The Wordless Book
A Sermon delivered by
C. H. SPURGEON,
At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington,
On Thursday Evening, January 11th, 1866.
C. H. SPURGEON,
At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington,
On Thursday Evening, January 11th, 1866.
"Wash
me, and I shall be whiter than snow."—Psalm 51:7.
I DARESAY you have most of you heard of a
little book which an old divine used constantly to study, and when his friends
wondered what there was in the book, he told them that he hoped they would all
know and understand it, but that there was not single word in it. When they
looked at it, they found that it consisted of only three leaves; the first was
black, the second was red, and the third was pure white. The old minister used
to gaze upon the black leaf to remind himself of his sinful state by nature,
upon the red leaf to call to his remembrance the precious blood of Christ, and
upon the white leaf to picture to him the perfect righteousness which God has
given to believers through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ his Son.
I want you, dear friends, to read this book this
evening, and I desire to read it myself. May God the Holy Spirit graciously
help us to do so to our profit!
I. First, LET US LOOK AT
THE BLACK[1]
LEAF.
There is something about this in the text, for
the person who used this prayer said, "Wash me," so he was black and
needed to be washed; and the blackness was of such a peculiar kind that a
miracle was needed to cleanse it away, so that the one who had been black would
become white, and so white that he would be "whiter than snow."
If we consider David's case when he
wrote this Psalm, we shall see that he was very black. He had
committed the horrible sin of adultery, which is so shameful a sin that we can
only allude to it with bated breath. It is a sin which involves much
unhappiness to others besides the persons who commit it; and it is a sin which,
although the guilty ones may repent, cannot be undone. It is altogether a most
foul and outrageous crime against God and man, and they who have committed it
do indeed need to be washed.
But David's sin was all the greater because of
the circumstances in which he was placed. He was like the owner of a great
flock, who had no need to take his neighbour's one ewe lamb when he had so many
of his own. The sin in his case was wholly inexcusable, for he so well knew
what a great evil it was. He was a man who had taken delight in God's law,
meditating in it day and night. He was, therefore, familiar with the
commandment which expressly forbad that sin; so that, when he sinned in this
way, he sinned as one does who takes a draught of poison, not by mistake, but
well knowing what will be the consequences of drinking it. It was wilful
wickedness on David's part for which there cannot be the slightest palliation.
Nay, more; not only did he know the nature of
the sin, but he also knew the sweetness of communion with God, and must have
had a clear sense of what it must have meant for him to lose it. His fellowship
with the Most High had been so close that he was called "the man after
God's own heart." How sweetly has he sung of his delight in the Lord. You
know that, in your happiest moment, when you want to praise the Lord with your
whole heart, you cannot find any better expression than David has left you in
his Psalms. How horrible it is that the man who had been in the third heaven of
fellowship with God should have sinned in this foul fashion!
Besides, David had received many providential
mercies at the Lord's hands. He was but a shepherd lad, and God took him from
feeding his father's flock, and made him king over Israel. The Lord also
delivered him out of the paw of the lion and out of the paw of the bear,
enabled him to overthrow and slay giant Goliath, and to escape the malice of
Saul when he hunted him as a partridge upon the mountains. The Lord preserved
him from many perils, and at last firmly established him upon the throne; yet,
after all these deliverances and mercies, this man, so highly favoured by God,
fell into this gross sin.
Then, also, it was a further aggravation of
David's sin that it was committed against Uriah. If you read through the lists
of David's mighty men, you will find at the end the name of Uriah the Hittite;
he had been with David when he was outlawed by Saul, he had accompanied his
leader in his wanderings, he had shared his perils and privations, so it was a
shameful return on the part of the king when he stole away the wife of his
faithful follower who was at that very time fighting against the king's
enemies. Searching through the whole of Scripture, or at least through the Old
Testament, I do not know where we have the record of a worse sin committed by
one who yet was a true child of God. So David had good reason to pray to the
Lord, "Wash me," for he was indeed black with a special and peculiar
blackness.
But now, turning from David, let us consider our
own blackness in the sight of God. Is there not, my dear friend, a peculiar
blackness about your case as a sinner before God? I cannot picture it, but I
ask you to call it to your remembrance now that your soul may be humbled on
account of it. Perhaps you are the child of Christian parents, or you were the
subject of early religious impressions, or it may be that you have been in
other ways specially favoured by God, yet you have sinned against him, sinned
against light and knowledge, sinned against a mother's tears, a father's
prayers, and a pastor's admonitions and warnings. You were very ill once, and thought
you were going to die, but the Lord spared your life, and restored you to
health and strength, yet you went back to your sin as the dog returns to his
vomit, or the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire. Possibly a
sudden sense of guilt alarmed you, so that you could not enjoy your sin, yet
you could not break away from it. You spent your money for that which was not
bread, and your labour for that which did not satisfy you, yet you went on
wasting your substance with riotous living until you came to beggary, but even
that did not wean you from your sin. In the house of God you had many solemn
warnings, and you went home again and again resolving to repent, yet your
resolves soon melted away, like the morning cloud and the early dew, leaving
you more hardened than ever. I remember John B. Gough,[2] at Exeter Hall, describing
himself in his drinking days as seated upon a wild horse which was hurrying him
to his destruction until a stronger hand than his own seized the reins, pulled
the horse down upon its haunches, and rescued the reckless rider. It was a
terrible picture, yet it was a faithful representation of the conversion of
some of us. How we drove the spurs into that wild horse, and urged it to yet
greater speed in its mad career until it seemed as if we would even ride over
that gracious Being who was determined to save us! That was sin indeed, not
merely against the dictates of an enlightened conscience, and against the
warnings which were being continually given to us, but it was what the apostle
calls treading under foot the Son of God, counting the blood of the covenant an
unholy thing, and doing despite unto the Spirit of grace.
Let me, beloved, before I turn away from this
black leaf, urge you to study it diligently, and to try to comprehend the
blackness of your heart and the depravity of your lives. That false peace which
results from light thoughts of sin is the work of Satan; get rid of it at once,
if he has wrought it in you. Do not be afraid to look at your sins, do not shut
your eyes to them; for you to hide your face from them may be your ruin, but
for God to hide his face from them will be your salvation. Look at your sins
and meditate upon them until they even drive you to despair. "What!"
says one, "until they drive me to despair?" Yes; I do not mean that
despair which arises from unbelief, but that self-despair which is so near akin
to confidence in Christ. The more God enables you to see your emptiness, the
more eager will you be to avail yourself of Christ's fulness. I have always
found that, as my trust in self went up, my trust in Christ went down; and as
my trust in self went down, my trust in Christ went up, so I urge you to take
an honest view of your own blackness of heart and life, for that will cause you
to pray with David, "Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." Weigh
yourselves in the scales of the sanctuary, for they never err in the slightest
degree. You need not exaggerate a single item of your guilt, for just as you
are you will find far too much sin within you if the Holy Spirit will enable
you to see yourselves as you really are.
II. But now we must turn to the second leaf, THE BLOOD-RED LEAF OF THE WORDLESS BOOK,
which brings to our remembrance
the precious blood of Christ.
When the sinner cries, "Wash me,"
there must be some fount of cleansing where he can be washed "whiter than
snow." So there is, but there is nothing but the crimson blood of Jesus
that can wash out the crimson stain of sin. What is there about Jesus Christ
that makes him able to save all who come unto God by him? This is a matter upon
which Christians ought to meditate much and often. Try to understand, dear
friends, the greatness of the atonement. Live much under the shadow of the
cross. Learn to—
"View the flowing
Of the Saviour's
precious blood,
By divine assurance
knowing
He has made your peace with God."
Feel that Christ's blood was
shed for you, even for you. Never be satisfied till you have learned the
mystery of the five wounds; never be content till you are "able to
comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and
height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge."
The Power of Jesus to cleanse
from sin must lie, first, in the
greatness of his person. It is not conceivable that the sufferings of a
mere man, however holy or great he might have been, could have made atonement
for the sins of the whole multitude of the Lord's chosen people. It was because
Jesus Christ was one of the persons in the Divine Trinity, it was because the
Son of Mary was none other than the Son of God, it was because he who lived,
and laboured, and suffered, and died and was the great Creator, without whom
was not anything made that was made, that his blood has such efficacy that it
can wash the blackest sinner so clean that they are "whiter than
snow." The death of the best man who ever lived could not make an
atonement even for his own sins, much less could it atone for the guilt of
others; but when God himself "took upon him the form of a servant, and was
made in the likeness of men," and "humbled himself, and became obedient
unto death, even the death of the cross," no limit can be set to the value
of the atonement that he made. We hold most firmly the doctrine of particular
redemption, that Christ loved his Church, and gave himself for it; but we do
not hold the doctrine of the limited value of his precious blood. There can be
no limit to Deity, there must be infinite value in the atonement which was
offered by him who is divine. The only limit of the atonement is in its design,
and that design was that Christ should give eternal life to as many as the
Father has given him; but in itself the atonement is sufficient for the
salvation of the whose world, and if the entire race of mankind could be
brought to believe in Jesus, there is enough efficacy in his precious blood to
cleanse everyone born of woman from every sin that all of them have ever
committed.
But the power of the cleansing
blood of Jesus must also lie in the
intense sufferings which he endured in making atonement for his people.
Never was there another case like that of our precious Saviour. In his merely
physical sufferings there may have been some who have endured as much as he
did, for the human body is only capable of a certain amount of pain and agony,
and others beside our Lord have reached that limit; but there was an element in
his sufferings that was never present in any other case. The fact of his dying
in the room, and place, and stead of his people, the one great sacrifice for
the whole of his redeemed, makes his death altogether unique, so that not even
the noblest of the noble army of martyrs can share the glory with him. His
mental sufferings also constituted a very vital part of the atonement, the
sufferings of his soul were the very soul of his sufferings. If you can
comprehend the bitterness of his betrayal by one who had been his follower and
friend, and of his desertion by all his disciples, his arraignment for sedition
and blasphemy before creatures whom he had himself made; if you can realize
what it was for him, who did no sin, to be made sin for us, and to have laid
upon him the iniquity of us all; if you can picture to yourself how be loathed
sin and shrank from it, you can form some slight idea of what his pure nature
must have suffered for our sakes. We do not shrink from sin as Christ did
because we are accustomed to it, it was once the element in which we lived, and
moved, had our being; but his holy nature shrank from evil as a sensitive plant
recoils from the touch. But the worst of his sufferings must have been when his
Father's wrath was poured out upon him as he bore what his people deserved to
bear, but which now they will never have to bear.
"The waves of
swelling grief
Did o'er his bosom roll,
and mountains of
almighty wrath
Lay heavy on his soul."
For his Father to have to hide
his face from him so that he cried in his agony, "My God, my God, why hast
thou forsaken me?" must have been a veritable hell to him. This was the
tremendous draught of wrath which our Saviour drank for us to its last dregs so
that our cup might not have one drop of wrath in it for ever. It must have been
a great atonement that was purchased at so great price.
We may think of the greatness
of Christ's atonement in another way.
It must have been a great atonement which has safely landed such multitudes
of sinners in heaven, and which has saved so many great sinners, and
transformed them into such bright saints. It must be a great atonement which is
yet to bring innumerable myriads into the unity of the faith, and into the
glory of the church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven. It is so
great an atonement, sinner, that if thou wilt trust to it, thou shalt be saved
by it however many and great thy sins may have been. Art thou afraid that the
blood of Christ is not powerful enough to cleanse thee? Dost thou fear that his
atonement cannot bear the weight of such a sinner as thou art? I heard, the other
day, of a foolish woman at Plymouth who, for a long while, would not go over
the Saltash Bridge because she did not think it was safe. When, at length,
after seeing the enormous traffic that passed safely over the bridge, she was
induced to trust herself to it, she trembled greatly all the time, and was not
easy in her mind until she was off it. Of course, everybody laughed at her for
thinking that such a ponderous structure could not bear her little weight.
There may be some sinner, in this building, who is afraid that the great bridge
which eternal mercy has constructed, at infinite cost, across the gulf which
separates us from God, is not strong enough to bear his weight. If so, let me
assure him that across that bridge of Christ's atoning sacrifice millions of
sinners, as vile and foul as he is, have safely passed, and the bridge has not
even trembled beneath their weight, nor has any single part of it ever strained
or displaced. My poor fearful friend, your anxiety lest the great bridge of
mercy should not be able to bear your weight reminds me of the fable of the
gnat that settled on the bull's ear, and then was concerned lest the powerful
beast should be incommoded by his enormous weight. It is well that you should
have a vivid realization of the weight of your sins, but at the same time you
should also realize that Jesus Christ, by virtue of his great atonement, is not
only able to bear the weight of your sins, but he can also carry—indeed, he has
already carried upon his shoulders the sins of all who shall believe in him
right to the end of time; and he has borne them away into the land of
forgetfulness, where they shall not be remembered or recovered forever. So
efficacious is the blood of the everlasting covenant that even you, black as
you are, may pray, with David, "Wash me, and I shall be whiter than
snow."
III. This brings me to THE WHITE[3]
LEAF OF THE WORDLESS BOOK, which
is just as full of instruction as either the black leaf or the red one:
"Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow."
What a beautiful sight it was,
this morning, when we looked out, and saw the ground all covered with snow! The
trees were all robed in silver; yet it is almost an insult to the snow to
compare it to silver, for silver at its brightest is not worthy to be compared
with the marvelous splendour that was to be seen wherever the trees appeared
adorned with beautiful festoons above the earth which was robed in its pure
white mantle. If we had taken a piece of what we call white paper, and laid it
down upon the surface of newly-fallen snow, it would have seemed quite begrimed
in comparison with the spotless snow. This morning's scene at once called the
text to my mind: "Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." You, O
black sinner, if you believe in Jesus, shall not only be washed in his precious
blood until you become tolerably clean, but you shall be made white, yea, you
shall be "whiter than snow." When we have gazed upon the pure
whiteness of the snow before it has become defiled, it has seemed as though
there could be nothing whiter. I know that, when I have been among the Alps,
and have for hours looked upon the dazzling whiteness of the snow, I have been
almost blinded by it. If the snow were to lie long upon the ground, and if the
whole earth were to be covered with it, we should soon all be blind. The eyes
of man have suffered with his soul through sin, and just as our soul would be
unable to bear a sight of the unveiled purity a God, our eyes cannot endure to
look upon the wondrous purity of the snow. Yet the sinner, black through sin,
when brought under the cleansing power of the blood of Jesus, becomes
"whiter than snow."
Now, how can a sinner be made
"whiter than snow"? Well, first
of all, there is a permanence about the whiteness of a blood-washed
sinner which there is not about the snow. The snow that fell this morning
was much of it anything but white this afternoon. Where the thaw had begun to
work, it looked yellow even where no foot of man had trodden upon it; and as
for the snow in the streets of London, you know how soon its whiteness
disappears. But there is no fear that the whiteness which God gives to a sinner
will ever depart from him; the robe of Christ's righteousness which is cast
around him is permanently white.
"This spotless robe
the same appears
When ruin'd nature sinks
in years;
No age can change its
glorious hue,
The robe of Christ is ever new."
It is always "whiter than
snow." Some of you have to live in smoky, grimy London, but the smoke and
the grime cannot discolour the spotless robe of Christ's righteousness. In
yourselves, you are stained with sin; but when you stand before God, clothed in
the righteousness of Christ, the stains of sin are all gone. David in himself
was black and foul when he prayed the prayer of our text, but clothed in the
righteousness of Christ he was white and clean. The believer in Christ is as
pure in God's sight at one time as he is at another. He does not look upon the
varying purity of our sanctification as our ground of acceptance with him; but
he looks upon the matchless and immutable purity of the person and work of the
Lord Jesus Christ, and he accepts us in Christ, and not because of what we are
in ourselves. Hence, when we are once "accepted in the Beloved," we
are permanently accepted; and being accepted in him, we are "whiter than
snow."
Further, the whiteness of snow
is, after all, only created whiteness. It is something which God has made,
yet it has not the purity which appertains to God himself; but the
righteousness which God gives to the believer is a divine righteousness, as Paul
says, "He hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him. "And remember that this is true
of the very sinner who before was so black that he had to cry to God,
"Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." There may be one who came
into this building black as night through sin; but if he is enabled now, by
grace, to trust in Jesus, his precious blood shall at once cleanse him so
completely that he shall be "whiter than snow." Justification is not
a work of degrees; it does a progress from one stage to another, but it is the
work of a moment, and it is instantaneously complete. God's great gift of
eternal life is bestowed in a moment, and you may not be able to discern the
exact moment when it is bestowed. Yet you may know even that; for, as soon as
you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you are born of God, you have passed from
death unto life, you are saved to all eternity. The act of faith is a very
simple thing, but it is the most God-glorifying act that a man can perform.
Though there is no merit in faith, yet faith is a most ennobling grace, and
Christ puts a high honour upon it when he says, "Thy faith hath saved
thee; go in peace." Christ puts the crown of salvation upon the head of
faith, yet faith will never wear it herself, but lays it at the feet of Jesus,
and gives him all the honour and glory.
There may be one in this place
who is afraid to think that Christ will save him. My dear friend, do my Master
the honour to believe that there are no depths of sin into which you may have
gone which are beyond his reach. Believe that there is no sin that is too black
to be washed away by the precious blood of Christ, for he has said, "All
manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men," and "all
manner of sin" must include yours. It is the very greatness of God's mercy
that sometimes staggers a sinner. Let me use a homely simile to illustrate my
meaning. Suppose you are sitting at your table, carving the joint for dinner,
and suppose your dog is under the table, hoping to get a bone or a piece of
gristle for his portion. Now, if you were to set the dish with the whole joint
on it down on the floor, he would probably be afraid to touch it lest he should
get a cut of the whip; he would know that a dog does not deserve such a dinner
as that, and that is just your difficulty, poor sinner, you know that you do
not deserve such grace as God delights to give. But the fact that it is of
grace shuts out the question of merit altogether. "By grace are ye saved
through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God." God's
gifts are like himself, immeasurably great. Perhaps some of you think you would
be content with crumbs or bones from God's table. Well, if he were to gives me
a few crumbs or a little broken meat, I would be grateful for even that, but it
would not satisfy me; but when he says to me, "Thou art my son, I have
adopted thee into my family, and thou shalt go no more out for ever;" I do
not agree with you that it is too good to be true. It may be too good for you,
but it is not too good for God; he gives as only he can give. If I were in
great need, and obtained access to the Queen, and after laying my case before her,
she said to me, "I feel a very deep interest in your case, here is a penny
for you," I should be quite sure that I had not seen the Queen, but that
some lady's maid or servant had been making a fool of me. Oh, no! the Queen
gives as Queen, and God gives as God; so that the greatness of his gift,
instead of staggering us, should only assure us that it is genuine, and that it
comes from God. Richard Baxter wisely said, "O Lord, it must be great
mercy or no mercy, for little mercy is of no use to me!" So, sinner, go to
the great God, with your great sin, and ask for great grace that you may be
washed in the great fountain filled with the blood of the great sacrifice, and
you shall have the great salvation which Christ has procured, and for it you
shall ascribe great praise for ever and ever to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
God grant that it may be so, for Jesus' sake! Amen.
The
Wordless Book: A Short History
The Wordless Book was first introduced by C.H. Spurgeon[4] in
this sermon. “Mr. Spurgeon told of an old
unnamed minister who had put three pages together and often looked at them to
remind himself of his sinfulness, of Christ’s blood poured out for him, and of
the “whiter-than-snow” cleansing provided for him.”[5]
In 1875, D.L. Moody[6] used the book of colors at
a children’s service with the addition of a Gold page representing the glories
of Heaven. The Wordless book has been used by Hudson Taylor,[7] missionary to China, Fanny
Crosby,[8] the famous hymn writer, and
Amy Carmichael,[9]
missionary to southern India.
In 1924, Ruth Overholtzer, wife Child Evangelism Fellowship®
founder, Irvin Overholtzer,[10] discovered in the
Wordless Book a bookstore operated by Dr. Harry Ironside.[11] Fifteen years later CEF® began printing the book with a green page to
represent Christian growth. In 2016,
over 40,000 Wordless Books were ordered from CEF® and a
quick look on the internet reveals that many churches and organizations use
these colors as a visual cue when explaining the Gospel.
CEF® Wordless
Book Training Link
[2]
John
Bartholomew Gough (1817 - 1886) was a temperance orator. Over the more than forty years he campaigned against drinking,
Gough gave upwards of 9,600 lectures to more than nine million people in
America, Canada, and Great Britain. When he died in 1886, the New York Times wrote that he
"was probably better known in this country and in Great Britain than any
other public speaker."
