Love Jesus 13

Excerpt from “The Secret of Love to God,” by
Charles Haddon Spurgeon, sermon delivered August 15, 1880

I cannot imagine a true man saying, “I love Christ, but I do not want others to know that I love him, lest they should laugh at me.” That is a reason to be laughed at, or rather, to be wept over. Afraid of being laughed at? O sir, this is indeed a cowardly fear! Are there not some of Christ’s servants, who live in the full glare of public observation, and whose names are ridiculed every hour of the day? Yet has that ridicule ever broken their bones, or their hearts? Verily, nay; and if God makes men of us, we ought never to be afraid of such a thing as a sneer, or a jeer, or a jest on account of our religion.

Perhaps some will say that they do love Christ; but that, if they avowed their affection for him, they would provoke opposition. Of course you would; did not God himself say so to the serpent in the Garden of Eden, “I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed”?

Did you expect the woman’s seed to be loving the Lord, and yet not to be opposed by the serpent’s seed?

Did not Jesus say to his disciples, “If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you”? You know how the world treated him; and shall the disciple be above his Master, the servant above his Lord?

So, my brethren, if you do love the Lord, say, “We love’ him,” for there is no good reason why you should not avow your affection for him; but, on the other hand, there is abundant reason why you should do so; for, first, Jesus Christ deserves and claims that avowal. He was not ashamed of his love for us. He left all the glories of heaven that he might espouse our cause; and when we came to his feet, burdened, and guilty, and full of woes, there was not one lovely trait in our character to attract him toward us; yet he took pity upon us, and loved us, and saved us; and now he pleads for us in heaven. He is not ashamed to call us brethren; so, surely, we night, bravely and joyfully, to declare that we are on his side.

     We ought not to need any urging to that avowal; but if we do, let us remember that Christ claims it, for he has said, “Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation; of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.” And he also said, “Whosoever shall confess me before men, him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels of God: but he that denieth me” — and the apposition, you see, makes that word “deny ” mean “he that does not confess me” — “he that denieth me before men shall be denied before the angels of God.” Come, then, brothers and sisters, since Christ claims it, and so richly deserves it, let the avowal of this fact be made, if fact it be, “We love him.”