4th OF 9 REASONS WHY MEN DON'T SHARE THE GOSPEL
Seeing it is a duty that the King
has laid upon every man according to his ability to exhort and reprove in the
Great Commission work (Matt. 28:19-20), and with all possible diligence to labor
after the salvation of all about him, judge then whether this work be reasonably
performed. Where shall we find the man almost among us, that sets himself to it
with all his might, and that has set his heart upon the souls of his fellow man,
that they may be saved? Let us here, therefore, question what may be the causes
of the gross neglect of this duty, that the hindrances being
discovered may more easily be overcome.
Another hindrance is a base,
man-pleasing disposition that is in us. We are so careful to not displease men,
and so desirous to keep in credit and favor with them, that it makes us most
unconscionably neglect our known duty of the King's Great Commission. A foolish physician he is, and a most
unfaithful friend, that will let a sick man die for fear of troubling him; and
cruel victims are we to our friends, that will rather suffer them to go quietly
to hell, than we might anger them, or hazard our reputation with them. If they
did but fall in a faint, we would rub them and pinch them, and never halt at
hurting them.
If they were distracted we would
bind them with chains, and we would please them in nothing that be disposed to their
hurt; and yet, when they are beside themselves in the point of salvation, and
in their madness marching on to damnation, we will not stop them, for fear of
displeasing them. How can these men be Christians that love the praise and favor
of men more than the favor of God? John 12:43. “For if they yet seek to please men, they are no longer the servants of
Christ,” Gal. 1:10. To win them indeed, they must become all things to all
men; but to please them to their destruction, and let them perish, that, we may
keep our credit with them, is a course so base and barbarously cruel, that he
that has the face of a Christian should abhor it, 1 Cor. 9:20-24; Prov. 11:36.
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