Faith in Christ the Only Way of Righteousness

T. Spurgeon.

Matthew 5:20

For I say to you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees…

Will you try to imagine that just in front of you there is roaring the great cataract of Niagara? Now, there are two ways of getting over the cataract. "What are they? " asks. one. Well, do you see that thin airy looking bridge, which in the distance seems like a spider's web, which has been flung athwart the torrent? That is the suspension bridge of Niagara, and that is one way across, and the best way. too. There is another way — the way that poor foolhardy Captain Webb went — right through the breakers. You may say that he did not get across. No; but it was his fault that he went that way, for it was not a way after all. And there are two ways to cross the cataract of sin and the avalanche of God's wrath. One way is the bridge of salvation which God, in mercy, through the blood and sacrifice of Christ, has flung right across the mighty stream. Its buttresses are eternal power and everlasting love, and feeble as it looks it is strong enough to bear creation. There is another way, and there thou shalt battle with the flood thyself, and stem the breakers in thine own strength, and dash thyself against the stones, and sink to rise no more. Any man in his senses would choose the simplest path, the way that everybody else goes.

(T. Spurgeon.)