Evening, October 27, edited from Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening

“For all of us have become like one who is unclean.” — Isaiah 64:6

The believer is a new creature; he belongs to a holy generation and a special people; the Spirit of God is in him, and in all respects he is far removed from the natural man; but for all that, the Christian is a sinner still. He is a sinner still due to the imperfection of his nature, and will continue so to the end of his earthly life. The black fingers of sin leave smuts upon our fairest robes. Sin mars our repentance, before the great Potter has finished it upon the wheel. Selfishness defiles our tears, and unbelief tampers with our faith. The best thing we ever did apart from the merit of Jesus only increased the number of our sins; for when we have been most pure in our own sight, even like the heavens, we are not pure in God’s sight; and as he charged his angels with foolishness, much more must he charge us with it, even in our most angelic frames of mind. The song we sing, which thrills men to heaven, and seeks to emulate angelic strains, still has human discords in it. The prayer which moves the arm of God is still a bruised and battered prayer, and only moves that arm because the sinless One, the great Mediator, has stepped in to take away the sin that taints our pleading prayer. The most golden faith or the purest degree of sanctification to which a Christian ever attained on earth, still has so much mixed alloy in it as to be only worthy of the purifying flames, if considered by itself. Every night we look in the mirror we see a sinner, and have the need to confess, “All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment.” Oh, how precious the blood of Christ is to such hearts as ours! How priceless a gift is his perfect righteousness! And how bright the hope of perfect holiness to come! Even now, though sin dwells in us, its power is broken. It has no dominion; it is a broken-backed snake; we are in bitter conflict with it, but it is with a vanquished foe that we must deal. But in just a little while we shall enter victoriously into the city where nothing defiles us.