THE SOWER. SERMON PREACHED BY THE LATE MR. SINKINSON, AT PROVIDENCE CHAPEL, BATH, APRIL 17TH, 1870. "And they said one to another, Did not our heart burn within us, while He talked with us by the way, and while He opened to us the Scriptures?"-LUKE xxiv. 32. It is a great privilege to have the communion of saints, and it is a mercy if you and I have been led to prize it. Some of you have, perhaps, been talking together recently about the Son of God, and your faith in Him has become stronger. You have been led to know more of His power in your hearts, and you do believe from your very soul that He only is your rock and your salvation, your fortress and your defence. What a good thing it is to talk with each other by the way about these things. The Lord has mercifully provided these means for the edification of His body the Church. You read together, pray together, converse about better things, and come to God's house in company to hear His Word read and expounded-which course is all right and Scriptural. "Forsake not the assembling of yourselves together as the manner of some is; and so much the more as ye see the day approaching" (Heb. x. 25). I like to feel a holy boldness in the things of God, and perfect freedom in speaking of the Saviour when I am with the Lord's people. It is a blessed thing to be brought sweetly by faith to the Lord Jesus Christ. He will support, comfort, and cheer you. He says, "Let not your heart be troubled." How kind, how gracious, He is to poor distressed ones. "Let not your heart be troubled ye believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you." He is gone and is making ready for you, poor, distressed, trembling one; and by-and-bye He will come and receive you to Himself, that where He is there you may be also. The worldly man talks about worldly things, such as the market, and what profit there is on this or that article, or whether it would be a profitable speculation to take up a certain matter, and what amount of interest he will be likely to realize by such and such an investment. Worldly minds pursue the world; not so the children of God. If they get entangled with the world they do not like it; they feel something about it that tends to distress and embarrass them. It is a dangerous position when No. 56, NEW SERIES, AUGUST, 1883. ' a child of God is getting allured with the fashions and pursuits of the world. What a mercy when you are led to have a little conversation with a lover of God. The world then is nothing to you, and you will see how blessed it is to "set your affection on things above." Where is your affection? Which is the object of your love, the world, or Jesus? Have you, have I, any love to Christ? Have our hearts been humbled, and brought to His blessed feet, to "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world"? These two disciples spoke together, and said, "Did not our heart burn within us, while He talked with us by the way? They were obliged to speak to each other of the love of Christ, because they felt it and had tasted of His resurrection power. "He was known of them in breaking of bread." He broke bread to them on the first day of the week, then their eyes were opened to know Him, and "He vanished out of their sight." The two disciples were going to Emmaus, when Jesus appeared to them. The Jewish Sabbath was past, and the Lord's day had come, the day the blessed Redeemer rose from the dead, and this day we commemorate that fact-being reminded of His resurrection. I consider this to be an essential doctrine of the Gospel; yea, it is the ground of our hope. Paul says, "If Christ be not risen, our preaching is vain, and ye also have believed in vain." It is, therefore, the foundation of our hope, and we can't allow it to be done away with. Paul says, "He was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification." He made it manifest to His own chosen people after He rose from the dead; He appeared to them, He appeared to these two disciples and conversed with them by the way. They did not know Him, their eyes were holden, but when the Lord warmed their hearts, and opened their eyes, they saw and believed that He was the Son of God. Oh, if you have been led in that way-to see Christ as your risen Saviour, as the ascended One at the right hand of the Father. If you have been led to look on Him as your Advocate with the Father, He is now at His right hand, for He ever liveth, and He knows all His sheep, and the needs of all His people. He strengthens the weak, gives life to the faint, and revives the drooping. "He ever liveth to make intercession for us." Your Redeemer liveth. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, is not the God of the dead, but of the living; and He says, "Because I live, ye shall live also." Oh, poor soul, if you have felt that living power, if the Lord has brought you into life, and given you to feel your sins are all forgiven, the load is taken from your conscience; for they that believe in a glorified Christ have the witness in themselves, the Holy Spirit takes of the things that are Christ's, and reveals them unto them. This is an indubitable evidence that you have passed from death unto life, because you love the brethren. Oh, that love is a burning principle. Those of you who have felt the fire of God's law, and the burning of God's love, will never be satisfied without a whole Christ as the foundation of your hope, and that is a sure foundation. You feel very fickle, and when doubts and fears begin to rise, it is a trying time. "Can I deem myself a child? Have I really an interest in a risen Christ? Has He put away my sin?" How you feel that you sin with your eyes, your feet, and your tongue. You can't keep your heart right; "The thought of foolishness is sin." Oh, what a wandering mind you have. How you have been tempest-tossed, lifted up, and cast down, and have wondered where the scene would end. It has, perhaps, been a rough journey you have had lately; you were not aware at the commencement of the work that you would be troubled as you have been. But oh, what a mercy that God has led you through. He, in His mercy, has been your Guide, your Helper, and your salvation; and He will be to the end. He is everything to you; therefore, seeing you have these Gospel wants, you come to Him. Is not that right? Where else can you go ? Sometimes people run to other sources, but Simon said, "Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life." The carnal professor runs away, exclaiming, "These are hard sayings, who can bear them?" like many of His professed disciples once did who walked no more with Him; but you have had your ear bored at the door-post; you can't go away. He has been a source of comfort to you in many a trying hour, and He has not left you yet; but loves you still, and will for ever, for He rests in His love. I daresay some of you are desirous just now to feel more of that love, for God's religion is an inside work; it is not an outside thing, like putting on your Sunday coat, dressing the parson in a fancy dress, or decking the place of worship with flowers, but it is a meek and quiet spirit that is in the sight of God of great price. Ah! bless you, if the Lord has made you humble, and led you to see that your beauty is all in Christ, He is now your all and in all. The precious Christ, which we preach to you to-day, is "of God made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption." "He is the Rock, and His work is perfect." He is the foundation; yea, the every thing to His people. These two poor disciples were brought to feel it, and I hope you may feel this same love burning in your hearts; the Lord appeared to them, and He is not far from you. Perhaps you have come here, saying, "We would see Jesus." Oh, that is a good feeling, and the Lord will satisfy you. You have been looking at other things, such as your children, friends, outward circumstances, business, &c., but how often have you been led to look to Jesus? How many hours have you spent with Jesus, leaning on the arm of your Beloved? How sweet those moments are when you can in confidence draw nigh to the blessed Redeemer, when you see His blood is the fountain opened for all sin and uncleanness. That is something the world is a stranger to; it knows nothing of this intercourse, communion, and fellowship with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ, or the divine movement of the Holy Spirit in your heart, encouraging you to draw nigh to Christ. Poor though thou art, He says, "Him that cometh to Me, I will in no wise cast out." "Did not our heart burn within us, while He talked with us by the way?" Amazing condescension! "By the way." It does not matter where you are. You may be going up the hills alone, and all at once you feel as if a blessed risen Christ was with you, drawing you out in sweet communion with Himself. Sometimes you are busy in the kitchen, and He comes and gives you a word, lets a word drop into your heart when you are not thinking of Him. He comes, your heart is melted, and you can say with John, "We have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love, and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him." You know that, because you have felt it. When the blessed Spirit revealed the truth to you, if there had been a thousand devils you could have said just then, "I know whom I have believed." It is an experience that is strengthening and encouraging. "By the way." They were going to Emmaus, and you have been in the way. It was a right way, although they were so doubtful; they were looking for something temporal, but the Lord condescended to go down to their lowest state, yet He did not leave them without a reproof. How slow they were to believe. Some people say, "How easy it is to believe!" but man, in his natural state, has no spiritual capacity to believe in God; he has neither will nor power to do anything acceptable in the sight of God; therefore, when a poor sinner is led to feel the power of God, it is the Lord's doing. It was God who stopped you, and opened your eyes to see; your teacher was God the Holy Ghost. What a blessed view you had of the Trinity in Unity then; you had heard a voice, saying, "This is the way, walk ye in it," when you were turning either to the right hand or to the left. "By the way." Oh, if the Lord should speak a word this morning, if you should hear Him calling, "Mary, Mary," it would cheer you; or, as Martha said, "The Master is come, and calleth for thee." You would have a burning heart, that is, a loving heart, an affectionate heart, a kind benevolent heart, a feeling courteous heart, prepared by the blessed God. Oh, for that loving heart! You can't of yourself prepare your heart, for "the preparation of the heart in man and the answer of the tongue is from the Lord." Thus, to believe in Him makes the heart to burn; if some men were to lose their heads, their religion would go with them, but not so with God's people. The naturalist says, "it is in the head, in the brain," but the text says, "it is in the heart." God looks at the heart, not at the outward appearance. Oh, what a mercy you have felt your poor heart to burn and glow; while you have been musing, the fire has burned. God was giving you a foretaste of His everlasting love, and you could scarcely think why it should be so; you felt a little humbling of the heart at the thought that God should set His love on such a guilty, ruined one as you. You said— "Why was I made to hear Thy voice, And enter while there's room; While thousands make a wretched choice, “'Twas the same love that spread the feast Else I had still refused to taste, And perished in my sin." That is the way; it is accounted for on that principle and no other. Thus, if the Lord has talked to you by the way, and opened to you some of His secrets, you know what these secrets are. It is not everybody that can tell what they are. It is like a poor man I knew, who found a sovereign in a field when he was in great need, and when he found it he began praising and blessing God. His workfellows said, "What's to do?" He said, "It's I that knows ;" and, when God lets His love into your hearts, you know. It is a precious thing to feel as the Word says, "We love Him, because He first loved us." "God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him might not perish, but have everlasting life." What a merciful God. You, who love Him, are in the way now; you are travelling on, and it may be the Lord is working faith in your heart with power while I am speaking; your heart is led to the Saviour, and you say, "That is all I have, that is where I want to be found; so do I. seen an end of all perfection; " you know that— You have "If ever your poor soul be saved, 'Tis Christ must be the way." You have had many struggles in your time, and have proved, as the poet says |