by J. C. Ryle
The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.—1 John 1:7
Man’s sins are many and great. It is of the utmost importance that these sins should be cleansed away. Man’s guilt in the sight of God is enormous. Man’s danger of hell after he dies is imminent and tremendous. Yet man cannot cleanse away his own sins! It is written, and it is true, “By the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified” (Rom 3:20).
(a) It will not cleanse away your sins to be sorry for them. You may mourn over your past wickedness and humble yourself in sackcloth and ashes. You may shed floods of tears and acknowledge your own guilt and danger. You may, you must, you ought to do this. But you will not by so doing wipe out your transgressions from the book of God. sorrow cannot make atonement for sin.
The convicted criminal in a court of justice is often sorry for his offences. He sees the misery and ruin they have brought upon him. He mourns over his folly in not listening to advice and in giving way to temptation. But the judge does not let him off because he is sorry. The deed has been done; the law has been broken; the penalty has been incurred. The punishment must be inflicted, notwithstanding the criminal’s tears. This is precisely your position in the sight of God. Your sorrow is right, good, and proper. But your sorrow has no power whatever to cleanse away your sins. It needs something more than penitence to take the burden off your heart.
(b) It will not cleanse away your sins to mend your life. You may reform your conduct and turn over a new leaf. You may break off many evil habits and take up many good ones. You may become, in short, an altered man in all your outward behavior. You may, you must, you ought to do so. Without such change, no soul ever was saved. But you will not, by so doing, wipe away one particle of your guilt in God’s sight. reformation makes no atonement for sin.
The bankrupt tradesman, who owes ten thousand pounds and has not ten shillings to pay, may resolve to become a reformed character. After wasting his whole substance in riotous living, he may become steady, temperate, and respectable. It is all right and proper that he should be so: but this will not satisfy the claims of those to whom he owes money. Once more, I say, this is precisely your case by nature in the sight of God. You owe Him ten thousand talents and have “nothing to pay” (Luk 7:43). Today’s amendments are all very well, but they do not wipe away yesterday’s debts. It requires something more than amendment and reformation to give you a light heart and to set your conscience free.
(c) It will not cleanse away your sins to become diligent in the use of the forms and ordinances of religion. You may alter your habits about Sunday and attend services from morning to night. You may take pains to hear preaching on weekdays, as well as on Sundays. You may receive the Lord’s Supper on every possible occasion, give alms,[36] and keep fasts. It is all very well as far as it goes. It is a right and proper thing to attend to your religious duties. But all the means of grace in the world will never do you any good so long as you trust in them as saviors. They will not bind up the wounds of your heart and give you inward peace. formality[37] cannot make atonement for sin…
(d) It will not cleanse away your sins to look to man for help. It is not in the power of any child of Adam to save another’s soul. No bishop, no priest, no ordained man of any church or denomination has power to forgive sins: no human absolution,[38] however solemnly conferred, can purge the conscience that is not purged by God. It is well to ask the counsel of the ministers of the Gospel when the conscience is perplexed. It is their office to help the laboring and heavy-laden and to show them the way of peace. But it is not in the power of any minister to deliver any man from his guilt. We can only show the path that must be followed; we can only point out the door at which everyone must knock. It requires a hand far stronger than that of man to take the chains off conscience and set the prisoner free. no child of adam can take away his brother’s sins.
The bankrupt who asks a bankrupt to set him up in business again is only losing time. The pauper who travels off to a neighbor pauper and begs him to help him out of difficulties is only troubling himself in vain. The prisoner does not beg his fellow-prisoner to set him free; the shipwrecked sailor does not call on his shipwrecked comrade to place him safe ashore. Help in all these cases must come from some other quarter: relief in all these cases must be sought from some other hand. It is just the same in the matter of cleansing away your sins. So long as you seek it from man, whether man ordained or man not ordained, you seek it where it cannot be found…It is not in the power of any man on earth or in heaven to take the burden of sin from off another man’s soul. “None can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him” (Psa 49:7).
Thousands in every age have tried to cleanse themselves from their sins in the ways I have now described and have tried in vain. Thousands, I doubt not, are trying at this very moment and find themselves “nothing bettered, but rather [growing] worse” (Mar 5:26). They are climbing up a steep precipice[39] of ice, toiling hard, and yet slipping backwards as fast as they climb. They are pouring water into a cask full of holes, laboring busily, and yet no nearer the end of their work than when they began. They are rowing a boat against a rapid stream, plying the oar diligently, and yet in reality losing ground every minute. They are trying to build up a wall of loose sand, wearing themselves out with fatigue, and yet seeing their work roll down on them as fast as they throw it up. They are striving to pump dry a sinking ship: the water gains on them, and they will soon be drowned. Such is the experience in every part of the world of all who think to cleanse themselves from their sins.
I warn every reader of this [article] to beware of quack medicines in religion. Beware of supposing that penitence, reformation, formality, and priestcraft can ever give you peace with God. They cannot do it. It is not in them. The man who says they can must be ignorant of two things: he cannot know the length and breadth of human sinfulness; he cannot understand the height and depth of the holiness of God. There never breathed the man or woman on earth who tried to cleanse himself from his sins and in so doing obtained relief.
If you have found out this truth by experience, be diligent to impart it to others. Show them as plainly as you can their guilt and danger by nature. Tell them with no less plainness the immense importance of having their sins forgiven and cleansed away. But then warn them not to waste time in seeking to be cleansed in unlawful fashions…
The [next] remark I have to make is this: The blood of Jesus Christ can cleanse away all our sins. I enter on this part of my [article] with a thankful heart. I bless God that after setting before my readers the deadly nature of their spiritual disease, I am able to set before them an almighty remedy. But I feel it needful to dwell upon this remedy for a few minutes. A thing of such wondrous efficacy as this “blood” ought to be clearly understood: there should be no vagueness or mystery in your ideas about it. When you hear of the “blood of Christ,” you ought thoroughly to comprehend what the expression means.
The blood of Christ is that life-blood that the Lord Jesus shed when He died for sinners upon the cross. It is the blood that flowed so freely from His head pierced with thorns, His hands and feet pierced with nails, and His side pierced with a spear in the day when He was crucified and slain. The quantity of that blood may very likely have been small. The appearance of that blood was doubtless like that of our own. But never since the day when Adam was first formed out of the dust of the ground has any blood been shed of such deep importance to the whole family of mankind.
It was blood that had been long covenanted and promised. In the day when sin came into the world, God mercifully engaged that the Seed of the woman should bruise the serpent’s head (Gen. 3:15). One born of woman should appear one day and deliver the children of Adam from Satan’s power. That Seed of the woman was our Lord Jesus Christ. In the day that He suffered on the cross, He triumphed over Satan and accomplished redemption for mankind. When Jesus shed His life-blood on the cross, the head of the serpent was bruised, and the ancient promise was fulfilled.
It was blood that had been long typified and prefigured. clean to all eternity (Rom 3:26).
This wondrous blood of Christ applied to your conscience can cleanse you from all sin. It matters nothing what your sins may have been: “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool” (Isa 1:18). From sins of youth and sins of age, from sins of ignorance and sins of knowledge, from sins of open profligacy and sins of secret vice, from sins against law and sins against Gospel, from sins of head, heart, tongue, thought, and imagination, from sins against each and all of the Ten Commandments—from all these the blood of Christ can set us free. To this end was it appointed; for this cause was it shed; for this purpose, it is still a fountain open to all mankind. That thing which you cannot do for yourself can be done in a moment by this precious fountain. you can have all your sins cleansed away.
From Old Paths: Being Plain Statements of Some of the Weightier Matters of Christianity,
The Banner of Truth Trust, www.banneroftruth.org.
J. C. Ryle (1816-1900): English Anglican Bishop and author; born at Macclesfield, Cheshire County, UK.