Man differs from the brute creation in that he learns and profits by experience - he advances. He passes through stage after stage toward the perfection of his life upon the earth. He is the hunter at one period, then the shepherd, then the agriculturist. From the lowest barbarism he reaches, in time, the most refined civilization. But he is very slow indeed to learn, if he does learn at all, moral and spiritual truths. The excellency of thrift, of temperance, of purity, of patience, - how long a time it is taking man to acquire these virtues! Our text opens to us the truth of the danger of spiritual trifling, and indicates that what men were long ages ago, that they still are in this respect.

I. SPIRITUAL TRIFLING. The men of the time of Noah were living in a state of utter worldliness and impiety. They were not without remonstrance and rebuke; Noah was himself "a preacher of righteousness" unto them. But they hearkened not, nor heeded; they made light of his admonitions and his warnings. They found some pretext under which they could easily hide the truth he reminded them of, and they went on their way of materialism and enjoyment. The same with the people of Sodom, and the character and instruction of Lot. And so with us.

1. Men are living in sinful selfishness and worldliness - many in crime, many more in vice; but a very large multitude in practical godlessness. God is not in all, he is not in many if in any of their thoughts. His will is not the object of their inquiry, is not the rule of their life.

2. The religious teacher comes and admonishes; he says, "Man cannot live by bread alone;" the claims of the Divine Father, of the holy Saviour, are the supreme claims, etc.

3. But still the same course is pursued; the better thoughts that are momentarily stirred in the heart are silenced; sacred truths are extinguished; the truth of God is treated lightly; the world and the things that are in the world are uppermost and are victorious.

II. THE PALPABLE FOLLY OF SUCH TRIFLING AS THIS.

1. It is attended with immediate and certain injury. For it is impossible for a human soul to reject the truth or to quench the Spirit of God, and not be seriously the worse for such an act.

2. There is the grave peril of a great disaster. The generation is eating and drinking and marrying, and behold! the Flood sweeps them away. The cities are trading and feasting, and lo! the fires of heaven come down and consume them. They who trifle with the most sacred things are sure to find that, suddenly, in such an hour as they think not, the end arrives. The business plans are all broken off; the brilliant career is concluded; the flow of pleasures is arrested. Death suddenly appears, and deals his fatal blow. These sacred opportunities which have been so little prized, so much disparaged, recede with terrible rapidity and disappear. Opportunity that waited by the side, and waited all in vain, melts and vanishes in a moment. The soul awakes from its long lethargy to see that its powers have been wasted and that its chance is gone!

III. THE ELUSIVENESS OH THIS SOLEMN LESSON. Men have always known this, and they have always acted as if they were ignorant of it. "As it was... so shall it be." So is it to-day. By spiritual trifling men fritter away the golden chance that Divine love puts into their hands. Be wise in time. Realize what you are doing, what injury you are working, what risk you are running. - C.

I. IT IS COMMONLY REQUIRED OF US TO SACRIFICE A LOWER GOOD, IN ORDER TO GAIN A HIGHER. Not always, but almost always. The good things of this world are of several sorts, very unlike one another. Consider the sensualist, the man of pleasure, what is called the man of the world. Now it is idle to say, that the pleasures of sense are not real pleasures. Pleasure is not altogether out of the question amongst higher things, as is proved by such examples as those of Pericles, Caesar, and Bonaparte; but pleasure supreme is simply fatal to a great career. It may give you an Alcibiades, but never a Leonidas. So, too, of money. Here again it is idle to say that money is of no account. All that is higher, and all that is lower, must be cheerfully given up. Money must be the one thing he goes for. This, indeed, is the price of money, as of everything else; and he must pay it. But, at all events, he must give up the lower good. He must not be a man of the world. He must be abstemious in eating; temperate in drinking; temperate in all things. He must rein in his appetite. Good personal habits — habits of self-restraint, must be well established. And so of fame. But neither the scholar, the artist, nor the orator, must be idle, or avaricious. The lore of pleasure and the love of money are both of them fatal to these higher aims. Learning grows puny and trivial, when waited on by sensual delights; while the love of gain eats into it like rust. So, too, of art. Growing either voluptuous, or sordid, it falls like an angel from heaven. And so of eloquence. It flies from lips that are steeped in pleasure; it will not quiver in fingers that clutch at gold. The ambition of scholarship, of art, of eloquence, is a lofty ambition, and it will not tolerate much baseness. The scholars of antiquity were, for the most part, severe and temperate men. The scholars of the Middle Ages were the cloistered and ascetic monks. The votaries of art, too, with rare exceptions, have wasted away in martyrdom to their calling. Thus it is that the Temple of Fame keeps a stern sentinel standing ever at her gateway of Corinthian brass. And every comer is challenged with such questions as these: Canst thou live on bread and water? Art thou willing to be poor? If not, avaunt! And so of all sorts of earthly good. Each sort has its price; and may be taken at that price. But two or more sorts may not ordinarily be taken by one and the same purchaser. The lower must be sacrificed to the higher. The coarser must give place to the finer. Such is the well-established method of our ordinary life. Every step of our earthly progress is a sacrifice. We gain by losing; grow by dwindling; live by dying. Our text, it is plain, is but an extension of this well-established method to the entire range and circle of our interests. What is seen to be true of earthly advantages considered in reference to one another, is here declared to be true of all these advantages together, when considered in relation to the life eternal. This world and the next world are set in opposition to each other. Body and soul are put at variance. And all that a man may win of worldly good, it is taught, he must be ready to sacrifice, if need be, in order to save his soul. You may call the demand a hard one; but all the analogies of our ordinary life endorse and favour it. In many dark corners of the earth are sitting men to-day, who have abandoned almost everything for Christ. And their feeling is that they have barely done their duty: that a necessity is laid upon them; that they must suffer for Christ; and by and by die for Him. And the stern warrant for it all is in our text: "He that findeth his life, shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for My sake, shall find it." God be praised, if we, in our sphere, are spared the fullest execution of this warrant. The spirit of it, however, we may never wish to escape. Our hearts are to hold themselves always reedy for the fiercest discipline. Personal ease and comfort, houses and lands, friends, reputation, and even life itself, are to be reckoned cheap. We are to hold them in low esteem. So relaxed must be our grasp, that the slightest breath of persecution may suffice to sweep them swiftly and clean away.

II. The second law referred to, and the counterpart of the one we have now considered, is this: BY FIRST SECURING THE HIGHER GOOD, WE ARE PREPARED PROPERLY TO ENJOY THE LOWER, AND ARE MORE LIKELY TO SECURE IT. The principle is, that no worldly good of any sort can be well secured, or properly enjoyed, if pursued by itself and for its own sake. This may be seen in our most ordinary life. The man, whose aim is pleasure, may indeed, secure it for a while; but only for awhile. It soon palls upon his senses, disgusts and wearies him. It is easy of proof, that more is really enjoyed, more of mere pleasure is there, among business men, in the brief intervals of business, than among those with whom pleasure may be said to be a profession. Pleasure, in a word, is far sweeter as a recreation than a business. And so of gold. The man who strains all his energies of soul and body to the acquisition of it, never properly enjoys it. He enjoys the activity which the chase imposes upon him; but not the gold itself. He best enjoys gold, because he best knows the uses of it, who is occupied by higher thoughts and aims. It is God's decree, that gold shining useless in a miser's coffers, shall never gladden the one who gathered it. And so also of fame. If pursued for its own sake, the chase is often a bootless one. Selfish ambition almost always betrays itself, and then it provokes men to defeat and humble it. General Zachary Taylor, the twelfth President of the United States, spent forty years of his life in comparatively obscure, but very faithful service, at our Western outposts; receiving no applause from the country at large, and asking for none; intent only upon doing promptly and efficiently the duties laid upon him. By and by events, over which he had exercised no control, called him into notice upon a broader theatre. And then it was discovered how faithful and how true a man he was. The Republic, grateful for such a series of self-denying and important services, snatched him from the camp, and bore him, with loud acclaim, to her proudest place of honour. And this was done at the cost of bitterest disappointment to more than one, whose high claims to this distinction were not denied, but who had been known to be aspiring to the exalted seat. And so through our whole earthly life — in all its spheres, and in all its struggles. To lose is to find; to die is to live. It is so in our religion. We begin by abjuring all; we end by enjoying all. Am I charged with preaching that "gain is godliness"? Not so, my friend. But godliness is gain. It begins by denouncing and denying all; it ends by restoring all. First it desolates; then it rebuilds. Its mien, in approaching us, is stern and terrible. It blights our pleasures; strips us of our possessions; smites our friends; and lays our vaunted honours in the dust. And then, when all is done, when the desolating work is finished, when our very lives are spent and worried out of us, the scene changes as by a miracle, and all is given us anew. God, we find, is not merely in all; but He includes all, is all. And we learn, assuredly, from our own blessed experience, that "no good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly." Nay, it is of the very essence of our religion to forget and deny ourselves. Two remarks seem to grow naturally out of our subject.

1. We may learn the great mistake committed by men of the world in their chase after worldly good. They make it an end.

2. We may learn why it is the happiness of Christians is so imperfect.

(R. D. Hitchcock, D. D.)

Jesus, Noah, NoeGalilee, Jerusalem, Road to Jerusalem, Samaria, SodomAnyone, Attempt, Gain, Gives, Lose, Loses, Makes, Object, Preserve, Preserves, Safe, Save, Seek, Seeks1. Jesus teaches to avoid occasions of offense;
3. and to forgive one another.
5. The power of faith.
6. How we are bound to God.
11. Jesus heals ten lepers.
22. Of the kingdom of God, and the coming of the Son of Man.

Luke 17:33

     4030   world, behaviour in
     8115   discipleship, nature of
     8209   commitment, to Christ
     8435   giving, of oneself
     8481   self-sacrifice

Luke 17:26-35

     2363   Christ, preaching and teaching

Luke 17:26-37

     2309   Christ, as judge

May 7 Evening
They persecute him whom thou hast smitten.--PSA. 69:26. It is impossible but that offences will come: but woe unto him, through whom they come!--Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain.--They did spit in his face, and buffeted him; and others smote him with the palms of their hands, saying, Prophesy unto us, thou Christ, Who is he that smote thee?--Likewise also the chief priests mocking him, with the scribes …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

June 5 Morning
When ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants.--LUKE 17:10. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith.--What hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?--By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

June 18 Evening
Faith as a grain of mustard seed.--MATT. 17:20. Barak said unto [Deborah], if thou wilt go with me, then I will go: but if thou wilt not go with me, then I will not go. God subdued on that day Jabin the king of Canaan.--Gideon . . . feared his father's household, and the men of the city, that he could not do it by day, . . . did it by night. And Gideon said unto God, If thou wilt save Israel by mine hand as thou hast said, . . . let me prove, I pray thee. And God did so. Thou hast a little strength, …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

Where are the Nine?
'And it came to pass, as He went to Jerusalem, that He passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee. 12. And as He entered into a certain village, there met Him ten men that were lepers, which stood afar off: 13. And they lifted up their voices, and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. 14. And when He saw them, He said unto them, Go show yourselves unto the priests. And it came to pass, that, as they went, they were cleansed. 15. And one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions Of Holy Scripture

God's Slaves
'Doth He thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him! I trow not. 10. So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.' --LUKE xvii. 9-10. There are two difficulties about these words. One is their apparent entire want of connection with what precedes--viz., the disciples' prayer, 'Lord, increase our faith,' and the other is the harshness and severity of tone which …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions Of Holy Scripture

Thankfulness for Mercies Received, a Necessary Duty
Numberless marks does man bear in his soul, that he is fallen and estranged from God; but nothing gives a greater proof thereof, than that backwardness, which every one finds within himself, to the duty of praise and thanksgiving. When God placed the first man in paradise, his soul no doubt was so filled with a sense of the riches of the divine love, that he was continually employing that breath of life, which the Almighty had not long before breathed into him, in blessing and magnifying that all-bountiful, …
George Whitefield—Selected Sermons of George Whitefield

On the Words of the Gospel, Luke xvii. 3, "If Thy Brother Sin, Rebuke Him," Etc. , Touching the Remission of Sins.
Delivered at the Table of St. Cyprian, in the presence of Count Boniface. 1. The Holy Gospel which we heard just now as it was being read, has admonished touching the remission of sins. And on this subject must ye be admonished now by my discourse. For we are ministers of the word, not our own word, but the word of our God and Lord, whom no one serves without glory, whom no one despises without punishment. He then the Lord our God, who abiding with the Father made us, and having been made for us, …
Saint Augustine—sermons on selected lessons of the new testament

The Necessity of Increased Faith
It is a matter of dispute as to the occasion when these words were uttered. Some think that we must look at the connection of the chapter for the explanation. Jesus Christ had been teaching his disciples that if their brother should trespass against them seven times a day, and seven times a day turned again to them, saying, I repent, they were to forgive him, and that constrained the apostle to say "increase our faith." They conceived it to be so hard a duty incessantly to pardon and constantly to …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 1: 1855

Li. Gratitude.
14th Sunday after Trinity. S. Luke xvii. 18. "There are not found that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger." INTRODUCTION,--There is nothing that the merciful God desires more from man than thanks, and there is nothing of which He receives less. In the Gospel for to-day we have an example. Christ performs a notable miracle. He heals ten lepers, and only one returns to thank Him. The disease from which He delivered them was disgusting, and it was one which cut the sufferers off …
S. Baring-Gould—The Village Pulpit, Volume II. Trinity to Advent

The Ten Lepers
(Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity.) Luke xvii. 17, 18. Were there not ten cleansed, but where are the nine? There are not found that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger. No men, one would have thought, had more reason to thank God than those nine lepers. Afflicted with a filthy and tormenting disease, hopelessly incurable, at least in those days, they were cut off from family and friends, cut off from all mankind; forced to leave their homes, and wander away; forbidden to enter the …
Charles Kingsley—Town and Country Sermons

The First Degree of Prayer
The First Degree of Prayer Those who have not learnt to read, are not, on that account, excluded from prayer; for the Great Book which teacheth all things, and which is legible as well internally as externally, is Jesus Christ Himself. The method they should practice is this: They should first learn this fundamental truth, that "the kingdom of God is within them" (Luke xvii. 21), and that it is there, only it must be sought. It is as incumbent on the Clergy, to instruct their parishioners in prayer, …
Madame Guyon—A Short and Easy Method of Prayer

Answer to Mr. W's Second Objection.
I pass, says Mr. W. p. 15. to a second observation.--What became of these three persons after their resurrection? How long did they live afterwards? And of what use and advantage were their restored lives to the church or to mankind? The evangelical and ecclesiastical history is entirely silent as to these questions, which is enough to make us suspect their stories to be merely romantick or parabolical; and that there were no such persons raised from the dead; or we must have heard somewhat of their …
Nathaniel Lardner—A Vindication of Three of Our Blessed Saviour's Miracles

Of the Fewness of those who Love the Cross of Jesus
Jesus hath many lovers of His heavenly kingdom, but few bearers of His Cross. He hath many seekers of comfort, but few of tribulation. He findeth many companions of His table, but few of His fasting. All desire to rejoice with Him, few are willing to undergo anything for His sake. Many follow Jesus that they may eat of His loaves, but few that they may drink of the cup of His passion. Many are astonished at His Miracles, few follow after the shame of His Cross. Many love Jesus so long as no …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ

Of the Inward Life
The kingdom of God is within you,(1) saith the Lord. Turn thee with all thine heart to the Lord and forsake this miserable world, and thou shalt find rest unto thy soul. Learn to despise outward things and to give thyself to things inward, and thou shalt see the kingdom of God come within thee. For the kingdom of God is peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, and it is not given to the wicked. Christ will come to thee, and show thee His consolation, if thou prepare a worthy mansion for Him within thee. …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ

Are You Willing to be a Servant?
Nothing is clearer from the New Testament than that the Lord Jesus expects us to take the low position of servants. This is not just an extra obligation, which we may or may not assume as we please. It is the very heart of that new relationship which the disciple is to take up to God and to his fellows if he is to know fellowship with Christ and any degree of holiness in his life. When we understand the humbling and self-emptying that is involved in really being a servant, it becomes evident that …
Roy Hession and Revel Hession—The Calvary Road

Journey to Jerusalem. Ten Lepers. Concerning the Kingdom.
(Borders of Samaria and Galilee.) ^C Luke XVII. 11-37. ^c 11 And it came to pass, as they were on their way to Jerusalem, that he was passing along the borders of Samaria and Galilee. [If our chronology is correct, Jesus passed northward from Ephraim about forty miles, crossing Samaria (here mentioned first), and coming to the border of Galilee. He then turned eastward along that border down the wady Bethshean which separates the two provinces, and crossed the Jordan into Peræa, where we soon …
J. W. McGarvey—The Four-Fold Gospel

Unprofitable Servants.
"Then said he unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences will come: but woe unto him, through whom they come! It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones. Take heed to yourselves: If thy brother trespass against thee, rebuke him; and if he repent, forgive him. And if he trespass against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day turn again to thee, saying, I repent; thou shalt …
William Arnot—The Parables of Our Lord

His Passion and Crucifixion.
AS all active virtues meet in Jesus, so he unites the active or heroic virtues with the passive and gentle. He is the highest standard of all true martyrdom. No character can become complete without trial and suffering; and a noble death is the crowning act of a noble life. Edmund Burke said to Fox, in the English Parliament, "Obloquy is a necessary ingredient of all true glory, Calumny and abuse are essential parts of triumph." The ancient Greeks and Romans admired a good man struggling with misfortune, …
Philip Schaff—The Person of Christ

The Conflict with Evil
The Kingdom of God Will Have to Fight for Its Advance The great objective is the Kingdom of God. In realizing the Reign of God on earth three recalcitrant forces have to be brought into obedience to God's law: the desire for power, the love of property, and unsocial religion. We have studied Christ's thought concerning these in the foregoing chapters. The advance of the Kingdom of God is not simply a process of social education, but a conflict with hostile forces which resist, neutralize, and defy …
Walter Rauschenbusch—The Social Principles of Jesus

The Two Classes.
"Two men went up into the temple to pray."--Luke xvii. 10. I now want to speak of two classes: First, those who do not feel their need of a Saviour who have not been convinced of sin by the Spirit; and Second, those who are convinced of sin and cry, "What must I do to be saved?" All inquirers can be ranged under two heads: they have either the spirit of the Pharisee, or the spirit of the publican. If a man having the spirit of the Pharisee comes into an after-meeting, I know of no better portion …
Dwight L. Moody—The Way to God and How to Find It

Whether a Man Can Merit Anything from God
Whether a Man can Merit Anything from God We proceed to the first article thus: 1. It seems that a man cannot merit anything from God. No one merits a reward by repaying what he owes to another. But we cannot even fully repay what we owe to God, by all the good that we do. For we always owe him more than this, as the philosopher says in 8 Ethics 14. Hence it is said in Luke 17:10: "when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that …
Aquinas—Nature and Grace

Whether Charity is Prior to Hope
Whether Charity is Prior to Hope We proceed to the eighth article thus: 1. It seems that charity is prior to hope. For on Luke 17:6, "If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed . . .," the gloss by Ambrose says: "From faith issues charity, and from charity issues hope." But faith is prior to charity. Hence charity is prior to hope. 2. Again, Augustine says (14 De Civ. Dei. 9): "good movements and affections are derived from love, and from holy charity." Now to hope, as an act of hope, is a good movement …
Aquinas—Nature and Grace

The Boasted Merit of Works Subversive Both of the Glory of God, in Bestowing Righteousness, and of the Certainty of Salvation.
1. After a brief recapitulation, the question, Whether or not good works merit favor with God, considered. 2. First answer, fixing the meaning of the term Merit. This term improperly applied to works, but used in a good sense, as by Augustine, Chrysostom, Bernard. 3. A second answer to the question. First by a negative, then by a concession. In the rewarding of works what to be attributed to God, and what to man. Why good works please God, and are advantageous to those who do them. The ingratitude …
John Calvin—The Institutes of the Christian Religion

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