The condition of hardened sinners desperate.

I. WHY IS IT SO?

1. Because repeated warnings have been rejected. (Vers, 4, 5.) These have been inspired and infallible. Had they believed ever so little they might have trusted implicitly what was spoken, accompanied as it was with such miraculous credentials. We, in these last times, have had the Lord himself. He has revealed the heart of the Father.

(2) They were sufficiently numerous and seasonable. God "rose up early and sent them." He sent them all. No opportunity or peculiarity of individual influence was emitted. Christ is greater than all the prophets put together, and his gospel is universally declared and universally authoritative over the consciences of men. God cannot send another messenger, nor would it avail if he could.

2. Because the lessons of experience have been ignored. (Vers. 9, 10.) How terribly severe had not these been! It was scarcely possible for greater temporal punishments to be inflicted. Yet it was in the discipline of these judgments they were to have been saved. The path of transgressions, as the sinner looks back upon it, is marked by ruin and death. Yet will he not repent.

3. Their persistent disobedience is an intolerable offence to God. (Ver. 8.) God's judgments are not exhausted, but his patience may be. The history of offence and punishment will not repeat itself indefinitely. There are abysses of wrath. There is an eternal fire. Let them beware lest they be utterly consumed.

II. WHAT ARE THE SIGNS THAT IT IS SO?

1. The Word of God is wholly against them, The indictment has no redeeming feature.

2. The pathos and pitifulness of God's entreaty. (Vers. 4, 7.) There is compassion in the Divine mind because of the consequences that impend. Who so able to understand the sinner's circumstances as his Father? He who can see before and after, and who can fathom the mystery of iniquity, fears for his erring child.

III. WHAT ELEMENT OF HOPE, IF ANY, IS STILL LEFT FOR THEM?

1. God still pleads. Silence would mean hopelessness. Whilst his servant is authorized to speak, there may remain a way of escape.

2. The fatherly compassion his voice betrays. There are tears in the entreaty: "Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate!" It is the birth cry of an evangel; a prophecy of Jesus. Mercy may move and melt where judgment has failed. "For the love of Christ constraineth us," etc. (2 Corinthians 5:14); "But God commendeth his own love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8). - M.

1. They represent to them their deplorable situation; they describe to them the horrors of the pit wherein there is no water, in which they lie; the miseries of that prison in which they are closely confined; the unprofitableness of the drudgery in which they are engaged; and the tribulation and anguish which they have to expect. "Knowing the terrors of the Lord, they persuade men"; and sensible that, if they are unfaithful, the blood of souls will be required at their hands, they are "instant in season and out of season," if by any means they Could persuade them to flee from the wrath to come.

2. They do all this in the name of the Lord.

(1)They speak in obedience to His command.

(2)They speak in perfect agreement with the Divine word.

(3)They preach in the hope of promoting His glory.

II. THE UNPLEASANT RECEPTION WITH WHICH THEIR MESSAGE OFTEN MEETS. "We will not hearken."

1. We hope that there are but few who would plainly say this in words; who are so hardened as to glory in their shame; or so incorrigible as to tell God's ministers that they cast His words behind their back, as unworthy of attention, and beneath their notice: yet we are persuaded that there are many professors who say this in their hearts, and who will not see when the hand of God is lifted up; for if this were not the case, would ministers so often have to lament over them, saying, "Oh, that they were wise"; and, "Oh, that there were such a heart in them, to keep His commandments and do them"? Careless hearers all say, "We will not hearken unto Thee." And oh, how few are there that will hear believingly! The word does not profit, "not being mixed with faith in them that hear it"; men often "reject the counsel of God against themselves," and disbelieve the record that God has given of His Son. Their conduct shows that they believe not in the name of the only-begotten Son of God.

2. What is the reason that they will not attend to those things, which, it is evident, belong to their peace?

(1)Because they are in league with sin.

(2)What your ministers preach loudly speaks your condemnation.I would say, by way of inference, In what an awful state are those persons who are making the resolution contained in the text. They are evidently exposed to the loss of their privileges; to hardness of heart, and contempt of God's Word and commandments; and to utter and eternal destruction.

(T. Spencer.).