THE UNDOING

John 6:38 "For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.     "I am come, not to act according to human motives, passions, or prejudices; but according to infinite wisdom, goodness, and mercy. Jewish passions and prejudices would reject publicans and sinners as those alluded to, and shut the gate of heaven against the Gentiles; but God's mercy receives them, and I am come to manifest that mercy to men." "This man receives sinners." “It was a singular group which had gathered round our Saviour, when these words were uttered; for we are told by the evangelist—"Then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners for to hear him." The publicans—the very lowest grade, the public oppressors, scorned and hated by the meanest Jew—these, together with the worst of characters, the scum of the streets and the very riff-raff of the society of Jerusalem, came around this mighty preacher, Jesus Christ, in order to listen to his words. On the outside of the throng there stood a few respectable people, who in those days were called Pharisees and Scribes—men who were highly esteemed in the synagogues as rulers, and governors, and teachers. These looked with scorn upon the Preacher; and watched him with invidious eyes, to find some fault. If they could find none in him personally, yet they could easily find it in his congregation; his deportment towards them shocked their false notion of propriety, and when they observed that he was friendly with the very worst of characters, that he spoke loving words to the most fallen of mankind, they said of him what they intended for a disgrace, albeit it was highly to his honour: "This man receives sinners." I believe that our Savior could not have wished to have had a sentence uttered concerning him, more evidently true or more thoroughly consistent with his sacred commission. It is the exact portrait of his character; the hand of a master seems to have limned him to the very life. He is the man who "receives sinners." SpurgeonSONGS: KING OF KINGS, FLATIRONSHALLELUJAH, WHAT A SAVIOR, CHOIRLIVING HOPE, BETHEL