CHRIST will not die in vain. His Father gave him a certain number to be the
reward of his soul travail, and he will have every one of them, as he said,
“All that the Father giveth me shall come to me.” Almighty grace shall
sweetly constrain them all to come. My father gave me recently some
letters which I wrote to him when I began to preach. They are almost
boyish epistles; but, in reading through them again, I noticed in one of
them this expression, “How I long to see thousands of men saved; but my
great comfort is that some will be saved, must be saved, shall be saved, for
it is written, ‘All that the Father giveth me shall come to me.’”

The question for each of you to ask is, “Do I belong to that number?” I am
going to preach with the view of helping you to find out whether you
belong to that “all” whom the Father gave to Christ, the “all” who shall
come to him. We can use the second part of the verse to help us to
understand the first. “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out,”
will explain our Savior’s previous words, “All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me.”

I shall have no time for any further preface; I must at once get to my
subject, and try to put everything in a condensed form. Kindly give heed to
the word, think about it, pray over it; and may God the Holy Ghost apply it
to all your hearts!

I. First, notice in the text THE NECESSITY OF CHARACTER: 

“Him that cometh to me.” If you want to be saved, you must come to Christ. There is no other way of salvation under heaven but coming to Christ. Go wherever else you will, you must be disappointed and lost; it is only by coming to him that you can by any possibility have eternal life.

What is it to come to Christ? Well, it implies leaving all other confidences.
To come to anybody, is to leave everybody else. To come to Christ, is to
leave everything else, to leave every other hope, every other trust. Are you
trusting to your own works? Are you trusting to a priest? Are you trusting
to the merits of the Virgin Mary, or the saints and angels in heaven? Are
you trusting to anything but the Lord Jesus Christ? If so, leave it, and have
done with it. Come away from every other reliance, and trust to Christ
crucified, for this is the only way of salvation, as Peter said to the rulers
and elders of Israel, “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is
none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be
saved.

and come to him at once, and thy soul shall live for ever.

To come to Jesus means, in brief, trusting him. He is a Savior; that is his
business, come you to him, and trust him to save you. If you could save
yourself, you would not need a Savior; and now that Christ has set up to
be a Savior, let him do the business. He will. Come, and lay all your needs
at his feet, and trust him. Resolve that, if lost, you will be lost trusting
alone in Jesus; and that can never be. Tie up all your hopes into one
bundle, and put that bundle upon Christ. Let him be all thy salvation, and
all thy desire, and so thou shalt be surely saved.

I have sometimes tried to explain to you what the life of faith is like; it is
very much like a man walking on a tight rope. The believer is told that he
shall not fall, he trusts in God that he shall not; but every now and then he
says, “What a way it is down there if I did fall!” I have often had this
experience: I have gone up an invisible staircase; I could not see the next
step, but when I put my foot down on it, I found that it was solid granite. I
could not see the next stair, and it seemed as if I should plunge into an
abyss; yet have I gone on upward, steadily, one step at a time, never able
to see farther into absolute darkness, as it seemed, and yet always with a
light just where the light was wanted. When I used to hold a candle to my
father, of an evening, when he was sawing wood out in the yard, he used to
say, “Boy, do hold the candle where I am sawing, don’t look over there.”
And I have often thought to myself, when I wanted to see something in the
middle of next week, or next year, that the Lord seemed to say to me,
“Hold your candle on the piece of work which you have to do to-day; and
if you can see that, be satisfied, for that is all the light you want just now.”
Suppose that you could see into next week, it would be a great mercy if
you lost your sight a while, for a far-seeing gaze into care and trouble is no
gain. “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,” as sufficient unto the day
will be the good thereof. But the Lord does train his people for the skies by
testing their faith in the matter of his daily care of them. Often, a man’s
reliance upon God for the supply of his earthly wants proves that he has
trusted the Lord for the weightier affairs relating to his soul’s salvation. Do
not draw a line between the temporal and the spiritual, and say, “God will
go just so far; but I must not take such and such a thing to him in prayer.” I
remember hearing of a certain good man, of whom one said, “Why, he is a
very curious man; he prayed about a key the other day!” Why not pray
about a key? Why not pray about a pin? Sometimes, it may be as important
to pray about a pin as to pray about a kingdom. Little things are often the
linch-pins of great events. Take care that you bring everything to God in
faith and prayer. “Be careful for nothing; but in everything by prayer and
supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto
God.”

I have turned aside from my subject for a minute, but let us now think
again of this matter of coming to Christ. To come to Jesus, not only
implies leaving all other confidences, and trusting Christ, it also means
following him. If you trust him, you must obey him. If you leave your soul
in his hands, you must take him to be your Master, and your Lord, as well
as your Savior. Christ has come to save you from sin, not in sin. He will
therefore help you to leave your sin, whatever it is; he will give you the
victory over it; he will make you holy. He will help you to do whatever you
should do in the sight of God: He is able to save unto the uttermost them
that come unto God by him; but you must come to him if you would be
saved by him.

To put together all I have said, you must quit every other hope; you must
take Jesus to be your sole confidence, and then you must be obedient to his
command, and take him to be your Master, and Lord. Will you do that? If
not, I have nothing to say to you except this, — he that believeth not in
him will perish without hope. If you will not have God’s remedy for your
soul malady, the only remedy that there is, there remaineth for you nothing
but blackness and dismal darkness for ever and ever.

II. But, now, secondly, while there is this necessity of character, notice also THE UNIVERSALITY OF PERSONS: “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.”

Granted that he comes to Christ, that is all that is needed. Does some one
say, “Sir, I am a very obscure person. Nobody knows me; my name was
never in the papers, and never will be; I am a nobody”? Well, if Mr.
Nobody comes to Christ, he will not cast him out. Come along, you
unknown person, you anonymous individual, you that everybody but Christ
forgets! If even you come to Jesus, he will not cast you out.

Another says, “ I am so very odd.” Do not say much about that, for I am
odd, too; but, dear friends, however odd we are, though we may be
thought very eccentric, and some may even consider us a little touched in
the head, yet, nevertheless, for all that, Jesus says, “Him that cometh to me
I will in no wise cast out.” Come along with you, Mr. Oddman! You shall
not be lost for want of brains, nor yet for having too many; though that is
not a very common misfortune. If you will but come to Christ, though you
have no talent, though you are but poor, and will never make much
headway in the world, Jesus says, “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise
cast out.”

“Ah!” says a third friend, “I do not mind about being obscure, or being
eccentric; but it is the greatness of my sin that keeps me back from Christ.”
Let us read the text again: “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast
out.” If he had been guilty of seven murders, and all the whoredoms and
adulteries that ever defiled mortal man, if impossible sins could be charged
against him, yet if he came to Christ, mark you, if he came to Christ, the
promise of Jesus would be fulfilled even in his case, “Him that cometh to
me I will in no wise cast out.”

“But,” says another, “I am completely worn out, I am good for nothing. I
have spent all my days and years in sin. I have come to the very end of the
chapter, I am not worth anybody’s having.” Come along with you, you fag-end of life! Jesus says, “Him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out.”
You have to walk with two sticks, do you? Never mind, come you to
Jesus. You are so feeble that you wonder that you are alive at your
advanced age. My Lord will receive you if you are a hundred years of age;
there have been many cases in which persons have been brought to Christ
even after that age. There are some very remarkable instances of that fact
on record. Christ says, “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.”
If he were as old as Methuselah, if he did but come to Christ, he should not
be cast out.

“Alas!” says one, “I am in a worse case than even that aged friend, for
beside being old, I have resisted the Spirit of God. I have been many years
troubled in my conscience; but I have tried to cover it all up. I have stifled
every godly thought.” Yes, yes; and it is a very sad thing, too; but for all
that, if you come to Christ, if you can even make a dash for salvation, and
come to Jesus, he cannot cast you out.

One friend perhaps says, “I am afraid that I have committed the
unpardonable sin.“ If you come to Christ, you have not, I know; for him
that cometh to him Jesus will in no wise cast out. He cannot, therefore,
have committed the unpardonable sin. Come along with you, man, and if
you are blacker than all the rest of the sinners in the world, so much the
more glorious shall be the grace of God when it shall have proved its
power by washing you whiter than snow in the precious blood of Jesus.

“Ah!” says one, “you do not know me, Sir.” No, dear friend, I do not; but,
perhaps, one of these days I may have that pleasure.” It will not be any
pleasure to you, Sir, for I am an apostate. I used to be a professor of
religion; but I have given it all up, and I have gone back to the world,
wilfully and wickedly doing all manner of evil things.” Ah! well, if you can
but come to Christ, though there were seven apostasies piled one upon
another, still his promise stands true, “Him that cometh to me I will in no
wise cast out.” Whatever the past, or whatever the present, backslider,
return to Christ, for he standeth to his plighted word, and there are no
exceptions mentioned in my text: “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise
cast out.”

“Well, Sir,” cries another, “I should like to come to Christ; but I do not
feel fit to come.“ Then, come all unfit, just as you are. Jesus says, “Him
that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.” If I were woke up in the
middle of the night by a cry of “Fire!” and I saw that some one was at the
window with a fire-escape, I do not think that I should keep in bed, and
say, “I have not my black necktie on,” or “I have not my best waistcoat
on.” I should not speak in that way at all. I would be out of the window as
quickly as ever I could, and down the fire-escape. Why do you talk about
your fitness, fitness, fitness? I have heard of a cavalier, who lost his life
because he stopped to curl his hair when Cromwell’s soldiers were after
him. Some of you may laugh at the man’s foolishness; but that is all that
your talk about fitness is. What is all your fitness but the curling of your
hair when you are in imminent danger of losing your soul? Your fitness is
nothing to Christ. Remember what we sang at the beginning of the service:

Come to Christ just as you are, foul, vile, careless, godless, Christless.
Come now, even now, for Jesus said, “Him that cometh to me I will in no
wise cast out.”

Is there not a glorious width about my text: “Him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out.” What “him” is this? It is “him that cometh.” What
“him that cometh”? Any “him that cometh” in all the world. If he comes to
Christ, he shall not be cast out. A red man, or a black man, or a white man,
or a yellow man, or a coppercoloured man, whatever he is, if he comes to
Jesus, he shall in no wise be cast out.

When you mean to put a thing broadly, it is always best to state it, and
leave it. Do not go into details; the Savior does not. Some years ago, there
was a man, a kind, loving husband, who wished to leave to his wife all his
property. Whatever he had, he intended her to have it all, as she ought; so
he put down in his will, “I leave to my beloved wife, Elizabeth, all that I
have.” That was all right. Then he went on to describe in detail what he
was leaving her, and he wrote, “All my freehold and personal estate.” The
most of his property happened to be leasehold, so the wife did not get it
because her husband gave a detailed description; it was in the detail that
the property slipped away from the good woman. Now, there is no detail at
all here: “Him that cometh.” That means that every man, and woman, and
child, beneath the broad heavens, who will but come, and trust in Christ,
shall in no wise be cast out. I thank God that there is no allusion to any
particular character, in order specially to say, “People of that character
shall be received,” for then the characters left out might be supposed to be
excluded; but the text clearly means that every soul that comes to Christ
shall be received by him.

III. The flight of time hurries me on, therefore, I beg you to listen
earnestly while I speak to you, in the third place, about THE
UNMISTAKEABLENESS OF THE PROMISE: 

“Him that cometh to me I will in no wise” — that is, for no reason, under no circumstances, at no time, under no conditions whatever, — “I will in no wise cast out”; which means, being interpreted, “I will receive him, I will save him, I will bless him.”

Then if you, my dear friend, come to Christ, how could the Lord cast you
out? How could he do it in consistency with his truthfulness? Imagine my
Lord Jesus making this declaration, and giving it to us as an inspired
Scripture, “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out,” and yet
casting out somebody, even that unknown somebody up in the corner.
Why, it would be a lie; it would be an acted lie! I pray you, blaspheme not
my Lord, the truthful Christ, by supposing that he could be guilty of such
conduct as that. He could do as he liked about whom he would receive
until he made the promise; but after he had pledged his word, he bound
himself by the veracity of his nature to keep it; and as long as Christ is the
truthful Christ, he must receive every soul that comes to him.

But let me also ask you, suppose that you came to Jesus, and he cast you
out, with what hands could he do it? “With his own hands,” you answer.
What! Christ coming forward to cast out a sinner who has come to him? I
ask again, with what hands could he do it? Would he do it with those
pierced hands, that still bear the marks of the nails? The Crucified rejecting
a sinner? Ah! no; he hath no hand with which to do such a cruel work as
that, for he has given both his hands to be nailed to the tree for guilty men.
He hath neither hand, nor foot, nor heart with which to reject sinners, for
all these have been pierced in his death for them; therefore he cannot cast
them out if they come to him.

Let me ask you another question, What profit would it be to Christ if he
did cast you out? If my dear Lord, of the thorny crown, and the pierced
side, and the wounded hands, were to cast you away, what glory would it
bring to him? If he cast you into hell, you who have come to him, what
happiness would that bring to him? If he were to cast you away, you who
have sought his face, you who trust his love and his blood, by what
conceivable method could that ever render him the happier or the greater?
It cannot be.

What would such a supposition involve? Imagine for a moment that Jesus
did cast away one who came to him; if it were ascertained that one soul
came to Christ and yet he had cast him away, what would happen? Why,
there are thousands of us who would never preach again! For one, I would
have done with the business. If my Lord can cast away a sinner who comes
to him, I cannot, with a clear conscience, go and preach from his words,
“Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.” Moreover, I should feel
that, if he failed in one promise, he might fail in the others. I could not go
and preach a possible but doubtful gospel. I must have “shells” and “wills”
from the eternal throne of God; and if it is not so, our preaching is vain,
and your faith is also vain.

See what would follow if one soul came to Christ, and Christ cast him out.
All the saints would lose their confidence in him. If a man breaks his
promise once, it is of no use for him to say, “Well, I am generally truthful.”
You have caught him false to his word once, and you will not trust him
again, will you? No; and if our dear Lord, whose every word is truth and
verity, could break one of his promises only once, he would not be trusted
by his people any more, and his Church would lose the faith that is her very
life.

Ah! me; and then they would hear of it up in heaven; and one soul that
came to Christ, and was cast away, would stop the music of the harps of
heaven, would dim the lustre of the glory-land, and take away its joy, for it
would be whispered among the glorified, “Jesus has broken his promise.
He cast away a praying, believing soul; he may break his promise to us, he
may drive us out of heaven.” When they began to praise him, this one act
of his would make a lump come in their throats, and they would be unable
to sing. They would be thinking of that poor soul that trusted him, and was
cast away; so how could they sing, “Unto him that loved us, and washed us
from our sins in his own blood,” if they had to add, “But he did not wash
all that came to him, though he promised that he would”?

I do not like even to talk of all that the supposition would involve; it is
something so dreadful to me, for they would hear of it in hell, and they
would tell it to one another, and an awful glee would take possession of
the fiendish hearts of the devil and all his companions, and they would say,
“The Christ is not true to his word; the boasted Savior rejected one who
came to him. He used to receive even harlots, and he let one wash his feet
with her tears; and publicans and sinners came and gathered about him, and
he spoke to them in tones of love; but here is one, — well, he was too vile
for the Savior to bless; he was too far gone, Jesus could not restore him,
Christ could not cleanse him. He could save little sinners, but not great
ones; he could save sinners eighteen hundred years ago. Oh! he made a fine
show of them; but his power is exhausted now, he cannot save a sinner
now.” Oh, in the halls of Hades, what jests and ridicule would be poured
upon that dear name, and, I had almost said, justly, if Christ cast out one
who came to him! But, beloved, that can never be; it is as sure as God’s
oath, as certain as Jehovah’s being, that he who comes to Christ shall in no
wise be cast out. I gladly bear my own witness before this assembled
throng that —