"Have ye your heart yet hardened?"--Mark 8: 17
Christ had just wrought the miracle of feeding the four thousand men with
seven loaves. In teaching his disciples shortly after, he warned them to
"beware of the leaven of the Pharisees." They did not understand him, and
supposed that he gave them the warning, because they had forgotten to take
bread with them. Perceiving their blindness, he said:--"Why reason ye
because ye have no bread? Perceive ye not yet, neither understand ? Have ye
your heart yet hardened? Having eyes see ye not? and having care hear ye
not? and do ye not remember?"
In speaking from these verses I inquire,
I. What is hardness of heart?
Answer:--The language is often used to designate an unfeeling state of
the sensibility. But this is not the meaning of hardness of heart when it is
spoken of as a crime, as a sin against God. When hardness of heart is spoken
of as a sin, the terms designate the committal of the will to a false
position; a stubbornness in regard to the claims of God; an attitude of
disobedience and self-will. In this sense we often use such language. When a
child is stubborn, stands out against parental authority, we speak of him as
hard-hearted, and as hardening his heart against the claims and authority of
the parent.
II. Let us notice some of the effects and manifestations of hardness of
heart.
1. A want of candor is one of its effects and manifestations. The will is
committed in a dishonest attitude; consequently in this state the mind will
manifest an uncandid spirit in regard to testimony. Hence it will be very
hard to convince. It is difficult to carry conviction home to a mind, where
the heart is hard. The will girds itself, and uses the intellect unfairly.
It will evade testimony; it will cavil; it will divert attention from the
truth; it will resort to various shifts to avoid the conviction of error and
wrong.
2. Prejudice is another of its effects and manifestations. Prejudice is
pre-judgment. It is one-sided; the mind made up without the full examination
of all sides of the question. The mind is ready, in this state, to leap to a
conclusion that will in any way favor the false position it has taken. Where
the heart is hard, there will be a general manifestation of prejudice on a
great many questions. The attitude of the mind is so false, unjust,
ungenerous, that it is not careful to weigh evidence, and to be just in its
judgments; but, on the contrary, it will leap to conclusions, however
unjust, and indulge various prejudices against persons, doctrines,
communities--and indeed such a mind will reveal itself as a nest of
prejudices.
3. Another of its effects and manifestations will be the absence of
tender and kindly feeling. Especially will this be so in regard to all
persons and things that stand related to the false position that it has
taken. Suppose the mind is committed to money-making. One of the effects and
manifestations of this position of the will, will be an unfeelingness in
dealing with men; a want of tender and kind feelings in regard to the poor
and the suffering. If the heart is hard in respect to God, it will manifest
a want of appreciation in regard to almost all its relations to him. It will
be unappreciative of the guilt of sin; it will not realize the nature of sin
as consisting in the neglect of God, his rights, feelings, authority,
well-being. While such a mind may admit that such neglect of God is sin;
still the guilt of sin will not be realized, will not be felt. The
confession that this neglect is sin, will be cold, heartless, emotionless.
4. When the heart is hard, the mind will manifest an inability to
appreciate the necessity of an atonement; to honor God who has been
dishonored by sin; and to honor the law that has been degraded by sin. When
the heart is hard, the moral feelings are obtuse, and blunt, and often
perverted. It cannot feel the dishonor of God and of the law that sin has
occasioned; and it inquires coldly and recklessly, what need of a
sin-offering to condemn sin and honor the law? The fact is, where the heart
is hard, the moral feelings and perceptions are blunted; and consequently
the great truths connected with the necessity of an atoning sacrifice are
not appreciated.
5. When the heart is hard, the mind is unappreciative of ill-desert. It
is slow even to admit that it deserves damnation; and if compelled to admit
it as an intellectual judgment, the mind does not feel it, its not clearly
and keenly realized. Such a one will say, "I cannot feel that it would be
just in God to send me to hell. It seems hard that for the sins committed in
this short life, God should punish me forever."
6. When the heart is hard, the mind also is inappreciative of the
compassion and forbearance of God. Being in a great degree blind to the
nature and guilt of sin, having no appropriate sense and feeling of guilt,
the compassion of God in sparing such a soul will not be at all appreciated.
Upon such a mind the forbearance of God makes little impression; it is not
seen, realized, felt. The will is so stubborn, the intellect is so unfairly
used, and the whole mind is held in such a position by the force of the
will, that the feelings are very little affected in view of the compassion
and forbearance of God.
7. While the heart is hard, the mind is inappreciative of the love of
Christ. To such a mind this love is scarcely felt to be a reality. If it be
admitted, it is not felt; it is not realized; the mind is not impressed and
subdued by it. The fact is, the soul is in the attitude of rebellion; it is
committed against the claims of Christ; it is girded to maintain its
position of resistance to Christ and his authority. In this state the love
of Christ is not so perceived, is not so realized, as to melt and subdue the
soul.
Whenever the heart is hard, there is unbelief; and this unbelief in
regard to the love of Christ, this withholding confidence in this love, this
refusing to yield the mind up to its influence, prevents this love from
overcoming and subduing the mind.
Persons whose hearts are hard, will complain that they are not affected
by the love of Christ. They are often not aware that it is their voluntary
stubbornness that prevents their being duly affected by it. They seem not to
know that they are closing the windows of the soul that the love of Christ
may not shine in and melt them.
They seem not to realize that they are holding their emotions all back,
not allowing them to flow, not allowing their feelings to be aroused and
quickened.
They will even in this case complain of the hardness of their own hearts,
meaning by this their unfeelingness in view of the love of Christ; and in
this they overlook the fact that they are the voluntary authors of this very
unfeelingness, of which they complain.
8. While the heart is hard, the soul will not appreciate the guilt that
is involved in neglecting to labor for the souls of others. Now, if a city
were on fire, and one that knew it, should fail to give the alarm, and
should see the city burn down and hundreds of souls perish, there would be a
general outcry against such cruelty; people generally would be shocked, and
even horrified at such wickedness.
But souls may be asleep in their sins, and thousands of them may perish
unwarned, unreproved, unprayed for, uncared for, and yet the guilt of all
this neglect be scarcely realized or felt at all.
Now this is owing to the hardness of the heart, and the consequent
unbelief and blindness of the soul. You talk to such people about their
sins, and they say, "What have I done? Whom have I injured? I have wronged
no man; I have paid all my debts; and I have done my duty to my neighbors
and friends around me."
Now in all this the hardness of heart prevents the person from
understanding really what his duty is. He satisfied himself with not having
defrauded, or with not having otherwise positively injured his neighbor.
But the law of God is positive. His duty was to love his neighbor as
himself; to make all possible effort to save the soul of his neighbor; to
warn, reprove, persuade, and use all possible moral influence to arouse his
neighbor to secure the salvation of his soul. All this he has neglected, and
perhaps has neglected many around him that are already dead, and have gone
down to hell; and yet he does not feel that he has totally neglected his
duty. His duty was to love his neighbor positively; to do his neighbor all
the good he could; and especially, if possible, to save his soul. All that
he can truly say, is, that he has abstained from directly and positively
injuring his neighbor by his every-day acts; but to say that he has done his
duty to his neighbor is absurd. He has performed no duty to his neighbor.
His duty was to love, and to express this love in every way. This he has
totally neglected; hence he has performed no duty to his neighbor, and no
duty to God. But his heart is so hard that all this he does not feel, this
he does not realize; and thus he is acting under a gross delusion, ruinous
and damning, because his heart is so hard.
9. The same is true of directly neglecting God. When the heart is hard
one of its effects and manifestations will be, God will be neglected; prayer
will be neglected; praise will be neglected; obedience will be neglected;
love will be withheld; confidence will be withheld; gratitude will be
withheld; obedience from the heart will be withheld; and nothing will be
present but cold formality and religious affectation, at the most. And yet
this neglect will not be keenly felt as a sin against God; it will not be
realized as deserving damnation. Such a soul is so hardened toward God that
it cares not for his rights, or for his well-being in any respect. It can
see him dishonored without feeling it; it can hear his name even blasphemed
without just and holy indignation; it can see his rights invaded, his
authority spurned, his feelings outraged, his law trampled on and despised,
and yet not feel it. The feelings are locked up as cold and dead as an
Arctic ocean.
In short, when the heart is hard, there will be a general unfeelingness
toward God. The thought of God does not melt the sensibility. Talk to such a
soul of the justice of God, his abhorrence of sin, his righteous
indignation, and you will hardly excite its fears. It girds itself, and
scorns to be made afraid. But, turn the subject over, and represent his
loving-kindness, slowness to anger, and readiness to forgive, his vast
compassion, and spread out before such a soul all the tenderness there is in
God's heart, and you will not arouse the feelings. Such a soul will still
complain, "I do not feel, I know it--it is all true; but I cannot feel it."
10. Another effect and manifestation of hardness of heart is
uncharitableness. Where the will is dishonestly committed against the claims
of God, the mind is uncharitable in the sense of lacking confidence in God,
and in everybody else.
You will almost always observe when the heart is hard that there is a
censorious spirit, a disposition to find fault, to judge God and man
censoriously. Such a mind can see little that is good in God or anybody
else; it naturally dwells upon the dark side; is keen to discern the faults,
real or supposed, of men; and prone to censure in God whatever it cannot
understand.
11. Another manifestation of hardness of heart is a self-justifying
spirit. If accused of wrong, such a mind will immediately fall to
excuse-making. If it cannot deny the fact charged, it will immediately seek
either wholly to justify, or to palliate and extenuate the guilt. If it has
a controversy with another, it is blind to but one side of the question. And
you will observe if two persons, both of whose hearts are hard, have a
controversy, you cannot get them to see alike. Each will justify himself and
condemn the other; and try as you may, while their hearts are hard, each
will think the other most in fault. Neither can see that he is the guilty
party; and consequently the controversy will be perpetuated while their
hearts are hard. Soften their hearts, and they will soon come together.
12. Hardness of heart will manifest itself in an unrelenting state of
mind, even when convinced that it has injured another. In such cases the
conviction will not be allowed to take such possession of the mind as to
melt the sensibility and subdue the will. The confession of guilt in such
cases will be tearless, feelingless, ungracious.
13. Hardness of heart manifests general spiritual blindness and
self-deception. When the will is committed against the claims of God, it
will of course admit as little light and conviction into the intelligence as
possible. It will not candidly weigh evidence, it will not honestly consider
the matter; and consequently, on all subjects relating to God and our
relations to him, a hard heart will produce great spiritual blindness and
self-deception.
We sometimes see those whose hearts are so hard that they will tell you
they always do right, they do their duty. They think they are getting along
very well, and that God has but little cause to find fault with them. Nay,
many of this class will profess to be Christians; and they really suppose
they are, when it is as manifest to others as possible that they are blind,
because of the hardness of their hearts. It is remarkable often to see how
deep the delusion of such a mind is.
I have known some to profess to live even without sin, and think
themselves in a state of sanctification, who after all were manifestly
hardened, feelingless, exhibiting no real love to God or man, none of the
tenderness and compassion of Christ, no spirit of concern for souls, nothing
that was truly Christ-like or Christian. Their minds seemed to be as dark as
the grave, and their hearts as hard as the nether mill-stone.
14. Another effect and manifestation of hardness of heart is a constant
tendency to excuse all religious delinquency. If such persons neglect
prayer, they have an excuse for it; if they neglect religious meetings, they
have an excuse for it; if they neglect to warn and win souls, they have an
excuse for it; if they neglect to do their part in the support of public
worship, to sustain missions, to forward religion in any and every way, they
have always an excuse for it. You will not see them tender, and manifesting
great sorrow that they are deprived of the privilege or opportunity of doing
these things. You cannot avoid discovering, often, that it is the spirit of
excuse-making for religious delinquency; and that this spirit is the effect
of hardness of heart and of that blindness of mind which we always see
consequent upon it.
15. Selfishness in trade is another effect and manifestation of hardness
of heart. You will always observe that such men are difficult to get along
with. They are close and hard in their dealings, and will be sure to have
the best end of a bargain. They have no such tenderness as will not allow
them to do as they would not be done by. The golden rule is to them a blank.
Their maxims are, "Take care of number one;" "Charity begins at home;" "Let
every man look out for himself;" "My business is to make as good a bargain
as I can."
These are the practical rules of trade.
Hence he can take little advantages of the poor; give them short measure,
and short weight , and poor articles, and put them off as he may, making
what he can out of them. He can see a poor man, or a poor woman, go from his
counter or from his shop, with a sense of having been wronged and hardly
dealt with, and not feel sorry for it. He can see the poor man go away with
a few pennies less than was his due, and yet have no generous outburst of
feeling that will call him back and deal generously, or even fairly with
him. The fact is, his heart is like an adamant stone; his "tender mercies
are cruel." He could even return a fugitive slave to his master for money.
16. Another effect and manifestation of this hardness of heart is, an
unwillingness to take pains to oblige anybody; especially a stranger, or
some one in whom he has no particular personal interest. He will not be at
expense and pains-taking for the good of others. If anybody suffers, what is
that to him? He goes not to seek out the poor or the suffering. He will get
along as cheaply as he can in regard to all expense or pains-taking for the
poor, or for the kingdom of Christ.
It is curious to see how hard-hearted persons will get along in such
cases. They will pay their minister, who labors for their souls, as little
as possible; they will cut down the wages of the sexton, who makes the
meeting-house comfortable and clean for their use, to the lowest point; if
any extra meetings are proposed, they will object on account of the cost,
the extra expense that it will make; if anything is to be done for the cause
of God, they will get along without doing their full share, if possible.
17. Another effect and manifestation of hardness of heart, is a great
tardiness and superficiality in confessing any wrong done, either to God or
man.
When confessions are made, they are dry, heartless, superficial, and
perhaps mixed up with recrimination and throwing blame upon others. The
confessions of such a mind will not be ingenuous, fair, full, free, but the
opposite of all these. Such persons will confess as far as they are obliged
in all decency to confess; especially so far as their iniquities are known,
and cannot be hid. But their confessions are not spontaneous, not generous,
not satisfactory either to God or man.
18. Another effect and manifestation of hardness of heart is an aptness
to indulge in resentful feelings. If any one has injured them, or neglected
them, they resent it. They indulge such feelings that they cannot be cordial
or kind to such persons; cannot pray for them; cannot labor for their good.
They lay it up against them; and render even themselves unhappy by the hard,
unkind, and jealous feelings which they indulge.
19. Another effect and manifestation of hardness of heart is a want of
the spirit of prayer. If such persons pray, it is not in the Spirit; there
is no unction, no power, no prevalence in their prayers.
Indeed their prayers are not prayers. They are not supplication; they are
not intercession and pleading; they are not the language of want, felt and
realized. They are theological, philosophical, didactic, polemic--anything
but supplication.
You will hear persons whose hearts are hard, often engage in what they
call prayer--and scarcely a petition in their prayer. It is all talk,
preaching, exhortation, perhaps accusation, but little or no real
supplication.
You feel agonized to hear it. It does not touch you; it does not help
your own spirit to pray; it does not bring out the responsive amen. No; it
is anything but the spirit of prayer. A hard heart cannot pray.
You can hear a hard-hearted man pray, but you cannot feel him. Or rather,
I should have said, you can hear him preach, or exhort, or theologize; but
you cannot feel him pray, for he has not the spirit of prayer.
20. Another effect and manifestation of hardness of heart is the total
absence of a loving and compassionate spirit.
His prayers are not loving and compassionate; if a preacher, his
preaching is not loving and compassionate; if not a preacher, in
conversation and social intercourse he is not loving and compassionate. He
is not compassionate to the poor, to the ignorant, to the oppressed, to the
afflicted, to the tried and tempted.
A hard heart will manifest a general want of the loving and compassionate
in social and Christian intercourse.
21. The hard-hearted are not watchful against stumbling others. They do
not love others; are not careful for their well-being. They are so set upon
having their own will and their own way, and securing their own ends, that
they are very reckless of their influence, whether they stumble others or
not. They will speak against Christians, and against ministers, and in many
ways say that which is calculated in the highest degree to prejudice others
against religion, against truth, against God., and yet not feel it, not
realize what they are doing.
22. When they have stumbled others, the hard-hearted are not willing to
take up the stumbling blocks by making full confession and setting all
right. They are too proud to do this. They do not care enough about the evil
they have done, to hasten with all earnestness to remove the stumbling
blocks out of the way.
23. The hard-hearted have no true brotherly love. They do not feel for
Christ's people, or feel for Christ's church. They can see the state of
religion low, meetings poorly attended, but little of the spirit of prayer
in the church, sinners remaining unconverted, and Christ dishonored in the
house of his friends; and neither sigh nor cry in view of such a state of
things.
They are so taken up with their self-seeking ways as to have little
thought of Christ's dishonor, or the soul's ruin. They live on in an
unfeeling, unconcerned manner, while hundreds around them are perishing in
sin.
REMARKS.
1. From what has been said, some of you can see why it is that you have
so little feeling on religious subjects.
Some of you profess to be in a state of consecration to God, who manifest
no feeling for the souls around you.
Now, do you not see that you are deceived, that your hearts are hard?
Your will is after all committed to self-pleasing, and not to pleasing God.
2. You see the secret of alienation among brethren. Their hearts are
hard. Now they cannot see alike. Being in this hardened state, every one
sees everything in the light, or rather in the darkness, of his own
selfishness and self-will. Each one has but a poor opinion of the other;
each one justifies himself and condemns the other. They have no Christian
confidence, for they have really no Christian character.
3. Hardness of heart is often the ruin of families. If members of the
same family become stubborn and willful, of course everything is ajar in the
family. If the father or mother, or both, become hard-hearted toward each
other, it will scatter desolation throughout all the family. Everything will
go wrong; tempers wrong, words wrong--no loving government or influence, but
all will be desolate.
4. Hardness of heart is often the curse and ruin of churches. Sometimes a
deacon, or some prominent member of the church, has a hard heart. He is
self-willed, opinionated; does not care for the church half as much as he
cares for himself. Perhaps two of the deacons will become hardened; and then
be striving with each other; create division in the church; stand in the way
of the influence of the pastor; stir up a party spirit in the church; and
all will be moral desolation. Until those deacons have their hearts
softened, nothing can be done to counteract their influence. If in such
cases the church could kindly and with unanimity set them aside, the
difficulty in some measure could be obviated. But if the deacons or leading
members become hardened, it is very likely that they will be instrumental in
hardening others; and then wo[e] to the minister, wo[e] to the parish, wo[e]
to the church! hardness of heart will be the ruin of all.
5. Many seem really given over to hardness of heart and blindness of
mind. This is an awful state to be in. It is awful to the subject of it.
A hard-hearted person is in a most deplorable state; in a most unhappy
state; in a most guilty state; in a state fatal to his salvation, if he
abides in it.
Again, it is an awful state in respect to all those connected with a
hard-hearted person.
What an awful thing it is for a church to have a hard-hearted minister!
He will be blind to the wants of the people, and unloving and unfeeling
in his treatment of them. He will inevitably do them infinitely more harm
than good.
And it is an evil thing for a minister to have a hard-hearted church, and
a hard-hearted congregation. They will probably starve him, neglect him,
abuse him, tie his hands and prevent his usefulness, break him down and
destroy his influence--or drive him away to seek a people that will receive
the gospel.
6. From this subject we see how to account for the astonishing blindness
of some persons. It is very striking, sometimes, to see what strange
delusions people are laboring under.
They seem to be totally blind to their moral state. You cannot persuade
them to look into the matter so thoroughly as to understand themselves. If
you examine the matter to the bottom, you will find them committed to some
false position; consequently, hardened and blinded. Or rather, their
hardness consists in their committal to this false position; and their
blindness is its natural result. While the heart is hard, everything,
almost, is seen in a false light. The full impression of no truth is
received; and much that is admitted is by no means felt or realized.
Delusion is the inevitable consequence. In this state persons will justify
that which will shock others immeasurably.
7. Fanatics are always hard-hearted. Fanaticism is not to be confounded
with enthusiasm. Enth[u]siasm is over-heated zeal; a zeal amounting
sometimes almost to insanity. Yet it may be kind and beautiful, were it not
exaggerated. Fanaticism is a state of mind in which the malignant element
predominates; in which the malign emotions are fanned into a flame and take
the control of the will.
A fanatic is always hard-hearted, severe, censorious, cruel. Paul was in
a state of fanaticism when he persecuted the church of God. They were
fanatics of whom Christ said, "The days will come when he that killeth you
will think that he doeth God-service." Fanatics are often as sincere as
enthusiasts; but their very sincerity is culpable, is wicked.
Persecutors are always fanatics, and they are always hard-hearted. Paul,
in his fanaticism and hard-heartedness, "verily thought that he ought to do
many things, contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth."
The malign emotions having control of the will, the soul is in a false
position, and can think itself doing God service in hunting and betraying
the innocent.
Fanatics feel, but not charitably, not kindly. Even in prayer, or
conversation, or preaching, or exhortation, the very tones of the voice, the
gestures, the looks, manifest the hardness of the heart.
They do not speak tenderly or compassionately. If they have occasion to
probe the conscience, to reprove or rebuke, they do not do it benevolently,
but malevolently. They seem to take a pleasure in rebuke. They mistake their
fanatical unkindness for Christian faithfulness.
8. A hard heart will so manifest itself in speaking, and praying, and
doing everything, as to force upon tender minds a spirit of protest. Tender
hearts cannot receive it, cannot fellowship it. You will always observe, if
in a congregation there are a number of hard hearts, that they will
sympathize with anything that is hard-hearted, either in speaking or
praying; while, on the contrary, with the tender spirits these remarks and
prayers will force a protest and a recoil.
They cannot fellowship them; cannot be interested in them; cannot receive
the fanatical and hard-hearted remarks that have been made, or spirit that
has been manifested.
9. We see why it is that some persons are always so full of
fault-finding. They never seem to be kind, loving, forbearing. They do not
yearn over those that are out of the way, and love them back to obedience;
but they scold; they find fault; the very language of their speaking and
praying but repels those whom they would try to win.
Ministers sometimes become hard-hearted, and by their fault-finding and
scolding manner drive the church away rather than win them back to Christ.
They do not, like a good shepherd, go before their sheep and lead them, but
undertake to drive them. In this they greatly err; and it is generally owing
to the hardness of their hearts. If they get melted down, they will take a
different course, and a different result will almost certainly follow.
I knew a minister who had been regarded as a very faithful man, but he
had no revival for a long time. He preached from sternness to his church,
and as they said, scolded them; but the more fault he found with them the
more occasion he had to find fault, for the worse they became. But he came
to where there was a revival, became convicted, saw his mistake, went home
to his people at the close of the week, and on Sabbath morning went into the
pulpit to preach to them. Before he began to preach, he commenced to make
confession of his hardness of heart and blindness of mind. He melted
down--they melted down. He saw things in a different light, presented in the
compassion and melting of his spirit.
The heart of the church broke down, and that day commenced a glorious
revival which gathered in most of the impenitent of the congregation.
Now, please remember that hardness of heart is a voluntary state of mind.
It is a state of mind that continually resists the Holy Spirit; it is a
self-justifying, cruel state of mind; it grieves, it dishonors God; it ruins
the souls of men.
