eChurch Blog

“His name shall endure for ever” Psalm 72:17

No one here requires to be told that this is the name of Jesus Christ, which
“shall endure for ever.” Men have said of many of their works, “they shall
endure for ever;” but how much have they been disappointed! In the age
succeeding the flood, they made the brick, they gathered the slime, and
when they had piled old Babel’s tower, they said, “This shall last for ever.”
But God confounded their language; they finished it not. By his lightnings
he destroyed it, and left it a monument of their folly. Old Pharoah and the
Egyptian monarchs heaped up their pyramids, and they said, “They shall
stand for ever,” and so indeed they do stand; but the time is approaching
when age shall devour even these. So with all the proudest works of man,
whether they have been his temples or his monarchies, he has written
“everlasting” on them; but God has ordained their end, and they have
passed away. The most stable things have been evanescent as shadows and
the bubbles of an hour, speedily destroyed at God’s bidding. Where is
Nineveh, and where is Babylon? Where the cities of Persia? Where are the
high places of Edom? Where are Moab, and the princes of Ammon? Where
are the temples or the heroes of Greece? Where the millions that passed
from the gates of Thebes? Where are the hosts of Xerxes, or where the
vast armies of the Roman emperors? Have they not passed away? And
though in their pride they said, “This monarchy is an everlasting one: this
queen of the seven hills shall be called the eternal city,” its pride is dimmed;
and she who sat alone, and said, “I shall be no widow, but a queen for
ever,” she hath fallen, hath fallen, and in a little while she shall sink like a
millstone in the flood, her name being a curse and a by-word, and her site
the habitation of dragons and of owls. Man calls his work eternal – God calls
them fleeting; man conceives that they are built of rock-God says, “Nay,
sand; or worse than that-they are air.” Man says he erects them for eternity
— God blows but for a moment, and where are they? Like baseless fabrics
of a vision, they are passed and gone for ever.

It is pleasant, then, to find that there is one thing which is to last for ever.
Concerning that one thing we hope to speak tonight, if God will enable me
to preach, and you to hear: “His name shall endure for ever.” First, the
religion sanctified by his name shall endure for ever; secondly, the honor of
his name shall endure for ever; and thirdly, the saving, comforting power of
his name shall endure for ever.

I. First, the religion of the name of Jesus is to endure for ever. When
impostors forged their delusions, they had hopes that peradventure they
might in some distant age carry the World before them, and if they saw a
few followers gather around their standard, who offered incense at their
shrine, then they smiled, and said, “My religion shall outshine the stars and
last through eternity.” But how mistaken have they been! How many false
systems have started up and passed away! Why, some of us have seen,
even in our short lifetime, sects that rose like Jonah’s gourd in a single
night, and passed away as swiftly. We too have beheld prophets rise, who
have had their hour – yea, they have had their day, as dogs all have, but like
the dogs, their day has passed away, and the impostor, where is he? And
the arch-deceiver, where is he? Gone and ceased. Specially might I say this
of the various systems of infidelity. Within a hundred and fifty years how
has the boasted power of reason changed! It has piled up one thing, and
then another day it has laughed at its own handiwork, demolished its own
castle, and constructed another, and the next day a third. It hath a thousand
dresses. Once it came forth like a fool with its bells, heralded by Voltaire;
then it came out a braggart bully, like Tom Paine; then it changed its
course and assumed another shape, till forsooth we have it in the base,
bestial seculiarism of the present day, which looks for nought but the earth,
keeps its nose upon the ground, and like the beast thinks this world is
enough, or looks for another through seeking this. Why, before one hair on
this head shall be grey, the last securalist shall have passed away; before
many of us are fifty years of age, a new infidelity shall come, and to those
who say “Where will saints be? “we can turn round and say, “Where are
you?” And they will answer, “We have altered our names.” They will have
altered their name, assumed a fresh shape, put on a new form of evil; but
still their nature will be the came, opposing Christ, and endeavoring to
blaspheme his truths. On all their systems of religion, or nonreligion – for
that is a system too – it may be written, “Evanescent: fading as the flower,
fleeting as the meteor, frail and unreal as a vapor.” But of Christ’s religion
it shall be said, “His name shall endure for ever.” Let me now say a few
things – not to prove it, for that I do not wish to do – but to give you some
hints whereby possibly I may one day prove it to other people, that Jesus
Christ’s religion must inevitably endure for ever.

And first, we ask those who think it shall pass away, when was there a time
when it did not exist? We ask them whether they can point their finger to a
period when the religion of Jesus was an unheard of thing. “Yes,” they will
reply, “before the days of Christ and his apostles.” But we answer, “Nay,
Bethlehem was not the birthplace of the gospel; though Jesus was born
there, there was a gospel long before the birth of Jesus, and a preached one
too, although not preached in all its simplicity and plainness, as we hear it
now. There was a gospel in the wilderness of Sinai, although it might be
confused with the smoke of the incense, and only to be seen through
slaughtered victims, yet there was a gospel there.” Yea, more, we take
them back to the fair trees of Eden, where the fruits perpetually ripened,
and summer always rested, and amid these groves we tell them there was a
gospel, and we let them hear the voice of God, as he spoke to recreant
man, and said, “The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent’s head.”
And having taken them thus far back, we ask “Where were false religions
born? Where was their cradle?” They point us to Mecca, or they turn their
fingers to Rome, or they speak of Confucius, or the dogmas of Budha. But
we say, you only go back to a distant obscurity; we take you to the
primeval age; we direct you to the days of purity; we take you back to the
time when Adam first trod the earth; and then we ask you whether it is not
likely that as the firstborn, it will not also be the last to die; and as it was
born so early, and still exists, whilst a thousand ephemera have become
extinct, whether it does not look most probable, that when all others shall
have perished like the bubble upon the wave, this only shall swim, like a
good ship upon the ocean, and still shall bear its myriad souls, not to the
land of shades, but across the river of death to the plains of heaven.
We ask next, supposing Christ’s gospel to become extinct, what religion is
to supplant it? We enquire of the wise man, who says Christianity is soon
to die, “Pray sir, what religion are we to have in its stead? Are we to have
the delusions of the heathen, who bow before their gods and worship
images of wood and stone? Will ye have the orgies of Baechus, or the
obscenities of Venus? Would ye see your daughters once more bowing
down before Thammuz, or performing obscene rites as of old? “Nay, ye
would not endure such things; ye would say, “It must not be tolerated by
civilized men.” “Then what would ye have? Would ye have Romanism and
its superstition? “Ye will say, “No, God help us, never “They may do what
they please with Britain; but she is too wise to take old Popery back again
while Smithfield lasts, and there is one of the signs of martyrs there; ay,
while there breathes a man who marks himself a freeman, and swears by
the constitution of Old England, we cannot take Popery back again. She
may be rampant with her superstitions and her priestcraft; but with one
consent my hearers reply, “We will not have Popery.” Then what will ye
choose? Shall it be Mahomedanism? Will ye choose that, with all its fables,
its wickedness, and libidinousness? I will not tell you of it. Nor will I
mention the accursed imposture of the West that has lately arisen. We will
not allow Polygamy, while there are men to be found who love the social
circle, and cannot see it invaded. We would not wish, when God hath given
to man one wife, that he should drag in twenty, as the companions of that
one. We cannot prefer Mormonism; we will not, and we shall not. Then
what shall we have in the place of Christianity? “Infidelity!” you cry, do
you, sirs? And would you have that? Then what would be the
consequence? What do many of them promote? Communist views, and the
real disruption of all society as at present established. Would you desire
Reigns of Terror here, as they had in France? Do you wish to see all
society shattered, and men wandering like monster icebergs on the sea,
dashing against each other, and being at last utterly destroyed? God save
us from Infidelity! What can you have, then? Nought. There is nothing to
supplant Christianity. What religion shall overcome it? There is not one to
be compared with it. If we tread the globe round and search from Britain to
Japan, there shall be no religion found, so just to God, so safe to man.

We ask the enemy once more, suppose a religion were to be found which
would be preferable to the one we love, by what means would you crush
ours? How would you get rid of the religion of Jesus? and how would you
extinguish his name? Surely, sirs, ye would never think of the old practice
of persecution, would you? Would ye once more try the efficacy of stakes
and fires, to burn out the name of Jesus? Would ye try racks and thumbscrews?

Would ye give us the boots and instruments of torture? Try it, sirs,
and ye shall not quench Christianity. Each martyr, dipping his finger in his
blood, would write its honors ton the heavens as he died; and the very
flame that mounted up to heaven would emblazon the skies with the name
of Jesus. Persecution has been tried. Turn to the Alps; let the valleys of
Piedmont speak; let Switzerland testify; let France, with its St.
Bartholomew; let England, with all its massacres, speak. And if ye have not
crushed it yet, shall ye hope to do it? Shall ye? Nay, a thousand are to be
found, and ten thousand if it were necessary, who are willing to march to
the stake to-morrow: and when they are burned, if ye could take up their
hearts, ye would see engraver upon each of them the name of Jesus. “His
name shall endure for ever; “for how can ye destroy our love to it? “Ah!
but” ye say, “we would try gentler means than that.” Well, what would ye
attempt? Would ye invent a better religion? We bid you do it, and let ye
hear it; we have not yet so much as believed you capable of such a
discovery. What then? Would ye wake up one that should deceive us and
lead us astray? We bid you do it; for it is not possible to deceive the elect.

You may deceive the multitude, but God’s elect shall not be led astray.
They have tried us. Have they not given us Popery? Have they not assailed
us with Puseyism? Are they not tempting us with Arminianism by the
wholesale? And do we therefore renounce God’s truth? No; we have taken
this for our motto, and by it we will stand. “The Bible, the whole Bible,
and nothing but the Bible,” is still the religion of Protestants; and the
selfsame truth which moved the lips of Chrysostom, the old doctrine that
ravished the heart of Augustine, the old faith which Athanasius declared,
the good old doctrine that Calvin preached, is our gospel now, and God
helping us, we will stand by it till we die. How will ye quench it? If ye wish
to do it, where can ye find the means? It is not in your power. Aha! aha!
aha! we laugh you to scorn.

But you will quench it, will you? You will try it, do you say? And you hope
you will accomplish your purpose? Yes; I know you will, when you have
annihilated the sun; when you have quenched the moon with drops of your
tears; when you have dried up the sea with your drinking. Then shall ye do
it. And yet ye say ye will.

And next, I ask you, suppose you did, what would become of the world
then? Ah! were I eloquent tonight, I might perhaps tell you. If I could
borrow the language of a Robert Hall I might hang the world in mourning;
I might make the sea the great chief mourner, with its dirge of howling
wince, and its wild death-march of disordered waves; I might clothe all
nature – not in robes of green, but in garments of sombre blackness; I would
bid hurricanes howl the solemn wailing – that death shriek of a world – for
what would become of us, if we should lose the gospel? As for me, I tell
you fairly, I would cry, “Let me begone!” I would have no wish to be here
without my Lord; and if the gospel be not true, I should bless God to
annihilate me this instant, for I would not care to live if ye could destroy
the name of Jesus Christ. But that would not be all, that one man should be
miserable, for there are thousands and thousands who can speak as I do.

Again, what would become of civilization if ye could take Christianity
away? Where would be the hope of a perpetual peace? Where
governments? Where your Sabbath-schools? Where all your societies?
Where everything that ameliorates the condition of man, reforms his
manners, and moralizes his character? Where? Let echo answer, “Where?
“They would be gone, and not a scrap of them would be left. And where,
O men, would be your hope of heaven? And where the knowledge of
eternity? Where a help across the river death? Where a heaven? And where
bliss everlasting? All were gone if his name did not endure for ever. But we
are sure of it, we know it, we affirm it, we declare it; we believe, and ever
will, that “his name shall endure for ever” – ay, for ever! let who will try to
stop it.

This is my first point; I shall have to speak with rather bated breath upon
the second, although I feel so warm within as well as without, that I would
to God I could speak with all my strength as I might do.

II. But, secondly, as his religion, so the honor of his name is to last for
ever. Voltaire said he lived in the twilight of Christianity. He meant a lie; he
spoke the truth. He did live in its twilight; but it was the twilight before the
mowing – not the twilight of the evening, as he meant to say; for the
morning comes, when the light of the sun shall break upon us in its truest
glory. The scorners have said that we should soon forget to honor Christ,
and that one day no man should acknowledge him. Now, we assert again,
in the words of my text, “His name shall endure for ever,” as to the honor
of it. Yes, I will tell you how long it will endure. As long as on this earth
there is a sinner who has been reclaimed by Omnipotent grace, Christ’s
name shall endure; as long as there is a Mary ready to wash his feet with
tears and wipe them with the hair of her head; as long as there breathes a
chief of sinners who has washed himself in the fountain opened for sin and
for uncleanesss; as long as there exists a Christian who has put his faith in
Jesus, and found him his delight, his refuge, his stay, his shield, his song,
and his joy, there will be no fear that Jesus’ name will cease to be heard.

We can never give up that name. We let the Unitarian take his gospel
without a Godhead in it; we let him deny Jesus Christ; but as long as
Christians – true Christians, live, as long as we taste that the Lord is
gracious, have manifestations of his love, sights of his face, whispers of his
mercy, assurances of his affection, promises of his grace, hopes of his
blessing, we cannot cease to honor his name. But if all these were gone – if
we were to cease to sing his praise, would Jesus Christ’s name be forgotten
then? No; the stones would sing, the hills would be an orchestra, the
mountains would skip like rams, and the little hills like lambs; for is he not
their creator? And if these ripe, and the lips of all mortals were dumb at
once, there are creatures enough in this wide world besides. Why, the sun
would lead the chorus; the moon would play upon her silver harp, and
sweetly sing to her music; stars would dance in their measured courses; the
shoreless depths of ether would become the home of songs; and the void
immensity would burst out into one great shout, “Thou art the glorious
Son of God; great is thy majesty, and infinite thy power.” Can Christ’s
name be forgotten? No; it is painted on the skies; it is written on the floods;
the wince whisper it; the tempests howl it; the seas chant it; the stars shine
it; the beasts low it; the thunders proclaim it; earth shouts it; heaven echoes
it. But if that were gone – if this great universe should all subside in God,
just as a moment’s foam subsides into the wave that bears it and is lost for
ever – would his name be forgotten then? No. Turn your eyes up yonder; see
heaven’s terra firma “who are these that are arrayed in white, and whence
came they?” “These are they that came out of great tribulation; they have
washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb;
therefore they are before the throne of God, and praise him day and night
in his temple.” And if these were gone; if the last harp of the glorified had
been touched with the last fingers; if the last praise of the saints had
ceased; if the last hallelujah had echoed through the then deserted vaults of
heaven, for they would be gloomy then; if the last immortal had been
buried in his grave, – if graves there might be for immortals -would his praise
cease then? No, by heaven; no; for yonder stand the angels; they too sing
his glory; to him the cherubim and seraphim do cry without ceasing, when
they mention his name in that thrice holy chorus, “Holy, holy, holy, Lord
God of armies.” But if these were perished – if angels had been swept away,
if the wing of seraph never flapped the ether; if the voice of the cherub
never sung his flaming sonnet, if the living creatures ceased their
everlasting chorus, if the measured symphonies of glory were extinct in
silence, would his name then be lost? Ah! no; for as God upon the throne
he sits, the everlasting One, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. And if the
universe were all annihilated, still would his name be heard, for the Father
would hear it, and the Spirit would hear it, and deeply graven on immortal
marble in the rocks of ages, it would stand,-Jesus the Son of God; co-equal
with his Father. “His name shall endure for ever.”

III. And so shall the power of his name. Do you enquire what this is? Let
me tell you. Seest thou yonder thief hanging upon the cross? Behold the
fiends at the foot thereof, with open mouths; charming themselves with the
sweet thought, that another soul shall give them meat in hell. Behold the
death-bird, fluttering his wings o’er the poor wretch’s head; vengeance
passes by and stamps him for her own; deep on his breast is written “a
condemned sinner;” on his brow is the clammy sweat, expressed from him
by agony and death. Look in his heart: it is filthy with the crust of years of
sin; the smoke of lust is hanging within, in black festoons of darkness; his
whole heart is hell condensed. Now, look at him. He is dying. One foot
seems to be in hell; the other hangs tottering in life – only kept by a nail.

There is a power in Jesus’ eye. That thief looks: he whispers, “Lord,
remember me.” Turn your eye again there. Do you see that thief? Where is
the clammy sweat? It is there. Where is that horrid anguish? Is it not there.
Positively there is a smile upon his lips. The fiends of hell where are they?
There are none: but a bright seraph is present, with his wings outspread,
and his hands ready to snatch that soul, now a precious jewel, and bear it
aloft to the palace of the great King. Look within his heart: it is white with
purity. Look at his breast: it is not written “condemned,” but “justified.”
Look in the book of life: his name is graven there. Look on Jesus’ heart:
there on one of the precious stones he bears that poor thief’s name. Yea,
once more, look! Seest thou that bright one amid the glorified, clearer than
the sun, and fair as the moon? That is the thief! That is the power of Jesus;
and that power shall endure for ever. He who saved the thief can save the
last man who shall ever live; for still

“There is a fountain filled with blood,
Drawn from Immanuel’s vein’s;
And sinners plunged beneath that flood,
Loose all their guilty stems
The dying thief rejoic’d to see
That fountain in his day;
O may I there, tho’ vile as he,
Wash all my sins away.
Dear dying Lamb! that precious blood
Shall never lose its power,
Till all the ransom’d church of God
Be saved to sin no more.”

His powerful name shall endure for ever.

Nor is that all the power of his name. Let me take you to another scene and
ye shall witness somewhat else. There on that deathbed lies a saint; no
gloom is on his brow, no terror on his face, weakly but placidly he smiles;
he groans, perhaps, but yet he sings. He sighs now and then, but oftener he
shouts. Stand by him. “My brother, what makes thee look in death’s face
with such joy?” “Jesus,” he whispers, What makes thee so placid and so
calm? “The name of Jesus.” See he forgets everything! Ask him a question;
he cannot answer it – he does not understand you. Still he smiles. His wife
comes, enquiring, “Do you know my name?” He answers, “No.” His
dearest friend requests him to remember his intimacy. “I know you not,” he
says. Whisper in his ear, “Do you know the name of Jesus?” and his eyes
flash glory, and his face beams heaven, and his lips speak sonnets, and his
heart bursts with eternity; for he hears the name of Jesus, and that name
shall endure for ever. He who landed one in heaven will land me there.

Come on, death! I will mention Christ’s name there. O grave! this shall be
my glory, the name of Jesus! Hell dog! this shall be thy death – for the sting
of death is extracted – Christ our Lord. “His name shall endure for ever.”

I had a hundred particulars to give you; but my voice fails, so I had better
stop. You will not require more of me tonight, you perceive the difficulty
I feel in speaking each word. May God send it home to your souls! I am
not particularly anxious about my own name, whether that shall endure for
ever or not, provided it is recorded in my Master’s book. George
Whitfield, when asked whether he would found a denomination, said, “No;
brother John Wesley may do as he pleases, but let my name perish; let
Christ’s name last for even.” Amen to that! Let my name perish; but let
Christ’s name last for ever. I shall be quite contented for you to go away
and forget me. I have not see the faces of half of you again, I dare say; you
may never be persuaded to step within the walls of a conventicle; you will
think it perhaps not respectable enough to come to a Baptist meeting. Well,
I do not say we are a very respectable people; we don’t profess to be; but
this one thing we do profess, we love our Bibles; and if that is not
respectable to do so, we do not care to be had in esteem. But we do not
know that we are so disreputable after all, for I believe, if I may state my
own opinion, that if Protestant Christendom were counted out of that
door – not merely every real Christian, but every professor – I believe the
Paedo-Baptists would have no very great majority to boast of. We are not,
after all, such a very small disreputable sect. Regard us in England we may
be; but take America, Jamaica, and the West Indies, and include those who
are Baptists in principle, though not openly so, and we surrender to none,
not even to the Established Church of this country, in numbers. That,
however, we care very little about; for I say of the Baptist name, let it
perish, but let Christ’s name last for ever. I look forward with pleasure to
the day when there will not be a Baptist living. I hope they will soon be
gone. You will say, “Why?” Because when everybody else sees baptism by
immersion, we shall be immersed into all sects, and our sect will be gone.

Once give us the predominance and we are not a sect any longer. A man
may be a Churchman, a Wesleyan, or an Independent, and yet be a Baptist.
So that I say I hope the Baptist name will soon perish; but let Christ’s
name last for ever. Yea, and yet again, much as I love dear old England, I
do not believe she will ever perish. No, Britain! thou shalt never perish; for
the flag of old England is nailed to the mast by the prayers of Christians, by
the efforts of Sunday schools, and her pious men. But I say let even
England’s name perish; let her be merged in one great brotherhood; let us
have no England, and no France, and no Russia, and no Turkey, but let us
have Christendom; and I say heartily, from my soul, let nations and national
distinctions perish, but let Christ’s name last for ever. Perhaps there is only
one thing on earth that I love better than the last I have mentioned, and
that is the pure doctrine of unadulterated Calvinism. But if that be wrong – if
there be anything in that which is false – I for one say let that perish too, and
let Christ’s name last for ever. Jesus! Jesus! Jesus! Jesus: “Crown him Lord
of all! “You will not hear me say anything else. These are my last words in
Exeter Hall for this time. Jesus! Jesus! Jesus! “Crown him Lord of all.”