Furthermore, when we have faith in God and perform all our works with the best of motives, even then we have not so much as a solitary good work, until the blood of Christ is sprinkled thereon.

Looking on all that we have ever done in our lives, can we find a solitary thing that we dare call good until Christ’s blood is put upon it? Grant there is something good about it–for the Spirit wrought it in our souls–there is so much also that is evil about it. For even our best exercises are so terribly spoiled, marred, and ruined by the sins and imperfections that are in them that we dare not call them good, until Jesus Christ hath sprinkled them with His blood and taken the stain away. Oh, how often have I thought to myself, “Now, I have labored to preach God’s word. I have not spared at all times before friends or foes, and I hope I have not shunned to declare the whole counsel of God!” And yet, beloved, how many of those sermons have not been good works at all because I had not an eye to my Master’s honor at the time or because there was not faith mixed with them. I preached in a desponding, low, miserable frame, or perhaps I had some natural aim, even in the winning of souls. For I have often feared, even when we rejoice to see souls converted, that we may have some evil motive, such as honoring ourselves, that the world may say, “See how many souls are brought to God by him!” And even when the church associates in doing holy works, have you not noticed that something creeps in–a wish to exalt our own church, to glorify our own people, and to make ourselves mighty? I am sure, beloved, if you sit down and pull your good works to pieces, you will find so many bad stitches in them that they need to be all unstitched and done over again. There are so many spots and blurs about them, that you need to have them washed in the blood of Christ to make them good for anything.

–C.H. Spurgeon