Reading 161. New Spirit Filled Life Daily Bible (NKJV)
(SOCS)
2 Kings 8 verses 12, 13
Our ignorance of the depravity of our own hearts is a startling fact.
Hazael did not believe that he was bad enough to do any of the things here anticipated.
“Is thy servant a dog that he should do this great thing.”
He might have been conscious enough that his heart was none so pure, but it might consent to do many an evil thing, yet crimes so flagrant as those the prophet had foretold of him, he thought himself quite incapable to commit…
Ah, my brethren, the ignorance of Hazael is ours to a greater or less degree.
In our natural state we are oblivious of the depravity of our own hearts…
Ay, but, my brethren, we were, to a great degree, cured of this our ignorance when the Spirit of God brought us under conviction…
Much of our ignorance was taken away; but alas! how much remained!…
None of us know, after all, much of the baseness of our hearts…
The depravity of our nature forbids… a venturing or presuming to play and toy with temptations…
He who carries gunpowder about him had better not stand where there are many sparks…
I implore thee, therefore, as thou wouldst honor thy God, and thou wouldst stand in brightness, go not I beseech thee where the temptation to sin is glaring, and flatter thyself that thou will come out guileless…
God grant that we may not… be as Hazael, the perpetrators of crimes of which we never suspected ourselves capable.
Charles H. Spurgeon, Sermons of Rev. C.H. Spurgeon
1993 by Thomas Nelson, Inc