Awareness Of Sin, Then Come To Christ By Joseph Alleine
Awareness Of Sin is the starting point for a person’s search for a Savior
Men will not come to Christ for healing until they are tired and heavy laden, pricked in the heart, and sick of sin, and they will not sincerely enquire, ‘What shall we do?’ [Acts 2:37] Before they can come to Christ and live, they must see themselves as dead men. So work hard to put all your sins in order in front of you; don’t be afraid to look at them; instead, let your spirit search diligently. Inquire into your heart and life; conduct a thorough examination of yourself and all your ways in order to make a complete discovery; and seek the help of God’s Spirit, if you are unable to do so on your own, because it is His proper work to convict of sin. Spread everything out in front of your conscience until your heart and eyes are filled with tears. Do not stop striving with God and your own soul until it, like the enlightened jailer, cries out under the weight of your sins, ‘What must I do to be saved?’ [Acts 16:30]
Meditate on the NUMBER of your sins.
When David realized this, his heart broke, and he realized he had more sins than the hairs on his head. This made him cry out for the multitude of God’s tender mercies. The disgusting carcass does not swarm with crawling maggots in the same way that an unsanctified soul does with filthy lusts. They fill his head, his heart, his eyes and his mouth. Look back; where have you never not sinned? When was the last time you did not commit a sin? Look inward; what part or power in your soul or body can you find that isn’t poisoned by sin; what duty do you ever perform that isn’t tainted by this poison? Oh, the sum of your debts, you who have been in debt your entire life and have never paid off a single penny! Look over the sin of your nature, and all its cursed brood, the sins of your life. Bring to mind your sins of omission and commission; the sins of your thoughts, words, and actions; the sins of your youth and the sins of your riper years. Don’t be like a bankrupt who is afraid to look at his books. Carefully examine the conscience records. Sooner or later, these books will have to be opened.
Meditate upon the AGGRAVATIONS of your sins
Meditate upon the AGGRAVATIONS of your sins, as they are the grand enemies of the God of your life, and of the life of your soul; in a word, they are the public enemies of all mankind. How do David, Ezra, Daniel, and the good Levites, aggravate their sins, from the consideration of their opposition to God and His good and righteous laws, and of the mercies and warnings against which they were committed! Oh the work that sin has done in the world! This is the enemy that has brought in death; that has robbed and enslaved man, that has turned the world upside down, and sown the dissensions between man and the creatures, between man and man, yes, between man and himself, setting the animal part against the rational, the will against the judgment, lust against conscience; yes, worst of all, between God and man, making the sinner both hateful to God and the hater of God. O man, how can you make so light of sin?
Sin is the traitor that thirsted for the blood of the Son of God, that sold Him, that mocked Him, that scourged Him, that spat in His face, that tore His hands, that pierced His side, that pressed His soul, that mangled His body, that never left Him until he had bound Him, condemned Him, nailed Him, crucified Him, and put Him to an open shame! Sin is that deadly poison, so powerful of operation that one drop of it, shed on the root of mankind, has corrupted, spoiled, poisoned, and ruined the whole race. Sin is the bloody executioner that has killed the prophets, burned the martyrs, murdered all the apostles, all the patriarchs, all the kings and potentates. Sin has destroyed cities, swallowed empires, and devoured whole nations. Whatever weapon it was done by, it was sin that caused the execution. Do you yet think sin is only a small thing?
If Adam and all his children could be dug out of their graves, and their bodies piled up to heaven, and an inquiry were made as to what heinous murderer was guilty of all this blood, it would be all found in sin!
Study the nature of sin, until your heart incline to fear and loathe it; and meditate on the aggravations of your particular sins, how you have sinned against all God’s warnings, against your own prayers, against mercies, against corrections, against clearest light, against freest love, against your own resolutions, against promises, vows, and covenants of better obedience. Charge your heart with these things until it blush for shame, and be brought out of all good opinion of itself.
Meditate on the DESERT of sin.
It cries to Heaven; it calls for vengeance. Its due wages are death and damnation; it brings the curse of God upon the soul and body. The least sinful word or thought lays you under the infinite wrath of God. O what a load of wrath, what a weight of curses, what treasures of vengeance, have all the millions of your sins deserved! Oh judge yourself that the Lord may not judge you.
Meditate on the deformity and DEFILEMENT of sin.
It is black as hell, the very image and likeness of the devil drawn upon the soul. It would terrify you to see yourself in the hateful deformity of your nature. There is no mire so unclean, no plague or leprosy so detestable as sin, in which you are plunged and rendered more displeasing to the pure and holy nature of the glorious God than the vilest object can be to you. Could you take up a toad into your bosom; could you cherish it, and take delight in it? But you are as contrary to the pure and perfect holiness of the divine nature, until you are purified by the blood of Jesus and the power of renewing grace.
Above all other sins, consider these two.
The sin of your heart.
There is to little purpose to lop off the branches while the root of corruption remains untouched. In vain do men stop up the streams, when the fountain is running which fills up all again. Let the axe of your repentance, with David’s go to the root of sin. Study how deep, how permanent is your natural pollution, how universal it is, until you cry out, with Paul, against your body of death. The heart is never soundly broken until thoroughly convinced of the heinousness of its original and deep-rooted depravity. Here fix your thoughts; Sin is that which makes you backward to all good, and prone to all evil; that sheds blindness, pride, prejudice, and unbelief into your mind; enmity, inconstancy, and obstinacy into your will; inordinate heats and colds into your affections; insensibleness and unfaithfulness into your conscience; slipperiness into your memory. In a word, sin has put every wheel of the soul out of order, and made it, from a habitation of holiness, to become a very hell of iniquity. This is what has defiled and perverted all your members, and turned them into weapons of unrighteousness, and servants of sin; that has filled the head with carnal and corrupt designs, the hand with sinful practices, the eyes with wandering and wantonness, the tongue with deadly poison. This is what has opened the ears to tales, flattery and filthy talk, and shut them against the instructions of life; and has rendered your heart the cursed source of all deadly imaginations, so that it pours out its wickedness without ceasing even as naturally as a fountain pours forth its waters—or the raging sea casts forth mire and dirt.
And will you yet be in love with yourself, and tell us any longer of your good heart? Oh never leave meditating on the desperate contagion, the original corruption of your heart, until, with Ephraim, you bemoan yourself; and with the deepest shame and sorrow smite on your bosom, as the publican; and, with Job, abhor yourself and repent in dust and ashes.
The particular evil that you are most addicted to.
Find out all its aggravations; set home upon your heart all God’s threats against it. Repentance drives before it the whole herd—but especially sticks the arrow in the beloved sin, and singles this out, above the rest, to run it down. Oh labor to make this sin odious to your soul, and double your guard and resolutions against it, realize that this is most dishonoring to God and dangerous to you.
This article is an edited version of “Directions to the Unconverted” in Joseph Alleine’s book, “An Alarm to the Unconverted”. Welcome to read ALL related posts here or purchase the book