Select Sermons

Charles Hodge

Select Sermons of Charles Hodge

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Contents

Not Ashamed

God of the Jews and Gentiles

No Condemnation

Glory of Salvation

Fervent in Spirit

Not Ashamed1

“I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth; to the Jew first and also the Greek.” Romans 1:16

When the Spirit led the prophet into the valley covered with bones exceeding dry, and commanded him to preach to them, it was to all appearance a hopeless task, yet as he preached, they lived, and stood up as a less hopeless exceeding great army. This event has often been used as an illustration of the spiritual state of men and of the means used for their salvation. Had any man but a prophet gone to preach to dry bones, the enterprise would have been regarded not merely as hopeless, but as absurd. It may, however, without exaggeration be said that the task of those who preach to sinners without a divine message and a divine mission is not less hopeless. If any Hebrew prophet addressed himself to men long dead, such preachers address themselves to those whom the immutable law of God has already condemned to death. Without authority, to exhort such to live, is to exhort them to escape from the presence of the Omnipresent, from the power of the Omnipotent, or to change him who is unchangeable. If any Hebrew prophet addressed those who had no ears to hear, or power to obey; such teachers address those who are dead in trespasses and sin, who though they have ears they hear not, and are no more likely to turn unto God alive, than the any dead, by their own power, to leave their graves. Notwithstanding the hopelessness of this task, it is one which men are constantly disposed to undertake. To secure the forgiveness of sin and reservation to the favour of God may be said to be the great object to which the mind of man has ever been directed. The fact that we need forgiveness and renovation is deeply graven on the common consciousness of men. How a man can be just with God, and how a clean thing can be brought out of an unclean; in other words, how he is to escape the punishment due to him for sin, and how he is to be prepared for the presence of God, is the great problem to the solution of which all religions, all systems of philosophy, and all minds have ever been directed.

It may be said that this statement is much too strong, since there are many men who give themselves little concern about their relation to God, or their condition in a future world. Even if the fact were so, it would hardly require any modification in what has just ...