Serve two masters.
Neutrality in religion exposed
I. No man can serve two masters.
1. There are many who contrive to elude the force of this maxim, or make awful experiments to try the certainty of it.
2. Nor are these persons wanting in excuses to palliate, if not to justify their practice.
3. There are, however, four cases in which you may serve two masters, but the exceptions only render the general rule more remarkable.
(1) You may serve two masters successively.
(2) By serving one in reality and the other in pretence.
(3) You may serve two masters unequally.
(4) When they are on the same side and differ only in degree. You cannot serve God and mammon.
II. One of these you will unavoidably serve.
1. It is impossible for a man to be without some master.
2. The advocates of independence are greatest slaves.
3. The service of religion does not demand greater privations than that of sin.
III. You ought to serve God. Remind you-
1. Of His various and undeniable claims.
2. Of His designs in employing you in His service; our own good, not His need.
3. Make the right choice. (W. Jay.)
The impossibility of serving God and mammon
I. The meaning and truth of the maxim here laid down. The man who serves his master serves him with faithfulness and singleness of heart, with a mind wholly given to his service. It is impossible thus to serve two. He may appear to serve both: but let contrary interests arise and it will be seen to which he really belongs.
II. Our Lord’s application of this maxim. God and mammon are two masters: cannot serve both.
1. You must follow your worldly business from right motives.
2. You must follow it by right rules.
3. You must use your worldly gain in a right manner.
Two motives weigh with a man in selecting masters, interest or gratitude. On these grounds God claims your service above the world.
1. God can do more for you than mammon can do. God claims your service on the ground of what He has done for you. (E. Cooper.)
I. The necessity of decision in religion.
1. From the impracticability of uniting the two services.
2. From the misery which is an attendant on the attempt to unite these services.
3. The fatal consequences in another world.
4. The happy consequences from a uniform attachment to the right master.
(1) Faithfulness has its own reward;
(2) The path of decision is that of safety;
(3) In heaven.
II. Application of the subject.
1. Decision of character, it is evident, is totally distinct from party spirit.
2. We do not intend anything like indifference.
3. But are not some decided on the other side? (J. Fell.)
No man can serve two masters
1. It is a moral impossibility. He will love the one, etc. Men who love the world hate religion; and those who hate the world love Christ.
2. A divided service is making a divided life, the world comes into the religion, and religion comes into the world; both are spoilt.
3. The luxury, repose, and strength of a heart quite made up. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
God and mammon
I. The service that cannot be divided.
II. Why cannot both be served.
1. Because God claims a whole service.
2. Because God claims a heart-service.
III. The grounds of a reasonable choice.
1. Justice-God claims our service as His due; not upon contract, but natural relationship.
2. Gratitude-God has redeemed us.
3. Interest. Here mammon rests his whole case. His claim is that he offers
(1) advantages suited to our nature.
(2) That they are present. Examine his claims. They are not adapted to our nature as it ought to be. Are there no present advantages in God’s service?
Concerning the advantages of mammon three inquiries have to be answered.
1. Are they certain?
2. Are they real?
3. Will they last? (T. M. Macdonald, M. A.)
The service of the heart supreme
When a statute was made in Queen Elizabeth’s reign that all should come to church, the Papists sent to Rome to know the Pope’s pleasure; he returned them this answer, it is said: “Bid the Catholics in England give me their hearts, and let the Queen take the rest.” (Gurnall.)
You cannot sail under two flags.
The impossibility of serving God and mammon, and the propriety of giving God the preference
I. The impossibility of serving both.
1. Because of their opposite interests.
2. From the different objects they have to advance.
3. From the nature of the flesh and the spirit.
II. The propriety of giving God the preference.
1. He has the first claim upon you. He your Creator.
2. Consider the relative character of the service. One your life and joy, the other servitude and death.
III. Improvement.
1. The infinite importance of having singleness of heart in matters of religion.
2. How necessary to examine our hearts that we may know whom we serve.
3. What an awful idea the subject gives us of worldly-minded possessors. (J. E. Good.)
The inconsistency of the love of God and love of the world
I. What is it to serve God?
1. A visible profession, a steady belief, and awful sentiments of a Supreme Being.
2. To ascribe that worship that is strictly due to Him, as an acknowledgment of His almighty power, and a testimony of our submission.
3. Regard to His sacred laws.
4. A ready and cheerful obedience to His will, and a resignation under afflictions.
II. What is it to serve mammon?
1. It implies a persuasion of mind that riches and grandeur are the true seat of human happiness.
2. It is to attribute that worship to the creature which is only due to the Creator.
3. It is to be so much devoted to the world, as to fret at every disappointment, and repine at the least obstruction to our growing rich.
III. To show wherein the service of God and mammon is inconsistent. Their commands are contrary and irreconcilable. God commands us to seek Him first; mammon tempts us with kingdoms. God asks for our time; mammon takes it.
2. Annex a consideration to enforce what has been said.
(1) The folly to saunter away this span of life in the fruitless pursuit of riches, since we cannot tell who shall gather them.
(2) Can all the kingdoms of the world give us any inducement to their pursuit: they are gilded toys.
(3) Riches make to themselves wings and fly away.
(4) From the impossibility of finding happiness in the love of the world, and its inconsistency with the love of God, we meet with an indispensable obligation of fixing our attention on greater objects. (W. Adey.)