Sketches of Four Hundred Sermons Deuteronomy 30:6 And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart, and the heart of your seed, to love the LORD your God with all your heart… I. THE PURITY OF ITS CHARACTER: "The Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart," etc. Circumcision was originally instituted to ratify the covenant which the Lord made with Abraham His faithful servant (Genesis 17:10, 11). It subsequently became a distinguishing and standing rite in the Jewish Church. It was an outward and typical sign of an internal and spiritual grace. Hence we read of "the circumcision of the flesh made with hands," and also of "the heart made without hands," by Jesus Christ. Circumcision, therefore, of the heart implies — 1. The renovation of its moral powers. Human nature is totally depraved, and every man's heart is "desperately wicked." Hence we must be spiritually circumcised and made holy, or we cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven (Hebrews 12:14). This inward circumcision includes a deliverance from the power and pollution of sin, and an actual participation of the Divine nature. 2. The special result of Divine operation. "The Lord thy God will, etc., and the heart of the seed," who shall believe in His name. He only is able to achieve this great and glorious change. II. THE EXCELLENCY OF ITS PRINCIPLE: "To love the Lord thy God," etc. Purity of heart is invariably accompanied with the principle of Divine love. When grace becomes predominant, it sways the whole empire of the soul, and reigns through righteousness unto eternal life. The object which the believer's love embraces, "The Lord thy God." 1. His essential character demands our love. He is the Lord — the uncreated, infinite, and eternal Jehovah. 2. His relative character also demands our love. He is thy God — not only Creator, Legislator, Benefactor, but also Redeemer, Saviour, Portion. Thine by innumerable obligations, relations, and endearments: by right, by purchase, by covenant, by adoption, by enjoyment, by profession, and by anticipation. 3. The degree to which the believers love extends. "With all thy heart, and with all thy soul."(1) It must be sincere, and not in word and tongue only, but in deed and in truth. (2) Intense, not a lukewarm and languishing desire, but a vigorous and hallowing flame, ever burning on the altar of the heart. (3) Supreme, admitting no rival, but refining and regulating all subordinate attachments to inferior objects. (4) Entire in its character, casting out all tormenting fear, reaching to all the faculties of the soul, and engaging all the powers and energies of the mind. (5) Progressive, "abounding yet more and more in knowledge, and in all judgment, being rooted and grounded in love, and filled with all the fulness of God" (Ephesians 3:17-19). III. THE FELICITY OF ITS SUBJECTS. "That thou mayest live." This assertion affords both instruction and encouragement. It plainly intimates the destructive tendency of sin, and the quickening and saving efficacy of Divine grace. 1. The misery of the impenitent is fairly implied. Life's opposite is death: and those who lose the former must endure the latter. The wicked are already legally dead by the condemning sentence of the law, are spiritually dead in trespasses and sins; and except they speedily repent, they will eternally perish. 2. The reward of the righteous is Divinely promised: "That thou mayest live." This gracious promise is very comprehensive. It not merely includes a negative deliverance from a death of sin, but is also expressive of the peculiar excellency and perpetuity of religion as a principle of spiritual and eternal life.We may conclude by observing — 1. The necessity of personal purity, without which the external ordinances of Christianity are insufficient and unprofitable. And — 2. The exalted character and blessedness of the pious, as participants of saving grace, and heirs of the glorious "inheritance of the saints in light." (Sketches of Four Hundred Sermons.) Parallel Verses KJV: And the LORD thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live. |
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