It is not merely on the surface. This being the case it must be evident to us that no merely outward and superficial treatment can avail to heal us of it. The remedy must go as deep as the disease, else there can be no cure. Education and culture do not reach it. No matter how assiduously the thistle and the thornbush may be cultivated, they remain of the same nature, will never yield figs or grapes.
Sin comes out of the heart.
The second truth stated by the Lord Jesus Christ is that sin defiles the man. Sin is moral and spiritual pollution. It makes the man unclean, unfit to stand in the presence of God and of His holy angels. There is a stain, a filthy blot upon the sinner's soul, which nothing this world knows of can remove. The second of those teachings of our Lord on sin is found in Matt.