Luke 2:34-35 And Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary his mother, Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel… Wherever Christ Jesus comes, with whomsoever He may come in contact, He is never without influence, never inoperative, but in every case a weighty result is produced. There is about the holy Child Jesus a power which is always in operation. He is not set to be an unobserved, inactive, slumbering personage in the midst of Israel but He is set for the falling or for the rise of the many to whom He is known Never does a man hear the gospel, but he either rises or falls under that hearing. Observe, then, the two sides of the truth — Jesus always working upon men with marked effect; and, on the other hand, man treating the Lord Jesus with warmth either of affection or opposition; an action and a reaction being evermore produced. Why is this? 1. Because of the energy which dwells in the Lord's Christ, and in the gospel which now represents Him among men. The gospel is all life and energy; like leaven it heaves and ferments with inward energy, it cannot rest till it leavens all around it. It may be compared to salt which must permeate, penetrate, and season that which is subject to its influence. It is no more possible for you to restrain the working of the gospel than to forbid the action of fire. Stand before the fire, it shall warm and comfort you; thrust your hand into it, it shall burn you. It must work, because it is fire. And so with yonder sun. Though clouds may hide it from our sight at this moment, yet for ever does it pour forth, as from a furnace mouth, its heat and light. Nor could it cease to burn and shine, unless it ceased to be a sun. As long as it is a sun, it must permeate surrounding space with its influence and splendour. Do you wonder that the Sun of Righteousness is of yet Diviner energy? 2. Jesus Christ and His gospel are matters of such prime necessity to mankind, that from this cause also there must always be an effect produced by Christ. He is as necessary to our souls as the air is to our bodies. If we receive Him, we live; if we will not receive Him, we must die. It is unavoidable that it should be so. You cannot reject the Saviour, and be a little damaged thereby; there is no alternative but that you utterly perish. 3. The position in which Jesus Christ meets men makes it inevitable that He must have an effect upon them. He stands right in men's way. They must decide about Him one way or the other. 4. He was appointed for this very thing. "Set." It was for this very end He came. See the husbandman take the fan. You observe the heap of mingled wheat and chaff lying on the floor. He begins to move the fan to and fro till he has created a breeze of wind. What happens? The chaff flies to the further end of the threshing floor, and there it lies by itself; the wheat, more weighty, remains purified and cleansed, a golden heap of grain. Such is the preaching of the gospel. Such is Christ: he is the separater of those who will perish from those who shall be saved. The fan discerns and discovers, it reveals the worthless and manifests the precious. Thus hath Christ the fan in his hand! Or, take another metaphor, which we find in the prophets, "Who may abide the day of His coming? and who shall stand when He appeareth? for He is like a refiner's fire, and like fuller's soap." You see the refiner's fire. Notice how it burns and blazes. Now, it turns to a white heat; you cannot bear to look on it. What has happened? Why, the dross is divided from the silver and the alloy from the gold. The refiner's fire separates the precious from the vile. And so the gospel reveals the elect of God, and leaves to hardness of heart the finally impenitent. Where it is preached, the men who accept it are precious ones of God, His elect, His chosen; the men who reject it are the reprobate silver. So shall men call them, for God hath rejected them. Mark too, the fuller's soap. The fuller takes his soap, and exercising his craft upon yonder piece of linen marked with many stains and colours, you see how these foul things fly before the soap, and the fair fabric alone remains. Both spots and linen feel the power of the soap. So cloth the gospel take the polluted fabric of humanity and cleanse it: the filth departs and flies before it, and the fair linen remains. Such are the saints of God; when the gospel comes to them they are purified thereby, while the wicked, as foul spots, are driven away in their wickedness. Having thus set forth the great truth of the text, I purpose now to answer briefly one or two questions. I. WHO ARE THOSE THAT FALL BY CHRIST. In Christ's day the question was not difficult to answer. Those that fell by Christ were — 1. The holders of tradition, who gave men's sayings higher authority than God's commands. 2. The externalists. 3. The self-righteous. 4. The wiseacres. 5. The sceptical. Very much the same sort of people as fell by Christ then fall by Christ now. II. TO WHOM WILL THE LORD JESUS BE A RISING AGAIN? He will be a rising again to those who have fallen. Dost thou confess, "I have fallen"? Dost thou acknowledge, "I possess a fallen nature"? Dost thou lament thou hast fallen into sin? O my brother, He will be thy rising. He cannot uplift those who are not brought low. Note, again, those that rise in Him are those who are now willing to rise m Him. Jesus is set to raise you up. III. There are SOME WHO SHALL BOTH FALL AND RISE, AGAIN IN CHRIST; to whom Christ shall give such a fall as they never had before, and such a rise as shall be to their eternal resurrection. But what a fall was there when I learned that if salvation was of works, it could not be of grace, and if it was of grace it could not be of works; the two could not be mixed together. Then I said I would hope in the performance of the duties which the gospel inculcates; I thought I had power to do this; I would repent, and believe, and so win heaven. But what a fall I had, and how each bone seemed broken when He declared to me, "without Me, ye can do nothing." Ah, this is how Christ saves souls. He gives them a fall first, and afterwards He makes them rise. You cannot fill the vessel till it is empty. There must be room made for mercy by the pouring out of human merit. You cannot clothe the man who is clothed already, or feed him who has no hunger. But this fall which Jesus gives us is a blessed fall. He never did throw a man down without lifting him up afterwards. "I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal," these are attributes of Jehovah Jesus. IV. We shall conclude with a few words upon the last part of the text. The text tells us that the Lord Jesus is "A SIGN THAT SHALL BE SPOKEN AGAINST." 1. Christ was a sign of Divine love. In Him God reaches the climax of benevolence, and man exhibits the climax of deadly hate. The greatest gift provokes the greatest hostility, and the loftiest sign brings forth the most virulent opposition. 2. Christ was a sign of Divine justice. A bleeding Saviour, the Son of God deserted by His Father, the thunderbolts of vengeance finding a target in the Person of the Well-beloved, herein is justice revealed most fully. I hear not that other signs of vengeance have been spoken against. Men have trembled, but have not railed. Sodom and Gomorrah with bowed head confessed the justice of their doom. Egypt engulphed in the Red Sea saith nothing of it; none of her records contain a single blasphemy against Jehovah for having swept away the nation's chivalry. The judgments of God, as a rule, strikes men dumb with awe! But this, which was the greatest display of Divine hatred of sin, where the Son of God was made to descend into the lowest depths as our substitute, this provokes to-day man's uttermost wrath. Know you not how many are continually railing at the Cross? The Crucified is still abhorred. How matchless is the perversity of human nature, that when God displays His justice most, but blends it sweetly with His love, the sign is everywhere spoken against! 3. Christ was the sign of man's communion with God, and of God's fellowship with man. A ladder reaching from earth to heaven; a connecting bridge between creature and Creator. But alas! man does not want to be near his Maker, and hence he rails at the means provided for communion. 4. Christ is the sign of the elect seed, the representative of the holy, the newborn, the spiritual; and hence, as soon as the carnal mind, that knoweth not God nor loveth Him, perceives Christ and His gospel, it at once stirs up the depth of its malevolence to put down Christ if it be possible. But they shall never put Him down. They may speak against the gospel, but here is our joy, that Christ will raise up His people, and will certainly give the fall to His enemies. The ark of the Lord can never fall before Dagon; but Dagon must fall down before the Lord's ark. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Parallel Verses KJV: And Simeon blessed them, and said unto Mary his mother, Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel; and for a sign which shall be spoken against; |
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