Matthew 17:8 - “Jesus only” | Pastor Octavius Winslow

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And when they had lifted up their eyes, they saw no man, save Jesus only (Matthew 17:8) Believer in Jesus! remember, all your confidence, all your hope, all your comfort flows from the finished work of your Saviour. “Jesus only.” [See that you do not unwittingly add something to the perfection of this work]. You may be betrayed into this sin and this folly by looking within yourself rather than to the person of Jesus; by attaching an importance too great to repentance and faith, and your own doings and strivings, rather than ceasing from your own works altogether, and resting for your peace and joy and hope, simply, entirely, and exclusively in the work of Jesus. Remember that whatever we unintentionally add to the finished work of Christ, mars the perfection and obscures the beauty of that work. “If thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it” (Exodus 20:25). Nothing have we to do but, in our moral pollution and nakedness, to plunge beneath the fountain, and wrap our selves within the robe of that Saviour’s blood and righteousness who, when he expired on the tree, so completed our redemption, as to leave us nothing to do but to believe and be saved. “It is finished!” (John 19:30) — O words, pregnant of the deepest meaning! O words, rich of the richest consolation! Salvation is finished! “Jesus only.” Look from fluctuating frames, and fitful feelings, and changing clouds, to “Jesus only.” Look from sins and guilt, from emptiness and poverty, to “Jesus only.” The veil of the temple is rent in twain, and you may pass into its holiest, and lay upon the altar the sacrifice of a broken and a contrite heart, which shall be accepted through him who “gave himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God, for a sweetsmelling savor” (Ephesians 5:2). “It is finished!” Let devils hear it, and tremble! let sinners hear it, and believe! let saints hear it, and rejoice! All is finished. “Then, Lord, I flee to thee, just as I am! I have stayed away from thee too long, and ‘am nothing bettered, but rather grown worse.’ Too exclusively have I looked at my unworthiness, too absorbed have I been with my penury, too bitterly have I mourned having nothing to pay. Upon thy own finished work I now cast myself. Save, Lord, and I shall be saved!” Before this stupendous truth, let all creature merit sink, let all human glory pale, let all man’s boasting vanish, and Jesus be all in all. Perish forms and ceremonies — perish rites and rituals — perish creeds and churches — perish, utterly and forever perish, whatever would be a substitute for the finished work of Jesus, what ever would attempt to add to the finished work of Jesus, whatever would tend to neutralize the finished work of Jesus, whatever would obscure with a cloud, or dim with a vapor, the beauty, the luster, and the glory of the finished work of Jesus, [let it perish]! It was “Jesus only” in the councils of eternity — it was “Jesus only” in the everlasting covenant of grace,— it was “Jesus only” in the manger of Bethlehem — it was “Jesus only” in the garden of Gethsemane — it was “Jesus only” upon the cross of Calvary — it was “Jesus only” in the tomb of Joseph — it was “Jesus only” who, “when he had by Himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high” (Hebrews 1:3). And it shall be “Jesus only” the joy of our hearts, the object of our glory, the theme of our song, the Beloved of our adoration, our service, and our praise, through the endless ages of eternity. O stand fast in life and in death, by the finished work of Jesus. — Octavius Winslow