lls them why
God had driven them out, and why God was going to bring them back.

He had driven them out for their sins. But he was not going to
bring them back for their righteousness. He was going to bring them
back out of his own free grace, his own pure love and mercy, which
was wider, deeper, and higher, than all their sins, or than the sins
of the whole world. He had sworn to Abraham to be the friend of
those foolish rebellious Jews, and he would keep his promise for
ever. Their wickedness could not conquer his goodness, or their
denying him make him deny himself.

But one thing he did require of them. Not that they should turn and
do right all at once. That must come afterwards. But that they
should open their eyes, and see that they had done wrong. He wanted
to produce in them the humble and the contrite heart.

Now, as I told you last Sunday, a contrite heart does not merely
mean a broken heart; it means more. It means literally a heart
crushed; a heart ground to powder. You can have no stronger word.

It was this heart which God wished to breed in these rebellious
Jews. A heart like Isaiah's heart, when he said, after having seen
God's glory, 'Woe is me, for I am a man of unclean lips, and dwell
among a people of unclean lips.' A heart like Jeremiah's heart,
when he said, 'Oh, that my head were waters, and mine eyes a
fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of
the daughter of my people.' A heart like Daniel's heart, when he
confessed before God that, to him and all his people belonged shame
and confusion of face.

Why do I mention these three men? They were not bad men, but good
men. What need had they of a contrite heart?

I mention them, because they were good men. And why were they good
men? For any good works of their own? Not in the least. What made
them good men was, just the having the humble and the contrite
heart; just feeling that in themselves they were as bad as the
sinners round them; that the only thing which kept them out of the
idolatry and profligacy of their neighbours was confessing their own
weakness, and clinging fast to God by faith; confessing that their
own righteousness was as filthy rags, and that God must clothe them
with his righteousness.

Do you suppose that Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel would have been
good men, if they had said to themselves, 'We are prophets; we are
inspired; we know God's law: and therefore we are righteous;