When guilt is raised up, take heed of getting it allayed in any way but by Christ’s blood: that will tend to hardening. Make Christ your peace; “for He is our peace” (Eph 2:14); not your duties and your tears. Christ your righteousness, not your graces. You may destroy Christ by duties, as well as by sins. Look at Christ, and do as much as you will. Stand with all your weight upon Christ’s righteousness. Take heed of having one foot on your righteousness, another on Christ’s. Till Christ come and sit on high upon a throne of grace in the conscience, there is nothing but guilt, terrors, secret suspicions; the soul hanging upon hope and fear, which is an ungospel-like state. Thomas Willcox
The shorter sentence just above the center of the quote above is quite powerful. It does not mean that a person can destroy Christ Himself, but instead destroy the hope of Christ alone for salvation for that person. This is a very weighty sentence and in the context has a very weighty meaning and one that does not appear to be taught much in the modern day. After all, we think, we must get people to living a moral life and involved in the church. Those things may be true, but we should not mix those things with the Gospel.
We can see how a person that pursues a life of open sin does not truly have a new heart and have Christ as Lord and Savior. That much, at least in terms of Scripture, is obvious. However, what is not so obvious to modern folks is the great truth that our duties and our morality can also destroy any hope of having Christ as Savior. The soul is to trust/rest/lean on Christ alone for salvation. When the soul thinks it has trusted in Christ and starts certain duties, it can easily look to those duties rather than Christ or at least along with Christ. But the soul must look and rest on Christ alone. The duties, then, though good in and of themselves must never be used to take the soul’s place in any percentage of leaning on Christ. The duties can be a way the soul takes its eyes off of Christ and this is a terrible thing to do to the soul which was made to feed and drink Christ. The duties are to flow from the life of Christ in the soul, but they must never take the place of Christ in any way.
What an insightful statement that each person should take to heart. “You may destroy Christ by duties, as well as by sins.” This sounds so much like the words of Jesus in Matthew 7: “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. 22 “Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’” There were those who prophesied (preached as part of that) and those who cast out demons and performed miracles. Could the act of preaching take a man’s eyes off of Christ? Could the doing of miracles take a person’s eyes off of Christ? It appears that our most religious duties and actions have the possibility of taking our eyes off of Christ. When any action we do, and perhaps especially religious actions, are not from looking at Christ and His grace, we will look off of Christ and to the actions.
While some read things like the above and have the idea that people will sit around and do nothing, that is far from the point. People are to look at Christ and receive grace from Him and then do what they do, but they must never look to their works and duties as a way to obtain Christ. All that the believer does is to be from God and through Christ to the glory of God. Many people think that they will be accepted because of their good works and many say they are accepted by Christ because they believe in Him and do what they do because they believe in Him. They can say these things while their hearts are deceived which is the same thing as looking to their duties rather than Christ alone and grace alone. People don’t think that they are the ones who are deceived because their theology is correct, they are moral, and they are doing their religious duties. But people are declared just on the basis of Christ and Christ alone and not because they have correct theology, morality, and do religious duties.
Oh how people need to examine their hearts and how ministers need to open the hearts of people to themselves in their sermons. It is not enough to say a word or two about sin here and there, but the hearts must be opened and exposed by truth so that people can see what they are truly standing on. Poor sinners are deceived by their own hearts and the evil one and they must see that they have no ground in themselves and in any works and duties that they can perform. Sinners need to have anything that they are resting on yanked out from under them that they can see that there is nothing solid to rest on but Christ alone. How many are in the path of damnation in churches with orthodox creeds? How many are headed to hell and going there through an orthodox pulpit? How many are under the wrath of God as they do their Christian duties? The examination of the heart is not an option.
God Loves... Himself 
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