Morning & Evening Daily Devotional Reading– September 29

by Charles H. Spurgeon, Revised and Edited by William C. Neff

“Behold, if the leprosy has covered all his flesh, (the priest) shall pronounce him clean.”

—Leviticus 13:13

As strange as this regulation appears, there was great wisdom in it, for the throwing out of the disease proved that the person’s constitution was sound. This morning it may be good for us to see the important teaching in this rule, for we too are lepers and may apply this law to ourselves.

When a man sees himself to be altogether lost and ruined, covered all over with the defilement of sin and no part free from pollution; when he disclaims all righteousness of his own and pleads guilty before the Lord, then he is clean through the blood of Jesus and the grace of God. Hidden, unfelt, unconfessed iniquity is the true leprosy, but when sin is seen and felt it has received its death blow.

Nothing is more deadly than self-righteousness or more hopeful than contrition. We must confess that we are “nothing else but sin,” for no confession short of this will be the whole truth. And if the Holy Spirit is at work in us convincing us of sin, it shouldn’t be difficult to confess this. It should spring spontaneously from our lips.

What comfort this text gives to those under a deep sense of sin. If sin is mourned and confessed, then, no matter how dark and foul, it will never keep a man from the Lord Jesus. Though dishonest as the thief, though impure as the adulterous woman, though fierce as Saul of Tarsus, though rebellious as the prodigal, God’s heart of love will look upon the man who feels his own destitution, and, when he trusts in Jesus, will pronounce him clean. [M&E]