![]() Nor is this the sole cause I suspect it lies somewhere else too. I have a heart, which God knoweth, I wish I could wring from my body and hurl to an infinite distance a soul which is a cage of unclean birds, a den of loathsome creatures, where dragons haunt and owls do congregate, where every evil beast of ill-omen dwells a heart too vile to have a parallel-"deceitful above all things and desperately wicked." This is the reason why I am forgetful of Christ. But alas! we have a worm in the heart, a pest-house, a charnel-house within, lusts, vile imaginations, and strong evil passions, which, like wells of poisonous water, send out continually streams of impurity. If we were entirely regenerated beings, we should sit down and meditate on all our Saviour did and suffered all he is all he has gloriously promised to perform and never would our roving affections stray but centered, nailed, fixed eternally to one object, we should continually contemplate the death and sufferings of our Lord. If we were purely new-born creatures, we should never forget the name of him whom we love. We forget him because we carry about with us the old Adam of sin and death. ![]() We forget Christ, because regenerate persons as we really are, still corruption and death remain even in the regenerate. The cause of this is very apparent: it lies in one or two facts. ![]() Oh! my friends, is it not too sadly true that we can recollect anything but Christ, and forget nothing so easy as him whom we ought to remember? While memory will preserve a poisoned weed, it suffereth the Rose of Sharon to wither. It is the incessant round of world, world, world the constant din of earth, earth, earth, that takes away the soul from Christ. Some earthly business engrosses your attention when you should have your eye steadily fixed upon the cross. I appeal to the conscience of every Christian here: Can you deny the truth of what I utter? Do you not find yourselves forgetful of Jesus? Some creature steals away your heart, and you are unmindful of him upon whom your affection ought to be set. Where one would think that memory would linger, and unmindfulness would be an unknown intruder, that is the spot which is desecrated by the feet of forgetfulness, and that the place where memory too seldom looks. The object which we should make the monarch of our hearts, is the very thing we are most inclined to forget. Forget him who ne'er forgot us! Forget him who poured his blood forth for our sins! Forget him who loved us even to the death! Can it be possible? Yes it is not only possible, but conscience confesses that it is too sadly a fault of all of us, that we can remember anything except Christ. It appears almost impossible that those who have been redeemed by the blood of the dying Lamb should ever forget their Ransomer that those who have been loved with an everlasting love by the eternal Son of God, should ever forget that Son but if startling to the ear, it is alas, too apparent to the eye to allow us to deny the fact. It seems at first sight too gross a crime to lay at the door of converted men. Nor is this a bare supposition: it is, alas, too well confirmed in our experience, not as a possibility, but as a lamentable fact. There could be no need for this loving exhortation, if there were not a fearful supposition that our memories might prove treacherous, and our remembrance superficial in its character, or changing in its nature. The text implies the possibility of forgetfulness concerning him whom gratitude and affection should constrain them to remember. It seems, then, that Christians may forget Christ. "This do in remembrance of me."-1 Corinthians 11:24.
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