His people; the evil He hinders and restricts, the good He speeds and multiplies, and, therefore, strong in invisible succors, we must not wonder that out of weakness the believer is made strong.
I must not omit one powerful ingredient in faith’s life-draught: it is the prospect of ultimate reward. Faith bows her head in the day of battle when the poisoned arrows fly like hail. She whispers to herself, “I may fall, but I shall rise again,” and she vows, by the eternal God, that when she rises it shall be with the same banner in her hand for which she fought. She knows that in the end she cannot, must not, fall—that she shall conquer. When a man fears defeat, he will probably bring it upon himself, for his fear insures it; but when a man does not know how to be defeated, the little petty disasters of the way all contribute to his ultimate victory.
So, Christians, you who are warring for God and His truth, I hope you will not despair because of the gloomy aspect of the present age. It may appear as if infidelity and Puseyism together would eat out the very heart of God’s church, but courage, my brothers and sisters, courage. These foes will eat up one another one of these days, or there shall rise a man out of their own ranks who will be their downfall; we may yet live to thank God for the apparent retrograde movements of today, for upon this the Lord may ride to a brighter ultimate triumph. Faith is strong because she is sure of victory. Faith takes to herself this thought, that in the victory she shall share her reward. What will men not do for a crown? Even for an ivy crown, the Grecian athlete would strain every nerve; now they did it for a corruptible crown, but we for an incorruptible. Faith makes the crown of eternal life glitter before the believer’s eyes; it waves before him the palm branch. Sense pictures the grave, loss, suffering, defeat, death, forgetfulness, but faith points to the resurrection, the pompous appearance of the Son of Man, the calling of the saints from every corner of the earth, the clothing of them all in their triumphant array, and the entrance of the blood-washed conquerors into the presence of God with eternal joy. Thus faith makes us, out of weakness, to become strong.
The Power of Faith: Seeing the Invisible
Let me remind you that the essential ingredients of faith’s comfort are just these—faith sees the invisible, and beholds the substance of that which is afar off. Faith believes in God—a present, powerful God full of love and wisdom effecting His decrees, accomplishing His purposes, fulfilling His promises, and glorifying His Son. Faith believes in the blood of Jesus, in the effectual redemption on the bloody tree; it believes in the power of the Holy Spirit, His might to soften the stone, and to put life into the very ribs of death. Faith grasps the reality of this Book; she does not look upon it as a sepulcher with a stone laid on it, but as a temple in which Christ reigns, as an ivory palace out of which He comes riding in His chariot, conquering and to conquer.
Faith does not believe the gospel to be a worn-out scroll, to be rolled up and put away; she believes that the gospel, instead of being in its senility, is in its youth; she anticipates for it a manhood of mighty struggles, and a grand maturity of blessedness and triumph; faith does not shirk the fight, she longs for it because she foresees the victory. I would compare faith to an emperor of whom we have read that he summoned his counselors and generally judged as to whether he should go to war by their opinion, but he did it in the following manner—if they warned him that it would be a very fearful war, if they said that the enemy’s cities would never be taken, that the armies on the other side were too numerous to be conquered, and the provinces too extensive to be held, he would reply, “We will do it then, for if there is anything which you, gentlemen, think to be easy, it is beneath the dignity of the emperor and the troops whom he commands, but if you reckon it impossible there is a clear field for honor.”
Was it not a man fit to be a soldier of such a prince, who when told that the Persian arrows were so numerous that they would obscure the light of the sun, replied, “We shall fight splendidly in the shade.” Surely he was akin to Alexander, who, when they said that the Persians were as the sands on the seashore, replied, “One butcher is not afraid of a whole flock of sheep.” So let it be with us; let us feel that we are men of another mold than to be afraid; let us feel that believing in God we do not know how to spell “coward,” and as to fear of defeat or fear of man, we give that up for the craven dogs who slink at their master’s heels, and wear their master’s collar, and eat the garbage which his bounty throws to them. We care not for the things that are seen; we have learned to live upon angels’ diets, and to eat the bread which comes down from heaven. Our motto is, “Courage! Courage!” And our belief is that the day shall come—
“When the might with the right
And the right with the might
Forever more shall be,
And come what may
To stand in the way,
That day the world shall see.”
Administering the Medicine of Faith
III. The thIrd point is to administer this medicine, but no time remains, and besides, I cannot do it; you must go to Him who compounded it, namely, the blessed Spirit of the living God, and take with you this prayer, “Lord, I believe, help my unbelief,” and this other one, “Lord, increase our faith.” But I will give you a few hints. Some of you are goIng through a present personal difficulty; you are embarrassed in money matters, or a child is sick, or the wife is dying, or some other providential trial is vexing you—you are saying, “I cannot bear it!” I will not pray with you that you may be comforted in that sinful weakness, but I will, and do beseech you to ask for faith in that Father’s hand which wields the rod that you may get out of the weakness, and may now be made strong to suffer with holy patience what your loving Father’s wisdom appoints for you.
Others have a spiritual duty before you, but you are shirking it because of its difficulty. You do not like to “go through the ordeal”—that is what you call it. You are disobediently timid. Now, I shall not ask God to comfort you in that weakness—you know your Master’s will, and you do it not; may you be beaten with many stripes, and may the stripes be blessed to you. I will ask that, knowing your duty, you may rise out of that weakness by believing that God will help you to obey, and so out of weakness you may be made strong.
Some of you are called, where you live, to contend earnestly for God and for His truth. You have many adversaries, and your weakness makes you withhold your testimony; you have been trimming a good deal; you have been worshipping that modern Diana called Charity, which is the devil in the form of an angel of light, and instead of bringing out all the truth of God, you have given up the corners of it. I shall not ask that you may have any comfort in such weakness. May you be ashamed of having been ashamed of Christ and of His cross; but I do plead with God for you that, believing the very sweepings of His truth to be precious, and the very cuttings of the diamond of the gospel to be worth fighting for, you may escape from your weakness, and be made strong in life and death to boldly declare God’s truth.
Some of you always doubt your Father’s love, the faithfulness of Christ, and your own interest in Him. I will not comfort you in such a state; I will not pray God to comfort you while you are in it, but I do ask you to pray that you flee from such weakness. Do not doubt your God till you have cause to doubt Him. Oh, brothers and sisters, if you will never distrust the Lord Jesus till He gives you an occasion for distrust, and till there is something in His character which should rationally excite your suspicion, you will never disbelieve again! I pray you seek more faith, and you will rise out of your fears.
You who are afraid of dying—and there are some such here—shall I ask that you may be made strong while in that weakness? No. I dare not. Jesus Christ did not come to give you comfort while you are under the fear of death; He came to deliver those who, through fear of death, are their entire lifetime subject to bondage. The plea shall be, therefore, that you may have such faith in God, and such a view of the Canaan on the other side of the flood, that you may look forward with delight, or at least with resignation, to the time when you shall pass the river and be forever with the Lord.
The text says out of weakness, brothers and sisters, and oh, may God grant that some of you who have been lying spiritually on a sickbed may through this sermon be made to take up your bed and walk; may all weakness be left behind even as the child leaves the little garments of the nursery behind him when he becomes a man.
Praise to the Physician
IV. My last work was to praise the Physician, and who is this? Who is it that has taught us to believe? It is our Father who is in heaven, who has taught us and bids us trust Him—blessed be His name! Join with me—you need not sing with those lips—let your heart sing as you say, “Blessed be our heavenly Father who has given us precious faith in Him. Source of all goodness, foundation of all confidence, we adore You for teaching us the sweet art of trusting You!” Let us also, with equal thankfulness, bless the Lord Jesus, for we had never been capable of faith in the invisible God if there had not been a Mediator by whom we might come to Him. Blessed be those wounds and those agonies, and that death which is the door of our faith in the Father’s love. Blessed, moreover, be that mysterious person, the Holy Spirit, for faith is His gift, and if it is to be increased in us, He must increase it. “O blessed Spirit, be You forever praised for putting such a jewel as faith into our poor hearts; and blessed be Your power for keeping it there, for Satan would long ago have stolen it; and blessed be Your Energy which shall keep it till I am beyond the reach of the foe.”
Brothers and sisters, do not let what I have said this morning merely pass your ears. I am persuaded that though I have not put it as I could wish, there is a great deal of practical value in the truths of God which I have stated. You must be strong. This is not an age in which weak Christianity will do. It is strong, energetic religion that we need now, and you cannot obtain it except by gaining strong faith, and much of it. Plead for it, and then, when you shall have obtained it, the world shall feel your power, God shall be glorified, and Christ’s name shall be lifted high. You who have no faith at all may learn something here. It is only by faith that the impotence and inability of human nature is overcome, so that the soul receives Christ unto salvation. May the Holy Spirit work that faith in you to your eternal salvation, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
Portion of Scripture Read Before the Sermon—Hebrews 11