PUT NO CONFIDENCE IN MAN.
Let me call your attention to a few verses where God has warned us not to put faith in man: Jeremiah xvii. 5: “Thus saith the Lord; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord. For he shall be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh; but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, in a salt land and not inhabited. Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is.” You will find some men have not faith in God; they are like a tree that is withered and blasted. And there is a man perhaps right along next to them who has strong faith in God; “he is like a tree planted by the rivers of water; his leaf also shall not wither.” Why? He trusts in the living God. “Happy is the man that hath the God of Jacob for his help.” Cursed is the man that leaneth upon an arm of flesh, and trusteth in man. The same thought is brought out in Isaiah xxx.: “Woe to the rebellious children, saith the Lord, that take counsel, but not of me; and that cover with a covering, but not of my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin: that walk to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at my mouth; to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and to trust in the shadow of Egypt! Therefore shall the strength of Pharaoh be your shame, and the trust in the shadow of Egypt your confusion.” In one place He says, “Woe,” and in another place He says, “Cursed be the man.” It is a terrible thing for man to put faith in man. Then Psalm cxlvi. 3: “Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish. Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his God.” Now here we are told very plainly by God that we are not to put our trust in this man or that man—not to lean upon an arm of flesh. All the ministers in the world and all the potentates in the church put together cannot save one soul. It is thoroughly impossible. It is the Lord that can save, and the Lord alone; therefore we want to get our eyes away from man, from the church, and right straight up to the man Christ Jesus. We read in Mark xi. 22 whom we are to believe in. Christ says—and how sweet it sounds—“Have faith in God.” I never saw a man or woman in my life that had faith in God who was confounded, I do not care what their troubles or trials were. Have faith in God, and not in man.