Natural or Spiritual

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1 Corinthians 2:13-14

Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Ghost teaches…

The apostle knows of only two classes of men — natural and spiritual. Under "natural," he includes all who are not partakers of the Spirit of God, no matter how excellent they may be. On the other hand, all into whom the Spirit of God has come he calls spiritual men.

I. THE NATURAL MAN RECEIVES NOT THE THINGS OF THE SPIRIT OF GOD, BUT COUNTS THEM FOOLISH.

1. Some oppose them violently, and do their best to put down such folly.

2. A greater proportion secretly despise and condemn. They dare say that religion is a good thing for old women, &c., but utterly repudiate it as a thing worthy the attention of wise men.

3. The great mass are indifferent. "For forms of faith let graceless zealots fight, he can't be wrong whose life is in the right."

II. THERE IS NOTHING WHATEVER IN THE THINGS THEMSELVES TO JUSTIFY SUCH AN ESTIMATION. You do not know what you say when you declare that the gospel of Christ is absurd. It is generally pretty safe to ask a man who rails at the Bible, "Did you ever read it?" These learned gentlemen are like those critics who, when they meet with a new volume, take the knife and cut the first page, smell it, and then condemn or praise. The mightiest intellects confess that the truths of this book are above their highest flights. Even Newton said there were depths here which no mortal could fathom. As these things of the Spirit of God are wise and profound, so they are most important, and if not received, it is not because they are uncongenial with our necessities. There are some speculations which a man need not enter upon, but the doctrines of God teach you your relationship to your Maker; your condition before Him; how He can be just to man, and yet be gracious; how you can approach Him, and become His child; how you may be conformed to His image, and made a partaker of His glory.

III. THE REASON FOR THE REJECTION OF THE GOSPEL.

1. Want of taste. You have sometimes seen an artist standing before a splendid picture. "What a fine conception!" says he, "I could stand a week and admire that." Some bumpkin, however, says, "It looks to me to be an old decayed piece of canvas that wants cleaning." Then leaving the gallery, he notices on the wall outside a picture of an elephant standing on his head, and a clown performing in some circus, and he says, "That's more to my taste." Just so is it with the natural man. Give him some work of fiction — a daub upon the wall — and he is satisfied. But he has no taste for the things of God.

2. Want of organs. Just as a blind man cannot appreciate a landscape nor a deaf man music; so the natural man lacking the eye and ear of faith cannot appreciate the beauties and music of the gospel.

3. Want of nature. The brute cannot appreciate the studies of the astronomer because he lacks an intellectual nature; and so the mere man of intellect cannot appreciate the things of the Spirit because he lacks a spiritual nature.

IV. THE PRACTICAL TRUTHS WHICH FLOW FROM THIS GREAT THOUGH SORROWFUL FACT.

1. The absolute necessity for regeneration, or the work of the Spirit. You may educate a nature up to its highest point, but you cannot educate an old nature into a new one. You may educate a horse, but you cannot educate it into a man. You may by your own efforts make yourselves the best of natural men, but still at your very best there is a division wide as eternity between you and the regenerate man. And no man can help us out of such a nature into a state of grace. "Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."

2. If any of us have received the things of the Spirit, we ought to look upon that as comfortable evidence that we have been born again.

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