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The sermon teaches a strongly Reformed account of sin: humanity is personally corrupt, condemned under divine justice, and incapable of producing saving repentance or faith independently of grace. Christ’s crucifixion is presented as substitutionary atonement, with Christ bearing the curse, condemnation, and punishment due to sinners. Salvation is found not in moral improvement or human effort but by looking to and trusting Christ. The sermon closes with a tender but urgent invitation to weary sinners, assuring them that Christ is willing to forgive and receive all who come to Him.
Theological center: Sinners are totally ruined, condemned, and unable to save themselves, but Christ bears their sin and condemnation as a sufficient substitute, offering salvation through faith.
Applications: Look to Christ · Trust Christ today · Come to Christ for rest · Recognize human inability
Primary texts: Numbers 21:8 · 1 Timothy 1:15 · Matthew 11:29
“And the LORD said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.” Numbers 21:8 I DO not propose this morning to explain again the mystery of the brazen serpent. As many of you well remember, not long ago I preached upon that subject, and endeavored to expound it in all its lengths and breadths. I have a somewhat similar object at the present time, the details may indeed be different, but after all the moral will be the same. Man has very many wants, and he should be grateful whenever the least of them is supplied. But he has one want which overtops every other, it is the want of bread. Give him raiment, house him well, decorate and adorn him, yet if you give him not bread, his body faints, he dies of hunger. Hence it is that while the earth when it is tilled is made to bring forth many things that minister unto the comfort and luxury of men, yet man is wise enough to understand that since bread is his chief want, he must be most careful concerning corn. He therefore sows broad acres with it, and he cultivates more of this, which is the grandest necessary, than he does of anything else in his husbandry. I feel that this is the only excuse I can offer you for coming back again constantly and continually to the simple doctrine of the salvation of the sinner through Christ Jesus. There are many things which the soul wants, it needs instruction, it needs comfort, it needs knowledge of doctrine and enlightenment in its experience, but there is one grand need of the soul, which far surmounts every other, it is the want of salvation, the want of Christ, and I do feel that I am right in repeating again, and again, and again, the simple announcement of the Gospel of Christ for poor perishing sinners. At any rate, I know I seldom feel more happy than when I am preaching a full Christ to empty sinners. My tongue becomes something like Anacreon’s harp. It is said of it, it resounded love alone. And so my tongue longs to resound Christ alone, and give forth no other strain, but Christ and His cross, Christ uplifted, the salvation of a dying world, Christ crucified, the life of poor dead sinners. I pray that this morning many here present, who have no clear views of the plan of salvation, may now see for the first time how men are saved through the lifting up of Christ, just as the poor Israelites in the wilderness were saved from the fiery serpents by lifting up the brazen serpent on the pole. Solemnly addressing you this morning, I shall need your attentio…