A devil in an angel's dress

Thomas Brooks


"Repent! Turn away from all your offenses; then sin
will not be your downfall." Ezekiel 18:30

True repentance is a turning, not from some sin—but 
from every sin. Every sin strikes at the law of God, the 
honor of God, the being of God, and the glory of God; 
and therefore the penitent must strike at all. Every sin 
fetches blood from the heart of Christ, and every sin is 
a grief and vexation to the Holy Spirit—and therefore 
the penitent must set upon crucifying of all. 

Herod turned from many sins—but not from his Delilah, 
his Herodias, which was his ruin! Judas, you know, was 
a devil in an angel's dress; he seemed to be turned 
from every sin—but he was a secret thief, he loved the 
money bag; and that golden devil, covetousness, choked 
him, and hanged him at last! Saul for a time turned from 
several evils—but his sparing one, Agag, cost him his 
soul and his kingdom at once! 

He who had the spot of leprosy in any one part of his
body was accounted a leper, although all the rest of 
his body were sound and whole, Lev. 13. Just so, he 
who has but one spot, one sin which he does not 
endeavor to wash out in the blood of Christ, and in 
the tears of true repentance—he is a leper in the 
account of God.

The true penitent is for the mortifying of every lust 
which has had a hand in crucifying of his dearest Savior. 

The sin-sick soul must break, not some—but all its idols 
in pieces, before a cure will follow. It must deface its 
golden idols, its most costly idols, its most darling idols! 
The returning sinner must make headway against all his 
sins, and trample upon all his lusts—or else he will die 
and be undone forever!

"Then you will defile your idols overlaid with silver and
your images covered with gold; you will throw them
away like a menstrual cloth and say to them—Away
with you!" Isaiah 30:22


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