The Danger of a Fruitless Possession of Religious Advantages
A. Boyd, M. A. Ezekiel 47:11 But the miry places thereof and the marshes thereof shall not be healed; they shall be given to salt. This vision of Ezekiel unrolled the map of the progress of the Gospel. The scene on which he looked down — so dark, so sterile, so lifeless — is but a picture of the world at large, separated from the knowledge and influences of Christianity. The natural features of the one correspond to the moral features of the other; for man, untaught by revelation, or unmoved by revelation, is like the desert, uncultivated and unfruitful; or like the dead lake, devoid of spiritual activity and buoyancy, and fitted but to spread around him the poisonous exhalation of his native depravity. It is the Gospel which reclaims man from this state, which pours fertilisation on the wilderness, and healing into the distempered waters. The Gospel of our Redeemer is represented by the river, which poured itself over the panoramic world, on which the prophet's eye was fixed. And we shall perceive the propriety of this emblem, if we turn our thoughts to the mystery of its origin. The prophet beheld the stream stealing forth from the threshold, but he saw not the source — the fountain from which it flowed; his eye could trace it rolling slowly from the eastern door, but he knew nothing of it till it thus opened upon his notice. All, previous to its appearance was wrapped in mystery and concealment. It is so with that wondrous development of our God's compassion and wisdom, which we designate the Gospel of Christ. Dwelling upon this lower world, living, as it were, outside the walls of the sanctuary, we see but the revelation, the unfolding of a mighty plan which is destined to be the cause of incalculable blessedness to countless millions. We can trace its progress, and mark its footsteps, and see its marvellous results. We can cast our eye backward upon the line of bygone ages, and trace the growth and the increasing firmness of the tree from the time that it was cast a seed into the ground, till it spread its branches over many climes and many nations. And as it carried its blessings and its comforts farther and farther still, displacing barbarism and introducing civilisation, dispelling the thick darkness, and pouring out its stream of pure and golden light, we can discover the proofs and indications of its power, but we can see nothing of the fountain out of which all this issues; for that lies concealed in the sanctuary of God's wisdom, in the dark and veiled recesses of the council halls of eternity. It lies in the depths both "of the wisdom and the knowledge of God," unfathomable to the plummet, of mortal investigation. But we shall perceive the propriety of this emblem no less clearly if we consider the effects which the Gospel is calculated to produce. When the prophet's eye traced the course of the sanctuary river, he saw that it carried fertility and health with its waters. He beheld wildernesses converted into gardens — a wild and cheerless waste into a second Eden. The Gospel of the Son of God is calculated to effect the same result. Already has it reclaimed a large portion of our globe from the sway of ignorance, of barbarism, of unbroken darkness, and carried along with its saving announcements the blessings of civilisation, and knowledge, and social happiness. It has proved itself powerful, not simply to confer moral renovation, but to implant the seeds and the elements of spiritual life. It is clear, from the text, that there may be spots and individuals visited by the truth, and yet unreclaimed by the truth. These are "the miry places and the marishes" of the vision — spots which the river has touched, but which it has not changed — which lie in their original wasteness and sterility, although the stream of improvement has flowed over them. And these may designate either nations, or communities, or individuals. It becomes, therefore, a point of importance for us to ascertain distinctly what constitutes that miry and marshy state which is so fearfully indicative of total disconnection with the saving blessings of the Gospel. The state of man by nature is one of spiritual deadness, for spiritual life forsook him when he became a rebel against God. If man would be saved, he must have this spiritual insensibility removed, and spiritual life implanted, There must come a quickening from the Holy Ghost, the author and giver of life, into the soul. The man must be made alive unto God. There must be life in the soul. The river of the sanctuary must not merely cleanse the wilderness, and wash away impurities from the surface, it must besides pour such a flood of quickening power into its bosom, as that "everything where it cometh shall live." It must give you life in your spiritual desires, life in your spiritual affections, life in your spiritual duties, life in your prayers. The second effect produced by the river of life is the healing of the distempered waters. Man is not only a being dead in trespasses, and so insensible, but he is also impregnated by corruption, and so unholy. There must enter a stream of sanctifying influences into the very fountain of his innate depravity, to expel its poisons, and to heal its corruptions. And when this is done, there will be a continual aim and effort after holiness in the life and conversation. The alteration of the mind and temper and dispositions will be there, and an energy in religion will be there, and a zeal for God will be there, and the fruits of the Spirit will be there; in other words, the man or the community touched by the Gospel's magic power will be Christian. But when these marks exist not, when there are no indications of a spiritual life being infused, or of a healing process having been carried forward, then, we say, the Gospel has effected nothing — it has passed over men without changing them; it has been preached to men without converting them; it has visited men without sanctifying them. And let it not for one moment be imagined that God will show Himself an unmoved spectator of all this insult offered to His mercy, of all this despite done to the Spirit of His grace. No; for such as will sit beneath the sound of a proclaimed Gospel, without being touched by its power, or healed by its virtues, the Lord has His sentence of doom. It rests not concealed in His treasury of wrath and indignation. It is already announced — it is already on record — it is at this moment entered upon the dark registries of condemnation. His own lips have spoken it — "they shall be given to salt." It is a doom of deep and appalling import, for it tells of the curse of present barrenness and future destruction being poured out upon the hardened and impenitent. There are many methods by which the Lord effects this. One is by withdrawing from a heedless and obdurate people the Gospel — the ordinances of His grace — altogether. When He has made the stream to roll in its richness through it, and it will neither be healed nor quickened, shall it seem a marvellous thing if He bend the direction of the river and make it flow into other lands; if He leave spots that will not be changed, without a privilege, without one single water drop of Christian advantages? Another method by which the Lord accomplishes this decree, is by continuing to an apathetic and gainsaying people the outward ministrations of His grace, but stripping them of their faithfulness and purity. We shall allude but to one method more by which the Lord executes His doom of "giving to salt" a Gospel-resisting people. He continues to such a people the ministrations of His truth in all its purity and faithfulness, but He refuses to bless them to the salvation and improvement of the people's souls. The river will flow, but it will not fructify. In such an instance of judicial retribution, there will be a flintiness, a hardihood, an insensibility, a paralysis over the hearers' hearts which will resist all approaches of the truth, and fling it back, as the breakwater rolls back the tide which would irrigate the soil. (A. Boyd, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: But the miry places thereof and the marishes thereof shall not be healed; they shall be given to salt. WEB: But the miry places of it, and its marshes, shall not be healed; they shall be given up to salt.