oubt, unclean men here; there are some who eat and drink
more than is good for them, habitually; there are, no doubt, men and
women who are living in avarice and worldliness, and doing things which
the ordinary conscience of the populace points to as faults and
blemishes. But I come to you respectable people that can say: 'I am not
as other men are, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican'; and
pray you, dear friends, to look at your character all round, in the
light of the righteousness and love of God, and to plead to the
indictment which charges you with neglect of many a duty and with sin
against Him. How do you plead, 'guilty or not guilty, sinful or not
sinful?' Be honest with yourselves, and the answer will not be far to
seek.

Notice how my text draws a broad distinction between the right and the
wrong kind of sorrow for sin. 'Godly sorrow' is, literally
rendered,'sorrow according to God,' which may either mean sorrow which
has reference to God, or sorrow which is in accordance with His will;
that is to say, which is pleasing to Him. If it is the former, it will
be the latter. I prefer to suppose that it is the former--that is,
sorrow which has reference to God. And then, there is another kind of
sorrow, which the Apostle calls the 'sorrow of the world,' which is
devoid of that reference to God. Here we have the characteristic
difference between the Christian way of looking at our own faults and
shortcomings, and the sorrow of the world, which has got no blessing in
it, and will never lead to anything like righteousness and peace. It is
just this--one has reference to God, puts its sin by His side, sees its
blackness relieved against the 'fierce light' of the Great White Throne,
and the other has not that reference.

To expand that for a moment,--there are plenty of us who, when our sin
is behind us, and its bitter fruits are in our hands, are sorry enough
for our faults. A man that is lying in the hospital a wreck, with the
sins of his youth gnawing the flesh off his bones, is often enough sorry
that he did not live more soberly and chastely and temperately in the
past days. That fraudulent bankrupt who has not got his discharge and
has lost his reputation, and can get nobody to lend him money enough to
start him in business again, as he hangs about the streets, slouching in
his rags, is sorry enough that he did not keep the straight road. The
'sorrow of the world' has no thought about God in it at all. T