JM
Puritan Board Doctor
Balm in Gilead
"Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?" - Jer 9:22
Is it not the Saviour’s blood-that precious, precious blood, of which the Holy Ghost testifieth that it "cleanseth from all sin?" Look at the words; weigh them well; they will bear the strictest, closest examination. "All sin;" then sins before calling, sins after calling, sins of thought, sins of word, sins of deed, sins of omission, sins of commission, sins against light, sins against life, sins against love, sins against the law, sins against the gospel, sins against God in every shape, in every form, of every name, every kind, every hue, every blackness, one sin only excepted-the sin against the Holy Ghost, which a believer can never commit. "The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth," not from some sins, not from many sins, not from a thousand sins, not from a million sins, but "the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." This is indeed the balm, when the conscience is cut and gashed, bleeding and sore, to allay the smart, to soothe the pain, to bring together the edges of the wound and to make it kindly heal. Is there any other remedy? Search the whole round of duties; run through the wide catalogue of forms and ceremonies; examine every cell and nook of the monastery, the convent, and the confessional; weigh every grain of human merit and creature obedience; tithe with the utmost nicety the anise, mint, and cumin of self-imposed observances; hold up the hair shirt, the bleeding scourge, the jagged crucifix, the protracted fast, the midnight vigil, the morning prayer, and the evening hymn, and see whether all or any of these can heal a wounded conscience. But why do I mention these things? Are there Papists or Puseyites before me? No. But because there really is no medium between faith in Christ’s blood and full-blown Popery. As between grace and works, Christ’s blood and human merits, there is no real medium, so there is no standing ground between experimental religion and Popery, between absolution by Christ and absolution by the Pope. The Pope’s real "see" is the human heart. To drive out this Antichrist and bring in Christ is the main work of the Spirit, the grand aim and end of the gospel.
Preached on Tuesday Evening, 27th July 1852, at Eden Street Chapel, Hampstead Road.
"Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?" - Jer 9:22
But what did this balm in Gilead literally signify?
Gilead was a country beyond Jordan, in which certain trees grew of great value and rarity, from the trunk and branches of which there distilled a highly odoriferous gum, which was said to be of sovereign efficacy in healing wounds. We find that the Ishmaelitish merchants to whom Joseph was sold by his brethren were taking some of this balm to Egypt; and when Jacob would propitiate the chief lord of Egypt, whom he knew not then to be Joseph, he bade his sons "take a little balm" with them, as a suitable and acceptable offering. It thus became celebrated for its healing properties; and its very scarcity, the trees growing in no other soil or climate, and consequent dearness, gave it a still higher reputation. The prophet, therefore, viewing on the one hand Zion’s desperate case, and on the other God’s own divinely-contrived and appointed remedy, asks this pregnant question, "Is there no balm in Gilead?" He looked at the hurt of the daughter of his people, and saw her pining away in her iniquities; the vail being taken off his own heart, he saw her like himself, beyond description black and base. But was there no hope for him or her?
Must she go down to the chambers of death?
Must she sigh out her heart without any manifestation of pardon and peace?
"Is there no balm in Gilead?"
Why, the very question implies that there is balm in Gilead; that God has provided a remedy which is suitable to the desperate malady; and that there is more in the balm to heal than there is in guilt to wound; for there is more in grace to save than there is in sin to destroy. Why, then, should Zion so languish? Why is she so sick and sore?
Why so bleeding to death?
Why does her head so droop, her hands so hang down, her knees so totter?
Why is her face so pale, her frame so wasted, her constitution so broken?
What has done all this?
Whence this sickness unto death?
"Is there no balm in Gilead?"
From that far country does now no healing medicine come? Has the balm-tree ceased to distil its gum?
Is there none to gather, none to bring, none to apply it to perishing Zion?
But spiritually viewed, what is this precious balm?
Gilead was a country beyond Jordan, in which certain trees grew of great value and rarity, from the trunk and branches of which there distilled a highly odoriferous gum, which was said to be of sovereign efficacy in healing wounds. We find that the Ishmaelitish merchants to whom Joseph was sold by his brethren were taking some of this balm to Egypt; and when Jacob would propitiate the chief lord of Egypt, whom he knew not then to be Joseph, he bade his sons "take a little balm" with them, as a suitable and acceptable offering. It thus became celebrated for its healing properties; and its very scarcity, the trees growing in no other soil or climate, and consequent dearness, gave it a still higher reputation. The prophet, therefore, viewing on the one hand Zion’s desperate case, and on the other God’s own divinely-contrived and appointed remedy, asks this pregnant question, "Is there no balm in Gilead?" He looked at the hurt of the daughter of his people, and saw her pining away in her iniquities; the vail being taken off his own heart, he saw her like himself, beyond description black and base. But was there no hope for him or her?
Must she go down to the chambers of death?
Must she sigh out her heart without any manifestation of pardon and peace?
"Is there no balm in Gilead?"
Why, the very question implies that there is balm in Gilead; that God has provided a remedy which is suitable to the desperate malady; and that there is more in the balm to heal than there is in guilt to wound; for there is more in grace to save than there is in sin to destroy. Why, then, should Zion so languish? Why is she so sick and sore?
Why so bleeding to death?
Why does her head so droop, her hands so hang down, her knees so totter?
Why is her face so pale, her frame so wasted, her constitution so broken?
What has done all this?
Whence this sickness unto death?
"Is there no balm in Gilead?"
From that far country does now no healing medicine come? Has the balm-tree ceased to distil its gum?
Is there none to gather, none to bring, none to apply it to perishing Zion?
But spiritually viewed, what is this precious balm?
Is it not the Saviour’s blood-that precious, precious blood, of which the Holy Ghost testifieth that it "cleanseth from all sin?" Look at the words; weigh them well; they will bear the strictest, closest examination. "All sin;" then sins before calling, sins after calling, sins of thought, sins of word, sins of deed, sins of omission, sins of commission, sins against light, sins against life, sins against love, sins against the law, sins against the gospel, sins against God in every shape, in every form, of every name, every kind, every hue, every blackness, one sin only excepted-the sin against the Holy Ghost, which a believer can never commit. "The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth," not from some sins, not from many sins, not from a thousand sins, not from a million sins, but "the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." This is indeed the balm, when the conscience is cut and gashed, bleeding and sore, to allay the smart, to soothe the pain, to bring together the edges of the wound and to make it kindly heal. Is there any other remedy? Search the whole round of duties; run through the wide catalogue of forms and ceremonies; examine every cell and nook of the monastery, the convent, and the confessional; weigh every grain of human merit and creature obedience; tithe with the utmost nicety the anise, mint, and cumin of self-imposed observances; hold up the hair shirt, the bleeding scourge, the jagged crucifix, the protracted fast, the midnight vigil, the morning prayer, and the evening hymn, and see whether all or any of these can heal a wounded conscience. But why do I mention these things? Are there Papists or Puseyites before me? No. But because there really is no medium between faith in Christ’s blood and full-blown Popery. As between grace and works, Christ’s blood and human merits, there is no real medium, so there is no standing ground between experimental religion and Popery, between absolution by Christ and absolution by the Pope. The Pope’s real "see" is the human heart. To drive out this Antichrist and bring in Christ is the main work of the Spirit, the grand aim and end of the gospel.
Preached on Tuesday Evening, 27th July 1852, at Eden Street Chapel, Hampstead Road.
