Call to Worship November 10, 2024
“3. Consider the evils of it; I mean its present evils. Danger respects what is to come; evil, what is present. Some of the many evils that attend an unmortified lust may be mentioned:—
(1.) It grieves the holy and blessed Spirit, which is given to believers to dwell in them and abide with them. So the apostle, Eph. 4:25–29, dehorting them from many lusts and sins, gives this as the great motive of it, verse 30, ‘Grieve not the Holy Spirit, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.’ ‘Grieve not that Spirit of God,’ saith he, ‘whereby you receive so many and so great benefits;’ of which he instances in one signal and comprehensive one,—’sealing to the day of redemption.’ He is grieved by it. As a tender and loving friend is grieved at the unkindness of his friend, of whom he hath well deserved, so is it with this tender and loving Spirit, who hath chosen our hearts for a habitation to dwell in, and there to do for us all that our souls desire. He is grieved by our harbouring his enemies, and those whom he is to destroy, in our hearts with him. ‘He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve us,’ Lam. 3:33; and shall we daily grieve him? Thus is he said sometimes to be ‘vexed,’ sometimes ‘grieved at his heart,’ to express the greatest sense of our provocation. Now, if there be any thing of gracious ingenuity left in the soul, if it be not utterly hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, this consideration will certainly affect it. Consider who and what thou art; who the Spirit is that is grieved, what he hath done for thee, what he comes to thy soul about, what he hath already done in thee; and be ashamed. Among those who walk with God, there is no greater motive and incentive unto universal holiness, and the preserving of their hearts and spirits in all purity and cleanness, than this, that the blessed Spirit, who hath undertaken to dwell in them as temples of God, and to preserve them meet for him who so dwells in them, is continually considering what they give entertainment in their hearts unto, and rejoiceth when his temple is kept undefiled. That was a high aggravation of the sin of Zimri, that he brought his adulteress into the congregation in the sight of Moses and the rest, who were weeping for the sins of the people, Numb. 25:6. And is it not a high aggravation of the countenancing a lust, or suffering it to abide in the heart, when it is (as it must be, if we are believers) entertained under the peculiar eye and view of the Holy Ghost, taking care to preserve his tabernacle pure and holy?”[1]
[1] John Owen, The Works of John Owen, ed. William H. Goold, vol. 6 (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, n.d.), 55.