you. A man may be most religious and
yet be most ungodly by Archibald Brown from The Ungodly and Their
End 1874 The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which
the wind drives away. Therefore the ungodly shall not
stand in the judgment nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.
Psalm 1 verse 4 and 5 The ungodly—who are they? I know full well who
are uppermost in your minds. I know Suna mentioned the text
and spoke about the doom of the ungodly. Then you began to think
of the vile and brutalized characters whose deeds of cruelty make up
that shameful list of crimes of violence now appearing in
our papers day by day. And side by side with them you
doubtless thought of the drunkard, pouring down his throat the liquid
fire, to better qualify himself for the devil's work. And you
thought of brazen-faced harlotry, and open immorality, and of those
who are steeped to the lips in sin, and of those who live, as
they say, for time, and let eternity look after itself. These are
the characters you pictured when we read the word ungodly. Well,
you're right. They are ungodly. But I am certain
that all I have mentioned fail to compose one tenth part of
those who are legitimately to be included in the catalogue
of the ungodly. Remember this, that a man may
be ungodly without being any of the characters that I have
mentioned. an ungodly man is simply a man who tries to get
through the world without God it is not necessary for a man's
life to be a shame and a disgrace for him to be ungodly it is not
necessary for him to be steeped in all sorts of vice in order
to be without God I will go further and venture to assert that a
man may be most moral and yet most ungodly. While vile immorality
has slain its thousands, a godless morality has slain its tens of
thousands. And for one that is dragged down
to perdition by the millstone of vice, there are hundreds who
are taken in the meshes of the net of a Christless virtue. A man may be honest in all his
transactions, pure in his language, chaste in his thoughts, An honourable
man in all his business dealings, just the very one he would like
to trade with, his word may be his bond, and all his actions
fair, and yet come under the designation of the ungodly. It is with him simply morality,
skin deep. There has been nothing of regeneration
within, without which it is impossible for a man to enter into the kingdom.
Look into his character and you will find that he is ungodly
in every part of his life. Inspect all his motives and you
will find that he never does a thing for God's sake. There
is no fear of God before his eyes. There is no reverence for
God within his heart. He may be gentle, amiable, moral,
a good sort of man as far as this world's goodness is concerned. He would be all right if a man
could be all right without God. But he belongs to the ungodly. we will go one step further and
say that a man may be most religious and yet be most ungodly I can
conceive of a man being a most talented preacher and yet being
ungodly it may be that he has a natural liking and gift for
speaking and he may perhaps take a very great deal of interest
in the increase of his denomination and the outward mechanism of
his church but for all that He is totally devoid of the life
of God within his soul. Oh, pass the question around,
I beg you, you who have made profession of the Lord Jesus
Christ for years. Have you got something more than
a mere name to live? Are you yet? Oh, can it be? Ungodly, though a professing
Christian. Ungodly, though once immersed
in the name of Christ. Ungodly, though your life is
almost a pattern for the very best of Christians. the question
is have you God or not for my text is not about the immoral
the profane or the criminal but about those who whatever else
they have possess not God The ungodly are not so, but are like
the chaff which the wind drives away. Therefore the ungodly shall
not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of
the righteous. Psalm 1 verse 4 and 5. you