Covenanter Witness Vol. 53 - Rparchives.org

sinned."wickedly."went."would'sinner,"adulterers."sinner,"sinner."possess."Our Confession of SinDevotional Address at Grinnell Convention Friday Morning, July 16, 1954Speaker: Rev. C. E. Caskey, D.D."We have sinned with our fathers, we have committed iniquity, we have donePsalm106:6.This morning we want to look at the Scripture,at this text and at other Scriptures ; we want to lookat the Covenant, at the Confession of Sin in the Covenant particularly; and with the gracious help of theHoly Spirit we want to look at ourselves. I don't liketo use that word "help" for it sounds like we are going to do something and are going to call the Spiritin to help us. That is not the proper attitude. PerhapsI should say with the "working" of the Holy Spiritwithin us we want to look at ourselves.Let us look at the text first. "With all our fathers we have Certainly that is true. Youcannot go out from here and sin a new sin. It may benew to you, but it is not a new sin. If they haveliquor stores here, and I suppose they have, youmight go down and get liquor No, you are too youngfor them to sell it to you, but you might get is someway and get drunk. That would be a new experiencefor you, but there is nothing new about that. Noahdid it. You might decide to tell a lie. Not a big lie, butjust what we used to call a "white lie." (I don't knowwhether they name them any more or not, but thatis what we used to call them.) Something that istrue one way you look at it, and you would ratherpeople would look at it that way, and another way itisn't true. There is nothing new in that. Abraham didsister."that. Abraham said of his wife, "She is myTrue, she was the daughter of his father, but not thedaughter of his mother. But she was his wife, thatwas the important thing. It would not be anythingTiew for you to tell a lie, for that is as old as Abraham. The sin that we would commit, though it mightbe new to us, is as old as Adam.In one of our Theology books there is a story ofa man and his wife who complained that they shouldnot have to suffer for the sin of Adam and Eve. Aman heard them. He did not argue with them. Argument does little good. You may recall the poem, "Myself when young did eagerly frequent Doctor andsage, and heard great argument. But ever morecame out by that same door wherein I Thatis not Scripture far from it, but it is true. So theman did not argue. He invited them to a dinner. Hemanaged to be called away just as they sat down atthe table. He said, "I shall have to leave. I am sorry.But help yourselves to anything that is on thetable, except that one dish in the middle of the table.You must not eat of it, and you must not even touchit."You know what happened. One of them judgefor yourself which one began to wonder what was inthe dish. Then they began to discuss it, and then theydecided it would do no harm just to look, for the manwould never know. So they lifted the lid, and a mousejumped out. Then when the man returned he madethe application. "Of all the trees of the garden you372may eat, but of the tree of the knowledge of goodand evil, which is in the midst of the garden, of ityou shall not eat, you shall not touch it. You saidyou not have sinned the way Adam and Evedid, but you have just proved that you would havedone just what they did." That is true of all of us.sinned.""With all our fathers we haveI picked up an old Session book recently. We hadto go back for some old records. There was mentionof a sin in that book which shocked me. I knew thefamily name, although I did not know the person, forthis had happened a good many years ago. The sinI will not even mention. "With all our fathers wesinned."haveIt is hard for us to confess sin, and Jesus gaveus some parables which would show this, some thatare valuable for us this morning. There is the oneabout the Pharisee and the Publican. Why did Jesusgive this parable ? He saw that there were some menwho thought that they were righteous and despisedothers. Two men went up to the temple to pray, theone a Pharisee and the other a publican. And thePharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: "LordI thank Thee that I am not as other men are: extortioners, unjust,And then as he waslooking around to see who was listening he saw thepublican standing afar off, and he added, "and noteven as this publican. I fast twice in the week. Igive tithes of all that I But the publicanwould not lift up so much as his eyes to heaven, ibutsmote upon his breast saying, "God be merciful tome, the the individual sinner. He singledthe individual sinner. Hehimself out, "thewent to his house justified rather than the other.It is hard for us to confess.I read a magazine story,I do not read toomany of them. I quit at the time when they stoppedhaving a nice young man and a nice young womanfall in love, struggle bravely through numerous difficulties, and end up being happily married. Whenstories started out with a couple already divorced, orwith a divorce just ahead, I quit reading. Someonesuggested that I read this story, and I am glad Idid, for it shows how hard it is for us to say, "God bemerciful to me, a It is a fantastic thing, andunbelievable, but it starts out with God punishing theearth for sin. Magazines and newspapers and novelshave their religion, but it is not the religion of salvation by the blood of Jesus Christ. Just the same itis a religion, and this story is full of religion, magazine variety. God punished the earth by holding backthe rain until finally they met for prayer and criedto God to send the rain. He did, in response to theprayer of a man who cried to Him to be merciful tothem as individual and national sinners. God answered with thunder and rain. But men immediatelydenied that God had anything to do with it. The rainwas from natural causes, they said, and would havecome anyway. Then the earth instead of bringingCOVENANTER WITNESS