{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_7925/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_7925","id":"gutenberg_7925","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/7925","summary":null,"tags":["Bible. Psalms -- Commentaries","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Christianity"],"text":"Produced by Charles Franks, Chew-Hung, Lee, and the Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nEXPOSITIONS OF HOLY SCRIPTURE\n\nPSALMS\n\nby\n\nALEXANDER MACLAREN, D. D., Litt. D.\n\n\n\n\n\nVOLUME I: PSALMS _I to XLIX_\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nBLESSEDNESS AND PRAISE (Psalm i. 1, 2; cl. 6)\n\nA STAIRCASE OF THREE STEPS (Psalm v. 11, 12)\n\nONE SAYING FROM THREE MEN (Psalm x. 6; xvi. 8; xxx. 6)\n\nMAN'S TRUE TREASURE IN GOD (Psalm xvi. 5, 6)\n\nGOD WITH US, AND WE WITH GOD (Psalm xvi. 8, 11)\n\nTHE TWO AWAKINGS (Psalm xvii. 15; lxxiii. 20)\n\nSECRET FAULTS (Psalm xix. 12)\n\nOPEN SINS (Psalm xix. 13)\n\nFEASTING ON THE SACRIFICE (Psalm xxii. 26)\n\nTHE SHEPHERD KING OF ISRAEL (Psalm xxiii. 1-6)\n\nA GREAT QUESTION AND ITS ANSWER (Psalm xxiv. 3)\n\nTHE GOD WHO DWELLS WITH MEN (Psalm xxiv. 7-10)\n\nGUIDANCE IN JUDGMENT (Psalm xxv. 8, 9)\n\nA PRAYER FOR PARDON AND ITS PLEA (Psalm xxv. 11)\n\nGOD'S GUESTS (Psalm xxvii. 4)\n\n'SEEK YE'--'I WILL SEEK' (Psalm xxvii. 8, 9)\n\nTHE TWO GUESTS (Psalm xxx. 5)\n\n'BE ... FOR THOU ART' (Psalm xxxi. 2, 3, R.V.)\n\n'INTO THY HANDS' (Psalm xxxi. 5)\n\nGOODNESS WROUGHT AND GOODNESS LAID UP (Psalm xxxi. 19)\n\nHID IN LIGHT (Psalm xxxi. 20)\n\nA THREEFOLD THOUGHT OF SIN AND FORGIVENESS (Psalm xxxii. 1, 2)\n\nTHE ENCAMPING ANGEL (Psalm xxxiv. 7)\n\nSTRUGGLING AND SEEKING (Psalm xxxiv. 10)\n\nNO CONDEMNATION (Psalm xxxiv. 22)\n\nSKY, EARTH, AND SEA: A PARABLE OF GOD (Psalm xxxvi. 5-7)\n\nWHAT MEN FIND BENEATH THE WINGS OF GOD (Psalm xxxvi. 8, 9)\n\nTHE SECRET OF TRANQUILLITY (Psalm xxxvii. 4, 5, 7)\n\nTHE BITTERNESS AND BLESSEDNESS OF THE BREVITY OF LIFE (Psalm xxxix. 6,\n12)\n\nTWO INNUMERABLE SERIES (Psalm xl. 5, 12)\n\nTHIRSTING FOR GOD (Psalm xlii. 2)\n\nTHE PSALMIST'S REMONSTRANCE WITH HIS SOUL (Psalm xliii. 5)\n\nTHE KING IN HIS BEAUTY (Psalm xlv. 2-7, R.V.)\n\nTHE PORTRAIT OF THE BRIDE (Psalm xlv. 10-15, R.V.)\n\nTHE CITY AND RIVER OF GOD (Psalm xlvi. 4-7)\n\nTHE LORD OF HOSTS, THE GOD OF JACOB (Psalm xlvi. 11)\n\nA SONG OF DELIVERANCE (Psalm xlviii. 1-14)\n\nTWO SHEPHERDS AND TWO FLOCKS (Psalm xlix. 14; Rev. vii. 17)\n\n\n\n\nBLESSEDNESS AND PRAISE\n\n\n    'Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly,\n    nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the\n    scornful.  2. But his delight is in the law of the Lord.'\n    --PSALM i. 1, 2.\n\n    'Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord. Praise ye the\n    Lord.'--PSALM cl. 6.\n\nThe Psalter is the echo in devout hearts of the other portions of divine\nrevelation. There are in it, indeed, further disclosures of God's mind\nand purposes, but its especial characteristic is--the reflection of the\nlight of God from brightened faces and believing hearts. As we hold it\nto be inspired, we cannot simply say that it is man's response to God's\nvoice. But if the rest of Scripture may be called the speech of the\nSpirit of God _to_ men, this book is the answer of the Spirit of God\n_in_ men.\n\nThese two verses which I venture to lay side by side present in a very\nremarkable way this characteristic. It is not by accident that they\nstand where they do, the first and last verses of the whole collection,\nenclosing all, as it were, within a golden ring, and bending round to\nmeet each other. They are the summing up of the whole purpose and issue\nof God's revelation to men.\n\nThe first and second psalms echo the two main portions of the old\nrevelation--the Law and the Prophets. The first of them is taken up with\nthe celebration of the blessedness and fruitful, stable being of the man\nwho loves the Law of the Lord, as contrasted with the rootless and\nbarren life of the ungodly, who is like the chaff. The second is\noccupied with the contemplation of the divine 'decree' by which the\ncoming King is set in God's 'holy hill of Zion,' and of the blessedness\nof 'all they who put their trust in Him,' as contrasted with the swift\ndestruction that shall fall on the vain imaginations of the rebellious\nheathen and banded kings of earth.\n\nThe words of our first text, then, may well stand at the beginning of\nthe Psalter. They express the great purpose for which God has given His\nLaw. They are the witness of human experience to the substantial, though\npartial, accomplishment of that purpose. They rise in buoyant triumph\nover that which is painful and apparently opposed to it; and in spite of\nsorrow and sin, proclaim the blessedness of the life which is rooted in\nthe Law of the Lord.\n\nThe last words of the book are as significant as its first. The closing\npsalms are one long call to praise--they probably date from the time of\nthe restoration under Ezra and Nehemiah, when, as we know, 'the service\nof song' was carefully re-established, and the harps which had hung\nsilent upon the willows by the rivers of Babylon woke again their\nancient melodies. These psalms climb higher and higher in their\nrapturous call to all creatures, animate and inanimate, on earth and in\nheaven, to praise Him. The golden waves of music and song pour out ever\nfaster and fuller. At last we hear this invocation to every instrument\nof music to praise Him, responded to, as we may suppose, by each, in\nturn as summoned, adding its tributary notes to the broadening river of\nharmony--until all, with gathered might of glad sound blended with the\ncrash of many voices, unite in the final words, 'Let every thing that\nhath breath praise the Lord. Praise ye the Lord.'\n\nI. We have here a twofold declaration of God's great purpose in all His\nself-revelation, and especially in the Gospel of His Son.\n\nOur first text may be translated as a joyful exclamation, 'Oh! the\nblessedness of the man--whose delight is in the law of the Lord.' Our\nsecond is an invocation or a command. The one then expresses the purpose\nwhich God secures by His gift of the Law; the other the purpose which He\nsummons us to fulfil by the tribute of our hearts and songs--man's\nhappiness and God's glory.\n\nHis purpose is Man's blessedness.\n\nThat is but another way of saying, God is love. For love, as we know it,\nis eminently the desire for the happiness of the person on whom it is\nfixed. And unless the love of God be like ours, however it may transcend\nit, there is no revelation of Him to our hearts at all. If He be love,\nthen He 'delights in the prosperity' of His children.\n\nAnd that purpose runs through all His acts. For perfect love is\nall-pervasive, and even with us men, it rules the whole being; nor does\nhe love at all who seeks the welfare of the heart he clings to by fits\nand starts, by some of his acts and not by others. When God comes forth\nfrom the unvisioned light, which is thick darkness, of His own eternal,\nself-adequate Being, and flashes into energy in Creation, Providence, or\nGrace, the Law of His Working and His Purpose are one, in all regions.\nThe unity of the divine acts depends on this--that all flow from one\ndeep source, and all move to one mighty end. Standing on the height to\nwhich His own declarations of His own nature lift our feebleness, we can\nsee how the 'river of God that waters the garden' and 'parts' into many\n'heads,' gushes from one fountain. One of the psalms puts what people\ncall the 'philosophy' of creation and of providence very clearly, in\naccordance with this thought--that the love of God is the source, and\nthe blessedness of man the end, of all His work: 'To Him that made great\nlights; for His mercy endureth for ever. To Him that slew mighty kings;\nfor His mercy endureth for ever.'\n\nCreation, then, is the effluence of the loving heart of God. Though the\nsacred characters be but partially legible to us now, what He wrote, on\nstars and flowers, on the infinitely great and the infinitely small, on\nthe infinitely near and the infinitely far off, with His creating hand,\nwas the one inscription--God is love. And as in nature, so in\nprovidence. The origination, and the support, and the direction of all\nthings, are the works and the heralds of the same love. It is printed in\nstarry letters on the sky. It is graven on the rocks, and breathed by\nthe flowers. It is spoken as a dark saying even by sorrow and pain. The\nmysteries of destructive and crushing providences have come from the\nsame source. And he who can see with the Psalmist the ever-during mercy\nof the Lord, as the reason of creation and of judgments, has in his\nhands the golden key which opens all the locks in the palace chambers of\nthe great King. He only hath penetrated to the secret of things\nmaterial, and stands in the light at the centre, who understands that\nall comes from the one source--God's endless desire for the blessedness\nof His creatures.\n\nBut while all God's works do thus praise Him by testifying that He seeks\nto bless His creatures, the loftiest example of that desire is, of\ncourse, found in His revelation of Himself to men's hearts and\nconsciences, to men's spirits and wills. That mightiest act of love,\nbeginning in the long-past generations, has culminated in Him in whom\n'dwelleth the whole fulness of the Godhead bodily,' and in whose work is\nall the love--the perfect, inconceivable, patient, omnipotent love of\nour redeeming God.\n\nAnd then, remember that this is not inconsistent with or contradicted by\nthe sterner aspects of that revelation, which cannot be denied, and\nought not to be minimised or softened. _Here_, on the right hand, are\nthe flowery slopes of the Mount of Blessing; _there_, on the left, the\nbarren, stern, thunder-riven, lightning-splintered pinnacles of the\nMount of Cursing. Every clear note of benediction hath its low minor of\nimprecation from the other side. Between the two, overhung by the hopes\nof the one, and frowned upon and dominated by the threatenings of the\nother, is pitched the little camp of our human life, and the path of our\npilgrimage runs in the trough of the valley between. And yet--might we\nnot go a step farther, and say that above the parted summits stretches\nthe one overarching blue, uniting them both, and their roots deep down\nbelow the surface interlace and twine together? That is to say, the\nthreatenings and rebukes, the acts of retributive judgment, which are\ncontained in the revelation of God, are no limitation nor disturbance of\nthe clear and happy faith that all which we behold is full of blessing,\nand that all comes from the Father's hand. They are the garb in which\nHis Love needs to array itself when it comes in contact with man's sin\nand man's evil. The love of God appears no less when it teaches us in\ngrave sad tones that 'the wages of sin is death,' than when it proclaims\nthat 'the gift of God is eternal life.'\n\nLove threatens that it may never have to execute its threats. Love warns\nthat we may be wise in time. Love prophesies that its sad forebodings\nmay not be fulfilled. And love smites with lighter strokes of\npremonitory chastisements, that we may never need to feel the whips of\nscorpions.\n\nRemember, too, that these sterner aspects both of Law and of Gospel\npoint this lesson--that we shall very much misunderstand God's purpose\nif we suppose it to be blessedness for us men _anyhow_, irrespective\naltogether of character. Some people seem to think that God loves us so\nmuch, as they would say--so little, so ignobly, as I would say--as that\nHe only desires us to be happy. They seem to think that the divine love\nis tarnished unless it provides for men's felicity, whether they are\nGod-loving and God-like or no. Thus the solemn and majestic love of the\nFather in heaven is to be brought down to a weak good nature, which only\ndesires that the child shall cease crying and be happy, and does not\nmind by what means that end is reached. God's purpose _is_ blessedness;\nbut, as this very text tells us, not blessedness anyhow, but one which\nwill not and cannot be given by God to those who walk in the way of\nsinners. His love desires that we should be holy, and 'followers of God\nas dear children'--and the blessedness which it bestows comes from\npardon and growing fellowship with Him. It can no more fall on\nrebellious hearts than the pure crystals of the snow can lie and sparkle\non the hot, black cone of a volcano.\n\nThe other text that I have read sets forth another view of God's\npurpose. God seeks our praise. The glory of God is the end of all the\ndivine actions. Now, that is a statement which no doubt is irrefragable,\nand a plain deduction from the very conception of an infinite Being. But\nit may be held in such connections, and spoken with such erroneous\napplication, and so divorced from other truths, that instead of being\nwhat it is in the Bible, good news, it shall become a curse and a lie.\nIt may be so understood as to describe not our Father in heaven, but an\nalmighty devil! But, when the thought that God's purpose in all His acts\nis His own glory, is firmly united with that other, that His purpose in\nall His acts is our blessing, then we begin to understand how full of\njoy it may be for us. His glory is sought by Him in the manifestation of\nHis loving heart, mirrored in our illuminated and gladdened hearts. Such\na glory is not unworthy of infinite love. It has nothing in common with\nthe ambitious and hungry greed of men for reputation or self-display.\nThat desire is altogether ignoble and selfish when it is found in human\nhearts; and it would be none the less ignoble and selfish if it were\nmagnified into infinitude, and transferred to the divine. But to say\nthat God's glory is His great end, is surely but another way of saying\nthat He is love. The love that seeks to bless us desires, as all love\ndoes, that it should be known for what it is, that it should be\nrecognised in our glad hearts, and smiled back again from our brightened\nfaces. God desires that we should know Him, and so have Eternal Life; He\ndesires that knowing Him, we should love Him, and loving should praise,\nand so should glorify Him. He desires that there should be an\ninterchange of love bestowing and love receiving, of gifts showered down\nand of praise ascending, of fire falling from the heavens and sweet\nincense, from grateful hearts, going up in fragrant clouds acceptable\nunto God. It is a sign of a Fatherly heart that He '_seeketh_ such to\nworship Him'. He desires to be glorified by our praise, because He loves\nus so much. He commences with an offer, He advances to a command. He\ngives first, and then (not till then) He comes seeking fruit from the\n'trees' which are 'the planting of the Lord, that He might be\nglorified.' His plea is not 'the vineyard belongs to Me, and I have a\nright to its fruits,' but 'what could have been done more to My\nvineyard, that I have not done in it?--judge between Me and My\nvineyard.' First, He showers down blessings; then, He looks for the\nrevenue of praise!\n\nII. We may also take these passages as giving us a twofold expression of\nthe actual effects of God's revelation, especially in the Gospel, even\nhere upon earth.\n\nThe one text is the joyful exclamation built upon experience and\nobservation. The other is a call which is answered in some measure even\nby voices that are often dumb in unthankfulness, often broken by sobs,\noften murmuring in penitence.\n\nGod does actually, though not completely, make men blessed here. Our\ntext sums up the experience of all the devout hearts and lives whose\nemotions are expressed in the Psalms. He who wrote this psalm would\npreface the whole book by words into which the spirit of the book is\ndistilled. It will have much to say of sorrow and pain. It will touch\nmany a low note of wailing and of grief. There will be complaints and\npenitence, and sighs almost of despair before it closes. But this which\nhe puts first is the note of the whole. So it is in our histories.\nThey will run through many a dark and desert place. We shall have\nbitterness and trials in abundance, there will be many an hour of\nsadness caused by my own evil, and many a hard struggle with it. But\nhigh above all these mists and clouds will rise the hope that seeks the\nskies, and deep beneath all the surface agitations of storms and\ncurrents there will be the unmoved stillness of the central ocean of\npeace in our hearts. In the 'valley of weeping' we may still be\n'blessed' if 'the ways' are in our hearts, and if we make of the very\ntears 'a well,' drawing refreshment from the very trials. With all its\nsorrows and pains, its fightings and fears, its tribulations in the\nworld, and its chastenings from a Father's hand, the life of a Christian\nis a happy life, and 'the joy of the Lord' remains with His servants.\n\nMore than twenty centuries have passed since that psalm was written. As\nmany stretched dim behind the Psalmist as he sang. He was gathering up\nin one sentence the spirit of the past, and confirming it by his own\nlife's history. And has any one that has lived since then stood up and\nsaid--'Behold! I have found it otherwise. I have waited on God, and He\nhas not heard my cry. I have served Him, and that for nought. I have\ntrusted in Him, and been disappointed. I have sought His face--in vain.\nAnd I say, from my own experience, that the man who trusts in Him is\n_not_ blessed'? Not one, thank God! The history of the past, so far as\nthis matter is concerned, may be put in one sentence 'They looked unto\nHim and were lightened, and their faces were not ashamed,' and as for\nthe present, are there not some of us who can say, 'This poor man cried,\nand the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles'?\n\nBrethren! make the experiment for yourselves. Test this experience by\nyour own simple affiance and living trust in Jesus Christ. We have the\nexperience of all generations to encourage us. What has blessed them is\nenough for you and me. Like the meal and the oil, which were the\nProphet's resource in famine, yesterday's supply does not diminish\nto-morrow's store. We, too, may have all that gladdened the hearts and\nstayed the spirits of the saints of old. 'Oh! taste and see that God is\ngood.' 'Blessed is the man that trusteth in Him.'\n\nSo, too, God's gift produces man's praise.\n\nWhat is it that He desires from us? Nothing but our thankful recognition\nand reception of His benefits. We honour God by taking the full cup of\nsalvation which He commends to our lips, and by calling, while we drink,\nupon the name of the Lord. Our true response to His Word, which is\nessentially a proffer of blessing to us, is to open our hearts to\nreceive, and, receiving, to render grateful acknowledgment. The echo of\nlove which gives and forgives, is love which accepts and thanks. We have\nbut to lift up our empty and impure hands, opened wide to receive the\ngift which He lays in them--and though they be empty and impure, yet\n'the lifting up of our hands' is 'as the evening sacrifice'; our sense\nof need stands in the place of all offerings. The stained thankfulness\nof our poor hearts is accepted by Him who inhabits the praises of\neternity, and yet delights in the praises of Israel. He bends from\nheaven to give, and all He asks is that we should take. He only seeks\nour thankfulness--but He does seek it. And wherever His grace is\ndiscerned, and His love is welcomed, there praise breaks forth, as\nsurely as streams pour from the cave of the glacier when the sun of\nsummer melts it, or earth answers the touch of spring with flowers.\n\nAnd that effect is produced, notwithstanding all the complaints and\nsighs and tears which sometimes choke our praise. It _is_ produced even\nwhile these last; the psalms of thanksgiving are not all reserved for\nthe end of the book. But even in those which read like the very sobs of\na broken heart, there is ever present some tone of grateful\nacknowledgment of God's mercy. He sends us sorrow, and He wills that we\nshould weep--but they should be tears like David's, who, at the lowest\npoint of his fortunes, when he plaintively besought God, 'Put Thou my\ntears into Thy bottle'--could say in the same breath, 'Thy vows are upon\nme, O God: I will render praises unto Thee.' God works on our souls that\nwe may have the consciousness of sin, and He wills that we should come\nwith broken and contrite hearts, and like the king of Israel wail out\nour confessions and supplications--'Have mercy upon me, O God! according\nto Thy loving-kindness.' But, like him, we should even in our lowliest\nabasement, when our hearts are bruised, be able to say along with our\ncontrition, 'Open Thou my lips, and my mouth shall show forth Thy\npraise.' Our sorrows are never so great that they hide our mercies. The\nsky is never so covered with clouds that neither sun nor stars appear\nfor many days. And in every Christian heart the low tones of lamentation\nand confession are blended with grateful praise. So it is even in the\ndarkest moments, whilst the blast of misfortune and misery is as a storm\nagainst the wall.\n\nBut a brighter hope even for our life here rises from these words, if we\nthink of the place which they hold in the whole book. They are the last\nwords. Whatever other notes have been sounded in its course, all ends in\nthis. The winter's day has had its melancholy grey sky, with many a\nbitter dash of snow and rain--but it has stormed itself out, and at\neventide, a rent in the clouds reveals the sun, and it closes in\npeaceful clearness of light.\n\nThe note of gladness heard at the beginning, 'Oh! the blessedness of the\nman that delights in the law of the Lord,' holds on persistently, like a\nsubdued and almost bewildered undercurrent of sweet sound amid all the\nmovements of some colossal symphony, through tears and sobs, confession\nand complaint, and it springs up at the close triumphant, like the ruddy\nspires of a flame long smothered, and swells and broadens, and draws all\nthe intricate harmonies into its own rushing tide. Some of you remember\nthe great musical work which has these very words for its theme. It\nbegins with the call, 'All that hath life and breath, praise ye the\nLord,' and although the gladness saddens into the plaintive cry of a\nsoul sick with hope deferred, 'Will the night soon pass?' yet, ere the\nclose, all discords are reconciled, and at last, with assurance firmer\nfor the experience of passing sorrows, loud as the voice of many waters\nand sweet as harpers harping with their harps, the joyful invocation\npeals forth again, and all ends, as it does in a Christian man's life,\nand as it does in this book, with 'Praise ye the Lord.'\n\nIII. We have here also a twofold prophecy of the perfection of Heaven.\n\nWhilst it is true that both of these purposes are accomplished here and\nnow, it is also true that their accomplishment is but partial, and that\ntherefore for their fulfilment we have to lift our eyes beyond this\nworld of imperfect faith, of incomplete blessedness, of interrupted\npraise. Whether the Psalmist looked forward thus we do not know. But for\nus, the very shortcomings of our joys and of our songs are prophetic of\nthe perfect and perpetual rapture of the one, and the perfect and\nperpetual music of the other. We know that He who has given us so much\nwill not stay His hand until He has perfected that which concerns us. We\nknow that He who has taught our dumb hearts to magnify His name will not\ncease till 'out of the lips of babes and sucklings, He has perfected\npraise.' We know that the pilgrims in whose hearts are the ways are\nblessed, and we are sure that a fuller blessedness must belong to those\nwho have reached the journey's end.\n\nAnd so these words give us a twofold aspect of that future on which our\nlonging hopes may well fix.\n\nIt is the perfection of man's blessedness. Then the joyous exclamation\nof our first text, which we have often had to strive hard not to\ndisbelieve, will be no more a truth of faith but a truth of experience.\nHere we have had to trust that it was so, even when we could scarce\ncleave to the confidence. There, memory will look back on our wanderings\nthrough this great wilderness, and, enlightened by the issue of them\nall, will speak only of Mercy and Goodness as our angel guides all our\nlives. The end will crown the work. Pure unmingled consciousness of\nbliss will fill all hearts, and break into the old exclamation, which we\nhad sometimes to stifle sobs ere we could speak on earth. When He says,\n'Come in! ye blessed of My Father,' all our tears and fears, and pains\nand sins, will be forgotten, and we shall but have to say, in wonder and\njoy, 'Blessed are they that dwell in Thy house; they will be still\npraising Thee.'\n\nIt is the perfection of God's praise. We may possibly venture to see in\nthese wonderful words of our text a dim and far-off hint of a\npossibility that seems to be pointed at in many parts of Scripture--that\nthe blessings of Christ's mighty work shall, in some measure and manner,\npass through man to his dwelling-place and its creatures. Dark shadows\nof evil--the mystery of pain and sorrow--lie over earth and all its\ntribes. 'We look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth\nrighteousness.' And the statements of Scripture which represent creation\nas suffering by man's sin, and participant in its degree in man's\nredemption, seem too emphatic and precise, as well as too frequent, and\nin too didactic connections, to be lightly brushed aside as poetic\nimagery. May it not be that man's transgression\n\n  'Broke the fair music that all creatures made\n   To their great Lord, whose love their motion swayed,'\n\nand that man's restoration may, indeed, bring back all that hath life\nand breath to a harmonious blessedness--according to the deep and\nenigmatical words, which declare that 'the creature itself also shall be\ndelivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory\nof the children of God'? Be that as it may, at all events our second\ntext opens to us the gates of the heavenly temple, and shows us there\nthe saintly ranks and angel companies gathered in the city whose walls\nare salvation and its gates praise. They harmonise with that other later\nvision of heaven which the Seer in Patmos beheld, not only in setting\nbefore us worship as the glad work of all who are there, but in teaching\nthe connection between the praises of men, and the answering hymns of\nangels. The harps of heaven are hushed to hear _their_ praise who can\nsing, 'Thou hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood,' and, in answer to\nthat hymn of thanksgiving for unexampled deliverance and resorting\ngrace, the angels around the throne break forth into new songs to the\nLamb that was slain--while still wider spread the broadening circles of\nharmonious praise, till at last 'every creature which is in heaven, and\non the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all\nthat are in them,' join in the mighty hymn of 'Blessing, and honour, and\nglory, and power, unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and to the Lamb\nfor ever and ever.' Then the rapturous exclamation from human souls\nredeemed,--'Oh! the blessedness of the men whom Thou hast loved and\nsaved,' shall be answered by choral praise from everything that hath\nbreath.\n\nAnd are you dumb, my friend, in these universal bursts of praise? Is\nthat because you have not chosen to take the universal blessing which\nGod gives? You have nothing to do but to receive the things that are\nfreely given to you of God--the forgiveness, the cleansing, the life,\nthat come from Christ by faith. Take them, and call upon the name of the\nLord, And can you refuse His gifts and withhold your praise? You can be\neloquent in thanks to those who do you kindnesses, and in praise of\nthose whom you admire and love, but your best Friend receives none of\nyour gratitude and none of your praise. Ignoble silence and dull\nunthankfulness--with these you requite your Saviour! 'I tell you that,\nif these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out!'\n\n\n\n\nA STAIRCASE OF THREE STEPS\n\n\n    'All those that put their trust in Thee ... them also that love Thy\n    name ... the righteous.'--PSALM v. 11, 12.\n\nI have ventured to isolate these three clauses from their context,\nbecause, if taken in their sequence, they are very significant of the\ntrue path by which men draw nigh to God and become righteous. They are\nall three designations of the same people, but regarded under different\naspects and at different stages. There is a distinct order in them, and\nwhether the Psalmist was fully conscious of it or not, he was\nanticipating and stating, with wonderful distinctness, the Christian\nsequence--faith, love, righteousness.\n\nThese three are the three flights of stairs, as it were, which lead men\nup to God and to perfection, or if you like to take another metaphor,\nmeaning the same thing, they are respectively the root, the stalk, and\nthe fruit of religion. 'They that put their trust in Thee ... them also\nthat love Thy Name ... the righteous.'\n\nI. So, then, the first thought here is that the foundation of all is\ntrust.\n\nNow, the word that is employed here is very significant. In its literal\nforce it really means to 'flee to a refuge.' And that the literal\nsignification has not altogether been lost in the spiritual and\nmetaphorical use of it, as a term expressive of religious experience, is\nquite plain from many of the cases in which it occurs. Let me just\nrepeat one of them to you. 'Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful to\nme, for my soul trusteth in Thee; yea, in the shadow of Thy wings will I\nmake my refuge.' There the picture that is in the words is distinctly\nbefore the Psalmist's mind, and he is thinking not only of the act of\nmind and heart by which he casts himself in confidence upon God, but\nupon that which represents it in symbol, the act by which a man flees\ninto some hiding-place. The psalm is said in the superscription to have\nbeen written when David hid in a cave from his persecutor. Though no\nweight be given to that statement, it suggests the impression made by\nthe psalm. In imagination we can see the rough sides of the cavern that\nsheltered him arching over the fugitive, like the wings of some great\nbird, and just as he has fled thither with eager feet and is safely\nhidden from his pursuers there, so he has betaken himself to the\neverlasting Rock, in the cleft of which he is at rest and secure. To\ntrust in God is neither more nor less than to flee to Him for refuge,\nand there to be at peace. The same presence of the original metaphor,\ncolouring the same religious thought, is found in the beautiful words\nwith which Boaz welcomes Ruth, when he prays for her that the God of\nIsrael may reward her, 'under the shadow of whose wings thou hast come\nto trust.'\n\nSo, as a man in peril runs into a hiding-place or fortress, as the\nchickens beneath the outspread wing of the mother bird nestle close in\nthe warm feathers and are safe and well, the soul that trusts takes its\nflight straight to God, and in Him reposes and is secure.\n\nNow, it seems to me that such a figure as that is worth tons of\ntheological lectures about the true nature of faith, and that it tells\nus, by means of a picture that says a great deal more than many a\ntreatise, that faith is something very different from a cold-blooded act\nof believing in the truth of certain propositions; that it is the flight\nof the soul--knowing itself to be in peril, and naked, and unarmed--into\nthe strong Fortress.\n\nWhat is it that keeps a man safe when he thus has around him the walls\nof some citadel? Is it himself, is it the act by which he took refuge,\nor is it the battlements behind which he crouches? So in faith--which is\nmore than a process of a man's understanding, and is not merely the\nsaying, 'Yes, I believe all that is in the Bible is true; at any rate,\nit is not for me to contradict it,' but is the running of the man, when\nhe knows himself to be in danger, into the very arms of God--it is not\nthe running that makes him safe, but it is the arms to which he runs.\n\nIf we would only lay to heart that the very essence of religion lies in\nthis 'flight of the lonely soul to the only God,' we should understand\nbetter than we do what He asks from us in order that He may defend us,\nand how blessed and certain His defence is. So let us clear our minds\nfrom the thought that anything is worth calling trust which is not thus\ntaking refuge in God Himself.\n\nNow, I need not remind you, I suppose, that all this is just as true\nabout us as it was about David, and that the emotion or the act of his\nwill and heart which he expresses in these words of my text is neither\nmore nor less than the Christian act of faith. There is no difference\nexcept a difference of development; there is no difference between the\nroad to God marked out in the Psalms, and the road to God laid down in\nthe Gospels. The Psalmist who said, 'Trust ye in the Lord for ever,' and\nthe Apostle who said, 'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt\nbe saved,' were preaching identically the same doctrine. One of them\ncould speak more fully than the other could of the Person on whom trust\nwas to be rested, but the trust itself was the same, and the Person on\nwhom it rested was the same, though His Name of old was Jehovah, and His\nName to-day is 'Immanuel, God with us.'\n\nNor need I do more than point out how the context of the words that I\nhave ventured to detach from their surroundings is instructive: 'Let all\nthose that put their trust in Thee rejoice because Thou defendest them.'\nThe word for defending there continues the metaphor that lies in the\nword for 'trust,' for it means literally to cover over and so to\nprotect. Thus, when a man runs to God for His refuge, God\n\n  'Covers his defenceless head\n   With the shadow of His wings.'\n\nAnd the joy of trust is, first, that it brings round me the whole\nomnipotence of God for my defence, and the whole tenderness of God for\nmy consolation, and next, that in the very exercise of trust in such\ndefence, so fortified and vindicated by experience, there is great\nreward. All who thus flee into the refuge shall find refuge whither they\nflee, and shall be glad.\n\nII. Then the next thought of my texts, which I do not force into them,\nbut which results, as it seems to me, distinctly from the order in which\nthey occur in the context, is that love follows trust.\n\n'All those that put their trust in Thee--they also that love Thee.' If I\nam to love God, I must be quite sure that God loves me. My love can\nnever be anything else than an answer to His. It can only be secondary\nand derived, or I would rather say reflected and flashed back from His.\nAnd so, very significantly, the Psalmist says, 'Those that love Thy\nName,' meaning by 'Name,' as is always meant by it, the revealed\ncharacter of God. If I am to love God, He must not hide in the darkness\nbehind His infinity, but must come out and give me something about Him\nthat I know. The three letters G O D mean nothing, and there is no power\nin them to stir a man's heart. It must be the knowledge of the acts of\nGod that brings men to love Him. And there is no way of getting that\nknowledge but through the faith which, as I said, must precede love. For\nfaith realises the fact that God loves. 'We have known and believed the\nlove that God hath to us.' The first step is to grasp the great truth of\nthe loving God, and through that truth to grasp the God that loves. And\nthen, and not till then, does there spring up in a man's heart love\ntowards Him. But it is only the faith that is set on Him who hath\ndeclared the Father unto us that gives us for our very own the grasp of\nthe facts, which facts are the only possible fuel that can kindle love\nin a human heart. 'We love Him because He first loved us,' and we shall\nnever know that He loves us unless we come to the knowledge through the\nroad of faith. So John himself tells us when he says, in the words that\nI have already quoted, 'We have known and believed.' He puts the\nfoundation last, 'We have known,' because 'we have believed' 'the love\nthat God hath to us.'\n\nAnd so faith is the only possible means by which any of us can ever\nexperience, as well as realise, the love that kindles ours. It is the\npossession of the fact of redemption for my very own and of the\nblessings which accompany it, and that alone, that binds a man to God in\nthe bonds of love that cannot be broken, and that subdues and unites all\nvagrant emotions, affections, and desires in the mighty tide of a love\nthat ever sets towards Him. As surely as the silvery moon in the sky\ndraws after it the heaped waters of the ocean all round the world, so\nGod's love draws ours. They that believe contemplate, and they that\nbelieve experience the effects of that divine love, which must be\nexperienced ere our answering love can be flashed back to heaven.\n\nStudents of acoustics tell us that if you have two stringed instruments\nin adjacent apartments, tuned to the same pitch, a note sounded on one\nof them will be feebly vibrated upon the other as soon as the waves of\nsound have reached the sensitive string. In like manner a man's heart\ngives off a faint, but musical, little tinkle of answering love to God\nwhen the deep note of God's love to him, struck on the chords of heaven\nup yonder, reaches his poor heart.\n\nLove follows trust. So, brethren, if we desire to be warmed, let us get\ninto the sunshine and abide there. If we desire to have our hearts\nfilled with love to God, do not let us waste our time in trying to pump\nup artificial emotions or to persuade ourselves that we love Him better\nthan we do, but let us fix our thoughts and fasten our refuge-seeking\ntrust on Him, and then that shall kindle ours.\n\nIII. Lastly, righteousness follows trust and love.\n\nThe last description here of the man who begins as a believer and then\nadvances to being a lover is _righteous_. That is the evangelical order.\nThat is the great blessing and beauty of Christianity, that it goes an\naltogether different way to work to make men good from that which any\nother system has ever dreamed of. It says, first of all, trust, and that\nwill create love and that will ensure obedience. Faith leads to\nrighteousness because, in the very act of trusting God, I come out of\nmyself, and going out of myself and ceasing from all self-admiration and\nself-dependence and self-centred life is the beginning of all good and\nhas in it the germ of all righteousness, even as to live for self is the\nmother tincture out of which we can make all sins.\n\nAnd faith leads to righteousness in another way. Open the heart and\nChrist comes in. Trust Him and He fills our poor nature with 'the law of\nthe Spirit of life that was in Christ Jesus,' and that 'makes me free\nfrom the law of sin and death.' Righteousness, meaning thereby just what\nirreligious men mean by it--viz. good living, plain obedience to the\nordinary recognised dictates of morality, going straight--that is most\nsurely attained when we cease from our own works and say to Jesus\nChrist, 'Lord, I cannot walk in the narrow path. Do Thou Thyself come to\nme and fill my heart and keep my feet.' They that trust and love are\n'found in Him, not having their own righteousness, but that which is of\nGod by faith.'\n\nAnd love leads to righteousness because it brings the one motive into\nplay in our hearts which turns duty into delight, toil into joy, and\nmakes us love better to do what will please our beloved Lover than\nanything besides. Why did Jesus Christ say,'My yoke is easy and My\nburden is light'? Was it because He diminished the weight of duties or\nlaid down an easier slipshod morality than had been enjoined before? No!\nHe intensified it all, and His Commandment is far harder to flesh and\nblood than any commandments that were ever given. But for all that, the\nyoke that He lays upon our necks is, if I may so say, padded with\nvelvet; and the burden that we have to draw behind us is laid upon\nwheels that will turn so easily that the load is diminished, inasmuch as\nfor Duty He substitutes Himself and says to us, 'If ye love Me, keep My\nCommandments.'\n\nSo, dear brethren! here is a very easily applied, and a very\nfar-reaching test for us who call ourselves Christians: Does our love\nand does our trust culminate in practical righteousness? We are all\ntempted to make too much of the emotions of the religious life, and too\nlittle of its persistent, dogged obedience. We are all too apt to think\nthat a Christian is a man that believes in Jesus Christ. 'Justification\nby faith alone without the works of the law' used to be the watchword of\nthe Evangelical Church. It might be so held as to be either a blessed\ntruth or a great error, and many of us make it an error instead of a\nblessing.\n\nOn the other hand, there is only one way by which righteousness can be\nattained, and that is: first by faith and then by love. Here are three\nsteps: 'we have known and believed the love that God hath to us'; that\nis the broad, bottom step. And above it 'we love Him because He first\nloved us,' that is the central one. And on the top of all, 'herein is\nour love made perfect that we keep His Commandments.' They that trust\nare they also who love Thy Name, and they who trust through love are,\nand only they are, the righteous.\n\n\n\n\nONE SAYING FROM THREE MEN\n\n\n    'The wicked hath said in his heart, I shall not be moved.'\n    --PSALM x. 6.\n\n    'Because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.'\n    --PSALM xvi. 8.\n\n    'And in my prosperity I said, I shall never be moved.'\n    --PSALM xxx. 6.\n\nHow differently the same things sound when said by different men! Here\nare three people giving utterance to almost the same sentiment of\nconfidence. A wicked man says it, and it is insane presumption and\ndefiance. A good man says it, having been lulled into false security by\neasy times, and it is a mistake that needs chastisement. A humble\nbelieving soul says it, and it is the expression of a certain and\nblessed truth. 'The wicked saith in his heart, I shall not be moved.' A\ngood man, led astray by his prosperity, said, 'I shall not be moved,'\nand the last of the three put a little clause in which makes all the\ndifference, '_because He is at my right hand_, I shall never be moved.'\nSo, then, we have the mad arrogance of godless confidence, the mistake\nof a good man that needs correction, and the warranted confidence of a\nbelieving soul.\n\nI. The mad arrogance of godless confidence.\n\nThe 'wicked' man, in the psalm from which our first text comes, said a\ngood many wrong things 'in his heart.' The tacit assumptions on which a\nlife is based, though they may never come to consciousness, and still\nless to utterance, are the really important things. I dare say this\n'wicked man' was a good Jew with his lips, and said his prayers all\nproperly, but in his heart he had two working beliefs. One is thus\nexpressed: 'As for all his enemies, he puffeth at them. He hath said in\nhis heart, I shall not be moved.' The other is put into words thus: 'He\nhath said in his heart, God hath forgotten, He hideth His face. He will\nnever see it.'\n\nThat is to say, the only explanation of a godless life, unless the man\nis an idiot, is that there lie beneath it, as formative principles and\nunspoken assumptions, guiding and shaping it, one or both of these two\nthoughts: either 'There is no God,' or 'He does not care what I do, and\nI am safe to go on for evermore in the present fashion.' It might seem\nas if a man with the facts of human life before him, could not, even in\nthe insanest arrogance, say, 'I shall not be moved, for I shall never be\nin adversity.' But we have an awful power--and the fact that we\nexercise, and choose to exercise, it is one of the strange riddles of\nour enigmatical existence and characters--of ignoring unwelcome facts,\nand going cheerily on as though we had annihilated them, because we do\nnot reflect upon them. So this man, in the midst of a world in which\nthere is no stay, and whilst he saw all round him the most startling and\ntragical instances of sudden change and complete collapse, stands\nquietly and says, 'Ah! _I_ shall never be moved'; 'God doth not require\nit.'\n\nThat absurdity is the basis of every life that is not a life of\nconsecration and devotion--so far as it has a basis of conviction at\nall. The 'wicked' man's true faith is this, absurd as it may sound when\nyou drag it out into clear, distinct utterance, whatever may be his\nprofessions. I wonder if there are any of us whose life can only be\nacquitted of being utterly unreasonable and ridiculous by the\nassumption, 'I shall never be moved'?\n\nHave you a lease of your goods? Do you think you are tenants at will or\nowners? Which? Is there any reason why any of us should escape, as some\nof us live as if we believed we should escape, the certain fate of all\nothers? If there is not, what about the sanity of the man whose whole\nlife is built upon a blunder? He is convicted of the grossest folly,\nunless he be assured that either there is no God, or that He does not\ncare one rush about what we do, and that consequently we are certain of\na continuance in our present state.\n\nDo you say in your heart, 'I shall never be moved'? Then you must be\nstrong enough to resist every tempest that beats against you. Is that\nso? 'I shall never be moved'--then nothing that contributes to your\nwell-being will ever slip from your grasp, but you will be able to hold\nit tight. Is that so? 'I shall never be moved'--then there is no grave\nwaiting for you. Is that so? Unless these three assumptions be\nwarranted, every godless man is making a hideous blunder, and his\ncharacter is the sentence pronounced by the loving lips of Incarnate\nTruth on the rich man who thought that he had 'much goods laid up for\nmany years,' and had only to be merry--'Thou fool! Thou fool!'\n\nIf an engineer builds a bridge across a river without due calculation of\nthe force of the winds that blow down the gorge, the bridge will be at\nthe bottom of the stream some stormy night, and the train piled on the\nfragments of it in hideous ruin. And with equal certainty the end of the\nfirst utterer of this speech can be calculated, and is foretold in the\npsalm, 'The Lord is King for ever and ever.... The godless are perished\nout of the land.'\n\nII. We have in our second text the mistake of a good man who has been\nlulled into false confidence.\n\nThe Psalmist admits his error by the acknowledgment that he spoke 'in my\nprosperity'; or, as the word might be rendered, 'in my _security_.' This\nsuggests to us the mistake into which even good men, lulled by the quiet\ncontinuance of peaceful days, are certain to fall, unless there be\ncontinual watchfulness exercised by them.\n\nIt is a very significant fact that the word which is translated in our\nAuthorised Version 'prosperity' is often rendered 'security,' meaning\nthereby, not safety, but a belief that I am safe. A man who is\nprosperous, or at ease, is sure to drop into the notion that 'to-morrow\nwill be as this day, and much more abundant,' unless he keeps up\nunslumbering watchfulness against the insidious illusion of permanence.\nIf he yields to the temptation, in his foolish security, forgetting how\nfragile are its foundations, and what a host of enemies surround him\nthreatening it, then there is nothing for it but that the merciful\ndiscipline, which this Psalmist goes on to tell us he had to pass\nthrough by reason of his fall, shall be brought to bear upon him. The\nwriter gives us a page of his own autobiography. 'In my security I said,\nI shall never be moved.' 'Lord! by Thy favour Thou hast made my mountain\nto stand strong. Thou didst hide Thy face.' What about the security\nthen? What about 'I shall never be moved' then? 'I was troubled. I cried\nto Thee, O Lord!'--and then it was all right, his prayer was heard, and\nhe was in 'security'--that is, safety--far more really when he was\n'troubled' and sore beset than when he had been, as he fancied, sure of\nnot being moved.\n\nLong peace rusts the cannon, and is apt to make it unfit for war. Our\nlack of imagination, and our present sense of comfort and well-being,\ntend to make us fancy that we shall go on for ever in the quiet jog-trot\nof settled life without any very great calamities or changes. But there\nwas once a village at the bottom of the crater of Vesuvius, and great\ntrees, that had grown undisturbed there for a hundred years, and green\npastures, and happy homes and flocks. And then, one day, a rumble and a\nrush, and what became of the village? It went up in smoke-clouds. The\nquiescence of the volcano is no sign of its extinction. And as surely as\nwe live, so sure is it that there will come a 'to-morrow' to us all\nwhich shall _not_ be as this day. No man has any right to calculate upon\nanything beyond the present moment, and there is no basis whatever,\neither for the philosophical assertion that the order of nature is\nfixed, and that therefore there are no miracles, or for the practical\ntranslation of the assertion into our daily lives, that we may\nreasonably expect to go on as we are without changes or calamities.\nThere is no reason capable of being put into logical shape for believing\nthat, because the sun has risen ever since the beginning of things, it\nwill rise to-morrow, for there will come a to-morrow when it will _not_\nrise. In like manner, the longest possession of our mercies is no reason\nfor forgetting the precarious tenure on which we hold them all.\n\nSo, Christian men and women! let us try to keep vivid that consciousness\nwhich is so apt to get dull, that nothing continueth in one stay, and\nthat we _shall_ be moved, as far as the outward life and its\ncircumstances are concerned. If we forget it, we shall need, and we\nshall get, the loving Fatherly discipline, which my second text tells us\nfollowed the false security of this good man. The sea is kept from\nputrefying by storms. Wine poured from vessel to vessel is purified\nthereby. It is an old truth and a wholesome one, to be always\nremembered, 'because they have no changes therefore they fear not God .'\n\nIII. Lastly, we have the same thing said by another man in another key.\n'Because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.' The prelude to\nthe assertion makes all the difference. Here is the warranted confidence\nof a simple faith.\n\nThe man who clasps God's hand, and has Him standing by his side, as his\nAlly, his Companion, his Guide, his Defence--that man does not need to\nfear change. For all the things which convict the arrogant or mistaken\nconfidences of the other men as being insanity or a lapse from faith\nprove the confidence of the trustful soul to be the very perfection of\nreason and common sense.\n\nWe may be confident of our power to resist anything that can come\nagainst us, if He be at our side. The man that stands with his back\nagainst an oak-tree is held firm, not because of his own strength, but\nbecause of that on which he leans. There is a beautiful story of some\nheathen convert who said to a missionary's wife, who had felt faint and\nasked that she might lean for a space on her stronger arm, 'If you love\nme, lean hard.' That is what God says to us, 'If you love Me, lean\nhard.' And if you do, because He is at your right hand, you will not be\nmoved. It is not insanity; it is not arrogance; it is simple faith, to\nlook our enemies in the eyes, and to feel sure that they cannot touch\nus, 'Trust in Jehovah; so shall ye be established.' Rest on the Lord,\nand ye shall rest indeed.\n\nIn like manner the man who has God at his right hand may be sure of the\nunalterable continuance of all his proper good. Outward things may come\nor go, as it pleases Him, but that which makes the life of our life will\nnever depart from us as long as He stands there. And whilst He is there,\nif only our hearts are knit to Him, we can say, 'My heart and my flesh\nfaileth, but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever. I\nshall not be moved. Though all that can go goes, He abides; and in Him I\nhave all riches.' Trust not in the uncertainty of outward good, but in\nthe living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy.\n\nThe wicked man was defiantly arrogant, and the forgetful good man was\ncriminally self-confident, when they each said, 'I shall not be moved.'\nWe are only taking up the privileges that belong to us if, exercising\nfaith in Him, we venture to say, 'Take what Thou wilt; leave me Thyself;\nI have enough.' And the man who says, 'Because God is at my right hand,\nI shall not be moved,' has the right to anticipate an unbroken\ncontinuance of personal being, and an unchanged continuance of the very\nlife of his life. That which breaks off all other lives abruptly is no\nbreach in the continuity, either of the consciousness or of the\navocations of a devout man. For, on the other side of the flood, he does\nwhat he does on this side, only more perfectly and more continually. 'He\nthat doeth the will of God abideth for ever,' and it makes comparatively\nlittle difference to him whether his place be on this or on the other\nside of Jordan. We 'shall not be moved,' even when we change our station\nfrom earth to heaven, and the sublime fulfilment of the warranted\nconfidence of the trustful soul comes when the 'to-morrow' of the skies\nis as the 'to-day' of earth, only 'much more abundant.'\n\n\n\n\nMAN'S TRUE TREASURE IN GOD\n\n\n    'The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup; Thou\n    maintainest my lot. The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places;\n    yea, I have a goodly heritage.'--PSALM xvi. 5, 6.\n\nWe read, in the law which created the priesthood in Israel, that 'the\nLord spake unto Aaron, Thou shalt have no inheritance in their land,\nneither shalt thou have any part among them. I am thy part and thine\ninheritance among the children of Israel' (Numbers xvii. 20). Now there\nis an evident allusion to that remarkable provision in this text. The\nPsalmist feels that in the deepest sense he has no possession amongst\nthe men who have only possessions upon earth, but that God is the\ntreasure which he grasps in a rapture of devotion and self-abandonment.\nThe priest's duty is his choice. He will 'walk by faith and not by\nsight.'\n\nAre not all Christians priests? and is not the very essence and\ninnermost secret of the religious life this--that the heart turns away\nfrom earthly things and deliberately accepts God as its supreme good,\nand its only portion? These first words of my text contain the essence\nof all true religion.\n\nThe connection between the first clause and the others is closer than\nmany readers perceive. The 'lot' which 'Thou maintainest,' the 'pleasant\nplaces,' the 'goodly heritage,' all carry on the metaphor, and all refer\nto God as Himself the portion of the heart that chooses and trusts Him.\n'Thou maintainest my lot'--He who is our inheritance also guards our\ninheritance, and whosoever has taken God for his possession has a\npossession as sure as God can make it. 'The lines are fallen to me in\npleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage'--the heritage that is\ngoodly is God Himself. When a man chooses God for his portion, then, and\nthen only, is he satisfied--'satisfied with favour, and full of the\ngoodness of the Lord.' Let me try to expand and enforce these thoughts,\nwith the hope that we may catch something of their fervour and their\nglow.\n\nI. The first thought, then, that comes out of the words before us is\nthis: all true religion has its very heart in deliberately choosing God\nas my supreme good.\n\n'The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and of my cup.' The two words\nwhich are translated in our version 'portion' and 'inheritance' are\nsubstantially synonymous. The latter of them is used continually in\nreference to the share of each individual, or family, or tribe in the\npartition of the land of Canaan. There is a distinct allusion,\ntherefore, to that partition in the language of our text; and the two\nexpressions, part or 'portion,' and 'inheritance,' are substantially\nidentical, and really mean just the same as if the single expression had\nstood--'The Lord is my Portion.'\n\nI may just notice in passing that these words are evidently alluded to\nin the New Testament, in the Epistle to the Colossians, where Paul\nspeaks of God 'having made us meet for our portion of the inheritance of\nthe saints in light.'\n\nAnd then the 'portion of my cup' is a somewhat strange expression. It is\nfound in one of the other Psalms, with the meaning 'fortune,' or\n'destiny,' or 'sum of circumstances which make up a man's life.' There\nmay be, of course, an allusion to the metaphor of a feast here, and God\nmay be set forth as 'the portion of my cup,' in the sense of being the\nrefreshment and sustenance of a man's soul. But I should rather be\ndisposed to consider that there is merely a prolongation of the earlier\nmetaphor, and that the same thought as is contained in the figure of the\n'inheritance' is expressed here (as in common conversation it is often\nexpressed) by the word 'cup,' namely, 'that which makes up a man's\nportion in this life.' It is used with such a meaning in the well-known\nwords, 'My cup runneth over,' and in another shape in 'The cup which My\nFather hath given Me, shall I not drink it?' It is the sum of\ncircumstances which make up a man's 'fortune.' So the double metaphor\npresents the one thought of God as the true possession of the devout\nsoul.\n\nNow, how do we possess God? We possess things in one fashion and persons\nin another. The lowest and most imperfect form of possession is that by\nwhich a man simply keeps other people off material good, and asserts the\nright of disposal of it as he thinks proper. A blind man may have the\nfinest picture that ever was painted; he may call it his, that is to\nsay, nobody else can sell it, but what good is it to him? A lunatic may\nown a library as big as the Bodleian, but what use is it to him? Does\nthe man who collects the rents of a mountain-side, or the poet or\npainter to whom its cliffs and heather speak far-reaching thoughts, most\ntruly possess it? The highest form of possession, even of things, is\nwhen they minister to our thought, to our emotion, to our moral and\nintellectual growth. We possess even them really, according as we know\nthem and hold communion with them. But when we get up into the region of\npersons, we possess them in the measure in which we understand them, and\nsympathise with them, and love them. Knowledge, intercourse, sympathy,\naffection--these are the ways by which men can possess men, and spirits,\nspirits. A disciple who gets the thoughts of a great teacher into his\nmind, and has his whole being saturated by them, may be said to have\nmade the teacher his own. A friend or a lover owns the heart that he or\nshe loves, and which loves back again; and not otherwise do we possess\nGod.\n\nSuch ownership must be, from its very nature, reciprocal. There must be\nthe two sides to it. And so we read in the Bible, with equal frequency:\nthe Lord is the inheritance of His people, and His people are the\ninheritance of the Lord. He possesses me, and I possess Him--with\nreverence be it spoken--by the very same tenure; for whoso loves God has\nHim, and whom He loves He owns. There is deep and blessed mystery\ninvolved in this wonderful prerogative, that the loving, believing heart\nhas God for its possession and indwelling Guest; and people are apt to\nbrush such thoughts aside as mystical. But, like all true Christian\nmysticism, it is intensely practical.\n\nWe have God for ours, first, in the measure in which our minds are\nactively occupied with thoughts of Him. We have no merely mystical or\nemotional possession of God to preach. There is a real, adequate\nknowledge of Him in Jesus Christ. We know God, His character, His heart,\nHis relations to us, His thoughts of good concerning us, sufficiently\nfor all intellectual and for all practical purposes.\n\nI wish to ask you a plain question: Do you ever think about Him? There\nis only one way of getting God for yours, and that is by bringing Him\ninto your life by frequent meditation upon His sweetness, and upon the\ntruths that you know about Him. There is no other way by which a spirit\ncan possess a spirit, that is not cognisable by sense, except only by\nthe way of thinking about him, to begin with. All else follows that.\nThat is how you hold your dear ones when they go to the other side of\nthe world. That is how you hold God, who dwells on the other side of the\nstars. There is no way to 'have' Him, but through the understanding\naccepting Him, and keeping firm hold of Him. Men and women that from\nMonday morning to Saturday night never think of His name--how do they\npossess God? And professing Christians that never remember Him all the\nday long--what absurd hypocrisy it is for them to say that God is\ntheirs!\n\nYours, and never in your mind! When your husband, or your wife, or your\nchild, goes away from home for a week, do you forget them as utterly as\nyou forget God? Do you have them in any sense if they never dwell in the\n'study of your imagination,' and never fill your thoughts with sweetness\nand with light?\n\nAnd so again when the heart turns to Him, and when all the faculties of\nour being, will, hope, and imagination, and all our affections and all\nour practical powers, when they all touch Him, each in its proper\nfashion, then and then only can we in any reasonable and true sense be\nsaid to possess God.\n\nThought, communion, sympathy, affection, moral likeness, practical\nobedience, these are the way--and not by mystical raptures only--by\nwhich, in simple prose fact, it is possible for the finite to grasp the\ninfinite, and for a man to be the _owner_ of God.\n\nNow there is another consideration very necessary to be remembered, and\nthat is that this possession of God involves, and is possible only by, a\ndeliberate act of renunciation. The Levite's example, that is glanced at\nin my text, is always our law. You must have no part or inheritance\namongst the sons of earth if God is to be your inheritance. Or, to put\nit into plain words, there must be a giving up of the material and the\ncreated if there is to be a possession of the divine and the heavenly.\nThere cannot be _two_ supreme, any more than there can be two\npole-stars, one in the north and the other in the south, to both of\nwhich a man can be steering. You cannot stand with\n\n  'One foot on land, and one on sea,\n   To one thing constant never.'\n\nIf you are to have God as your supreme good, you must empty your heart\nof earth and worldly things, or your possession of Him will be all\nwords, and imagination, and hypocrisy. Brethren! I wish to bring that\nmessage to your consciences to-day.\n\nAnd what is this renunciation? There must be, first of all, a fixed,\ndeliberate, intelligent conviction lying at the foundation of my life\nthat God is best, and that He and He only is my true delight and desire.\nThen there must be built upon that intelligent conviction that God is\nbest, the deliberate turning away of the heart from these material\ntreasures. Then there must be the willingness to abandon the outward\npossession of them, if they come in between us and Him. Just as\ntravellers in old days, that went out looking for treasures in the\nwestern hemisphere, were glad to empty their ships of their less\nprecious cargo in order to load them with gold, you must get rid of the\ntrifles, and fling these away if ever they so take up your heart that\nGod has no room there. Or rather, perhaps, if the love of God in any\nreal measure, howsoever imperfectly, once gets into a man's soul, it\nwill work there to expel and edge out the love and regard for earthly\nthings. Just as when the chemist collects oxygen in a vessel filled with\nwater, as it passes into the jar it drives out the water before it; the\nlove of God, if it come into a man's heart in any real sense, in the\nmeasure in which it comes, will deliver him from the love of the world.\nBut between the two there is warfare so internecine and endless that\nthey cannot co-exist: and here, to-day, it is as true as ever it was\nthat if you want to have God for your portion and your inheritance you\nmust be content to have no inheritance amongst your brethren, nor part\namongst the sons of earth.\n\nMen and women! are you ready for that renunciation? Are you prepared to\nsay, 'I know that the sweetness of Thy presence is the truest sweetness\nthat I can taste; and lo! I give up all besides and my own self'?\n\n\n  'O God of good, the unfathomed Sea!\n   Who would not yield himself to Thee?'\n\n\nAnd remember, that nothing less than these is Christianity--the\nconviction that the world is second and not first; that God is best,\nlove is best, truth is best, knowledge of Him is best, likeness to Him\nis best, the willingness to surrender all if it come in contest with His\nsupreme sweetness. He that turns his back upon earth by reason of the\ndrawing power of the glory that excelleth, is a Christian. The\nChristianity that only trusts to Christ for deliverance from the\npunishment of sin, and so makes religion a kind of fire insurance, is a\nvery poor affair. We need the lesson pealed into our ears as much as any\ngeneration has ever done, 'Ye cannot serve God and mammon.' A man's real\nworking religion consists in his loving God most and counting His love\nthe sweetest of all things.\n\nII. Now let me turn to the next point that is here, viz. that this\npossession is as sure as God can make it. 'Thou maintainest my lot.'\nThou art Thyself both my heritage and the guardian of my heritage. He\nthat possesses God, says the text, by implication, is lifted above all\nfear and chance of change.\n\nThe land, the partition of which amongst the tribes lies at the bottom\nof the allusive metaphor of my text, was given to them under the\nsanction of a supernatural defence; and the law of their continuance in\nit was that they should trust and serve the unseen King. It was He,\naccording to the theocratic theory of the Old Testament, and not\nchariots and horses, their own arm and their own sword, that kept them\nsafe, though the enemies on the north and the enemies on the south were\nbig enough to swallow up the little kingdom at a mouthful.\n\nAnd so, says the Psalmist allusively, in a similar manner, the Divine\nPower surrounds the man who chooses God for his heritage, and nothing\nshall take that heritage from him.\n\nThe lower forms of possession, by which men are called the owners of\nmaterial goods, are imperfect, because they are all precarious and\ntemporary. Nothing really belongs to a man if it can be taken from him.\nWhat we may lose we can scarcely be said to have. They _are_ mine, they\n_were_ yours, they _will be_ somebody else's to-morrow. Whilst we have\nthem we do not have them in any deep sense; we cannot retain them, they\nare not really ours at all. The only thing that is worth calling mine is\nsomething that so passes into and saturates the very substance of my\nsoul that, like a piece of cloth dyed in the grain, as long as two\nthreads hold together the tint will be there. That is how God gives us\nHimself, and nothing can take Him out of a man's soul. He, in the\nsweetness of His grace, bestows Himself upon man, and guards His own\ngift in the heart, which is Himself. He who dwells in God and God in him\nlives as in the inmost keep and citadel. The noise of battle may roar\naround the walls, but deep silence and peace are within. The storm may\nrage upon the coasts, but he who has God for his portion dwells in a\nquiet inland valley where tempests never come. No outer changes can\ntouch our possession of God. They belong to another region altogether.\nOther goods may go, but this is held by a different tenure. The life of\na Christian is lived in two regions: in the one his life has its roots,\nand its branches extend to the other. In the one there may be whirling\nstorms and branches may toss and snap, whilst in the other, to which the\nroots go down, may be peace. Root yourselves in God, making Him your\ntruest treasure, and nothing can rob you of your wealth.\n\nWe here in this commercial community see many examples of great fortunes\nand great businesses melting away like yesterday's snow. And surely the\ncertain alternations of 'booms' and bad times might preach to some of\nyou this lesson: Set not your hearts on that which can pass, but make\nyour treasure that which no man can take from you.\n\nThen, too, there is the other thought. God will help us so that no\ntemptations shall have power to make us rob _ourselves_ of our treasure.\nNone can take it from us but ourselves, but we are so weak and\nsurrounded by temptations so strong that we need Him to aid us if we are\nnot to be beguiled by our own treacherous hearts into parting with our\nhighest good. A handful of feeble Jews were nothing against the gigantic\nmight of Assyria, or against the compacted strength of civilised Egypt;\nbut there they stood, on their rocky mountains, defended, not by their\nown strength, but by the might of a present God. And so, unfit to cope\nwith the temptations round us as we are, if we cast ourselves upon His\npower and make Him our supreme delight, nothing shall be able to rob us\nof that possession and that sweetness.\n\nAnd there is just one last point that I would refer to here on this\nmatter of our stable possession of God. It is very beautiful to observe\nthat this psalm, which, in the language of my text, rises to the very\nheight of spiritual and, in a good sense, mystical devotion, recognising\nGod as the One Good for souls, is also one of the psalms which has the\nclearest utterance of the faith in immortality. Just after the words of\nmy text we read these others, in which the Old Testament confidence in a\nlife beyond the grave reaches its very climax: 'Thou wilt not leave my\nsoul in Sheol, neither wilt Thou suffer Thine holy one to see\ncorruption. Thou wilt show me the path of life; in Thy presence is\nfulness of joy; at Thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.'\n\nThat connection teaches us that the measure in which a man feels his\ntrue possession of God here and now, is the measure in which his faith\nrises triumphant over the darkness of the grave, and grasps, with\nunfaltering confidence, the conviction of an immortal life. The more we\nknow that God is our portion and our treasure, the more sure, and calmly\nsure, we shall be that a thing like death cannot touch a thing like\nthat, that the mere physical fact is far too small and insignificant a\nfact to have any power in such a region as that; that death can no more\naffect a man's relation to God, whom he has learned to love and trust,\nthan you can cut thought or feeling with a knife. The two belong to two\ndifferent regions. Thus we have here the Old Testament faith in\nimmortality shaping itself out of the Old Testament enjoyment of\ncommunion with God, with a present God. And you will find the very same\nprocess of thought in that seventy-third psalm, which stands in some\nrespects side by side with this one as attaining the height of mystical\ndevotion, joined with a very clear utterance of the faith in\nimmortality: 'Whom have I in heaven but Thee, and there is none upon\nearth that I desire beside Thee! Thou wilt guide me with Thy counsel,\nand afterwards receive me to glory.'\n\nSo Death himself cannot touch the heritage of the man whose heritage is\nthe Lord. And his ministry is not to rob us of our treasures as he robs\nmen of all treasures besides (for 'their glory shall not descend after\nthem'), but to give us instead of the 'earnest of the inheritance'--the\nbit of turf by which we take possession of the estate--the broad land in\nall the amplitude of its sweep, into our perpetual possession. 'Thou\nmaintainest my lot.' Neither death nor life 'shall separate us from the\nlove of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.'\n\nIII. And then the last thought here is that he who thus elects to find\nhis treasure and delight in God is satisfied with his choice. 'The\nlines'--the measuring-cord by which the estate was parted off and\ndetermined--'are fallen in pleasant places; yea!'--not as our Bible has\nit, merely 'I have a _goodly_ heritage,' putting emphasis on the fact of\npossession, but--'the heritage is goodly to _me_,' putting emphasis on\nthe fact of subjective satisfaction with it.\n\nI have no time to dwell upon the thoughts that spring from these words.\nTake them in the barest outline. No man that makes the worse choice of\nearth instead of God, ever, in the retrospect, said: 'I have a goodly\nheritage.' One of the later Roman Emperors, who was among the best of\nthem, said, when he was dying: 'I have been everything, and it profits\nme nothing.' No creature can satisfy your whole nature. Portions of it\nmay be fed with their appropriate satisfaction, but as long as we feed\non the things of earth there will always be part of our being like an\nunfed tiger in a menagerie, growling for its prey, whilst its fellows\nare satisfied for the moment. You can no more give your heart rest and\nblessedness by pitching worldly things into it, than they could fill up\nChat Moss, when they made the first Liverpool and Manchester Railway, by\nthrowing in cartloads of earth. The bog swallowed them and was none the\nnearer being filled.\n\nNo man who takes the world for his portion ever said, 'The lines are\nfallen to me in pleasant places.' For the make of your soul as plainly\ncries out 'God!' as a fish's fins declare that the sea is its element,\nor a bird's wings mark it out as meant to soar. Man and God fit each\nother like the two halves of a tally. You will never get rest nor\nsatisfaction, and you will never be able to look at the past with\nthankfulness, nor at the present with repose, nor into the future with\nhope, unless you can say, 'God is the strength of my heart, and my\nportion for ever.' But oh! if you do, then you have a goodly heritage, a\nheritage of still satisfaction, a heritage which suits, and gratifies,\nand expands all the powers of a man's nature, and makes him ever capable\nof larger and larger possession of a God who ever gives more than we can\nreceive, that the overplus may draw us to further desire, and the\nfurther desire may more fully be satisfied.\n\nThe one true, pure, abiding joy is to hold fellowship with God and to\nlive in His love. The secret of all our unrest is the going out of our\ndesires after earthly things. They fly forth from our hearts like Noah's\nraven, and nowhere amid all the weltering flood can find a\nresting-place. The secret of satisfied repose is to set our affections\nthoroughly on God. Then our wearied hearts, like Noah's dove returning\nto its rest, will fold their wings and nestle fast by the throne of God.\n'All the happiness of this life,' said William Law, 'is but trying to\nquench thirst out of golden _empty_ cups.' But if we will take the Lord\nfor 'the portion of our cup,' we shall never thirst.\n\nLet me beseech you to choose God in Christ for your supreme good and\nhighest portion; and having chosen, to cleave to your choice. So shall\nyou enter on possession of good that truly shall be yours, even 'that\ngood part, which shall not be taken away from' you.\n\nAnd, lastly, remember that if you would have God, you must take Christ.\nHe is the true Joshua, who puts us in possession of the inheritance. He\nbrings God to you--to your knowledge, to your love, to your will. He\nbrings you to God, making it possible for your poor sinful souls to\nenter His presence by His blood; and for your spirits to possess that\ndivine Guest. 'He that hath the Son, hath the Father'; and if you trust\nyour souls to Him who died for you, and cling to Him as your delight and\nyour joy, you will find that both the Father and the Son come to you and\nmake their home in you. Through Christ the Son you will receive power to\nbecome sons of God, and 'if children, then heirs, heirs of God,' because\n'joint heirs with Christ.'\n\n\n\n\nGOD WITH US, AND WE WITH GOD\n\n\n    'I have set the Lord always before me: because He is at my right\n    hand, I shall not be moved.... 11. In Thy presence is fulness of\n    joy; at Thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.'\n    --PSALM xvi. 8, 11.\n\n\nThere are, unquestionably, large tracts of the Old Testament in which\nthe anticipation of immortality does not appear, and there are others in\nwhich its presence may be doubtful. But here there can be no hesitation,\nI think, as to the meaning of these words. If we regard them carefully,\nwe shall not only see clearly the Psalmist's hope of immortal life, but\nshall discern the process by which he came to it, and almost his very\nact of grasping at it; for the first verse of our text is manifestly the\nfoundation of the second; and the facts of the one are the basis of the\nhopes of the other. That is made plain by the 'therefore' which, in one\nof the intervening verses, links the concluding rapturous anticipations\nwith the previous expressions.\n\nIf, then, we observe that here, in these two verses which I have read,\nthere is a very remarkable parallelism, we shall get still more\nstrikingly the connection between the devout life here and the\nperfecting of the same hereafter. Note how, even in our translation, the\nlatter verse is largely an echo of the former, and how much more\ndistinctly that is the case if we make a little variation in the\nrendering, which brings it closer to the original. 'I have set the Lord\nalways _before me_,' says the one,--that is the present. 'In Thy\n_presence_ is fulness of joy,' says the other,--that is the consequent\nfuture. And the two words, which are rendered in the one case 'before\nme' and in the other case 'in Thy presence,' are, though not identical,\nso precisely synonymous that we may take them as meaning the same thing.\nSo we might render 'I have set the Lord always before _my_ face':\n'Before _Thy_ face is fulness of joy.' The other clause is, to an\nEnglish reader, more obviously parallel: 'Because He is at _my right\nhand_ I shall not be moved'--shall be steadied here. 'At _Thy right_\nhand are pleasures for evermore'--the steadfastness here merges into\neternal delights hereafter.\n\nSo then, we have two conditions set before us, and the link between them\nmade very plain. And I gather all that I have to say about these words\ninto two statements. First, life here may be God's presence with us, to\nmake us steadfast. And secondly, if so, life hereafter will be our\npresence with God to make us glad. That is the Psalmist's teaching, and\nI will try to enforce it.\n\nI. First, then, life here may be God's presence with us, to make us\nsteadfast.\n\nMark the Psalmist's language. 'I have set the Lord always _in front of_\nme--before my face.' Emphasis is placed on 'set' and 'always.' God is\never by our sides, but we may be very far away from Him, 'though He be\nnot far off from every one of us,' and if we are to have Him blazing,\nclear and unobscured above and beyond all the mists and hubbub of earth,\nwe shall need continual effort in order to keep Him in our sight. 'I\nhave set the Lord'--He permits me to put out my hand, as it were, and\nstation Him where I want Him, that I may always have Him in my sight,\nand be able to look at Him and be calm and blessed.\n\nYou cannot do that, if you let the world, and wealth, and business, and\nanxieties, and ambitions, and cares, and sorrows, and duties, and family\nresponsibilities, jostle and hustle Him out of your minds and hearts.\nYou cannot do it if, like John Bunyan's man with the muckrake, you keep\nyour eyes always down on the straw at your feet, and never lift them to\nthe crown above. How many men in Manchester walk its streets from year's\nend to year's end, and never look up to the sky except to see whether\nthey must take their umbrellas with them or not? And so all the\nmagnificence and beauty of the daily heavens, and the nightly gemming of\nthe empty places with perpetually burning stars, are lost to them! So,\nGod is blazing there in front of us, but unless we set ourselves to it,\nwe shall never see Him. You have to look, by a conscious effort, over\nand away from the things that are 'seen and temporal' if you want to see\nthe things that are 'unseen and eternal.'\n\nBut if you disturb the whole tenor of your being by agitations and\ndistractions and petty cares, or if you defile it by sensual and fleshly\nlusts, and animal propensities gratified, and poor, miserable, worldly\nambitions and longings filling up your souls, then God can no more be\nvisible before your face than the blessed sun can mirror himself in a\nstorm-tossed sea or in a muddy puddle. The heart must be pure, and the\nheart must be still, and the mind must be detached from earth, and glued\nto Heaven, and the glasses of the telescope must be sedulously cleansed\nfrom dust, if we are to be blessed with the vision of God continuously\nbefore our face.\n\nThen note, still further, that if thus we have made God present with us,\nby realising the fact of His presence, when He comes, He comes with His\nhands full. 'I have set the Lord always before me,' says the Psalmist.\nAnd then he goes on to say, 'Because He is at my right hand.' Not only\nin front of you, then, David, to be looked at, but at your side! What\nfor? What do we summon some one to come and stand beside us for? In\norder that from his presence there may come help and succour and courage\nand confidence. And so God comes to the right hand of the man who\nhonestly endeavours through all the confusions and bustles of life to\nrealise His sweet and calming presence. Where He comes He comes to help;\nnot to be a spectator, but an ally in the warfare; and whoever sets the\nLord before him will have the Lord at his right hand.\n\nAnd then, note, still further, the steadfastness which God brings. I\nhave spoken of the effort which brings God. I speak now of the\nsteadfastness which He brings by His coming. The Psalmist's anticipation\nis a singularly modest one. 'Because He is at my right hand I\nshall'--What? Be triumphant? No! Escape sorrows? No! Have my life filled\nwith serenity? No! 'I shall not be moved.' That is the best I can hope\nfor. To be able to stand on the spot, with steadfast convictions, with\nsteadfast purposes, with steadfast actions--continuously in one\ndirection; 'having overcome all, to stand'--that is as much as the best\nof us can desire or expect, in this poor struggling life of ours.\n\nWhat a profound consciousness of inward weakness and of outward\nantagonism there breathes in that humble and modest hope, as being the\nloftiest result of the presence of Omnipotence for our aid: 'I shall not\nbe moved'! When we think of our inner weakness, when we remember the\nfluctuations of our feelings and emotions, when we compare the ups and\ndowns of our daily life, or when we think of the larger changes covering\nyears, which affect all our outlooks, our thoughts, our plans; and how\n\n  'We all are changed by still degrees,\n   All but the basis of the soul,'\n\nit is much to say, 'I shall not be moved.' And when we think of the\nobstacles that surround us, of the storms that dash against us, how we\nare swept by surges of emotion that wash away everything before their\nimperious onrush, or swayed by blasts of temptation that break down the\nstrongest defences, or smitten by the shocks of change and sorrow that\ncrush the firmest hearts, it is much to say, in the face of a world\npressing upon us with the force of the wind in a cyclone, that our poor,\nfeeble reed shall stand upright and 'not be moved' in the fiercest\nblast. 'What went ye out for to see?' 'A reed shaken with the\nwind'--that is humanity. 'Behold! I have made thee an iron pillar and\nbrazen walls, and they shall fight against thee, but they shall not\nprevail'--that is weak man, stiffened into uprightness, and rooted in\nsteadfastness by the touch of the hand of a present God.\n\nAnd, brother! there is nothing else that will stay a man's soul. The\nholdfast cannot be a part of the chain. It must be fastened to a fixed\npoint. The anchor that is to keep the ship of your life from dragging\nand finding itself, when the morning breaks, a ghastly wreck upon the\nreef, must be outside of yourself, and the cable of it must be wrapped\nround the throne of God. The anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast,\nwhich will neither break nor drag, can only be firm when it 'enters into\nthat within the veil.' God, and God only, can thus make us strong! So,\ndear friends, let us see to it that we fasten our aims and purposes, our\nfaith and love, our submission and obedience, upon that mighty Helper\nwho will be with us and make us strong, that we may 'stand fast in the\nLord and in the power of His might.'\n\nII. Now, secondly, notice how, if so, life hereafter will be our\npresence with God, to make us glad.\n\nI have already pointed out briefly the connection between these two\nportions of my text, and I need only remark here that the link which\nholds them together is very obvious. If a man loves God, and trusts Him,\nand 'walks with Him,' after the fashion described in our former verse,\nthen there will spring up, irrepressible and unconquerable, a conviction\nin that man's soul that this sweet and strong communion, which makes so\nmuch of the blessedness of life, must last after death. Anything is\nconceivable rather than that a man who walks with God shall cease to be!\nRather, when he 'is not' any more 'found' among men, it is only because\n'God took him.' Thus the emotions and experiences of a truly devout soul\nare (apart from the great revelation in Jesus Christ which hath brought\n'life and immortality to light') the best evidence and confirmation of\nthe anticipation of immortal life. It cannot be, unless our whole\nintellectual faculties are to be put into utter confusion, that such an\nexperience as that of the man who loves God, and tries to trust Him, and\nwalk before Him, is destined to be brought to nothingness with the mere\ndissolution of this earthly frame. The greatness and the smallness, the\nachievements and the failures, of the religious life as we see it here,\nall bear upon their front the mark of imperfection, and in their\nimperfection prophesy and proclaim a future completion. Because it is so\ngreat in itself, and because, being so great, its developments and\ninfluence are so strangely and sadly checked, the faith that knits a man\nto Christ demands eternity for its duration, and infinitude for its\nperfection. Thus, he that says 'I have set the Lord always before me,'\ngoes on to say, with an undeniable accuracy of inference, 'Therefore\nThou wilt not leave my soul in the under world.' God is not going to\nforget the soul that clave to Him, and anything is believable sooner\nthan that.\n\nOur texts not only assert this connection and base the confidence of\nimmortality on the present experiences of the spirit that trusts in God,\nbut also give the outline, at least, of the correspondences between the\nimperfections of the present and the perfectnesses of the future. And I\ncast this into two or three words before I close.\n\nThis is the first of them. If you will turn your faces to God, amidst\nall the flaunting splendours and vain shows and fleeting possessions of\nthis present, His face will dawn on you yonder. We can say but little of\nwhat is meant by such a hope as that. But only this we can say, that\nthere will be, as yet unimaginable, new wealths of revelation of the\nFather, and to match them, as yet unimaginable new inlets of\napprehension and perception upon our parts, so that the sweetest,\nclearest, closest, most satisfying vision of God that has ever dawned on\nsad souls here, shall be but 'as in a glass darkly' compared with that\nface to face sight. We live away out on the far-off outskirts of the\nsystem where those great planets plough along their slow orbits, and\nturn their languid rotations at distances that imagination faints in\ncontemplating, and the light and the heat and the life that reach them\nare infinitesimally small. We shall be shifted into the orb that is\nnearest the sun; and oh! what a rapture of light and life and heat will\ncome to our amazed spirits: 'I have set the Lord always before me.'\nTwilight though the light has been, I have tried to keep it. I shall be\nof the sons of light close to the Throne and shall see Thy face. I shall\nbe satisfied when I wake out of this sleep of life into Thy likeness.\n\nThen, again, if you will keep God at your right hand here, He will set\nyou on His hereafter. Keep Him here for your Companion, for your Ally,\nfor your Advocate, to breathe strength into you by the touch of His\nhand, as some feeble man, leaning upon a stronger arm, may be upheld. If\nyou will do that, then the place where the favoured servants stand will\nbe yours; the place where trusted counsellors stand will be yours; the\nplace where the sheep stand will be yours; the place where the Shepherd\nsits will be yours; for He to whom it is said, 'Sit Thou at My right\nhand till I make Thine enemies Thy footstool,' says to us, 'Where I am\nthere shall also My servant be.' Keep God by your sides, and you will be\nlifted to Christ's place at the right hand of the Majesty on high.\n\nLastly, if we let ourselves be stayed by God amidst the struggle and\ndifficulty, we shall be gladdened by Him with perpetual joys. The\nemphasis of the last words of my text is rather on the adjectives than\non the nouns--_full_ joy, _eternal_ pleasure. And how both\ncharacteristics contradict the experiences of earth, even the gladdest,\nwhich we fain would make permanent! For I suppose that no earthly joy is\neither central, reaching the deepest self, or circumferential, embracing\nthe whole being of a man, but that only God can so go into the depths of\nmy soul as that from His throne there He can flood the whole of my\nnature with felicity and peace. In all other gladnesses there is always\nin the landscape one bit of sullen shadow somewhere or other,\nunparticipant of the light, while all around is blazing. And we need\nthat He should come to make us blessed.\n\nJoys here are no more lasting than they are complete. As one who only\ntoo sadly proved the truth of his own words, burning out his life before\nhe was six-and-thirty, has said--\n\n  'Pleasures are like poppies spread,\n   You seize the flower, its bloom is shed!\n   Or like the snowflake in the river.\n   A moment white--then gone for ever.'\n\nOh! my friend, 'why do ye spend your money for that which is not bread?'\nThe life of faith on earth is the beginning, and only the beginning, of\nthat life of calm and complete felicity in the heavenly places.\n\nI have shown you the ladder's foot, 'I have set the Lord always before\nme.' The top round reaches the throne of God, and whoever begins at the\nbottom, and holds fast the beginning of his confidence firm unto the\nend, for him the great promise of the Master will come true, and\nChrist's 'joy will remain in him and his joy shall be full.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE TWO AWAKINGS\n\n\n    'I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with Thy likeness.'\n    --PSALM xvii. 15.\n\n    'As a dream when one awaketh; so, O Lord, when Thou awakest, Thou\n    shalt despise their image.'--PSALM lxxiii. 20.\n\nBoth of these Psalms are occupied with that standing puzzle to Old\nTestament worthies--the good fortune of bad men, and the bad fortune of\ngood ones. The former recounts the personal calamities of David, its\nauthor. The latter gives us the picture of the perplexity of Asaph its\nwriter, when he 'saw the prosperity of the wicked.'\n\nAnd as the problem in both is substantially the same, the solution also\nis the same. David and Asaph both point onwards to a period when this\nconfusing distribution of earthly good shall have ceased, though the one\nregards that period chiefly in its bearing upon himself as the time when\nhe shall see God and be at rest, while the other thinks of it rather\nwith reference to the godless rich as the time of their destruction.\n\nIn the details of this common expectation, also, there is a remarkable\nparallelism. Both describe the future to which they look as an awaking,\nand both connect with it, though in different ways and using different\nwords, the metaphor of an image or likeness. In the one case, the future\nis conceived as the Psalmist's awaking, and losing all the vain show of\nthis dreamland of life, while he is at rest in beholding the appearance,\nand perhaps in receiving the likeness, of the one enduring Substance,\nGod. In the other, it is thought of as God's awaking, and putting to\nshame the fleeting shadow of well-being with which godless men befool\nthemselves.\n\nWhat this period of twofold awaking may be is a question on which good\nmen and thoughtful students of Scripture differ. Without entering on the\nwide subject of the Jewish knowledge of a future state, it may be enough\nfor the present purpose to say that the language of both these Psalms\nseems much too emphatic and high-pitched, to be fully satisfied by a\nreference to anything in this life. It certainly looks as if the great\nawaking which David puts in immediate contrast with the death of 'men of\nthis world,' and which solaced his heart with the confident expectation\nof beholding God, of full satisfaction of all his being, and possibly\neven of wearing the divine likeness, pointed onwards, however dimly, to\nthat 'within the veil.' And as for the other psalm, though the awaking\nof God is, no doubt, a Scriptural phrase for His ending of any period of\nprobation and indulgence by an act of judgment, yet the strong words in\nwhich the context describes this awaking, as the 'destruction' and the\n'end' of the godless, make it most natural to take it as here referring\nto the final close of the probation of life. That conclusion appears to\nbe strengthened by the contrast which in subsequent verses is drawn\nbetween this 'end' of the worldling, and the poet's hopes for himself of\ndivine guidance in life, and afterwards of being taken (the same word as\nis used in the account of Enoch's translation) by God into His presence\nand glory--hopes whose exuberance it is hard to confine within the\nlimits of any changes possible for earth.\n\nThe doctrine of a future state never assumed the same prominence, nor\npossessed the same clearness in Israel as with us. There are great\ntracts of the Old Testament where it does not appear at all. This very\ndifficulty, about the strange disproportion between character and\ncircumstances, shows that the belief had not the same place with them as\nwith us. But it gradually emerged into comparative distinctness.\nRevelation is progressive, and the appropriation of revelation is\nprogressive too. There is a history of God's self-manifestation, and\nthere is a history of man's reception of the manifestation. It seems to\nme that in these two psalms, as in other places of Old Testament\nScripture, we see inspired men in the very course of being taught by\nGod, on occasion of their earthly sorrows, the clearer hopes which alone\ncould sustain them. They stood not where we stand, to whom Christ has\n'brought life and immortality to light'; but to their devout and\nperplexed souls, the dim regions beyond were partially opened, and\nthough they beheld there a great darkness, they also 'saw a great\nlight.' They saw all this solid world fade and melt, and behind its\nvanishing splendours they saw the glory of the God whom they loved, in\nthe midst of which they felt that there _must_ be a place for them,\nwhere eternal realities should fill their vision, and a stable\ninheritance satisfy their hearts.\n\nThe period, then, to which both David and Asaph look, in these two\nverses, is the end of life. The words of both, taken in combination,\nopen out a series of aspects of that period which carry weighty lessons,\nand to which we turn now.\n\nI. The first of these is that to all men the end of Life is an awaking.\n\nThe representation of death most widely diffused among all nations is\nthat it is a sleep. The reasons for that emblem are easily found. We\nalways try to veil the terror and deformity of the ugly thing by the\nthin robe of language. As with reverential awe, so with fear and\ndisgust, the tendency is to wrap their objects in the folds of metaphor.\nMen prefer not to name plainly their god or their dread, but find\nroundabout phrases for the one, and coaxing, flattering titles for the\nother. The furies and the fates of heathenism, the supernatural beings\nof modern superstition, must not be spoken of by their own appellations.\nThe recoil of men's hearts from the thing is testified by the aversion\nof their languages to the bald name--death. And the employment of this\nspecial euphemism of sleep is a wonderful witness to our weariness of\nlife, and to its endless toil and trouble. Everywhere that has seemed to\nbe a comforting and almost an attractive name, which has promised full\nrest from all the agitations of this changeful scene. The prosperous and\nthe wretched alike have owned the fatigue of living, and been conscious\nof a soothing expectance which became almost a hope, as they thought of\nlying still at last with folded hands and shut eyes. The wearied workers\nhave bent over their dead, and felt that they are blest in this at all\nevents, that they rest from their labours; and as they saw them absolved\nfrom all their tasks, have sought to propitiate the power that had made\nthis ease for them, as well as to express their sense of its merciful\naspect, by calling it not death, but sleep.\n\nBut that emblem, true and sweet as it is, is but half the truth. Taken\nas the whole, as indeed men are ever tempted to take it, it is a\ncheerless lie. It is truth for the senses--'the foolish senses,' who\n'crown' Death, as 'Omega,' the last, 'the Lord,' because '_they_ find no\n_motion_ in the dead.' Rest, cessation of consciousness of the outer\nworld, and of action upon it, are set forth by the figure. But even the\nfigure might teach us that the consciousness of life, and the vivid\nexercise of thought and feeling, are not denied by it. Death is sleep.\nBe it so. But does not that suggest the doubt--'in that sleep, what\ndreams may come?' Do we not all know that, when the chains of slumber\nbind sense, and the disturbance of the outer world is hushed, there are\nfaculties of our souls which work more strongly than in our waking\nhours? We are all poets, 'makers' in our sleep. Memory and imagination\nopen their eyes when flesh closes it. We can live through years in the\ndreams of a night; so swiftly can spirit move when even partially freed\nfrom 'this muddy vesture of decay.' That very phrase, then, which at\nfirst sight seems the opposite of the representation of our text, in\nreality is preparatory to and confirmatory of it. That very\nrepresentation which has lent itself to cheerless and heathenish\nthoughts of death as the cessation not only of toil but of activity, is\nthe basis of the deeper and truer representation, the truth for the\nspirit, that death is an awaking. If, on the one hand, we have to say,\nas we anticipate the approaching end of life, 'The night cometh, when no\nman can work'; on the other the converse is true, 'The night is far\nspent; the day is at hand.'\n\nWe shall sleep. Yes; but we shall wake too. We shall wake just because\nwe sleep. For flesh and all its weakness, and all its disturbing\nstrength, and craving importunities--for the outer world, and all its\ndissipating garish shows, and all its sullen resistance to our hand--for\nweariness, and fevered activity and toil against the grain of our\ntastes, too great for our strength, disappointing in its results, the\nend is blessed, calm sleep. And precisely because it is so, therefore\nfor our true selves, for heart and mind, for powers that lie dormant in\nthe lowest, and are not stirred into full action in the highest, souls;\nfor all that universe of realities which encompass us undisclosed, and\nknown only by faint murmurs which pierce through the opiate sleep of\nlife, the end shall be an awaking.\n\nThe truth which corresponds to this metaphor, and which David felt when\nhe said, 'I shall be satisfied when I awake,' is that the spirit,\nbecause emancipated from the body, shall spring into greater intensity\nof action, shall put forth powers that have been held down here and\nshall come into contact with an order of things which here it has but\nindirectly known. To our true selves and to God we shall wake. Here we\nare like men asleep in some chamber that looks towards the eastern sky.\nMorning by morning comes the sunrise, with the tender glory of its rosy\nlight and blushing heavens, and the heavy eyes are closed to it all.\nHere and there some lighter sleeper, with thinner eyelids or face turned\nto the sun, is half conscious of a vague brightness, and feels the\nlight, though he sees not the colours of the sky nor the forms of the\nfilmy clouds. Such souls are our saints and prophets, but most of us\nsleep on unconscious. To us all the moment comes when we shall wake and\nsee for ourselves the bright and terrible world which we have so often\nforgotten, and so often been tempted to think was itself a dream.\nBrethren, see to it that that awaking be for you the beholding of what\nyou have loved, the finding, in the sober certainty of waking bliss, of\nall the objects which have been your visions of delight in the sleep of\nearth.\n\nThis life of ours hides more than it reveals. The day shows the sky as\nsolitary but for wandering clouds that cover its blue emptiness. But the\nnight peoples its waste places with stars, and fills all its abysses\nwith blazing glories. 'If light so much conceals, wherefore not life?'\nLet us hold fast by a deeper wisdom than is born of sense; and though\nmen, nowadays, seem to be willing to go back to the 'eternal sleep' of\nthe most unspiritual heathenism, and to cast away all that Christ has\nbrought us concerning that world where He has been and whence He has\nreturned, because positive science and the anatomist's scalpel preach no\ngospel of a future, let us try to feel as well as to believe that it is\nlife, with all its stunted capacities and idle occupation with baseless\nfabrics, which is the sleep, and that for us all the end of it is--to\nawake.\n\nII. The second principle contained in our text is that death is to some\nmen the awaking of God.\n\n'When Thou awakest, Thou shalt despise their image.' Closely rendered,\nthe former clause would read simply 'in awaking,' without any specifying\nof the person, which is left to be gathered from the succeeding words.\nBut there is no doubt that the English version fills the blank correctly\nby referring the awaking to God.\n\nThe metaphor is not infrequent in the Old Testament, and, like many\nothers applying to the divine nature, is saved from any possibility of\nmisapprehension by the very boldness of its materialism. It has a\nwell-marked and uniform meaning. God 'awakes' when He ends an epoch of\nprobation and long-suffering mercy by an act or period of judgment. So\nfar, then, as the mere expression is concerned, there may be nothing\nmore meant here than the termination by a judicial act in this life, of\nthe transient 'prosperity of the wicked.' Any divinely-sent catastrophe\nwhich casts the worldly rich man down from his slippery eminence would\nsatisfy the words. But the emphatic context seems, as already pointed\nout, to require that they should be referred to that final crash which\nirrevocably separates him who has 'his portion in this life,' from all\nwhich he calls his 'goods.'\n\nIf so, then the whole period of earthly existence is regarded as the\ntime of God's gracious forbearance and mercy; and the time of death is\nset forth as the instant when sterner elements of the divine dealings\nstart into greater prominence. Life here is predominantly, though not\nexclusively, the field for the manifestation of patient love, not\nwilling that any should perish. To the godless soul, immersed in\nmaterial things, and blind to the light of God's wooing love, the\ntransition to that other form of existence is likewise the transition to\nthe field for the manifestation of the retributive energy of God's\nrighteousness. Here and now His judgment on the whole slumbers. The\nconsequences of our deeds are inherited, indeed, in many a merciful\nsorrow, in many a paternal chastisement, in many a partial\nexemplification of the wages of sin as death. But the harvest is not\nfully grown nor ripened yet; it is not reaped in all its extent; the\nbitter bread is not baked and eaten as it will have to be. Nor are men's\nconsciences so awakened that they connect the retribution, which does\nbefall them, with its causes in their own actions, as closely as they\nwill do when they are removed from the excitement of life and the deceit\nof its dreams. 'Sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily.'\nFor the long years of our stay here, God's seeking love lingers round\nevery one of us, yearning over us, besetting us behind and before,\ncourting us with kindnesses, lavishing on us its treasures, seeking to\nwin our poor love. It is sometimes said that this is a state of\nprobation. But that phrase suggests far too cold an idea. God does not\nset us here as on a knife edge, with abysses on either side ready to\nswallow us if we stumble, while He stands apart watching for our\nhalting, and unhelpful to our tottering feebleness. He compasses us with\nHis love and its gifts, He draws us to Himself, and desires that we\nshould stand. He offers all the help of His angels to hold us up. 'He\nwill not suffer thy foot to be moved; He that keepeth thee will not\nslumber.' The judgment sleeps; the loving forbearance, the gracious aid\nwake. Shall we not yield to His perpetual pleadings, and, moved by the\nmercies of God, let His conquering love thaw our cold hearts into\nstreams of thankfulness and self-devotion?\n\nBut remember, that that predominantly merciful and long-suffering\ncharacter of God's present dealing affords no guarantee that there will\nnot come a time when His slumbering judgment will stir to waking. The\nsame chapter which tells us that 'He is long-suffering to us-ward, not\nwilling that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance,'\ngoes on immediately to repel the inference that therefore a period of\nwhich retribution shall be the characteristic is impossible, by the\nsolemn declaration, '_But_ the day of the Lord shall come as a thief in\nthe night.' His character remains ever the same, the principles of His\ngovernment are unalterable, but there may be variations in the\nprominence given in His acts, to the several principles of the one, and\nthe various though harmonious phases of the other. The method may be\nchanged, the purpose may remain unchanged. And the Bible, which is our\nonly source of knowledge on the subject, tells us that the method _is_\nchanged, in so far as to intensify the vigour of the operation of\nretributive justice after death, so that men who have been compassed\nwith 'the loving-kindness of the Lord,' and who die leaving worldly\nthings, and keeping worldly hearts, will have to confront 'the terror of\nthe Lord.'\n\nThe alternation of epochs of tolerance and destruction is in accordance\nwith the workings of God's providence here and now. For though the\ncharacteristic of that providence as we see it is merciful forbearance,\nyet we are not left without many a premonition of the mighty final 'day\nof the Lord.' For long years or centuries a nation or an institution\ngoes on slowly departing from truth, forgetting the principles on which\nit rests, or the purposes for which it exists. Patiently God pleads with\nthe evil-doers, lavishes gifts and warnings upon them. He holds back the\ninevitable avenging as long as restoration is yet possible--and _His_\neye and heart see it to be possible long after men conclude that the\ncorruption is hopeless. But at last comes a period when He says, 'I have\nlong still holden My peace, and refrained Myself, now will I destroy';\nand with a crash one more hoary iniquity disappears from the earth which\nit has burdened so long. For sixty times sixty slow, throbbing seconds,\nthe silent hand creeps unnoticed round the dial and then, with whirr and\nclang, the bell rings out, and another hour of the world's secular day\nis gone. The billows of the thunder-cloud slowly gather into vague form,\nand slowly deepen in lurid tints, and slowly roll across the fainting\nblue; they touch--and then the fierce flash, like the swift hand on the\npalace-wall of Babylon, writes its message of destruction over all the\nheaven at once. We know enough from the history of men and nations since\nSodom till to-day, to recognise it as God's plan to alternate long\npatience and 'sudden destruction':--\n\n  'The mills of God grind slowly,\n   But they grind exceeding small';\n\nand every such instance confirms the expectation of the coming of that\ngreat and terrible day of the Lord, whereof all epochs of convulsion and\nruin, all falls of Jerusalem, and Roman empires, Reformations, and\nFrench Revolutions, and American wars, all private and personal\ncalamities which come from private wrong-doing, are but feeble\nprecursors. 'When Thou awakest, Thou wilt despise their image.'\n\nBrethren, do we use aright this goodness of God which is the\ncharacteristic of the present? Are we ready for that judgment which is\nthe mark of the future?\n\nIII. Death is the annihilation of the vain show of worldly life.\n\nThe word rendered _image_ is properly shadow, and hence copy or\nlikeness, and hence image. Here, however, the simpler meaning is the\nbetter. 'Thou shalt despise their shadow.' The men are shadows, and all\ntheir goods are not what they are called, their 'substance,' but their\n_shadow_, a mere appearance, not a reality. That show of good which\nseems but is not, is withered up by the light of the awaking God. What\nHe despises cannot live.\n\nSo there are the two old commonplaces of moralists set forth in these\ngrand words--the unsatisfying character of all merely external delights\nand possessions, and also their transitory character. They are\nnon-substantial and non-permanent.\n\nNothing that is without a man can make him rich or restful. The\ntreasures which are kept in coffers are not real, but only those which\nare kept in the soul. Nothing which cannot enter into the substance of\nthe life and character can satisfy us. That which we are makes us rich\nor poor, that which we own is a trifle.\n\nThere is no congruity between any outward thing and man's soul, of such\na kind as that satisfaction can come from its possession. 'Cisterns that\ncan hold no water,' 'that which is not bread,' 'husks that the swine did\neat'--these are not exaggerated phrases for the good gifts which God\ngives for our delight, and which become profitless and delusive by our\nexclusive attachment to them. There is no need for exaggeration. These\nworldly possessions have a good in them, they contribute to ease and\ngrace in life, they save from carking cares and mean anxieties, they add\nmany a comfort and many a source of culture. But, after all, a true,\nlofty life may be lived with a very small modicum. There is no\nproportion between wealth and happiness, nor between wealth and\nnobleness. The fairest life that ever lived on earth was that of a poor\nMan, and with all its beauty it moved within the limits of narrow\nresources. The loveliest blossoms do not grow on plants that plunge\ntheir greedy roots into the fattest soil. A little light earth in the\ncrack of a hard rock will do. We need enough for the physical being to\nroot itself in; we need no more.\n\nYoung men! especially you who are plunged into the busy life of our\ngreat commercial centres, and are tempted by everything you see, and by\nmost that you hear, to believe that a prosperous trade and hard cash are\nthe realities, and all else mist and dreams, fix this in your mind to\nbegin life with--God is the reality, all else is shadow. Do not make it\nyour ambition to get _on_, but to get _up_. 'Having food and raiment,\nlet us be content.' Seek for your life's delight and treasure in\nthought, in truth, in pure affections, in moderate desires, in a spirit\nset on God. These are the realities of our possessions. As for all the\nrest, it is sham and show.\n\nAnd while thus all without is unreal, it is also fleeting as the shadows\nof the flying clouds; and when God awakes, it disappears as they before\nthe noonlight that clears the heavens. All things that are, are on\ncondition of perpetual flux and change. The cloud-rack has the likeness\nof bastions and towers, but they are mist, not granite, and the wind is\nevery moment sweeping away their outlines, till the phantom fortress\ntopples into red ruin while we gaze. The tiniest stream eats out its\nlittle valley and rounds the pebble in its widening bed, rain washes\ndown the soil, and frost cracks the cliffs above. So silently and yet\nmightily does the law of change work that to a meditative eye the solid\nearth seems almost molten and fluid, and the everlasting mountains\ntremble to decay.\n\n'Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not?' Are we going to be\nsuch fools as to fix our hopes and efforts upon this fleeting order of\nthings, which can give no delight more lasting than itself? Even whilst\nwe are in it, it continueth not in one stay, and we are in it for such a\nlittle while! Then comes what our text calls God's awaking, and where is\nit all then? Gone like a ghost at cockcrow. Why! a drop of blood on your\nbrain or a crumb of bread in your windpipe, and as far as you are\nconcerned the outward heavens and earth 'pass away with a great'\nsilence, as the impalpable shadows that sweep over some lone hillside.\n\n  'The glories of our birth and state\n     Are shadows, not substantial things;\n   There is no armour against fate,\n     Death lays his icy hand on kings.'\n\nWhat an awaking to a worldly man that awaking of God will be! 'As when a\nhungry man dreameth, and behold he eateth, but he awaketh and his soul\nis empty.' He has thought he fed full, and was rich and safe, but in one\nmoment he is dragged from it all, and finds himself a starving pauper,\nin an order of things for which he has made no provision. 'When he\ndieth, he shall carry nothing away.' Let us see to it that not in utter\nnakedness do we go hence, but clothed with that immortal robe, and rich\nin those possessions that cannot be taken away from us, which they have\nwho have lived on earth as heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. Let\nus pierce, for the foundation of our life's house, beneath the shifting\nsands of time down to the Rock of Ages, and build there.\n\nIV. Finally, death is for some men the annihilation of the vain shows in\norder to reveal the great reality.\n\n'I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with Thy likeness.'\n\n'Likeness' is properly 'form,' and is the same word which is employed in\nreference to Moses, who saw 'the similitude of the Lord.' If there be,\nas is most probable, an allusion to that ancient vision in these words,\nthen the 'likeness' is not that conformity to the divine character which\nit is the goal of our hopes to possess, but the beholding of His\nself-manifestation. The parallelism of the verse also points to such an\ninterpretation.\n\nIf so, then, we have here the blessed confidence that when all the\nbaseless fabric of the dream of life has faded from our opening eyes, we\nshall see the face of our ever-loving God. Here the distracting whirl of\nearthly things obscures Him from even the devoutest souls, and His own\nmighty works which reveal do also conceal. In them is the hiding as well\nas the showing of His power. But there the veil which draped the perfect\nlikeness, and gave but dim hints through its heavy swathings of the\noutline of immortal beauty that lay beneath, shall fall away. No longer\nbefooled by shadows, we shall possess the true substance; no longer\nbedazzled by shows, we shall behold the reality.\n\nAnd seeing God we shall be satisfied. With all lesser joys the eye is\nnot satisfied with seeing, but to look on Him will be enough. Enough for\nmind and heart, wearied and perplexed with partial knowledge and\nimperfect love; enough for eager desires, which thirst, after all\ndraughts from other streams; enough for will, chafing against lower\nlords and yet longing for authoritative control; enough for all my\nbeing--to see God. Here we can rest after all wanderings, and say, 'I\ntravel no further; here will I dwell for ever--_I shall be satisfied_.'\n\nAnd may these dim hopes not suggest to us too some presentiment of the\nfull Christian truth of assimilation dependent on vision, and of vision\nreciprocally dependent on likeness? 'We shall be like Him, for we shall\nsee Him as He is,'--words which reach a height that David but partially\ndiscerned through the mist. This much he knew, that he should in some\ntranscendent sense behold the manifested God; and this much more, that\nit must be 'in righteousness' that he should gaze upon that face. The\ncondition of beholding the Holy One was holiness. We know that the\ncondition of holiness is trust in Christ. And as we reckon up the rich\ntreasure of our immortal hopes, our faith grows bold, and pauses not\neven at the lofty certainty of God without us, known directly and\nadequately, but climbs to the higher assurance of God within us,\nflooding our darkness with His great light, and changing us into the\nperfect copies of His express Image, His only-begotten Son. 'I shall be\nsatisfied, when I awake, with Thy likeness,' cries the prophet Psalmist.\n'It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master,' responds the\nChristian hope.\n\nBrethren! take heed that the process of dissipating the vain shows of\nearth be begun betimes in your souls. It must either be done by Faith,\nwhose rod disenchants them into their native nothingness, and then it is\nblessed; or it must be done by death, whose mace smites them to dust,\nand then it is pure, irrevocable loss and woe. Look away from, or rather\nlook through, things that are seen to the King eternal, invisible. Let\nyour hearts seek Christ, and your souls cleave to Him. Then death will\ntake away nothing from you that you would care to keep, but will bring\nyou your true joy. It will but trample to fragments the 'dome of\nmany-coloured glass' that 'stains the white radiance of eternity.'\nLooking forward calmly to that supreme hour, you will be able to say, 'I\nwill both lay me down in peace and sleep, for Thou, Lord, only makest me\ndwell in safety.' Looking back upon it from beyond, and wondering to\nfind how brief it was, and how close to Him whom you love it has brought\nyou, your now immortal lips touched by the rising Sun of the heavenly\nmorning will thankfully exclaim, 'When I awake, I am still with Thee.'\n\n\n\n\nSECRET FAULTS\n\n\n    'Who can understand his errors? cleanse Thou me from secret faults.'\n         PSALM xix. 12.\n\nThe contemplation of the 'perfect law, enlightening the eyes,' sends the\nPsalmist to his knees. He is appalled by his own shortcomings, and feels\nthat, beside all those of which he is aware, there is a region, as yet\nunilluminated by that law, where evil things nestle and breed.\n\nThe Jewish ritual drew a broad distinction between inadvertent--whether\ninvoluntary or ignorant--and deliberate sins; providing atonement for\nthe former, not for the latter. The word in my text rendered 'errors' is\nclosely connected with that which in the Levitical system designates the\nformer class of transgressions; and the connection between the two\nclauses of the text, as well as that with the subsequent verse,\ndistinctly shows that the 'secret faults' of the one clause are\nsubstantially synonymous with the 'errors' of the other.\n\nThey are, then, not sins hidden from men, whether because they have been\ndone quietly in a corner, and remain undetected, or because they have\nonly been in thought, never passing into act. Both of these pages are\ndark in every man's memory. Who is there that could reveal himself to\nmen? who is there that could bear the sight of a naked soul? But the\nPsalmist is thinking of a still more solemn fact, that, beyond the range\nof conscience and consciousness, there are evils in us all. It may do us\ngood to ponder his discovery that he had undiscovered sins, and to take\nfor ours his prayer, 'Cleanse Thou me from secret faults.'\n\nI. So I ask you to look with me, briefly, first, at the solemn fact\nhere, that there are in every man sins of which the doer is unaware.\n\nIt is with our characters as with our faces. Few of us are familiar with\nour own appearance, and most of us, if we have looked at our portraits,\nhave felt a little shock of surprise, and been ready to say to\nourselves, 'Well! I did not know that I looked like that!' And the bulk\neven of good men are almost as much strangers to their inward\nphysiognomy as to their outward. They see themselves in their\nlooking-glasses every morning, although they 'go away and forget what\nmanner of men' they were. But they do not see their true selves in the\nsame fashion in any other mirror. It is the very characteristic of all\nevil that it has a strange power of deceiving a man as to its real\ncharacter; like the cuttle-fish, that squirts out a cloud of ink and so\nescapes in the darkness and the dirt. The more a man goes wrong the less\nhe knows it. Conscience is loudest when it is least needed, and most\nsilent when most required.\n\nThen, besides that, there is a great part of every one's life which is\nmechanical, instinctive, and all but involuntary. Habits and emotions\nand passing impulses very seldom come into men's consciousness, and an\nenormously large proportion of everybody's life is done with the minimum\nof attention, and is as little remembered as it is observed.\n\nThen, besides that, conscience wants educating. You see that on a large\nscale, for instance, in the history of the slow progress which Christian\nprinciple has made in leavening the world's thinkings. It took eighteen\ncenturies to teach the Church that slavery was unchristian. The Church\nhas not yet learned that war is unchristian, and it is only beginning to\nsurmise that possibly Christian principle may have something to say in\nsocial questions, and in the determination, for example, of the\nrelations of capital and labour, and of wealth and poverty. The very\nsame slowness of apprehension and gradual growth in the education of\nconscience, and in the perception of the application of Christian\nprinciples to duty, applies to the individual as to the Church.\n\nThen, besides that, we are all biassed in our own favour, and what, when\nanother man says it, is 'flat blasphemy,' we think, when we say it, is\nonly 'a choleric word.' We have fine names for our own vices, and ugly\nones for the very same vices in other people. David will flare up into\ngenerous and sincere indignation about the man that stole the poor man's\newe lamb, but he has not the ghost of a notion that he has been doing\nthe very same thing himself. And so we bribe our consciences as well as\nneglect them, and they need to be educated.\n\nThus, down below every life there lies a great dim region of habits and\nimpulses and fleeting emotions, into which it is the rarest thing for a\nman to go with a candle in his hand to see what it is like.\n\nBut I can imagine a man saying, 'Well, if I do not know that I am doing\nwrong, how can it be a sin?' In answer to that, I would say that, thank\nGod! ignorance diminishes criminality, but ignorance does not alter the\nnature of the deed. Take a simple illustration. Here is a man who, all\nunconsciously to himself, is allowing worldly prosperity to sap his\nChristian character. He does not know that the great current of his life\nhas been turned aside, as it were, by that sluice, and is taken to drive\nthe wheels of his mill, and that there is only a miserable little\ntrickle coming down the river bed. Is he any less guilty because he does\nnot know? Is he not the more so, because he might and would have known\nif he had thought and felt right? Or, here is another man who has the\nhabit of letting his temper get the better of him. He calls it 'stern\nadherence to principle,' or 'righteous indignation'; and he thinks\nhimself very badly used when other people 'drive him' so often into a\ntemper. Other people know, and _he_ might know, if he would be honest\nwith himself, that, for all his fine names, it is nothing else than\npassion. Is he any the less guilty because of his ignorance? It is plain\nenough that, whilst ignorance, if it is absolute and inevitable, does\ndiminish criminality to the vanishing point, the ignorance of our own\nfaults which most of us display is neither absolute nor inevitable; and\ntherefore, though it may, thank God! diminish, it does not destroy our\nguilt. 'She wipeth her mouth and saith, I have done no harm': was she,\ntherefore, chaste and pure? In all our hearts there are many vermin\nlurking beneath the stones, and they are none the less poisonous because\nthey live and multiply in the dark. 'I know nothing against myself, yet\nam I not hereby justified. But he that judgeth me is the Lord.'\n\nII. Now, secondly, let me ask you to look at the special perilousness of\nthese hidden faults.\n\nAs with a blight upon a rose-tree, the little green creatures lurk on\nthe underside of the leaves, and in all the folds of the buds, and\nbecause unseen, they increase with alarming rapidity. The very fact that\nwe have faults in our characters, which everybody sees but ourselves,\nmakes it certain that they will grow unchecked, and so will prove\nterribly perilous. The small things of life are the great things of\nlife. For a man's character is made up of them, and of their results,\nstriking inwards upon himself. A wine-glassful of water with one drop of\nmud in it may not be much obscured, but if you come to multiply it into\na lakeful, you will have muddy waves that reflect no heavens, and show\nno gleaming stars.\n\nThese secret faults are like a fungus that has grown in a wine-cask,\nwhose presence nobody suspected. It sucks up all the generous liquor to\nfeed its own filthiness, and when the staves are broken, there is no\nwine left, nothing but the foul growth. Many a Christian man and woman\nhas the whole Christian life arrested, and all but annihilated, by the\nunsuspected influence of a secret sin. I do not believe it would be\nexaggeration to say that, for one man who has made shipwreck of his\nfaith and lost his peace by reason of some gross transgression, there\nare twenty who have fallen into the same condition by reason of the\nmultitude of small ones. 'He that despiseth little things shall fall by\nlittle and little'; and whilst the deeds which the Ten Commandments\nrebuke are damning to a Christian character, still more perilous,\nbecause unseen, and permitted to grow without check or restraint, are\nthese unconscious sins. 'Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that\nthing which he alloweth.'\n\nIII. Notice the discipline, or practical issues, to which such\nconsiderations should lead.\n\nTo begin with, they ought to take down our self-complacency, if we have\nany, and to make us feel that, after all, our characters are very poor\nthings. If men praise us, let us try to remember what it will be good\nfor us to remember, too, when we are tempted to praise ourselves--the\nunderworld of darkness which each of us carries about within us.\n\nFurther, let me press upon you two practical points. This whole set of\ncontemplations should make us practise a very rigid and close\nself-inspection. There will always be much that will escape our\nobservation--we shall gradually grow to know more and more of it--but\nthere can be no excuse for that which I fear is a terribly common\ncharacteristic of the professing Christianity of this day--the all but\nentire absence of close inspection of one's own character and conduct. I\nknow very well that it is not a wholesome thing for a man to be always\npoking in his own feelings and emotions. I know also that, in a former\ngeneration, there was far too much introspection, instead of looking to\nJesus Christ and forgetting self. I do not believe that\nself-examination, directed to the discovery of reasons for trusting the\nsincerity of my own faith, is a good thing. But I do believe that,\nwithout the practice of careful weighing of ourselves, there will be\nvery little growth in anything that is noble and good.\n\nThe old Greeks used to preach, 'Know thyself.' It was a high behest, and\nvery often a very vain-glorious one. A man's best means of knowing what\nhe is, is to take stock of what he does. If you will put your conduct\nthrough the sieve, you will come to a pretty good understanding of your\ncharacter. 'He that hath no rule over his own spirit is like a city\nbroken down, without walls,' into which all enemies can leap unhindered,\nand out from which all things that will may pass. Do you set guards at\nthe gates and watch yourselves with all carefulness.\n\nThen, again, I would say we must try to diminish as much as possible the\nmere instinctive and habitual and mechanical part of our lives, and to\nbring, as far as we can, every action under the conscious dominion of\nprinciple. The less we live by impulse, and the more we live by\nintelligent reflection, the better it will be for us. The more we can\nget habit on the side of goodness, the better; but the more we break up\nour habits, and make each individual action the result of a special\nvolition of the spirit guided by reason and conscience, the better for\nus all.\n\nThen, again, I would say, set yourselves to educate your consciences.\nThey need that. One of the surest ways of making conscience more\nsensitive is always to consult it and always to obey it. If you neglect\nit, and let it prophesy to the wind, it will stop speaking before long.\nHerod could not get a word out of Christ when he 'asked Him many\nquestions' because for years he had not cared to hear His voice. And\nconscience, like the Lord of conscience, will hold its peace after men\nhave neglected its speech. You can pull the clapper out of the bell upon\nthe rock, and then, though the waves may dash, there will not be a\nsound, and the vessel will drive straight on to the black teeth that are\nwaiting for it. Educate your conscience by obeying it, and by getting\ninto the habit of bringing everything to its bar.\n\nAnd, still further, compare yourselves constantly with your model. Do as\nthe art students do in a gallery, take your poor daub right into the\npresence of the masterpiece, and go over it line by line and tint by\ntint. Get near Jesus Christ that you may learn your duty from Him, and\nyou will find out many of the secret sins.\n\nAnd, lastly, let us ask God to cleanse us.\n\nMy text, as translated in the Revised Version, says, '_Clear_ Thou me\nfrom secret faults.' And there is present in that word, if not\nexclusively, at least predominantly, the idea of a judicial acquittal,\nso that the thought of the first clause of this verse seems rather to be\nthat of pronouncing guiltless, or forgiving, than that of delivering\nfrom the power of. But both, no doubt, are included in the idea, as\nboth, in fact, come from the same source and in response to the same\ncry.\n\nAnd so we may be sure that, though our eye does not go down into the\ndark depths, God's eye goes, and that where He looks He looks to pardon,\nif we come to Him through Jesus Christ our Lord.\n\nHe will deliver us from the power of these secret faults, giving to us\nthat divine Spirit which is 'the candle of the Lord,' to search us, and\nto convince of our sins, and to drag our evil into the light; and giving\nus the help without which we can never overcome. The only way for us to\nbe delivered from the dominion of our unconscious faults is to increase\nthe depth and closeness and constancy of our communion with Jesus\nChrist; and then they will drop away from us. Mosquitoes and malaria,\nthe one unseen in their minuteness, and the other, 'the pestilence that\nwalketh in darkness,' haunt the swamps. Go up on the hilltop, and\nneither of them are found. So if we live more and more on the high\nlevels, in communion with our Master, there will be fewer and fewer of\nthese unconscious sins buzzing and stinging and poisoning our lives, and\nmore and more will His grace conquer and cleanse.\n\nThey will all be manifested some day. The time comes when He shall bring\nto light the hidden things and darkness and the counsels of men's\nhearts. There will be surprises on both hands of the Judge. Some on the\nright, astonished, will say, 'Lord, when saw we Thee?' and some on the\nleft, smitten to confusion and surprise, will say, 'Lord, Lord, have we\nnot prophesied in Thy name?'\n\nLet us go to Him with the prayer, 'Search me, O God! and try me; and see\nif there be any wicked way in me; and lead me in the way everlasting.'\n\n\n\n\nOPEN SINS\n\n\n    'Keep back Thy servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not\n    have dominion over me: then shall I be upright, and I shall be\n    innocent from the great transgression.'--PSALM xix. 13.\n\nAnother psalmist promises to the man who dwells 'in the secret place of\nthe Most High' that' he shall not be afraid for the terror by night, nor\nfor the arrow that flieth by day, nor for the pestilence that walketh at\nnoonday,' but shall 'tread upon the lion and adder.' These promises\ndivide the dangers that beset us into the same two classes as our\nPsalmist does--the one secret; the other palpable and open. The former,\nwhich, as I explained in my last sermon, are sins hidden, not from\nothers, but from the doer, may fairly be likened to the pestilence that\nstalks slaying in the dark, or to the stealthy, gliding serpent, which\nstrikes and poisons before the naked foot is aware. The other resembles\nthe 'destruction that wasteth at noonday,' or the lion with its roar and\nits spring, as, disclosed from its covert, it leaps upon the prey.\n\nOur present text deals with the latter of these two classes.\n'Presumptuous sins' does not, perhaps, convey to an ordinary reader the\nwhole significance of the phrase, for it may be taken to define a single\nclass of sins--namely, those of pride or insolence. What is really meant\nis just the opposite of 'secret sins'--all sorts of evil which, whatever\nmay be their motives and other qualities, have this in common, that the\ndoer, when he does them, knows them to be wrong.\n\nThe Psalmist gets this further glimpse into the terrible possibilities\nwhich attach even to a servant of God, and we have in our text these\nthree things--a danger discerned, a help sought, and a daring hope\ncherished.\n\nI. Note, then, the first of these, the dreaded and discerned\ndanger--'presumptuous sins,' which may 'have dominion over' us, and lead\nus at last to a 'great transgression.'\n\nNow the word which is translated 'presumptuous' literally means _that\nwhich boils or bubbles_; and it sets very picturesquely before us the\nmovement of hot desires--the agitation of excited impulses or\ninclinations which hurry men into sin in spite of their consciences. It\nis also to be noticed that the prayer of my text, with singular pathos\nand lowly self-consciousness, is the prayer of 'Thy servant,' who knows\nhimself to be a servant, and who therefore knows that these glaring\ntransgressions, done in the teeth of conscience and consciousness, are\nall inconsistent with his standing and his profession, but yet are\nperfectly possible for him.\n\nAn old mediaeval mystic once said, 'There is nothing weaker than the\ndevil stripped naked.' Would it were true! For there is one thing that\nis weaker than a discovered devil, and that is my own heart. For we all\nknow that sometimes, with our eyes open, and the most unmistakable\nconsciousness that what we are doing was wrong, we have set our teeth\nand done it, Christian men though we may profess to be, and may really\nbe. All such conduct is inconsistent with Christianity; but we are not\nto say, therefore, that it is incompatible with Christianity. Thank God!\nthat is a very different matter. But as long as you and I have two\nthings--viz. strong and hot desires, and weak and flabby wills--so long\nshall we, in this world full of combustibles, not be beyond the\npossibility of a dreadful conflagration being kindled by some\ndevil-blown sparks. There are plenty of dry sticks lying about to put\nunder the caldron of our hearts, to make them boil and bubble over! And\nwe have, alas! but weak wills, which do not always keep the reins in\ntheir hands as they ought to do, nor coerce these lower parts of our\nnature into their proper subordination. Fire is a good servant, but a\nbad master; and we are all of us too apt to let it become master, and\nthen the whole 'course of nature' is 'set on fire of hell.' The servant\nof God may yet, with open eyes and obstinate disregard of his better\nself and of all its remonstrances, go straight into 'presumptuous sin.'\n\nAnother step is here taken by the Psalmist. He looks shrinkingly and\nshudderingly into a possible depth, and he sees, going down into the\nabyss, a ladder with three rungs on it. The topmost one is wilful,\nself-conscious transgression. But that is not the lowest stage; there is\nanother step. Presumptuous sin tends to become despotic sin. 'Let them\nnot _have dominion_ over me.' A man may do a very bad thing once, and\nget so wholesomely frightened, and so keenly conscious of the disastrous\nissues, that he will never go near it again. The prodigal would not be\nin a hurry, you may depend upon it, to try the swine trough and the far\ncountry, and the rags, and the fever, and the famine any more. David got\na lesson that he never forgot in that matter of Bathsheba. The bitter\nfruit of his sin kept growing up all his life, and he had to eat it, and\nthat kept him right. They tell us that broken bones are stronger at the\npoint of fracture than they were before. And it is possible for a man's\nsin--if I might use a paradox which you will not misunderstand--to\nbecome the instrument of his salvation.\n\nBut there is another possibility quite as probable, and very often\nrecurring, and that is that the disease, like some other morbid states\nof the human frame, shall leave a tendency to recurrence. A pin-point\nhole in a dyke will be widened into a gap as big as a church-door in ten\nminutes, by the pressure of the flood behind it. And so every act which\nwe do in contradiction of our standing as professing Christians, and in\nthe face of the protests, all unavailing, of that conscience which is\nonly a voice, and has no power to enforce its behests, will tend to\nrecurrence once and again. The single acts become habits, with awful\nrapidity. Just as the separate gas jets from a multitude of minute\napertures coalesce into a continuous ring of light, so deeds become\nhabits, and get dominion over us. 'He sold himself to do evil.' He made\nhimself a bond-slave of iniquity. It is an awful and a miserable thing\nto think that professing Christians do often come into that position of\nbeing, by their inflamed passions and enfeebled wills, servants of the\nevil that they do. Alas! how many of us, if we were honest with\nourselves, would have to say. 'I am carnal, sold unto sin.'\n\nThat is not the lowest rung of the slippery ladder. Despotic sin ends in\nutter departure.\n\nThe word translated here, quite correctly, 'transgression,' and\nintensified by that strong adjective attached, 'a _great_\ntransgression,' literally means _rebellion_, _revolt_, or some such\nidea; and expresses, as the ultimate issue of conscious transgression\nprolonged and perpetuated into habit, an entire casting off of\nallegiance to God. 'No man can serve two masters.' 'His servants ye are\nwhom ye obey,' whomsoever ye may call your master. The Psalmist feels\nthat the end of indulged evil is going over altogether to the other\ncamp. I suppose all of us have known instances of that sort. Men in my\nposition, with a long life of ministry behind them, can naturally\nremember many such instances. And this is the outline history of the\nsuicide of a Christian. First secret sin, unsuspected, because the\nconscience is torpid; then open sin, known to be such, but done\nnevertheless; then dominant sin, with an enfeebled will and power of\nresistance; then the abandonment of all pretence or profession of\nreligion. The ladder goes down into the pit, but not to the bottom of\nthe pit. And the man that is going down it has a descending impulse\nafter he has reached the bottom step and he falls--Where? The first step\ndown is tampering with conscience. It is neither safe nor wise to do\nanything, howsoever small, against that voice. All the rest will come\nafterward, unless God restrains--'first the blade, then the ear, then\nthe full corn in the ear,' and then the bitter harvest of the poisonous\ngrain.\n\nII. So, secondly, note the help sought.\n\nThe Psalmist is like a man standing on the edge of some precipice, and\npeeping over the brink to the profound beneath, and feeling his head\nbeginning to swim. He clutches at the strong, steady hand of his guide,\nknowing that unless he is restrained, over he will go. 'Keep Thou back\nThy servant from presumptuous sins.'\n\nSo, then, the first lesson we have to take is, to cherish a lowly\nconsciousness of our own tendency to light-headedness and giddiness.\n'Blessed is the man that feareth always.' That fear has nothing cowardly\nabout it. It will not abate in the least the buoyancy and bravery of our\nwork. It will not tend to make us shirk duty because there is temptation\nin it, but it will make us go into all circumstances realising that\nwithout that divine help we cannot stand, and that with it we cannot\nfall. 'Hold Thou me up, and I shall be safe.' The same Peter that said,\n'Though all should forsake Thee, yet will not I,' was wiser and braver\nwhen he said, in later days, being taught by former presumption, 'Pass\nthe time of your sojourning here in fear.'\n\nLet me remind you, too, that the temper which we ought to cherish is\nthat of a confident belief in the reality of a divine support. The\nprayer of my text has no meaning at all, unless the actual supernatural\ncommunication by God's own Holy Spirit breathed into men's hearts be a\nsimple truth. 'Hold Thou me up,' 'Keep Thou me back,' means, if it means\nanything, 'Give me in my heart a mightier strength than mine own, which\nshall curb all this evil nature of mine, and bring it into conformity\nwith Thy holy will.'\n\nHow is that restraining influence to be exercised? There are many ways\nby which God, in His providence, can fulfil the prayer. But the way\nabove all others is by the actual operation upon heart and will and\ndesires of a divine Spirit, who uses for His weapon the Word of God,\nrevealed by Jesus Christ, and in the Scriptures. 'The sword of the\nSpirit is the Word of God,' and God's answer to the prayer of my text is\nthe gift to every man who seeks it of that indwelling Power to sustain\nand to restrain.\n\nThat will keep our passions down. The bubbling water is lowered in its\ntemperature, and ceases to bubble, when cold is added to it. When God's\nSpirit comes into a man's heart, that will deaden his desires after\nearth and forbidden ways. He will bring blessed higher objects for all\nhis affections. He who has been fed on 'the hidden manna' will not be\nlikely to hanker after the leeks and onions, however strong their smell\nand pungent their taste, that grew in the Nile mud in Egypt. He who has\ntasted the higher sweetnesses of God will have his heart's desires after\nlower delights strangely deadened and cooled. Get near God, and open\nyour hearts for the entrance of that divine Spirit, and then it will not\nseem foolish to empty your hands of the trash that they carry in order\nto grasp the precious things that He gives. A bit of scrap-iron\nmagnetised turns to the pole. My heart, touched by the Spirit of God\ndwelling in me, will turn to Him, and I shall find little sweetness in\nthe else tempting delicacies that earth can supply. 'Keep Thy servant\nback from,' by depriving him of the taste for, 'presumptuous sins.'\n\nThat Spirit will strengthen our wills. For when God comes into a heart,\nHe restores the due subordination which has been broken into discord and\nanarchy by sin. He dismounts the servant riding on horseback, and\ncarrying the horse to the devil, according to the proverb, and gives the\nreins into the right hands. Now, if the gift of God's Spirit, working\nthrough the Word of God, and the principles and the motives therein\nunfolded, and therefrom deducible, be the great means by which we are to\nbe kept from open and conscious transgression, it follows very plainly\nthat our task is twofold. One part of it is to see that we cultivate\nthat spirit of lowly dependence, of self-conscious weakness, of\ntriumphant confidence, which will issue in the perpetual prayer for\nGod's restraint. When we enter upon tasks which may be dangerous, and\ninto regions of temptation which cannot but be so, though they be duty,\nwe should ever have the desire in our hearts and upon our lips that God\nwould keep us from, and in, the evil.\n\nThe other part of our duty is to make it a matter of conscience and\ncareful cultivation, to use honestly and faithfully the power which, in\nresponse to our desires, has been granted to us. All of you, Christian\nmen and women, have access to an absolute security against every\ntransgression; and the cause lies wholly at your own doors in each case\nof failure, deficiency, or transgression, for at every moment it was\nopen to you to clasp the Hand that holds you up, and at every moment, if\nyou failed, it was because your careless fingers had relaxed their\ngrasp.\n\nIII. Lastly, observe the daring hope here cherished.\n\n'Then shall I be upright, and I shall be innocent from the great\ntransgression.' That is the upshot of the divine answer to both the\npetitions which have been occupying us in these two successive sermons.\nIt is connected with the former of them by the recurrence of the same\nword, which in the first petition was rendered 'cleanse'--or, more\naccurately, 'clear'--and in this final clause is to be rendered\naccurately, 'I shall be _clear_ from the great transgression.' And it\nobviously connects in sense with both these petitions, because, in order\nto be upright and clear, there must, first of all, be divine cleansing,\nand then divine restraint.\n\nSo, then, nothing short of absolute deliverance from the power of sin in\nall its forms should content the servant of God. Nothing short of it\ncontents the Master for the servant. Nothing short of it corresponds to\nthe power which Christ puts in operation in every heart that believes in\nHim. And nothing else should be our aim in our daily conflict with evil\nand growth in grace. Ah! I fear me that, for an immense number of\nprofessing Christians in this generation, the hope of--and, still more,\nthe aim towards--anything approximating to entire deliverance from sin,\nhave faded from their consciences and their lives. Aim at the stars,\nbrother! and if you do not hit them, your arrow will go higher than if\nit were shot along the lower levels.\n\nNote that an indefinite approximation to this condition is possible. I\nam not going to discuss, at this stage of my discourse, controversial\nquestions which may be involved here. It will be time enough to discuss\nwith you whether you can be absolutely free from sin in this world when\nyou are a great deal freer from it than you are at present. At all\nevents, you can get far nearer to the ideal, and the ideal must always\nbe perfect. And I lay it on your hearts, dear friends! that you have in\nyour possession, if you are Christian people, possibilities in the way\nof conformity to the Master's will, and entire emancipation from all\ncorruption, that you have not yet dreamed of, not to say applied to your\nlives. 'I pray God that He would sanctify you wholly, and that your\nwhole body, soul, and spirit be preserved blameless unto the coming.'\n\nThat daring hope will be fulfilled one day; for nothing short of it will\nexhaust the possibilities of Christ's work or satisfy the desires of\nChrist's heart.\n\nThe Gospel knows nothing of irreclaimable outcasts. To it there is but\none unpardonable sin, and that is the sin of refusing the cleansing of\nChrist's blood and the sanctifying of Christ's Spirit. Whoever you are,\nwhatever you are, go to God with this prayer of our text, and realise\nthat it is answered in Jesus Christ, and you will not ask in vain. If\nyou will put yourself into His hands, and let Him cleanse and restrain,\nHe will give you new powers to detect the serpents in the flowers, and\nnew resolution to shake off the vipers into the fire. For there is\nnothing that God wants half so much as that we, His wandering children,\nshould come back to Him, and He will cleanse us from the filth of the\nswine trough and the rags of our exile, and clothe us in 'fine linen\nclean and white.' We may each be sinless and guiltless. We can be so in\none way only. If we look to Jesus Christ, and live near Him, He 'will be\nmade of God unto us wisdom,' by which we shall detect our secret sins;\n'righteousness,' whereby we shall be cleansed from guilt;\n'sanctification,' which shall restrain us from open transgression; 'and\nredemption,' by which we shall be wholly delivered from evil and\n'presented faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding\njoy.'\n\n\n\n\nFEASTING ON THE SACRIFICE\n\n\n    'The meek shall eat and be satisfied.'--PSALM xxii. 26.\n\n'The flesh of the sacrifice of his peace-offering for thanksgiving shall\nbe offered in the day of his oblation.' Such was the law for Israel. And\nthe custom of sacrificial feasts, which it embodies, was common to many\nlands. To such a custom my text alludes; for the Psalmist has just been\nspeaking of 'paying his vows' (that is, sacrifices which he had vowed in\nthe time of his trouble), and to partake of these he invites the meek.\nThe sacrificial dress is only a covering for high and spiritual\nthoughts. In some way or other the singer of this psalm anticipates that\nhis experiences shall be the nourishment and gladness of a wide circle;\nand if we observe that in the context that circle is supposed to include\nthe whole world, and that one of the results of partaking of this\nsacrificial feast is 'your heart shall live for ever,' we may well say\nwith the Ethiopian eunuch, 'Of whom speaketh the Psalmist thus?'\n\nThe early part of the psalm answers the question. Jesus Christ laid His\nhand on this wonderful psalm of desolation, despair, and deliverance\nwhen on the Cross He took its first words as expressing His emotion\nthen: 'My God! My God! Why hast Thou forsaken Me?' Whatever may be our\nviews as to its authorship, and as to the connection between the\nPsalmist's utterances and his own personal experiences, none to whom\nthat voice that rang through the darkness on Calvary is the voice of the\nSon of God, can hesitate as to who it is whose very griefs and sorrows\nare thus the spiritual food that gives life to the whole world.\n\nFrom this, the true point of view, then, from which to look at the whole\nof this wonderful psalm, I desire to deal with the words of my text now.\n\nI. We have, first, then, the world's sacrificial feast.\n\nThe Jewish ritual, and that of many other nations, as I have remarked,\nprovided for a festal meal following on, and consisting of the material\nof, the sacrifice. A generation which studies comparative mythology, and\nspares no pains to get at the meaning underlying the barbarous worship\nof the rudest nations, ought to be interested in the question of the\nideas that formed and were expressed by that elaborate Jewish ritual. In\nthe present case, the signification is plain enough. That which, in one\naspect, is a peace-offering reconciling to God, in another aspect is the\nnourishment and the joy of the hearts that accept it. And so the work of\nJesus Christ has two distinct phases of application, according as we\nthink of it as being offered to God or appropriated by men. In the one\ncase it is our peace; in the other it is our food and our life. If we\nglance for a moment at the marvellous picture of suffering and\ndesolation in the previous portion of this psalm, which sounds the very\ndepths of both, we shall understand more touchingly what it is on which\nChristian hearts are to feed. The desolation that spoke in 'Why hast\nThou forsaken Me?' the consciousness of rejection and reproach, of\nmockery and contempt, which wailed, 'All that see Me laugh Me to scorn;\nthey shoot out the lip; they shake the head, saying, \"He trusted on the\nLord that He would deliver Him; let Him deliver Him, seeing He\ndelighteth in Him\"'; the physical sufferings which are the very picture\nof crucifixion, so as that the whole reads liker history than prophecy,\nin 'All My bones are out of joint; My strength is dried up like a\npotsherd; and My tongue cleaveth to My jaws'; the actual passing into\nthe darkness of the grave, which is expressed in 'Thou hast brought Me\ninto the dust of death'; and even the minute correspondence, so\ninexplicable upon any hypothesis except that it is direct prophecy,\nwhich is found in 'They part My garments among them, and cast lots upon\nMy vesture'--these be the viands, not without bitter herbs, that are\nlaid on the table which Christ spreads for us. They are parts of the\nsacrifice that reconciles to God. Offered to Him they make our peace.\nThey are parts and elements of the food of our spirits. Appropriated and\npartaken of by us they make our strength and our life.\n\nBrethren! there is little food, there is little impulse, little strength\nfor obedience, little gladness or peace of heart to be got from a Christ\nwho is _not_ a Sacrifice. If we would know how much He may be to us, as\nthe nourishment of our best life, and as the source of our purest and\npermanent gladness, we must, first of all, look upon Him as the Offering\nfor the world's sin, and then as the very Life and Bread of our souls.\nThe Christ that feeds the world is the Christ that died for the world.\n\nHence our Lord Himself, most eminently in one great and profound\ndiscourse, has set forth, not only that He is the Bread of God which\n'came down from heaven,' but that His flesh and His blood are such, and\nthe separation between the two in the discourse, as in the memorial\nrite, indicates that there has come the violent separation of death, and\nthat thereby He becomes the life of humanity.\n\nSo my text, and the whole series of Old Testament representations in\nwhich the blessings of the Kingdom are set forth as a feast, and the\nparables of the New Testament in which a similar representation is\ncontained, do all converge upon, and receive their deepest meaning from,\nthat one central thought that the peace-offering for the world is the\nfood of the world.\n\nWe see, hence, the connection between these great spiritual ideas and\nthe central act of Christian worship. The Lord's Supper simply says by\nact what my text says in words. I know no difference between the rite\nand the parable, except that the one is addressed to the eye and the\nother to the ear. The rite is an acted parable; the parable is a spoken\nrite. And when Jesus Christ, in the great discourse to which I have\nreferred, dilates at length upon the 'eating of His flesh and the\ndrinking of His blood' as being the condition of spiritual life, He is\nnot referring to the Lord's Supper, but the discourse and the rite refer\nboth to the same spiritual truth. One is a symbol; the other is a\nsaying; and symbol and saying mean just the same thing. The saying does\nnot refer to the symbol, but to that to which the symbol refers. It\nseems to me that one of the greatest dangers which now threaten\nEvangelical Christianity is the strange and almost inexplicable\nrecrudescence of Sacramentarianism in this generation to which those\nChristian communities are contributing, however reluctantly and\nunconsciously, who say there is something more than commemorative\nsymbols in the bread and wine of the Lord's table. If once you admit\nthat, it seems, in my humble judgment, that you open the door to the\nwhole flood of evils which the history of the Church declares have come\nwith the Sacramentarian hypothesis. And we must take our stand, as I\nbelieve, upon the plain, intelligible thoughts--Baptism is a declaratory\nsymbol, and nothing more; the Lord's Supper is a commemorative symbol,\nand nothing more; except that both are acts of obedience to the\nenjoining Lord. When we stand there we can face all priestly\nsuperstitions, and say, 'Jesus I know; and Paul I know; but who are ye?'\n'The meek shall eat and be satisfied,' and the food of the world is the\nsuffering Messiah.\n\nBut what have we to say about the act expressed in the text? 'The meek\nshall eat.' I do not desire to dwell at any length upon the thought of\nthe process by which this food of the world becomes ours, in this\nsermon. But there are two points which perhaps may be regarded as\nvarious aspects of one, on which I would like to say just a sentence or\ntwo. Of course, the translation of the 'eating' of my text into\nspiritual reality is simply that we partake of the food of our spirits\nby the act of faith in Jesus Christ. But whilst that is so, let me put\nemphasis, in a sentence, upon the thought that personal appropriation,\nand making the world's food mine, by my own individual act, is the\ncondition on which alone I get any good from it. It is possible to die\nof starvation at the door of a granary. It is possible to have a table\nspread with all that is needful, and yet to set one's teeth, and lock\none's lips, and receive no strength and no gladness from the rich\nprovision. 'Eat' means, at any rate, incorporate with myself, take into\nmy very own lips, masticate with my very own teeth, swallow down by my\nvery own act, and so make part of my physical frame. And that is what we\nhave to do with Jesus Christ, or He is nothing to us. 'Eat'; claim your\npart in the universal blessing; see that it becomes yours by your own\ntaking of it into the very depths of your heart. And then, and then\nonly, will it become your food.\n\nAnd how are we to do that if, day in and day out, and week in and week\nout, and year in and year out, with some of us, there be scarce a\nthought turned to Him; scarce a desire winging its way to Him; scarce\none moment of quiet contemplation of these great truths. We have to\nruminate, we have to meditate; we have to make conscious and frequent\nefforts to bring before the mind, in the first place, and then before\nthe heart and all the sensitive, emotional, and voluntary nature, the\ngreat truths on which our salvation rests. In so far as we do that we\nget good out of them; in so far as we fail to do it, we may call\nourselves Christians, and attend to religious observances, and be\nmembers of churches, and diligent in good works, and all the rest of it,\nbut nothing passes from Him to us, and we starve even whilst we call\nourselves guests at His table.\n\nOh! the average Christian life of this day is a strange thing; very,\nvery little of it has the depth that comes from quiet communion with\nJesus Christ; and very little of it has the joyful consciousness of\nstrength that comes from habitual reception into the heart of the grace\nthat He brings. What is the good of all your profession unless it brings\nyou to that? If a coroner's jury were to sit upon many of us--and we are\ndead enough to deserve it--the verdict would be, 'Died of starvation.'\n'The meek shall eat,' but what about the professing Christians that feed\ntheir souls upon anything, everything rather than upon the Christ whom\nthey say they trust and serve?\n\nII. And now let me say a word, in the second place, about the rich\nfruition of this feast.\n\n'The meek shall be satisfied.' 'Satisfied!' Who in the world is? And if\nwe are not, why are we not? Jesus Christ, in the facts of His death and\nresurrection--for His resurrection as well as His death are included in\nthe psalm--brings to us all that our circumstances, relationships, and\ninward condition can require.\n\nThink of what that death, as the sacrifice for the world's sin, does. It\nsets all right in regard to our relation to God. It reveals to us a God\nof infinite love. It provides a motive, an impulse, and a Pattern for\nall life. It abolishes death, and it gives ample scope for the loftiest\nand most exuberant hopes that a man can cherish. And surely these are\nenough to satisfy the seeking spirit.\n\nBut go to the other end, and think, not of what Christ's work does for\nus, but of what we need to have done for us. What do you and I want to\nbe satisfied? It would take a long time to go over the catalogue; let me\nbriefly run through some of the salient points of it. We want, for the\nintellect, which is the regal part of man, though it be not the highest,\ntruth which is certain, comprehensive, and inexhaustible; the first, to\nprovide anchorage; the second, to meet and regulate and unify all\nthought and life; and the last, to allow room for endless research and\nceaseless progress. And in that fact that the Eternal Son of the Eternal\nFather took upon Himself human nature, lived, died, rose, and reigns at\nGod's right hand, I believe there lie the seeds of all truth, except the\npurely physical and material, which men need. Everything is there; every\ntruth about God, about man, about duty, about a future, about society;\neverything that the world needs is laid up in germ in that great gospel\nof our salvation. If a man will take it for the foundation of his\nbeliefs and the guide of his thinkings, he will find his understanding\nis satisfied, because it grasps the personal Truth who liveth, and is\nwith us for ever.\n\nOur hearts crave, however imperfect their love may be, a perfect love;\nand a perfect love means one untinged by any dash of selfishness,\nincapable of any variation or eclipse, all-knowing, all-pitying,\nall-powerful. We have made experience of precious loves that die. We\nknow of loves that change, that grow cold, that misconstrue, that may\nhave tears but have no hands. We know of 'loves' that are only a fine\nname for animal passions, and are twice cursed, cursing them that give\nand them that take. The happiest will admit, and the lonely will\nachingly feel, how we all want for satisfaction a love that cannot fail,\nthat can help, that beareth all things, and that can do all things. We\nhave it in Jesus Christ, and the Cross is the pledge thereof.\n\nConscience wants pacifying, cleansing, enlightening, directing, and we\nget all these in the good news of One that has died for us, and that\nlives to be our Lord. The will needs authority which is not force. And\nwhere is there an authority so constraining in its sweetness and so\nsweet in its constraint as in those silken bonds which are stronger than\niron fetters? Hope, imagination, and all other of our powers or\nweaknesses, our gifts or needs, are satisfied when they feed on Christ.\nIf we feed upon anything else it turns to ashes that break our teeth and\nmake our palates gritty, and have no nourishment in them. We shall be\n'for ever roaming with a hungry heart' unless we take our places at the\nfeast on the one sacrifice for the world's peace.\n\nIII. I can say but a word as to the guests.\n\nIt is 'the meek' who eat. The word translated 'meek' has a wider and\ndeeper meaning than that. 'Meek' refers, in our common language, mainly\nto men's demeanour to one another; but the expression here goes deeper.\nIt means both 'afflicted' and 'lowly'--the right use of affliction being\nto bow men, and they that bow themselves are those who are fit to come\nto Christ's feast. There is a very remarkable contrast between the words\nof my text and those that follow a verse or two afterwards. 'The meek\nshall eat and be satisfied,' says the text. And then close upon its\nheels comes, 'All those that be fat upon earth shall eat.' That is to\nsay, the lofty and proud have to come down to the level of the lowly,\nand take indiscriminate places at the table with the poor and the\nstarving, which, being turned into plain English is just this--the one\nthing that hinders a man from partaking of the fulness of Christ's\nfeeding grace is self-sufficiency, and the absence of a sense of need.\nThey that 'hunger and thirst after righteousness shall be filled'; and\nthey that come, knowing themselves to be poor and needy, and humbly\nconsenting to accept a gratuitous feast of charity--they, and only they,\ndo get the rich provisions.\n\nYou are shut out because you shut yourselves out. They that do not know\nthemselves to be hungry have no ears for the dinner-bell. They that feel\nthe pangs of starvation and know that their own cupboards are empty,\nthey are those who will turn to the table that is spread in the\nwilderness, and there find a 'feast of fat things.'\n\nAnd so, dear friends! when He calls, do not let us make excuses, but\nrather listen to that voice that says to us, 'Why do you spend your\nmoney for that which is not bread, and your labour for that which\nsatisfieth not.... Incline your ear unto Me; hear, and your soul shall\nlive.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE SHEPHERD KING OF ISRAEL\n\n\n    'The Lord is my shepherd: I shall not want. 2. He maketh me to lie\n    down in green pastures: He leadeth me beside the still waters. 3. He\n    restoreth my soul: He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for\n    His name's sake. 4. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the\n    shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod\n    and Thy staff, they comfort me. 5. Thou preparest a table before me\n    in the presence of mine enemies: Thou anointest my head with oil; my\n    cup runneth over. 6. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all\n    the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for\n    ever.'--PSALM xxiii. 1-6.\n\nThe king who had been the shepherd-boy, and had been taken from the\nquiet sheep-cotes to rule over Israel, sings this little psalm of Him\nwho is the true Shepherd and King of men. We do not know at what period\nof David's life it was written, but it sounds as if it were the work of\nhis later years. There is a fulness of experience about it, and a tone\nof subdued, quiet confidence which speaks of a heart mellowed by years,\nand of a faith made sober by many a trial. A young man would not write\nso calmly, and a life which was just opening would not afford material\nfor such a record of God's guardianship in all changing circumstances.\n\nIf, then, we think of the psalm as the work of David's later years, is\nit not very beautiful to see the old king looking back with such vivid\nand loving remembrance to his childhood's occupation, and bringing up\nagain to memory in his palace the green valleys, the gentle streams, the\ndark glens where he had led his flocks in the old days; very beautiful\nto see him traversing all the stormy years of warfare and rebellion, of\ncrime and sorrow, which lay between, and finding in all God's guardian\npresence and gracious guidance? The faith which looks back and says, 'It\nis all very good,' is not less than that which looks forward and says,\n'Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.'\n\nThere is nothing difficult of understanding in the psalm. The train of\nthought is clear and obvious. The experiences which it details are\ncommon, the emotions it expresses simple and familiar. The tears that\nhave been dried, the fears that have been dissipated, by this old song;\nthe love and thankfulness which have found in them their best\nexpression, prove the worth of its simple words. It lives in most of our\nmemories. Let us try to vivify it in our hearts, by pondering it for a\nlittle while together now.\n\nThe psalm falls into two halves, in both of which the same general\nthought of God's guardian care is presented, though under different\nillustrations, and with some variety of detail. The first half sets Him\nforth as a shepherd, and us as the sheep of His pasture. The second\ngives Him as the Host, and us as the guests at His table, and the\ndwellers in His house.\n\nFirst, then, consider that picture of the divine Shepherd and His\nleading of His flock.\n\nIt occupies the first four verses of the psalm. There is a double\nprogress of thought in it. It rises, from memories of the past, and\nexperiences of the present care of God, to hope for the future. 'The\nLord is my Shepherd'--'I will fear no evil.' Then besides this progress\nfrom what was and is, to what will be, there is another string, so to\nspeak, on which the gems are threaded. The various methods of God's\nleading of His flock, or rather, we should say, the various regions into\nwhich He leads them, are described in order. These are Rest, Work,\nSorrow--and this series is so combined with the order of time already\nadverted to, as that the past and the present are considered as the\nregions of rest and of work, while the future is anticipated as having\nin it the valley of the shadow of death.\n\nFirst, God leads His sheep into rest. 'He maketh me to lie down in green\npastures, He leadeth me beside the still waters.' It is the hot\nnoontide, and the desert lies baking in the awful glare, and every stone\non the hills of Judaea burns the foot that touches it. But in that\npanting, breathless hour, here is a little green glen, with a quiet\nbrooklet, and moist lush herb-age all along its course, and great stones\nthat fling a black shadow over the dewy grass at their base; and there\nwould the shepherd lead his flock, while the sunbeams, like swords,' are\npiercing everything beyond that hidden covert. Sweet silence broods\nthere, The sheep feed and drink, and couch in cool lairs till he calls\nthem forth again. So God leads His children.\n\nThe psalm puts the rest and refreshment _first_, as being the most\nmarked characteristic of God's dealings. After all, it is so. The years\nare years of unbroken continuity of outward blessings. The reign of\nafflictions is ordinarily measured by days. 'Weeping endures for a\nnight.' It is a rainy climate where half the days have rain in them; and\nthat is an unusually troubled life of which it can with any truth be\naffirmed that there has been as much darkness as sunshine in it.\n\nBut it is not mainly of outward blessings that the Psalmist is thinking.\nThey are precious chiefly as emblems of the better spiritual gifts; and\nit is not an accommodation of his words, but is the appreciation of\ntheir truest spirit, when we look upon them, as the instinct of devout\nhearts has ever done, as expressing both God's gift of temporal mercies,\nand His gift of spiritual good, of which higher gift all the lower are\nmeant to be significant and symbolic. Thus regarded, the image describes\nthe sweet rest of the soul in communion with God, in whom alone the\nhungry heart finds food that satisfies, and from whom alone the thirsty\nsoul drinks draughts deep and limpid enough.\n\nThis rest and refreshment has for its consequence the restoration of the\nsoul, which includes in it both the invigoration of the natural life by\nthe outward sort of these blessings, and the quickening and restoration\nof the spiritual life by the inward feeding upon God and repose in Him.\n\nThe soul thus restored is then led on another stage; 'He leadeth me in\nthe paths of righteousness for His name's sake,'--that is to say, God\nguides us into work.\n\nThe quiet mercies of the preceding verse are not in themselves the end\nof our Shepherd's guidance; they are means to an end, and that is--work.\nLife is not a fold for the sheep to lie down in, but a road for them to\nwalk on. All our blessings of every sort are indeed given us for our\ndelight. They will never fit us for the duties for which they are\nintended to prepare us, unless they first be thoroughly enjoyed. The\nhighest good they yield is only reached through the lower one. But,\nthen, when joy fills the heart, and life is bounding in the veins, we\nhave to learn that these are granted, not for pleasure only, but for\npleasure in order to power. We get them, not to let them pass away like\nwaste steam puffed into empty air, but that we may use them to drive the\nwheels of life. The waters of happiness are not for a luxurious bath\nwhere a man may lie, till, like flax steeped too long, the very fibre be\nrotted out of him; a quick plunge will brace him, and he will come out\nrefreshed for work. Rest is to fit for work, work is to sweeten rest.\n\nAll this is emphatically true of the spiritual life. Its seasons of\ncommunion, its hours on the mount, are to prepare for the sore sad work\nin the plain; and he is not the wisest disciple who tries to make the\nMount of Transfiguration the abiding place for himself and his Lord.\n\nIt is not well that our chief object should be to enjoy the consolations\nof religion; it is better to seek first to do the duties enjoined by\nreligion. Our first question should be, not, How may I enjoy God? but,\nHow may I glorify Him? 'A single eye to His glory' means that even our\ncomfort and joy in religious exercises shall be subordinated, and (if\nneed were) postponed, to the doing of His will. While, on the one hand,\nthere is no more certain means of enjoying Him than that of humbly\nseeking to walk in the ways of His commandments, on the other hand,\nthere is nothing more evanescent in its nature than a mere emotion, even\nthough it be that of joy in God, unless it be turned into a spring of\naction for God. Such emotions, like photographs, vanish from the heart\nunless they be fixed. Work for God is the way to fix them. Joy in God is\nthe strength of work for God, but work for God is the perpetuation of\njoy in God.\n\nHere is the figurative expression of the great evangelical principle,\nthat works of righteousness must follow, not precede, the restoration of\nthe soul. We are justified not by works, but for works, or, as the\nApostle puts it in a passage which sounds like an echo of this psalm, we\nare 'created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before\nordained _that we should walk in them_.' The basis of obedience is the\nsense of salvation. We work not _for_ the assurance of acceptance and\nforgiveness, but _from_ it. First the restored soul, then the paths of\nrighteousness for _His_ name's sake who has restored me, and restored me\nthat I may be like Him.\n\nBut there is yet another region through which the varied experience of\nthe Christian carries him, besides those of rest and of work. God leads\nHis people through sorrow. 'Yea, though I walk through the valley of the\nshadow of death, I will fear no evil.'\n\nThe 'valley of the shadow of death' does not only mean the dark approach\nto the dark dissolution of soul and body, but any and every gloomy\nvalley of weeping through which we have to pass. Such sunless gorges we\nhave all to traverse at some time or other. It is striking that the\nPsalmist puts the sorrow, which is as certainly characteristic of our\nlot as the rest or the work, into the future. Looking back he sees none.\nMemory has softened down all the past into one uniform tone, as the\nmellowing distance wraps in one solemn purple the mountains which, when\nclose to them, have many a barren rock and gloomy rift, All behind is\ngood. And, building on this hope, he looks forward with calmness, and\nfeels that no evil shall befall.\n\nBut it is never given to human heart to meditate of the future without\nsome foreboding. And when 'Hope enchanted smiles,' with the light of the\nfuture in her blue eyes, there is ever something awful in their depths,\nas if they saw some dark visions behind the beauty. Some evils may come;\nsome will probably come; one at least is sure to come. However bright\nmay be the path, somewhere on it, perhaps just round that turning, sits\nthe 'shadow feared of man.' So there is never hope only in any heart\nthat wisely considers the future. But to the Christian heart there may\nbe this--the conviction that sorrow, when it comes, will not harm,\nbecause God will be with us; and the conviction that the Hand which\nguides us into the dark valley, will guide us through it and up out of\nit. Yes, strange as it may sound, the presence of Him who sends the\nsorrow is the best help to bear it. The assurance that the Hand which\nstrikes is the Hand which binds up, makes the stroke a blessing, sucks\nthe poison out of the wound of sorrow, and turns the rod which smites\ninto the staff to lean on.\n\nThe second portion of this psalm gives us substantially the same\nthoughts under a different image. It considers God as the host, and us\nas the guests at His table and the dwellers in His house.\n\nIn this illustration, which includes the remaining verses, we have, as\nbefore, the food and rest, the journey and the suffering. We have also,\nas before, memory and present experience issuing in hope. But it is all\nintensified. The necessity and the mercy are alike presented in brighter\ncolours; the want is greater, the supply greater, the hope for the\nfuture on earth brighter; and, above all, while the former set of images\nstopped at the side of the grave, and simply refused to fear, here the\nvision goes on beyond the earthly end; and as the hope comes brightly\nout, that all the weary wanderings will end in the peace of the Father's\nhouse, the absence of fear is changed into the presence of triumphant\nconfidence, and the resignation which, at the most, simply bore to look\nunfaltering into the depth of the narrow house, becomes the faith which\nplainly sees the open gate of the everlasting home.\n\nGod supplies our wants in the very midst of strife. 'Thou preparest a\ntable before me in the presence of mine enemies. Thou anointest my head\nwith oil. My cup runneth over.' Before, it was food and rest first, work\nafterwards. Now it Is more than work--it is conflict. And the mercy is\nmore strikingly portrayed, as being granted not only _before toil_, but\n_in warfare_. Life is a sore fight; but to the Christian man, in spite\nof all the tumult, life is a festal banquet. There stand the enemies,\nringing him round with cruel eyes, waiting to be let slip upon him like\neager dogs round the poor beast of the chase. But for all that, here is\nspread a table in the wilderness, made ready by invisible hands; and the\ngrim-eyed foe is held back in the leash till the servant of God has fed\nand been strengthened. This is our condition--always the foe, always the\ntable.\n\nWhat sort of a meal should that be? The soldiers who eat and drink, and\nare drunken in the presence of the enemy, like the Saxons before\nHastings, what will become of them? Drink the cup of gladness, as men do\nwhen their foe is at their side, looking askance over the rim, and with\none hand on the sword, 'ready, aye ready,' against treachery and\nsurprise. But the presence of the danger should make the feast more\nenjoyable too, by the moderation it enforces, and by the contrast it\naffords--as to sailors on shore, or soldiers in a truce. Joy may grow on\nthe very face of danger, as a slender rose-bush flings its bright sprays\nand fragrant blossoms over the lip of a cataract; and that not the wild\nmirth of men in a pestilence, with their 'Let us eat and drink, for\nto-morrow we die,' but the simple-hearted gladness of those who have\npreserved the invaluable childhood gift of living in the present moment,\nbecause they know that to-morrow will bring God, whatever it brings, and\nnot take away His care and love, whatever it takes away.\n\nThis, then, is the form under which the experience of the past is\npresented in the second portion,--joy in conflict, rest and food even in\nthe strife. Upon that there is built a hope which transcends that in the\nprevious portion of the psalm. As to this life, 'Goodness and mercy\nshall follow us.' This is more than 'I will fear no evil.' That said,\nsorrow is not evil if God be with us. This says, sorrow is mercy. The\none is hope looking mainly at outward circumstances, the other is hope\nlearning the spirit and meaning of them all. These two angels of\nGod--Goodness and Mercy--shall follow and encamp around the pilgrim. The\nenemies whom God held back while he feasted, may pursue, but will not\novertake him. They will be distanced sooner or later; but the white\nwings of these messengers of the covenant will never be far away from\nthe journeying child, and the air will often be filled with the music of\ntheir comings, and their celestial weapons will glance around him in all\nthe fight, and their soft arms will bear him up over all the rough ways,\nand up higher at last to the throne.\n\nSo much for the earthly future. But higher than all that rises the\nconfidence of the closing words, 'I shall dwell in the house of the Lord\nfor ever.' This should be at once the crown of all our hopes for the\nfuture, and the one great lesson taught us by all the vicissitudes of\nlife. The sorrows and the joys, the journeying and the rest, the\ntemporary repose and the frequent struggles, all these should make us\n_sure_ that there is an end which will interpret them all, to which they\nall point, for which they may all prepare. We get the table in the\nwilderness here. It is as when the son of some great king comes back\nfrom foreign soil to his father's dominions, and is welcomed at every\nstage in his journey to the capital with pomp of festival, and\nmessengers from the throne, until he enters at last his palace home,\nwhere the travel-stained robe is laid aside, and he sits down with his\nfather at his table. God provides for us here in the presence of our\nenemies; it is wilderness food we get, manna from heaven, and water from\nthe rock. We eat in haste, staff in hand, and standing round the meal.\nBut yonder we sit down with the Shepherd, the Master of the house, at\nHis table in His kingdom. We put off the pilgrim-dress, and put on the\nroyal robe; we lay aside the sword, and clasp the palm. Far off, and\nlost to sight, are all the enemies. We fear no change. We 'go no more\nout.'\n\nThe sheep are led by many a way, sometimes through sweet meadows,\nsometimes limping along sharp-flinted, dusty highways, sometimes high up\nover rough, rocky mountain-passes, sometimes down through deep gorges,\nwith no sunshine in their gloom; but they are ever being led to one\nplace, and when the hot day is over they are gathered into one fold, and\nthe sinking sun sees them safe, where no wolf can come, nor any robber\nclimb up any more, but all shall rest for ever under the Shepherd's eye.\n\nBrethren! can you take this psalm for yours? Have you returned unto\nChrist, the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls? Oh! let Him, the Shepherd\nof Israel, and the Lamb of God, one of the fold and yet the Guide and\nDefender of it, human and divine, bear you away from the dreary\nwilderness whither He has come seeking you. He will carry you rejoicing\nto the fold, if only you will trust yourselves to His gentle arm. He\nwill restore your soul. He will lead you and keep you from all dangers,\nguard you from every sin, strengthen you when you come to die, and bring\nyou to the fair plains beyond that narrow gorge of frowning rock. Then\nthis sweet psalm shall receive its highest fulfilment, for then 'they\nshall hunger no more, neither shall they thirst any more, neither shall\nthe sun light on them, nor any heat, for the Lamb which is in the midst\nof the Throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains\nof waters, and God shall wipe all tears from their eyes.'\n\n\n\n\nA GREAT QUESTION AND ITS ANSWER\n\n\n    'Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? and who shall stand in\n    His holy place?'--PSALM xxiv. 3.\n\nThe psalm from which these words are taken flashes up into new beauty,\nif we suppose it to have been composed in connection with the bringing\nof the Ark into the Temple, or for some similar occasion. Whether it is\nDavid's or not is a matter of very small consequence. But if we look at\nthe psalm as a whole, we can scarcely fail to see that some such\noccasion underlies it. So just exercise your imaginations for a moment,\nand think of the long procession of white-robed priests bearing the Ark,\nand followed by the joyous multitude chanting as they ascended, 'Who\nshall ascend into the hill of the Lord, or who shall stand in His holy\nplace?' They are bethinking themselves of the qualifications needed for\nthat which they are now doing. They reach the gates, which we must\nsuppose to have been closed that they might be opened, and from the\nhalf-chorus outside there peals out the summons, 'Lift up your heads, O\nye gates! and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of Glory\nshall come in.' Then from within another band of singers answers with\nthe question, 'Who is this King of Glory' who thus demands entrance? And\ntriumphantly the reply rings out, 'The Lord, strong and mighty; the\nLord, mighty in battle.' Still reluctant, the question is put again,\n'Who is this King of Glory?' and the answer is given once more, 'The\nLord of hosts, He is the King of Glory.' There is no reference in the\nsecond answer to 'battle.' The conflicts are over, and the dominion is\nestablished, and at the reiterated summons the ancient gates roll back\non their hinges, burst as by a strong blow, and Jehovah enters into His\nrest, He and the Ark of His strength. If that is the general connection\nof the psalm--and I think you will admit that it adds to its beauty and\ndramatic force if we suppose it so--then this introductory question,\nsung as the procession climbed the steep, had realised what was needed\nfor those who should get the entrance that they sought, and comes to be\na very significant and important one. I deal now with the question and\nits answer.\n\nI. The question of questions.\n\nThat question lies deep in all men's hearts, and underlies sacrifices\nand priesthoods and asceticisms and tortures of all sorts, and is the\ninner meaning of Hindoos swinging with hooks in their backs, and others\nof them measuring the road to the temple by prostrating themselves every\nyard or two as they advance. These self-torturers are all asking the\nsame question: 'Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord?' It\nsometimes rises in the thoughts of the most degraded, and it is present\nalways with some of the better and nobler of men.\n\nNow, there are three places in the Old Testament where substantially the\nsame question is asked. There is this psalm of ours; there is another\npsalm which is all but a duplicate, which begins with 'Lord, who shall\nabide in Thy tabernacle? who shall dwell in Thy holy hill?' And there is\nanother shape into which the question is cast by the fervent and\nsomewhat gloomy imagination of one of the prophets, who puts it thus:\n'Who among us shall dwell with the devouring fire? Who shall dwell with\nthe everlasting burnings?' There never was a more disastrous\nmisapplication of Scripture than the popular idea that these two last\nquestions suggest the possibility of a creature being exposed to the\ntorments of future punishment. They have nothing to do with that. 'Who\namong us shall dwell with the devouring fire?' If you want a commentary,\nremember the words, 'Our God is a consuming fire.' That puts us on the\nright track, if we needed any putting on it, for answering this\nquestion, not in the gruesome and ghastly sense in which some people\ntake it, but in all the grandeur of Isaiah's thought. He sees God as\n'the everlasting burnings.' Fire is the emblem of life as well as of\ndeath; fire is the means of quickening as well as of destroying; and\nwhen we speak of Him as 'the everlasting burnings' we are reminded of\nthe bush in the desert, where His own signature was set, 'burning and\nnot consumed.'\n\nSo the question in all the three places referred to is substantially the\nsame--and what does it indicate? It indicates the deep consciousness\nthat men have that they need to be in that home, that for life and peace\nand blessedness, they must get somehow to the side of God, and be quiet\nthere, as children in their Father's house. We all know that this is\ntrue, whether our life is regulated by it or not. Very deep in every\nman's conscience, if he will attend to its voice, there is that which\nsays, 'You are a pilgrim and a sojourner, and homeless and desolate\nuntil you nestle beneath the outspread wings in the Holy Place, and are\na denizen of God's house.'\n\nThe question further suggests another. The universal\nconsciousness--which is, I believe, universal--though it is overlain and\nstifled by many of us, and neglected and set at nought by others--is\nthat this fellowship with God, which is indispensable to a man's peace,\nis impossible to a man's impurity. So the question raises the thought of\nthe consciousness of sin which comes creeping over a man when he is\nsometimes feeling after God, and seems to batter him in the face, and\nfling him back into the outer darkness, 'How can I enter in there?' and\nconscience has no answer, and the world has none, and as I shall have to\nsay presently, the answer which the Old Testament, as Law, gives is\nalmost as hopeless as the answer which conscience gives. But at all\nevents that this question should rise and insist upon being answered as\nit does proves these three things--man's need of God, man's sense of\nGod's purity, man's consciousness of his own sin.\n\nAnd what does that ascent to the hill of the Lord include? All the\npresent life, for, unless we are 'dwelling in the house of the Lord all\nthe days of our lives beholding His beauty and inquiring in His Temple,'\nthen we have little in life that is worth the having. The old Arab right\nof claiming hospitality of the Sheikh into whose tent the fugitive ran\nis used in Scripture over and over again to express the relation in\nwhich alone it is blessed for a man to live--namely, as a guest of\nGod's. That is peace. That is all that we require, to sit at His\nfireside, if I may so say, to claim the rites of hospitality, which the\nArab chief would not refuse to the veriest tatterdemalion, or the\ngreatest enemy that he knew, if he came into his tent and sought it. God\nsits in the door of His tent, and is ready to welcome us.\n\nThe ascent to the hill of the Lord means more than that. It includes\nalso the future. I suppose that when men think about another\nworld--which I am afraid none of us think about as often as we ought to\ndo, in order to make the best of this one--the question, in some shape\nor other, which this band of singers lifted up, rises to their lips,\n'Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord, or who shall stand in His\nHoly Place' beyond the stars? Well, brethren! that is the question which\nconcerns us all, more than anything else in the world, to have clearly\nand rightly answered.\n\nII. Note the answer to this great question.\n\nThe psalm answers it in an instructive fashion, which we take as it\nstands. 'He that hath clean hands and a pure heart.' Let me measure\nmyself by the side of that requirement. 'Clean hands?'--are mine clean?\n'And a pure heart?'--what about mine? 'Who hath not lifted up his soul\nunto vanity'--and where have my desires and thoughts so often gone? 'Nor\nsworn deceitfully.' These are the qualifications that our psalm dashes\ndown in front of us when we ask the question.\n\nThe other two occasions to which I have referred, where the same\nquestion is put, give substantially the same answer. It might be\ninteresting, if one had time, or this was the place, to look at the\ndifferences in the replies, as suggesting the slight differences in the\nideal of a good man as presented by the various writers, but that must\nbe left untouched now. Taking these four conditions that are laid down\nhere, we come to this, that psalmist and prophet with one voice say that\nsame solemn thing: 'Holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.'\nThere is no faltering in the answer, and it is an answer to which the\ndepths of conscience say 'Yes.' We all admit, when we are wise, that for\ncommunion with God on earth, and for treading the golden pavements of\nthat city into which nothing that is unclean shall enter, absolute\nholiness is necessary. Let no man deceive himself--that stands the\nirreversible, necessary condition.\n\nWell, then, is anybody to go in? Let us read on in our psalm. An\nimpossible requirement is laid down, broad and stern and unmistakable.\nBut is that all? 'He shall receive a blessing from the Lord, and\nrighteousness from the God of his salvation.' So, then, the impossible\nrequirement is made possible as a gift to be received. And although I do\nnot know that this psalmist, in the twilight of revelation, saw all that\nwas involved in what he sang, he had caught a glimpse of this great\nthought, that what God required, God would give, and that our way to get\nthe necessary, impossible condition realised in ourselves is to\n'receive' it. 'He shall receive ... righteousness from the God of his\nsalvation.' Now, do you not see how, like some great star, trembling\ninto the field of the telescope, and sending arrowy beams before it to\nannounce its approach, the great central Christian truth is here\ndawning, germinant, prophesying its full rising? And the truth is this,\n'that I might be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, but that\nwhich is of God through Christ.' Ah, brethren! impossibilities become\npossible when God comes and says, 'I give thee that which thou canst not\nhave.' The old prophet asked the question, 'What doth God require of\nthee?' and his answer was, 'That thou shouldst do justice, and love\nmercy, and walk humbly with thy God.' If he had gone on to ask a better\nquestion, 'What does God give thee?' he would have said what all the New\nTestament says, 'He gives what He commands, and He bestows before He\nrequires.' And so in Jesus Christ there is the forgiveness that blots\nout the past, and there is the new life bestowed that will develop the\nrighteousness far beyond our reach. And thus the question which evoked\nfirst the answer that might drive us to despair, evokes next a response\nthat commands us to hope.\n\nBut that is not all, for the psalm goes on: 'This is the generation of\nthem that seek Him, that seek Thy face.' Yes; couched in germ there lies\nin that last word the great truth which is expanded in the New\nTestament, like a beech-leaf folded up in its little brown sheath\nthrough all the winter, and ready to break and give out its green\nplumelets as soon as the warm rains and sunshine of spring come. 'They\nthat seek Him'--'if thou seek Him He will be found of thee.' The\nrequirement of righteousness, as I have said, is not abolished by the\nGospel, as some people seem to think that it substitutes faith for\nrighteousness; but it is made possible by the Gospel which through faith\ngives righteousness. And what the Psalmist meant by 'seeking' we\nChristian people mean by 'faith.' Earnest desire and confident\napplication to Him are sure to obtain righteousness. To these there will\nnever be returned a refusing answer. 'I have never said to any of the\nseed of Jacob, seek ye Me in vain.' So, brethren! if we seek we shall\nreceive; if we receive we shall be holy, if we are holy we shall dwell\nwith God, in sweet and blessed communion, and be denizens of His house,\nand sit together in heavenly places with Him all the days of our lives,\nand then shall pass, when 'goodness and mercy have followed us all the\ndays of our lives,' and 'dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE GOD WHO DWELLS WITH MEN\n\n\n    'Lift up your heads, O ye gates: and be ye lift up, ye everlasting\n    doors; and the King of glory shall come in. 8. Who is this King of\n    glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. 9.\n    Lift up your heads, O ye gates; even lift them up, ye everlasting\n    doors; and the King of glory shall come in. 10. Who is this King of\n    glory? The Lord of hosts, He is the King of glory.'\n    --PSALM xxiv. 7-10.\n\nThis whole psalm was probably composed at the time of the bringing of\nthe ark into the city of Zion. The former half was chanted as the\nprocession wound its way up the hillside. It mainly consists of the\nanswer to the question 'Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord?' and\ndescribes the kind of men that dwell with God, and the way by which they\nobtain their purity.\n\nThis second half of our psalm is probably to be thought of as being\nchanted when the procession had reached the summit of the hill and stood\nbefore the barred gates of the ancient Jebusite city. It is mainly in\nanswer to the question, 'Who is this King of Glory?' and is the\ndescription of the God that dwells with men, and the meaning of His\ndwelling with them.\n\nWe are to conceive of a couple of half choirs, the one within, the other\nwithout the mountain hold. The advancing choir summons the gates to open\nin the grand words: 'Lift up your heads, O ye gates! even lift them up,\nye everlasting doors, and the King of Glory shall come in.' Their lofty\nlintels are too low for His head to pass beneath; so they have to be\nlifted that He may find entrance. They are 'everlasting doors,' grey\nwith antiquity, hoary with age. They have looked down, perhaps, upon\nMelchizedek, King of Salem, as he went forth in the morning twilight of\nhistory to greet the patriarch. But in all the centuries they have never\nseen such a King as this King of Glory, the true King of Israel who now\ndesires entrance.\n\nThe answer to the summons comes from the choir within. 'Who is this King\nof Glory?' the question represents ignorance and possible hesitation, as\nif the pagan inhabitants of the recently conquered city knew nothing of\nthe God of Israel, and recognised no authority in His name. Of course,\nthe dramatic form of question and answer is intended to give additional\nforce to the proclamation as by God Himself of the Covenant name, the\nproper name of Israel's God, as Baal was the name of the Canaanite's\nGod, 'the Lord strong and mighty; the Lord mighty in battle,' by whose\nwarrior power David had conquered the city, which now was summoned to\nreceive its conqueror. Therefore the summons is again rung out, 'Lift up\nyour heads, O ye gates! and the King of Glory shall come in.' And once\nmore, to express the lingering reluctance, ignorance not yet dispelled,\nsuspicion and unwilling surrender, the dramatic question is repeated,\n'Who is this King of Glory?' The answer is sharp and authoritative in\nits brevity, and we may fancy it shouted with a full-throated\nburst--'The Lord of Hosts,' who, as Captain, commands all the embattled\nenergies of earth and heaven conceived as a disciplined army. That great\nname, like a charge of dynamite, bursts the gates of brass asunder, and\nwith triumphant music the procession sweeps into the conquered city.\n\nNow these great words, throbbing with the enthusiasm at once of poetry\nand of devotion, may, I think, teach us a great deal if we ponder them.\n\nI. Notice, first, their application, their historical and original\napplication, to the King who dwelt with Israel.\n\nWe must never forget that in the Old Testament we have to do with an\nincomplete and a progressive revelation, and that if we would understand\nits significance, we must ever endeavour to ascertain to what point in\nthat progress the words before us belong. We are not to read into these\nwords New Testament depth and fulness of meaning; we are to take them\nand try to find out what they meant to David and to his people; and so\nwe shall get a firm basis for any deeper significance which we may\nhereafter see in them. The thought of God, then, in these words is\nmainly that of a God of strong and victorious energy, a warrior-God, a\nconquering King, one whose word is power, who rules amidst the armies of\nheaven, and amidst the inhabitants of earth.\n\nA brief consideration of each expression is all which can be attempted\nhere. 'Who is this King of Glory?' The first idea, then, is that of\nsovereign rule; the idea which had become more and more plain and clear\nto the national consciousness of the Hebrew with the installation of\nmonarchy amongst them. And it is very beautiful to see how David lays\nhold of that thought of God being Himself the King of Israel; and dwells\nso often in his psalms on the idea that he, poor, pale, earthly shadow,\nis but a representative and a viceroy of the true King who sits in the\nheavens. He takes off his crown and lays it before His throne and says:\n'Thou art the King of Israel, the King of Glory.'\n\nThe Old Testament meaning of that word 'glory' is a great deal more\ndefinite than the ordinary religious use of it amongst us. The 'glory of\nGod' in the Old Testament is, first and foremost, the supernatural light\nthat dwelt between the cherubim and was the manifestation and symbol of\nthe divine Presence. And next it is the sum total of all the impression\nmade upon the world by God's manifestation of Himself, the Light, of\nwhich the material and supernatural light between the cherubs was but\nthe emblem; all by which God flames and flashes Himself upon the\ntrembling and thankful heart; that glory which is substantially the same\nas the Name of the Lord. And in this brightness, lustrous and dark with\nexcess of light, this King dwells. The splendour of His regalia is the\nbrightness that emanates from Himself. He is the King of Glory.\n\nNext, we have the great Name, 'the Lord,' Jehovah, which speaks of\ntimeless, independent, unchanging, self-sufficing being. It declares\nthat He is His own cause, His own law, His own impulse, the staple from\nwhich all the links of the chain of being depend, and not Himself a\nlink, the fontal Source of all which is.\n\nWe say: 'I am that which I have become; I am that which I have been\nmade; I am that which I have inherited; I am that which circumstances\nand example and training have shaped me to be.' God says: 'I AM THAT I\nAM.' This name is also significant, not only because it proclaims\nabsolute, independent, underived, timeless being, but because it is the\nCovenant name, and speaks of the God who has come into fellowship with\nmen, and has bound Himself to a certain course of action for their\nblessing, and is thus the Lord of Israel, and the God, in a special\nmanner, of His people.\n\n'The Lord mighty in battle.' A true warrior-God, who went out in no\nmetaphorical sense, but in prose reality, fought for His people and\nsubdued the nations under them, in order that His name might be spread\nand His glory be known in the earth.\n\nAnd then, still further, 'the Lord of Hosts,' the Captain of all the\narmies of heaven and earth. In that name is the thought to which the\nmodern world is coming so slowly by scientific paths, that all being is\none ordered whole, subject to the authority of one Lord. And in addition\nto that, the grander thought, that the unity of nature is the will of\nGod; and that as the Commander issues His orders over all the field, so\nHe speaks and it is done. The hosts are the angels of whom it is said:\n'Bless the Lord all ye His hosts; ye ministers of His that do His\npleasure.' The hosts are the stars that fill the nightly heavens, of\nwhom it is said, 'He bringeth out their host by number.' The hosts are\nall creatures that live and are; and all are the soldiers and servants\nof this conquering King. Such is the name of the Lord that dwelt with\nIsrael, the great conception that rises before this Psalmist.\n\nII. Now turn to the second application of these great words, that speak\nto us not only of the God that dwelt in Zion in outward and symbolical\nform, by means of a material Presence which was an emblem of the true\nnearness of Israel's God, but yet more distinctly, as I take it, of the\nChrist that dwells with men.\n\nThe devout hearts in Israel felt that there was something more needed\nthan this dwelling of Jehovah within an earthly Temple, and the process\nof revelation familiarised them with the thought that there was to be in\nthe future a 'coming of the Lord' in some special manner unknown to\nthem. So that the whole anticipation and forward look of the Old\nTestament system is gathered into and expressed by almost its last\nwords, which prophesy that 'the Lord shall suddenly come to His Temple,'\nand that once again this King of Glory shall stand before the\neverlasting gates and summon them to open.\n\nAnd when was that fulfilled? Fulfilled in a fashion that at first sight\nseems the greatest contrast to all this vision of grandeur, of warlike\nstrength, of imperial power and rule with which we have been dealing;\nbut which yet was not the contrast to these ideas so much as the highest\nembodiment of them. For, although at first sight it seems as if there\ncould be no greater contrast than between the lion might of the Jehovah\nof the Old Testament, and the lamb gentleness of the Jesus of the New,\nif we look more closely we shall see that it is not a relation of\ncontrast that exists between the two. Christ is all, and more than all,\nthat this psalm proclaimed the Jehovah of the Old Covenant to be. Let us\nlook again from that point of view at the particulars already referred\nto.\n\nHe is the highest manifestation of the divine rule and authority. There\nis no dominion like the dominion of the loving Christ, a kingdom based\nupon suffering and wielded in gentleness, a kingdom of which the crown\nis a wreath of thorns, and the sceptre a rod of reed; a dominion which\nis all exercised for the blessing of its subjects, and which, therefore,\nis an everlasting dominion. There is no rule like that; no height of\ndivine authority towers so high as the authority of Him who rules us so\nabsolutely because He gave Himself for us utterly. This is the King, the\nPrince of the kings of the earth, because this is the Incarnate God who\ndied for us.\n\nChrist is the highest raying out of the divine Light, or, as the Epistle\nto the Hebrews calls it, 'the effulgence of His glory.' The true glory\nof God lies in His love, and of that love Christ is the noblest and most\nwondrous example. So all other beams of the divine character, bright as\ntheir light is, are but dim as compared with the sevenfold lustre of the\nlight that shines from the gentle loving-kindness of the heart of\nChrist. He has glorified God because He shows us that the divinest thing\nin God is love.\n\nFor the same reason, He is the mightiest exhibition of the divine\npower--'the Lord strong and mighty.' There is no work of God's hand, no\nwork of God's will so great as that by which we are turned from darkness\nto light, and from the power of Satan unto God. The Cross is God's\nnoblest revelation of power; and in Him, His weakness, His surrender,\nHis death, with all the wonderful energies that flow from that death for\nman's salvation, we see the divine strength made perfect in the human\nweakness of Jesus. The Gospel of Christ 'is the power of God unto\nsalvation to everyone that believeth.' _There_ is divine power in its\nnoblest form, in the paradoxical shape of a dying man; in its noblest\neffect, salvation; in its widest sweep to all who believe.\n\n  ''Twas great to speak a world from nought,\n    'Tis greater to redeem.'\n\nThis 'strong Son of God' is the arm of the Lord in whom live and act the\nenergies of omnipotence.\n\nChrist is 'the Lord mighty in battle.' True, He is the Prince of peace,\nbut He is also the better Joshua, the victorious Captain, in whom dwells\nthe conquering divine might. Through all the gentleness of His life\nthere winds a martial strain, and it is not in vain that the Evangelist\nwho was most deeply penetrated by the sweetness of His love, is the one\nwho most often speaks of Him as overcoming, and who has preserved as His\nlast words to His timid followers, that triumphant command, 'Be of good\ncheer! I have overcome the world.' He has conquered for us, binding the\nstrong man, and so He will spoil his house. Sin, hell, death, the devil,\nlaw, fear, our own foolish hearts, all temptations that hover around\nus--they are all vanquished foes of a 'Lord' that is 'mighty in battle.'\nAnd as He overcame, so shall we if we will trust Him.\n\nChrist is the Commander and Wielder of all the forces of the universe.\nAs one said to Him in the days of His flesh, 'I am a man under\nauthority, and I say to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it. So do Thou\nspeak and Thy word shall be sovereign.' And so it was. He spake to\ndiseases and they vanished. He spake to the winds and the seas and there\nwas a great calm. He spake to demons, and murmuring, but yet obedient,\nthey came out of their victims. He flung His word into the recesses of\nthe grave, and Lazarus came forth, fumbling with the knots on his\ngrave-clothes, and stumbling into the light. 'He spake and it was done.'\nWho is He, the utterance of whose will is sovereign amongst all the\nregions of being? 'Who is the King of Glory?' 'Thou art the King of\nGlory, O Christ!' 'Thou art the Everlasting Son of the Father.'\n\nIII. And now, lastly, let me ask you to look, and that for a moment, at\nthe application of these words to the Christ who will dwell in our\nhearts.\n\nHis historical manifestation here upon earth and His Incarnation, which\nis the true dwelling of Deity amongst men, are not enough. They have\nleft something more than a memory to the world. He is as ready to abide\nas really within our spirits as He was to tabernacle upon earth amongst\nmen. And the very central message of that Gospel which Is proclaimed to\nus all is this, that if we will open the gates of our hearts He will\ncome in, in all the plenitude of His victorious power, and dwell in our\nhearts, their Conqueror and their King.\n\nWhat a strange contrast, and yet what a close analogy there is between\nthe victorious tones and martial air of this summons of my text. 'Lift\nup your heads, O ye gates! that the King of Glory may come in,' and the\ngentle words of the Apocalypse: 'Behold, I stand at the door and knock;\nif any man hear My voice and open the door, I will come in to him.' But\nHe that in the Old Covenant arrayed in warrior arms, summoned the rebels\nto surrender, is the same as He who, in the New, with the night-dews in\nHis hair, and patience on His face, and gentleness in the touch of His\nhand upon the door, waits to enter in. Brethren! open your hearts, 'and\nthe King of Glory shall come in.'\n\nAnd He will come in as a king that might seek to enter some city far\naway on the outposts of his kingdom, besieged by his enemies. If the\nKing comes in, the city will be impregnable. If you open your hearts for\nHim He will come and keep you from all your foes and give you the\nvictory over them all. So, to every hard-pressed heart, waging an\nunequal contest with toils and temptations, and sorrows and sins, this\ngreat hope is given, that Christ the Victor will come in His power to\ngarrison heart and mind. As of old the encouragement was given to\nHezekiah in his hour of peril, when the might of Sennacherib insolently\nthreatened Jerusalem, so the same stirring assurances are given to each\nwho admits Christ's succours to his heart--'He shall not come into this\ncity, for I will defend this city to save it for Mine own sake' Open\nyour hearts and the conquering King will come in.\n\nAnd do not forget that there is another possible application of these\nwords lying in the future, to the conquering Christ who shall come\nagain. The whole history of the past points onwards to yet a last time\nwhen 'the Lord shall suddenly come to His temple,' and predicts that\nChrist shall so come in like manner as He went up to heaven. Again will\nthe summons ring out. Again will He come arrayed in flashing brightness,\nand the visible robes of His imperial majesty. Again will He appear,\nmighty in battle, when 'in righteousness He shall judge and make war.'\nFor a Christian, one great memory fills the past--Christ has come; and\none great hope brightens the else waste future--Christ will come. That\nhope has been far too much left to be cherished only by those who hold a\nparticular opinion as to the chronology of unfulfilled prophecy. But it\nshould be to every Christian heart 'the blessed hope,' even the\nappearing of the glory of Him who has come in the past. He is with and\nin us, in the present. He will come in the future 'in His glory, and\nshall sit upon the throne of His glory.' All our pardon and hope of\nGod's love depend upon that great fact in the past, that 'the Lord was\nmade flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory.' Our purity\nwhich will fit us to dwell with God, our present blessedness, all our\npower for daily strife, and our companionship in daily loneliness,\ndepend on the present fact that He dwells in our hearts by faith, the\nseed of all good, and the conquering Antagonist of every evil. And the\none light which fills the future with hope, peaceful because assured,\nstreams from that most sure promise that He will come again, sweeping\nfrom the highest heavens, on His head the many crowns of universal\nmonarchy, in His hand the weapons of all-conquering power, and none\nshall need to ask, 'Who is this King of Glory?' for every eye shall know\nHim, the Judge upon His throne, to be the Christ of the Cross. Open the\ndoors of your hearts to Him, as He sues for entrance now in the meekness\nof His patient love, that on you may fall in that day of the coming of\nthe King, the blessing of the servants who wait for their returning\nLord, that 'when He cometh and knocketh, they may open unto Him\nimmediately.'\n\n\n\n\nGUIDANCE IN JUDGMENT\n\n\n    'Good and upright is the Lord; therefore will He teach sinners in\n    the way. 9. The meek will He guide in judgment; and the meek will He\n    teach His way.'--PSALM xxv. 8, 9.\n\nThe Psalmist prays in this psalm for three things: deliverance,\nguidance, and forgiveness. Of these three petitions the central one is\nthat for guidance. 'Show me Thy ways, O Lord,' he asks in a previous\nverse; where he means by 'Thy ways,' not God's dealings with men, but\nmen's conduct as prescribed by God. In my text he exchanges petition for\ncontemplation; and gazes on the character of God, in order thereby to be\nhelped to confidence in an answer to his prayer. Such alternations of\npetition and contemplation are the very heartbeats of devotion, now\nexpanding in desire, now closing on its treasure in fruition. Either\nattitude is incomplete without the other. Do _our_ prayers pass into\nsuch still contemplation of the face of God? Do _our_ thoughts of His\ncharacter break into such confident petition? My text contains a\nstriking view of the divine character, a grand confidence built\nthereupon, and a condition appended on which the fulfilment of that\nconfidence depends. Let us look at these in turn.\n\nI. First, then, we have here the Psalmist's thought of God. 'Good and\nupright is the Lord.'\n\nNow it is clear that the former of these two epithets is here employed,\nnot in its widest sense of moral perfectness, or else 'upright,' which\nfollows, would be mere tautology, but in the narrower sense, which is\nfamiliar too, to us, in our common speech, in which _good_ is tantamount\nto _kind_, _beneficent_, or to say all in a word, _loving_. _Upright_\nneeds no explanation; but the point to notice is the decisiveness with\nwhich the Psalmist binds together, in one thought, the two aspects of\nthe divine nature which so many people find it hard to reconcile, and\nthe separation of which has been the parent of unnumbered misconceptions\nand errors as to Him and to His dealings. 'Good _and_ upright, loving\n_and_ righteous is the Lord,' says the Psalmist. He puts in no\nqualifying word such as, loving _though_ righteous, righteous and _yet_\nloving. Such phrases express the general notions of the relation of\nthese two attributes. But the Psalmist employs no such expressions. He\nbinds the two qualities together, in the feeling of their profoundest\nharmony.\n\nNow let me remind you that neither of these two resplendent aspects of\nthe divine nature reaches its highest beauty and supremest power, except\nit be associated with the other. In the spectrum analysis of that great\nlight there are the two lines; the one purest white of righteousness,\nand the other tinged with a ruddier glow, the line of love. The one\nadorns and sets off the other. Love without righteousness is flaccid, a\nmere gush of good-natured sentiment, impotent to confer blessing,\npowerless to evoke reverence. Righteousness without love is as white as\nsnow, and as cold as ice; repellent, howsoever it may excite the\nsentiment of awe-struck distance. But we need that the righteousness\nshall be loving, and that the love shall be righteous, in order that the\none may be apprehended in its tenderest tenderness and the other may be\nadored in its loftiest loftiness.\n\nAnd yet we are always tempted to wrench the two apart, and to think that\nthe operation of the one must sometimes, at all events on the outermost\ncircumference of the spheres, impinge upon, and collide with, the\noperations of the other. Hence you get types of religion--yes! and two\ntypes of Christianity--in which the one or the other of these two\nharmonious attributes is emphasised to such a degree as almost to blot\nout the other. You get forms of religion in which the righteousness has\nswallowed up the love, and others in which the love has destroyed the\nrighteousness. The effect is disastrous. In old days our fathers fell\ninto the extreme on the one hand; and the pendulum has swung with a\nvengeance as far from the vertical line, to the other extreme, in these\ndays as it ever did in the past. The religion which found its\ncentre-point and its loftiest conception of the divine nature in the\nthought of His absolute righteousness made strong, if it made somewhat\nstern, men. And now we see renderings of the truth that God is love\nwhich degrade the lofty, noble, sovereign conception of the righteous\nGod that loveth, into mere Indulgence on the throne of the universe. And\nwhat is the consequence? All the stern teachings of Scripture men recoil\nfrom, and try to explain away. The ill desert of sin, and the necessary\niron nexus between sin and suffering--and as a consequence the\nsacrificial work of Jesus Christ, and the supreme glory of His mission\nin that He is the Redeemer of mankind--are all become unfashionable to\npreach and unfashionable to believe. God is Love. We cannot make too\nmuch of His love, unless by reason of it we make too little of His\nrighteousness.\n\nThe Psalmist, in his childlike faith, saw deeper and more truly than\nmany would-be theologians and thinkers of this day, when he proclaimed\nin one breath 'Good _and_ upright is the Lord.' Let us not forget that\nthe Apostle, whose great message to the world was, as the last utterance\ncompleting the process of revelation, 'God is Love,' had it also in\ncharge to 'declare unto us that God is Light, and in Him is no darkness\nat all.'\n\nII. And so, secondly, mark the calm confidence builded on this\nconception of the divine character.\n\nWhat a wonderful 'therefore' that is!--the logic of faith and not of\nsense. 'Good and upright is the Lord; _therefore_ will He teach sinners\nin the way.' The coexistence of these two aspects in the perfect divine\ncharacter is for us a guarantee that He cannot leave men, however guilty\nthey may be, to grope in the dark, or keep His lips locked in silence.\nThe Psalmist does not mean guidance as to practical advantages and\nworldly prosperity. That may also be looked for, in a modified degree.\nBut what he means is guidance as to the one important thing, the\nsovereign conception of duty, the eternal law of right and wrong. God\nwill not leave a man without adequate teaching as to that, just because\nHe is loving and righteous.\n\nFor what _is_ love, in its loftiest, purest, and therefore in its divine\naspect? What is it except an infinite desire to impart, and that the\nobject on which it falls shall be blessed. So because 'the Lord is good,\nand His tender mercies are over all His works,' certainly He must\ndesire, if one may so say, as His deepest desire, the blessedness of His\ncreatures. He is a God whose nature and property it is to love, and His\nlove is the infinite and ceaseless welling out of Himself, in all forms\nof beauty and blessedness, according to the capacity and contents of His\nrecipient creatures. He is 'the giving God,' as James in his epistle\neloquently and wonderfully calls Him, whose very nature it is to give.\nAnd that is only to say, in other words, 'good _is the Lord_.'\n\nBut then 'good _and_ upright'--that combination determines the form\nwhich His blessings shall assume, the channel in which by preference\nthey will flow. If we had only to say, 'good is the Lord,' then our\nhappiness, as we call it, the satisfaction of our physical needs and of\nlower cravings, might be the adequate expression of His love. But if God\nbe righteous, then because Himself is so, it must be His deepest desire\nfor us that we should be like Him. Not our happiness but our rectitude\nis God's end in all that He does with us. It is worth His while to make\nus, in the lower sense of the word, 'happy,' but the purpose of joy as\nof sorrow is to make us pure and righteous. We shall never come to\nunderstand the meaning of our own lives, and will always be blindly\npuzzling over the mysteries of the providences that beset us, until we\nlearn that not enjoyment and not sorrow is His ultimate end concerning\nus, but that we may be partakers of His holiness. Since He is righteous,\nthe dearest desire of His loving heart, and that to which all His\ndealings with us are directed; and that, therefore, to which all our\ndesires and efforts should be directed likewise, is to make us righteous\nalso.\n\n'Therefore will He teach sinners in the way.' If the righteousness\nexisted without the love it must 'come with a rod,' and the sinners who\nare out of the way must incontinently be crushed where they have\nwandered. But since righteousness is blended with love, therefore He\ncomes, and must desire to bring all wanderers back into the paths which\nare His own.\n\nI need not do more than in a word remind you how strong a presumption\nthere lies in this combination of aspects of the divine nature, in\nfavour of an actual revelation. It seems to me that, notwithstanding all\nthe objections that are made to a supernatural and objective revelation,\nthere is nothing half so monstrous as it would be to believe, with the\npure deist or theist, that God, being what He is, righteous and loving,\nhad never rent His heavens to say one word to man to lead him in the\npaths of righteousness. I can understand Atheism, and I can understand a\nrevealing God, but not a God that dwells in the thick darkness, and is\nyet Love and Righteousness, and looks down upon this world and never\nputs out a finger to point the path of duty. A silent God seems to me no\nGod but an Almighty Devil. Revelation is the plain conclusion from the\npremisses that 'good and upright is the Lord!'\n\nI speak not, for there is no time to do so, of the various manners in\nwhich this divine desire to bring sinners into the way fulfils itself.\nThere are our consciences; there are His providences; there is the\nobjective revelation of His word; there are the whispers of His Spirit\nin men's hearts. I do not know what you believe, but I believe that God\ncan find His way to my heart and infuse there illumination, and move\naffections, and make my eye clear to discern what is right. 'He that\nformed the eye, shall He not see?' He that formed the eye, shall He not\nsend light to it? Are we to shut out God, in obedience to the dictates\nof an arbitrary psychology, from access to His own creature; and to say,\n'Thou hast made me, and Thou canst not speak to me. My soul is Thine by\ncreation, but its doors are close barred against Thee; and Thou canst\nnot lay Thy hand upon it?' 'Good and upright is the Lord, therefore will\nHe teach sinners in the way.'\n\nIII. Now notice, again, the condition on which the fulfilment of this\nconfidence depends.\n\n'The meek will He guide in judgment, and the meek will He teach His\nway.' The fact of our being sinful only makes it the more imperative\nthat God should speak to us. But the condition of our hearing and\nprofiting by the guidance is meekness. By meekness the Psalmist means, I\nsuppose, little else than what we might call docility, of which the\nprime element is the submission of my own will to God's. The reason why\nwe go wrong about our duties is mainly that we do not supremely want to\ngo right, but rather to gratify inclinations, tastes, or passions. God\nis speaking to us, but if we make such a riot with the yelpings of our\nown kennelled desires and lusts, and listen to the rattle and noise of\nthe street and the babble of tongues, He\n\n  'Can but listen at the gate,\n   And hear the household jar within.'\n\n'The meek will He guide in judgment; the meek will He teach His way.'\nSome of us put our heads down like bulls charging a gate. Some of us\ndrive on full speed, and will not shut off steam though the signals are\nagainst us, and the end of that can only be one thing. Some of us do not\nwish to know what God wishes us to do. Some of us cannot bear suspense\nof judgment, or of decision, and are always in a hurry to be in action,\nand think the time lost that is spent in waiting to know what God the\nLord will speak. If you do not clearly see what to do, then clearly you\nmay see that you are to do _nothing_.\n\nThe ark was to go half a mile in front of the camp before the foremost\nfiles lifted a foot to follow, in order that there should be no mistake\nas to the road. Wait till God points the path, and wish Him to point it,\nand hush the noises that prevent your hearing His voice, and keep your\nwills in absolute submission; and above all, be sure that you act out\nyour convictions, and that you have no knowledge of duty which is not\nexpressed in your practice, and you will get all the light which you\nneed; sometimes being taught by errors no doubt, often being left to\nmake mistakes as to what is expedient in regard to worldly prosperity,\nbut being infallibly guided as to the path of duty, and the path of\npeace and righteousness.\n\nAnd now, before I close, let me just remind you of the great fact which\ntranscends the Psalmist's confidence whilst it warrants it.\n\nBecause God is Love, and God is Righteousness, He cannot but speak. But\nthis Psalmist did not know how wonderfully God was going to speak by\nthat Word who has called Himself the Light of men; and who has said, 'He\nthat followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light\nof life.' He 'teaches sinners in the way,' by Jesus Christ; for we have\nHim for our Pattern and Example. We have His love for our impelling\nmotive. We have His Spirit to speak in our hearts, and to 'guide us into\nall truth.' And this Shepherd, 'when He putteth forth His own sheep,\ngoeth before them; and the sheep follow Him and know His voice.' The\nPsalmist's confidence, bright as it is, is but the glow of the morning\ntwilight. The full sunshine of the transcendent fact to which God's\nrighteous love impelled and bound Him is Christ, who makes us know the\nwill of the Father. But we want more than knowledge. For we all know our\nduty a great deal better than any of us do it. What is the use of a\nguide to a lame man? But our Guide says to us, 'Arise and walk,' and if\nwe clasp His hand we receive strength, and 'the lame man leaps as a\nhart.'\n\nSo, dear brethren! let us all cleave to Him, the Guide, the Way, and the\nLife which enables us to walk in the way. If we thus cleave, then be\nsure that He will lead us in the paths of righteousness, which are paths\nof peace. He is the Way; He is the Leader of the march; He gives power\nto walk in the light, and His one command, 'Follow Me,' unfolds into all\nduty and includes all direction, companionship, perfection, and\nblessedness.\n\n\n\n\nA PRAYER FOR PARDON AND ITS PLEA\n\n\n    'For Thy name's sake, O Lord, pardon mine iniquity; for it is\n    great.'--PSALM xxv. 11.\n\nThe context shows us that this is the prayer of a man who had long loved\nand served God. He says that 'on God' he 'waits all the day,' that his\n'eyes are ever toward the Lord,' that he has 'integrity and uprightness'\nwhich will 'preserve him, for he waits upon God,' and yet side by side\nwith this consciousness of devotion and service there lie the profound\nsense of sin and of the need of pardon. The better a man is, the more\nclearly he sees, and the more deeply he feels, his own badness. If a\nshoe is all covered with mud, a splash or two more or less will make no\ndifference, but if it be polished and clean, one speck shows. A black\nfeather on a swan's breast is conspicuous. And so the less sin a man has\nthe more obvious it is, and the more he has the less he generally knows\nit. But whilst this consciousness of transgression and cry for pardon\nare inseparable and permanent accompaniments of a devout life all along\nits course, they are the roots and beginning of all true godliness. And\nas a rule, the first step which a man takes to knit himself consciously\nto God is through the gate of recognised and repeated and confessed sin\nand imploring the divine mercy.\n\nI. Notice, first, here the cry for pardon.\n\n'I believe in the forgiveness of sins' hundreds of thousands of\nEnglishmen have said twice to-day. Most of us, when we pray at all, push\nin somewhere or other the petition, 'Forgive us our sins.' And how many\nof us understand what we mean when we ask for that? And how many of us\nfeel that we need the thing which we seem to be requesting? Let me dwell\nfor a moment or two upon the Scriptural idea of forgiveness. Of course\nwe may say that when we ask forgiveness from God we are transferring\nideas and images drawn from human relations to the divine. Be it so.\nThat does not show that there is not a basis of reality and of truth in\nthe ideas thus transferred. But there are two elements in forgiveness as\nwe know it, both of which it seems to me to be very important that we\nshould carry in our minds in interpreting the Scriptural doctrine. There\nis the forgiveness known to law and practised by the lawgiver. There is\nthe forgiveness known to love and practised by the friend, or parent, or\nlover. The one consists in the remission of external penalties. A\ncriminal is forgiven, or, as we say (with an unconscious restriction of\nthe word _forgiven_ to the deeper thing), _pardoned_, when, the\nremainder of his sentence being remitted, he is let out of gaol, and\nallowed to go about his business without any legal penalties. But there\nis a forgiveness deeper than that legal pardon. A parent and a child\nboth of them know that parental pardon does not consist in the waiving\nof punishment. The averted look, the cold voice, the absence of signs of\nlove are far harder to bear than so-called punishment. And the\nforgiveness, which belongs to love only, comes when the film between the\ntwo is swept away, and both the offended and the offender feel that\nthere is no barrier to the free, unchecked flow of love from the heart\nof the aggrieved to the heart of the aggressor.\n\nWe must carry both of these ideas into our thoughts of God's pardon in\norder to see the whole fulness of it. And perhaps we may have to add yet\nanother illustration, drawn from another region, and which is enshrined\nin one of the versions of the Lord's Prayer, where we read, 'Forgive us\nour _debts_.' When a debt is forgiven it is cancelled, and the payment\nof it no longer required. But the two elements that I have pointed out,\nthe remission of the penalty and the uninterrupted flow of God's love,\nare inseparably united in the full Scriptural notion of forgiveness.\n\nScripture recognises as equally real and valid, in our relations to God,\nthe judicial and the fatherly side of the relationship. And it declares\nas plainly that the wages of sin is death as it declares that God's love\ncannot come in its fulness and its sweetness, upon a heart that indulges\nin unconfessed and unrepented sin. They are poor friends of men who, for\nthe sake of smoothing away the terrible side of the Gospel, minimise or\nhide the reality of the awful penalties which attach to every\ntransgression and disobedience, because they thereby maim the notion of\nthe divine forgiveness, and lull into a fatal slumber the consciences of\nmany men.\n\nDear brethren! I have to stand here saying, 'Knowing, therefore, the\nterrors of the Lord, we persuade men.' This is sure and certain, that\nover and above the forcing back upon itself of the love of God by my\nsin, that sin by necessary consequence will work out awful results for\nthe doer in the present and in the future. I do not wish to dwell upon\nthat thought, only remember that God is a Judge and God is the Father,\nand that the divine forgiveness includes both of these elements, the\nsweeping away of the penal consequences of men's sin, wholly in the\nfuture, and to some extent in the present; and the unchecked flow of the\nlove of God to a man's heart.\n\nThere are awful words in Scripture--which are not to be ruled out of it\nby any easy-going, optimistic, rose-water system of a mutilated\nChristianity--there are awful words in Scripture, concerning what you\nand I must come to if we live and die in our sins, and there would be no\nmessage of forgiveness worth the proclaiming to men, if it had nothing\nto say about the removal of that which a man's own unsophisticated\nconscience tells him is certain, the fatal and the damnable effects of\nhis departure from God.\n\nBut let us not forget that these two aspects do to a large extent\ncoincide, when we come to remember that the worst of all the penal\nconsequences of sin is that it separates from God, and exposes to 'the\nwrath of God,' a terrible expression by which the Bible means the\nnecessary disapprobation and aversion of the divine nature, being such\nas it is, from man's sin.\n\nExperimentalists will sometimes cut off one or other of the triple rays\nof which sunlight is composed by passing the beam through some medium\nwhich intercepts the red, or the violet, or the yellow, as may chance.\nAnd my sin makes an atmosphere which cuts off the gentler rays of that\ndivine nature, and lets the fiery ones of retribution come through. It\nis not that a sinful man, howsoever drenched overhead in the foul pool\nof his own unrepented iniquity, is shut out from the love of God, which\nlingers about him and woos him, and lavishes upon him all the gifts of\nwhich he is capable, but that he has made himself incapable of receiving\nthe sweetest of these influences, and that so long as he continues thus,\nhis life and his character cannot but be odious and hateful in the pure\neyes of perfect love.\n\nBut whilst thus there are external consequences which are swept away by\nforgiveness, and whilst the real hell of hells and death of deaths is\nthe separation from God, and the misery that must necessarily ensue\nthereupon, there are consequences of man's sin which forgiveness is not\nintended to remove, and will not remove, just because God loves us. He\nloves us too well to take away the issues in the natural sphere, in the\nsocial sphere, the issues perhaps in bodily health, reputation,\nposition, and the like, which flow from our transgression. 'Thou wast a\nGod that forgavest them, and Thou didst inflict retribution for their\ninventions.' He does leave much of these outward issues unswept away by\nHis forgiveness, and the great law stands, 'Whatsoever a man soweth that\nshall he also reap.' And yet the pardon that you and I need, and which\nwe can all have for the asking, flows to us unchecked and full--the\ngreat stream of the love of God, to whom we are reconciled, when we turn\nto Him in penitent dependence on the blood and righteousness of Jesus\nChrist, our Lord.\n\nThis consciousness of sin and cry for pardon lie at the foundation of\nvigorous practical religion. It seems to me that the differences between\ndifferent types of Christianity, insipid elegance and fiery earnestness,\nbetween coldness and fervour, the difference between a sapless and a\nliving ministry and between a formal and a real Christianity, are very\nlargely due to the differences in realising the fact and the gravity of\nthe fact of transgression. The prominence which we give to that in our\nthoughts will largely determine our notions of ourselves, and of\nChrist's work, and to a great extent settle what we think Christianity\nis for, and what in itself it is. If a man has no deep consciousness of\nsin he will be satisfied with a very superficial kind of religion.\n'Every man his own redeemer' will be his motto. And not knowing the\nnecessity for a Saviour, he will not recognise that Christianity is\nfundamentally and before anything else, a system of redemption. A moral\nagent? Yes! A large revelation of great truth? Yes! A power to make\nmen's lives, individually and in the community, nobler and loftier? By\nall means. But before all these, and all these consequentially on its\nbeing a system by which sinful men, else hopeless and condemned, are\ndelivered and set free. So, dear brethren! let me press upon you\nthis,--unless my Christianity gives large prominence to the fact of my\nown transgression, and is full of a penitent cry for pardon, it lacks\nthe one thing needful, I was going to say--it lacks, at all events, that\nwhich will make it a living power blessedly ruling my heart and life.\n\nII. Note in the next place the plea for pardon.\n\n'For Thy name's sake.' The Psalmist does not come with any carefully\nelaborated plea, grounded upon anything in himself, either on the\nexcuses and palliations of his evil, his corrupt nature, his many\ntemptations, and the like, or on the depth and reality of his\nrepentance. He does not say, 'Forgive me, for I weep for my evil and\nloathe myself.' Nor does he say, 'Forgive me, for I could not help doing\nit, or because I was tempted; or because the thing that I have done is a\nvery little thing after all.' He comes empty-handed, and says, 'For Thy\nname's sake, O Lord!'\n\nThat means, first, the great thought that God's mercy flows from the\ninfinite depths of His own character. He is His own motive. The fountain\nof His forgiving love wells up of itself, drawn forth by nothing that we\ndo, but propelled from within by the inmost nature of God. As surely as\nit is the property of light to radiate and of fire to spread, so surely\nis it His nature and property to have mercy. He forgives, says our text,\nbecause He is God, and cannot but do so. Therefore our mightiest plea is\nto lay hold of His own strength, and to grasp the fact of the unmotived,\nuncompelled, unpurchased, and therefore unalterable and eternal\npardoning love of God.\n\nScientists tell us that the sun is fed and kept in splendour by the\nconstant impact of bodies from without falling in upon it, and that if\nthat supply were to cease, the furnace of the heavens would go out. But\nGod, who is light in Himself, needs no accession of supplies from\nwithout to maintain His light, and no force of motives from without to\nsway His will. We do not need to seek to bend Him to mercy, for He is\nmercy in Himself. We do not need to stir His purpose into action, for it\nhas been working from of old and 'its goings forth are from\neverlasting.' He is His own motive, He forgives because of what He is.\nSo let us dig down to that deepest of all rock foundations on which to\nbuild our confidence, and be sure that, if I may use such an expression,\nthe necessity of the divine nature compels Him to pardon iniquity,\ntransgression, and sin.\n\nThen there is another thought here, that the past of God is a plea with\nGod for present forgiveness. 'Thy name' in Scripture means the whole\nrevelation of the divine character, and thus the Psalmist looks back\ninto the past, and sees there how God has, all through the ages, been\nplenteous in mercy and ready to forgive all that called upon Him; and he\npleads that past as a reason for the present and for the future.\nThousands of years have passed since David, if he was the Psalmist,\noffered this prayer; and you and I can look back to the blessed old\nstory of _his_ forgiveness, so swift, so absolute and free, which\nfollowed upon confession so lowly, and can remember that infinitely\npathetic and wonderful word which puts the whole history of the\nresurrection and restoration of a soul into two clauses. 'David said\nunto Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord: and Nathan said unto\nDavid'--finishing the sentence--'And the Lord hath made to pass the\niniquity of thy sin.' What He was He is; what He is He will be. 'For Thy\nname's sake, pardon mine iniquity.'\n\nThere is yet another thought that may be suggested. The divine\nforgiveness is in order that men may know Him better. That is\nrepresented in Scripture as being the great motive of the divine\nactions--'for the glory of Thine own name.' That may be so put as to be\npositively atrocious, or so as to be perfectly divine and lovely. It has\noften been put, by hard and narrow dogmatists, in such a way as to make\nGod simply an Almighty selfishness, but it ought to be put as the Bible\nputs it, so as to show Him as an Almighty love. For why does He desire\nthat His name should be known by us but for our sakes, that the light of\nthat great Name may come to us, 'sitting in darkness and in the shadow\nof death,' and that, knowing Him for what He is, we may have peace, and\nrest, and joy, and love, and purity? It is pure benevolence that makes\nHim act, 'for the glory of His great name'; sweeping away the clouds\nthat a darkened earth may expand and rejoice, and all the leaves unfold\nthemselves, and every bird sing, in the restored sunshine.\n\nAnd there is nothing that reveals the inmost hived sweetness and honey\nof the name of God like the assurance of His pardon. 'There is\nforgiveness with Thee that Thou mayest be feared.' Oh, dear brethren!\nunless you know God as the God that has forgiven you, your knowledge of\nHim is but shallow and incomplete, and you know not the deepest\nblessings that flow to them who find that this is life eternal to know\nthe only true God as the all-forgiving Father.\n\nNote the connection between the Psalmist's plea and the New Testament\nplea. David said, 'For Thy name's sake, pardon,' we say, 'For Christ's\nsake, forgive.' Are the two diverse? Is the fruit diverse from the bud?\nIs the complete noonday diverse from the blessed morning twilight?\nChrist _is_ the Name of God, the Revealer of the divine heart and mind.\nWhen Christian men pray 'For the sake of Christ,' they are not bringing\na motive, which is to move the divine love which else lies passive and\ninert, because God's love was the cause of Christ's work not Christ's\nwork the cause of God's love, but they are expressing their own\ndependence on the Great Mediator and His work, and solemnly offering, as\nthe ground of all their hope, that perfect sacrifice which is the medium\nby which forgiveness reaches men, and without which it is impossible\nthat the government of the righteous God could exist with pardon. Christ\nhas died; Christ, in dying, has borne the sins of the world; that is,\nyours and mine. And therefore the pardon of God comes to us through that\nchannel, without, in the slightest degree, trenching on the awfulness of\nthe divine holiness or weakening the sanctities of God's righteous\nretributive law. 'For Christ's sake hath forgiven us' is the daylight\nwhich the Psalmist saw as morning dawn when he cried, 'For Thy name's\nsake, pardon mine iniquity.'\n\nIII. Lastly, note the reason for the earnest cry, 'For it is great.'\n\nThat may be a reason for the pardon; more probably it is a reason for\nthe prayer. The fact is true in regard to us all. There is no need to\nsuppose any special heinous sin in the Psalmist's mind. I would fain\npress upon all consciences that listen to me now that these lowly words\nof confession are true about every one of us, whether we know it or not.\nFor if you consider how much of self-will, how much of indifference, of\nalienation from, if not of antagonism against, the law of God, go to\nevery trifling transgression, you will think twice before you call it\nsmall. And if it be small, a microscopic viper, the length of a cutting\nfrom your finger nail, has got the viper's nature in it, and its poison,\nand its sting, and it will grow. A very little quantity of mud held in\nsolution in a continuously flowing river will make a tremendous delta at\nthe mouth of it in the course of years. And however small may have been\nthe amount of evil and deflection from God's law in that flowing river\nof my past life, what a filthy, foul bank of slime must be piled up down\nyonder at the mouth!\n\nIf the fact be so, then is not that a reason for our all going to the\nonly One who can dredge it away, and get rid of it? 'Pardon me; for it\nis great.' That is to say, 'There is no one else who can deal with it\nbut Thyself, O Lord! It is too large for me to cart away; it is too\ngreat for any inferior hand to deal with. I am so bad that I can come\nonly to Thyself to be made better.' It is blessed and wise when the\nconsciousness of our deep transgression drives us to the only Hand that\ncan heal, to the only Heart that can forgive.\n\nSo, dear friends! in a blessed desperation of otherwise being unable to\nget rid of this burden which has grown on our backs ounce by ounce for\nlong years, let us go to Him. He and He alone can deal with it. 'Against\nThee, Thee only, have I sinned,' and to Thee, Thee only, will I come.\n\nOnly remember that, before you ask, God has given. He is 'like the dew\nupon the grass, that waiteth not for man.' Instead of praying for pardon\nwhich is already bestowed, do you see to it that you take the pardon\nwhich God is praying you to receive. Swallow the bitter pill of\nacknowledging your own transgression; and then one look at the crucified\nChrist and one motion of believing desire towards Him; 'and the Lord\nhath made to pass the iniquity of thy sin.'\n\n\n\n\nGOD'S GUESTS\n\n\n    'One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after; that\n    I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life.'\n    --PSALM xxvii. 4.\n\nWe shall do great injustice to this mystical aspiration of the Psalmist,\nif we degrade it to be the mere expression of a desire for unbroken\nresidence in a material Temple. He was no sickly, sentimental seeker\nafter cloistered seclusion. He knew the necessities and duties of life\nfar better than in a cowardly way to wish to shirk them, in order that\nhe might loiter in the temple, idle under the pretence of worship. Nor\nwould the saying fit into the facts of the case if we gave it that low\nmeaning, for no person had his residence in the temple. And what follows\nin the next verse would, on that hypothesis, be entirely inappropriate.\n'In the secret of His tabernacle shall He hide me.' No one went into the\nsecret place of the Most High, in the visible, material structure,\nexcept the high priest once a year. But this singer expects that his\nabode will be there always; and that, in the time of trouble, he can\nfind refuge there.\n\nApart altogether from any wider considerations as to the relation\nbetween form and spirit under the Old Covenant, I think that such\nobservations compel us to see in these words a desire a great deal\nnobler and deeper than any such wish.\n\nI. Let us, then, note the true meaning of this aspiration of the\nPsalmist.\n\nIts fulfilment depends not on where we are, but on what we think and\nfeel; for every place is God's house, and what the Psalmist desires is\nthat he should be able to keep up unbroken consciousness of being in\nGod's presence and should be always in touch with Him.\n\nThat seems hard, and people say, 'Impossible! how can I get above my\ndaily work, and be perpetually thinking of God and His will, and\nconsciously realising communion with Him?' But there is such a thing as\nhaving an undercurrent of consciousness running all through a man's life\nand mind; such a thing as having a melody sounding in our ears\nperpetually, 'so sweet we know not we are listening to it' until it\nstops, and then, by the poverty of the naked and silent atmosphere, we\nknow how musical were the sounds that we scarcely knew that we heard,\nand yet did hear so well high above all the din of earth's noises.\n\nEvery man that has ever cherished such an aspiration as this knows the\ndifficulties all too well. And yet, without entering upon thorny and\nunprofitable questions as to whether the absolute, unbroken continuity\nof consciousness of being in God's presence is possible for men here\nbelow, let us look at the question, which has a great deal more bearing\nupon our present condition--viz. whether a greater continuity of that\nconsciousness is not possible than we attain to to-day. It does seem to\nme to be a foolish and miserable waste of time and temper and energy for\ngood people to be quarrelling about whether they can come to the\nabsolute realisation of this desire in this world, when there is not one\nof them who is not leagues below the possible realisation of it, and\nknows that he is. At all events, whether or not the line can be drawn\nwithout a break at all, the breaks might be a great deal shorter and a\ngreat deal less frequent than they are. An unbroken line of conscious\ncommunion with God is the ideal; and that is what this singer desired\nand worked for. How many of my feelings and thoughts to-day, or of the\nthings that I have said or done since I woke this morning, would have\nbeen done and said and felt exactly the same, if there were not a God at\nall, or if it did not matter in the least whether I ever came into touch\nwith Him or not? Oh, dear friends! it is no vain effort to bring our\nlives a little nearer that unbroken continuity of communion with Him of\nwhich this text speaks. And God knows, and we each for ourselves know,\nhow much and how sore our need is of such a union. 'One thing have I\ndesired, that will I seek after; that I, in my study; I, in my shop; I,\nin my parlour, kitchen, or nursery; I, in my studio; I, in my\nlecture-hall--'may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my\nlife.' In our 'Father's house are many mansions.' The room that we spend\nmost of our lives in, each of us, at our tasks or our work-tables may be\nin our Father's house, too; and it is only we that can secure that it\nshall be.\n\nThe inmost meaning of this Psalmist's desire is that the consciousness\nof God shall be diffused throughout the whole of a man's days, instead\nof being coagulated here and there at points. The Australian rivers in a\ndrought present a picture of the Christian life of far too many of us--a\nstagnant, stinking pool here, a stretch of blinding gravel there;\nanother little drop of water a mile away, then a long line of\nfoul-smelling mud, and then another shallow pond. Why! it ought to run\nin a clear stream that has a scour in it and that will take all filth\noff the surface.\n\nThe Psalmist longed to break down the distinction between sacred and\nsecular; to consecrate work, of whatsoever sort it was. He had learned\nwhat so many of us need to learn far more thoroughly, that if our\nreligion does not drive the wheels of our daily business, it is of\nlittle use; and that if the field in which our religion has power to\ncontrol and impel is not that of the trivialities and secularities of\nour ordinary life, there is no field for it at all.\n\n'All the days of my life.' Not only on Wednesday nights, while Tuesday\nand Thursday are given to the world and self; not only on Sundays; not\nfor five minutes in the morning, when I am eager to get to my daily\nwork, and less than five minutes at night, when I am half asleep, but\nthrough the long day, doing this, that, and the other thing for God and\nby God and with God, and making Him the motive and the power of my\ncourse, and my Companion to heaven. And if we have, in our lives, things\nover which we cannot make the sign of the cross, the sooner we get rid\nof them the better; and if there is anything in our daily work, or in\nour characters, about which we are doubtful, here is a good test: does\nit seem to check our continual communion with God, as a ligature round\nthe wrist might do the continual flow of the blood, or does it help us\nto realise His presence? If the former, let us have no more to do with\nit; if the latter, let us seek to increase it.\n\nII. And now let me say a word about the Psalmist's reason for this\naspiration.\n\nThe word which he employs carries with it a picture which is even more\nvividly given us by a synonymous word employed in the same connection in\nsome of the other psalms. 'That I may dwell in the house of the\nLord'--now, that is an allusion, not only, as I think, to the Temple,\nbut also to the Oriental habit of giving a man who took refuge in the\ntent of the sheikh, guest-rites of protection and provision and\nfriendship. The habit exists to this day, and travellers among the\nBedouins tell us lovely stories of how even an enemy with the blood of\nthe closest relative of the owner of the tent on his hands, if he can\nonce get in there and partake of the salt of the host, is safe, and the\nfirst obligation of the owner of the tent is to watch over the life of\nthe fugitive as over his own. So the Psalmist says, 'I desire to have\nguest-rites in Thy tent; to lift up its fold, and shelter there from the\nheat of the desert. And although I be dark and stained with many evils\nand transgressions against Thee, yet I come to claim the hospitality and\nprovision and protection and friendship which the laws of the house do\nbestow upon a guest.' Carrying out substantially the same idea, Paul\ntells the Ephesians, as if it were the very highest privilege that the\nGospel brought to the Gentiles: 'Ye are no more strangers, but\nfellow-citizens with the saints, and _of the household of God_';\nincorporated into His family, and dwelling safely in His pavilion as\ntheir home.\n\nThat is to say, the blessedness of keeping up such a continual\nconsciousness of touch with God is, first and foremost, the certainty of\ninfallible protection. Oh! how it minimises all trouble and brightens\nall joys, and calms amidst all distractions, and steadies and sobers in\nall circumstances, to feel ever the hand of God upon us! He who goes\nthrough life, finding that, when he has trouble to meet, it throws him\nback on God, and that when bright mornings of joy drive away nights of\nweeping, these wake morning songs of praise, and are brightest because\nthey shine with the light of a Father's love, will never be unduly moved\nby any vicissitudes of fortune. Like some inland and sheltered valley,\nwith great mountains shutting it in, that 'heareth not the loud winds\nwhen they call' beyond the barriers that enclose it, our lives may be\ntranquilly free from distraction, and may be full of peace, of\nnobleness, and of strength, on condition of our keeping in God's house\nall the days of our lives.\n\nThere is another blessing that will come to the dweller in God's house,\nand that not a small one. It is that, by the power of this one satisfied\nlonging, driven like an iron rod through all the tortuosities of my\nlife, there will come into it a unity which otherwise few lives are ever\nable to attain, and the want of which is no small cause of the misery\nthat is great upon men. Most of us seem, to our own consciousness, to\nlive amidst endless distractions all our days, and our lives to be a\nheap of links parted from each other rather than a chain. But if we have\nthat one constant thought with us, and if we are, through all the\nvariety of occupations, true to the one purpose of serving and keeping\nnear God, then we have a charm against the frittering away of our lives\nin distractions, and the misery of multiplicity; and we enter into the\nblessedness of unity and singleness of purpose; and our lives become,\nlike the starry heavens in all the variety of their motions, obedient to\none impulse. For unity in a life does not depend upon the monotony of\nits tasks, but upon the simplicity of the motive which impels to all\nvarieties of work. So it is possible for a man harassed by multitudinous\navocations, and drawn hither and thither by sometimes apparently\nconflicting and always bewildering, rapidly-following duties, to say,\n'This one thing I do,' if all his doings are equally acts of obedience\nto God.\n\nIII. So, lastly, note the method by which this desire is realised.\n\n'One thing have I desired, ... that will I seek after' There are two\npoints to be kept in view to that end. A great many people say, 'One\nthing have I desired,' and fail in persistent continuousness of the\ndesire. No man gets rights of residence in God's house for a longer time\nthan he continues to seek for them. The most advanced of us, and those\nthat have longest been like Anna, who 'departed not from the Temple,'\nday nor night, will certainly eject ourselves unless, like the Psalmist,\nwe use the verbs in both tenses, and say, 'One thing _have_ I desired\n... that _will_ I seek after.' John Bunyan saw that there was a back\ndoor to the lower regions close by the gates of the Celestial City.\nThere may be men who have long lived beneath the shadow of the\nsanctuary, and at the last will be found outside the gates.\n\nBut the words of the text not only suggest, by the two tenses of the\nverbs, the continuity of the desire which is destined to be granted, but\nalso by the two verbs themselves--desire and seek after--the necessity\nof uniting prayer and work. Many desires are unsatisfied because conduct\ndoes not correspond to desires. Many a prayer remains unanswered because\nits pray-ers never do anything to fulfil their prayers. I do not say\nthey are hypocrites; certainly they are not consciously so, but I do say\nthat there is a large measure of conventionality that means nothing, in\nthe prayers of average Christian people for more holiness and likeness\nto Jesus Christ.\n\nDear friends! if we truly wish this desire of dwelling in the house of\nthe Lord to be fulfilled, the day's work must run in the same direction\nas the morning's petition, and we must, like the Psalmist, say, 'I _have\ndesired_ it of the Lord, so I, for my part, _will seek after it_.' Then,\nwhether or not we reach absolutely to the standard, which is none the\nless to be aimed at, though it seems beyond reach, we shall arrive\nnearer and nearer to it; and, God helping our weakness and increasing\nour strength, quickening us to 'desire,' and upholding us to 'seek\nafter,' we may hope that, when the days of our life are past, we shall\nbut remove into an upper chamber, more open to the sunrise and flooded\nwith light; and shall go no more out, but 'dwell in the house of the\nLord for ever.'\n\n\n\n\n'SEEK YE'--'I WILL SEEK'\n\n\n    'When Thou saidst, Seek ye my face; My heart said unto Thee, Thy\n    face, Lord, will I seek. 9. Hide not Thy face far from me.'\n    --PSALM xxvii. 8, 9.\n\nWe have here a report of a brief dialogue between God and a devout soul.\nThe Psalmist tells us of God's invitation and of his acceptance, and on\nboth he builds the prayer that the face which he had been bidden to\nseek, and had sought, may not be hid from him. The correspondence\nbetween what God said to him and what he said to God is even more\nemphatically expressed in the original than in our version. In the\nHebrew the sentence is dislocated, at the risk of being obscure, for the\nsake of bringing together the two voices. It runs thus, 'My heart said\nto Thee,' and then, instead of going on with his answer, the Psalmist\ninterjects God's invitation 'Seek ye My face,' and then, side by side\nwith that, he lays his response, 'Thy face, Lord, will I seek.' The\ncompleteness and swiftness of his answer could not be more vividly\nexpressed. To hear was to obey: as soon as God's merciful call sounded,\nthe Psalmist's heart responded, like a harp-string thrilled into music\nby the vibration of another tuned to the same note. Without hesitation,\nand in entire correspondence with the call, was his response. So\nswiftly, completely, resolutely should we respond to God's voice, and\nour ready 'I will' should answer His commandment, as the man at the\nwheel repeats the captain's orders whilst he carries them out. Upon such\nacceptance of such an invitation we, too, may build the prayer, 'Hide\nnot Thy face far from me.'\n\nNow, there are three things here that I desire to look at--God's\nmerciful call to us all; the response of the devout soul to that call;\nand the prayer which is built upon both.\n\nI. We have God's merciful call to us all.\n\n'Thou saidst, Seek ye My face.' Now, that expression, 'the face of God,'\nthough highly metaphorical, is perfectly clear and defined in its\nmeaning. It corresponds substantially to what the Apostle Paul calls, in\nspeaking of the knowledge of God beyond the limits of revelation, 'that\nwhich may be known of God'; or, in more modern language, the side of the\ndivine nature which is turned to man; or, in plainer words still, God,\nin so far as He is revealed. It means substantially the same thing as\nthe other Scriptural expression, 'the name of the Lord.' Both phrases\ndraw a broad distinction between what God is, in the infinite fulness of\nHis incomprehensible being, and what He is as revealed to man; and both\nimply that what is revealed is knowledge, real and valid, though it may\nbe imperfect.\n\nThis, then, being the meaning of the phrase, what is the meaning of the\ninvitation: 'Seek ye My face'? Have we to search for that, as if it were\nsomething hidden, far off, lost, and only to be recovered by our effort?\nNo: a thousand times no! For the seeking, to which God mercifully\ninvites us, is but the turning of the direction of our desires to Him,\nthe recognition of the fact that His face is more than all else to men,\nthe recognition that whilst there are many that say, 'Who will show us\nany good?' and put the question impatiently, despairingly, vainly, they\nthat turn the seeking into a prayer, and ask, 'Lord! lift Thou the light\nof Thy countenance upon us,' will never ask in vain. To seek is to\ndesire, to turn the direction of thought and will and affection to Him\nand to take heed that the ordering of our daily lives is such as that no\nmist rising from them shall come between us and that brightness of\nlight, or hide from us the vision splendid. They who seek God by desire,\nby the direction of thought and will and love, and by the regulation of\ntheir daily lives in accordance with that desire, are they who obey this\ncommandment.\n\nNext we come to that great thought that God is ever sounding out to all\nmankind this invitation to seek His face. By the revelation of Himself\nHe bids us all sun ourselves in the brightness of His countenance. One\nof the New Testament writers, in a passage which is mistranslated in our\nAuthorised Version, says that God 'calls us by His own glory and\nvirtue.' That is to say, the very manifestation of the divine Being is\nsuch that there lies in it a summons to behold Him, and an attraction to\nHimself. So fair is He, that He but needs to withdraw the veil, and\nmen's hearts rejoice in that countenance, which is as the sun shining in\nhis strength; 'nor know we anything more fair than is the smile upon His\nface.' If we see Him as He really is, we cannot choose but love. By all\nHis works He calls us to seek Him, not only because the intellect\ndemands that there shall be a personal Will behind all these phenomena,\nbut because they in themselves proclaim His name, and the proclamation\nof His name is the summons to behold.\n\nBy the very make of our own spirits He calls us to Himself. Our\nrestlessness, our yearnings, our movings about as aliens in the midst of\nthings seen and visible, all these bid us turn to Him in whom alone our\ncapacities can be satisfied, and the hunger of our souls appeased. You\nremember the old story of the Saracen woman who came to England seeking\nher lover, and passed through these foreign cities, with no word upon\nher tongue that could be understood of those that heard her except his\nname whom she sought. Ah! that is how men wander through the earth,\nstrangers in the midst of it. They cannot translate the cry of their own\nhearts, but it means, 'God--my soul thirsteth for Thee'; and the thirst\nbids us seek His face.\n\nHe summons us by all the providences and events of our changeful lives.\nOur sorrows by their poignancy, our joys by their incompleteness and\ntheir transiency, alike call us to Him in whom alone the sorrows can be\nsoothed and the joys made full and remain. Our duties, by their\nheaviness, call us to turn ourselves to Him, in whom alone we can find\nthe strength to fill the _role_ that is laid upon us, and to discharge\nour daily tasks.\n\nBut, most of all, He summons us to Himself by Him who is the Angel of\nHis Face, 'the effulgence of His glory, and the express image of His\nperson.' In the face of Jesus Christ, 'the light of the knowledge of the\nglory of God' beams out upon us, as it never shone on this Psalmist of\nold. He saw but a portion of that countenance, through a thick veil\nwhich thinned as faith gazed, but was never wholly withdrawn. The voice\nthat he heard calling him was less penetrating and less laden with love\nthan the voice that calls us. He caught some tones of invitation\nsounding in providences and prophecies, in ceremonies and in law; we\nhear them more full and clear from the lips of a Brother. They sound to\nus from the cradle and the cross, and they are wafted down to us from\nthe throne. God's merciful invitation to us poor men never has taken,\nnor will, nor can, take a sweeter and more attractive form than in\nChrist's version of it: 'Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy\nladen, and I will give you rest.' Friend! that summons comes to us; may\nwe deal with it as the Psalmist did!\n\nII. That brings me to note, secondly, the devout soul's response to the\nloving call from God.\n\nI have already pointed out how beautifully and vividly the contrast\nbetween the two is expressed in our text: 'Seek ye My face'--'Thy face\nwill I seek.' The Psalmist takes the general invitation and converts it\ninto an individual one, to which he responds. God's 'ye' is met by his\n'I.' The Psalmist makes no hesitation or delay--'_When_ Thou saidst ...\nmy heart said to Thee.' The Psalmist gathers himself together in a\nconcentrated resolve of a fixed determination--'Thy face _will_ I seek.'\nThat is how we ought to respond.\n\nMake the general invitation thy very own. God summons all, because He\nsummons each. He does not cast His invitations out at random over the\nheads of a crowd, as some rich man might fling coins to a mob, but He\naddresses every one of us singly and separately, as if there were not\nanother soul in the universe to hear His voice but our very own selves.\nIt is for us not to lose ourselves in the crowd, since He has not lost\nus in it; but to appropriate, to individualise, to make our very own,\nthe universality of His call to the world. It matters nothing to you\nwhat other men may do; it matters not to you how many others may be\ninvited, and whether they may accept or may refuse. When that 'Seek ye'\ncomes to my heart, life or death depends on my answering, 'Whatsoever\nothers may do, as for me I will seek Thy face.' We preachers that have\nto stand and address a multitude sound out the invitation, and it loses\nin power, the more there are to listen to us. If I could get you one by\none, the poorest words would have more weight with you than the\nstrongest have when spoken to a crowd. Brother! God individualises us,\nand God speaks to Thee, 'Wilt thou behold My face?' Answer, 'As for me,\nI will.'\n\nAgain, the Psalmist 'made haste, and delayed not, but made haste' to\nrespond to the merciful summons. Ah! how many of us, in how many\ndifferent ways, fall into the snare 'by-and-by'! 'not now'; and all\nthese days, that slip away whilst we hesitate, gather themselves\ntogether to be our accusers hereafter. Friend! why should you limit the\nblessedness that may come into your life to the fag end of it when you\nhave got tired and satiated, or tired and disappointed with the world\nand its good? 'Seek ye the Lord while He may be found, call ye upon Him\nwhile He is near.' It is poor courtesy to show to a merciful invitation\nfrom a bountiful host if I say; 'After I have looked to the oxen I have\nbought, and tested them, and measured the field that I have acquired;\nafter I have drunk the sweetness of wedded life with the wife that I\nhave married, then I will come. But, for the present, I pray thee, have\nme excused.' And that is what many are doing, more or less.\n\nThe Psalmist gathered himself together in a fixed resolve, and said, 'I\n_will_.' That is what we have to do. A languid seeker will not find; an\nearnest one will not fail to find. But if half-heartedly, now and then,\nwhen we are at leisure in the intervals of more important and pressing\ndaily business, we spasmodically bethink ourselves, and for a little\nwhile seek for the light of God's felt presence to shine upon us, we\nshall not get it. But if we lay a masterful hand, as we ought to do, on\nthese divergent desires that draw us asunder, and bind ourselves, as it\nwere, together, by the strong cord of a resolved purpose carried out\nthroughout our lives, then we shall certainly not seek in vain.\n\nAlas! how strange and how sad is the reception which this merciful\ninvitation receives from so many of us! Some of you never hear it at\nall. Standing in the very focus where the sounds converge, you are deaf,\nas if a man behind the veil of the falling water of Niagara, on that\nrocky shelf there, should hear nothing. From every corner of the\nuniverse that voice comes; from all the providences and events of our\nlives that voice comes; from the life and death of Jesus Christ that\nvoice comes; and not a sound reaches your ears. 'Having ears, they hear\nnot,' and some of us might take the Psalmist's answer, with one sad word\nadded, as ours--'When Thou saidst, Seek ye My face, my heart said unto\nThee, Thy face, Lord, will I _not_ seek.'\n\nBrethren! it is heaven on earth to say, 'Thou dost call, and I answer.\nSpeak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth.' Yet you shut yourselves up to,\nand with, misery and vanity, if you so deal with God's merciful summons\nas some of us are dealing with it, so that He has to say, 'I called, and\nye refused; I stretched out My hand, and no man regarded.'\n\nIII. Lastly, we have here a prayer built upon both the invitation and\nthe acceptance.\n\n'Hide not Thy face far from me.' That prayer implies that God will not\ncontradict Himself. His promises are commandments. If He bids us seek He\nbinds Himself to show. His veracity, His unchangeableness, are pledged\nto this, that no man who yields to His invitation will be balked of his\ndesire. He does not hold out the gift in His hand, and then twitch it\naway when we put out encouraged and stimulated hands to grasp it. You\nhave seen children flashing bright reflections from a mirror on to a\nwall, and delighting to direct them away to another spot, when a hand\nhas been put out to touch them. That is not how God does. The light that\nHe reveals is steady, and whosoever turns his face to it will be\nirradiated by its brightness.\n\nThe prayer builds itself on the assurance that, because God will not\ncontradict Himself, therefore every heart seeking is sure to issue in a\nheart finding. There is only one region where that is true, brethren!\nthere is only one tract of human experience in which the promise is\nalways and absolutely fulfilled:--'Ask, and ye shall receive; seek, and\nye shall find.' We hunt after all other good, and at the best we get it\nin part or for a time, and when possessed, it is not as bright as when\nit shone in the delusive colours of hope and desire. If you follow other\ngood, and are drawn after the elusive lights that dance before you, and\nonly show how great is the darkness, you will not reach them, but will\nbe mired in the bog. If you follow after God's face, it will make a\nsunshine in the shadiest places of life here. You will be blessed\nbecause you walk all the day long in the light of His countenance, and\nwhen you pass hence it will irradiate the darkness of death, and\nthereafter, 'His servants shall serve Him, and shall see His face,' and,\nseeing, shall be made like Him, for 'His name shall be in their\nforeheads.'\n\nBrethren! we have to make our choice whether we shall see His face here\non earth, and so meet it hereafter as that of a long-separated and\nlong-desired friend; or whether we shall see it first when He is on His\nthrone, and we at His bar, and so shall have to 'call on the rocks and\nthe hills to fall on us, and cover us from the face of Him who is our\nJudge.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE TWO GUESTS\n\n    'His anger endureth but a moment; in His favour is life: weeping may\n    endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.'--PSALM xxx. 5.\n\nA word or two of exposition is necessary in order to bring out the force\nof this verse. There is an obvious antithesis in the first part of it,\nbetween 'His anger' and 'His favour.' Probably there is a similar\nantithesis between a 'moment' and 'life.' For, although the word\nrendered 'life' does not unusually mean a _lifetime_ it _may_ have that\nsignification, and the evident intention of contrast seems to require it\nhere. So, then, the meaning of the first part of my text is, 'the anger\nlasts for a moment; the favour lasts for a lifetime.' The perpetuity of\nthe one, and the brevity of the other, are the Psalmist's thought.\n\nThen, if we pass to the second part of the text, you will observe that\nthere is there also a double antithesis. 'Weeping' is set over against\n'joy'; the 'night' against the 'morning.' And the first of these two\ncontrasts is the more striking if we observe that the word 'joy' means,\nliterally, 'a joyful shout,' so that the voice which was lifted in\nweeping is conceived of as now being heard in exultant praise. Then,\nstill further, the expression 'may endure' literally means 'may come to\nlodge.' So that Weeping and Joy are personified. Two guests come; one,\ndark-robed and approaching at the fitting season for such, 'the night.'\nThe other bright, coming with all things fresh and sunny, in the dewy\nmorn. The guest of the night is Weeping; the guest that takes its place\nin the morning is Gladness.\n\nThe two clauses, then, of my text suggest substantially the same\nthought, and that is the persistence of joy and the transitoriness of\nsorrow. The one speaks of the succession of emotions in the man; the\nother, of the successive aspects of the divine dealings which occasion\nthese. The whole is a leaf out of the Psalmist's own experience. The\npsalm commemorates his deliverance from some affliction, probably a\nsickness. That is long gone past; and the tears that it caused have long\nsince dried up. But this shout of joy of his has lasted all these\ncenturies, and is like to be immortal. Well for us if we can read our\nlife's story with the same cheery confidence as he did his, and have\nlearned like him to discern what is the temporary and what the permanent\nelement in our experience!\n\nI. Note, first, the proportion of joy and sorrow in an ordinary life.\n\nThe Psalmist expresses, as I have said, the same idea in both clauses.\nIn the former the 'anger' is contemplated not so much as an element in\nthe divine mind, as in its manifestations in the divine dealings. I\nshall have a word or two, presently, to say about the Scriptural\nconception of the 'anger' of God and its relation to the 'favour' of\nGod; but for the present I take the two clauses as being substantially\nequivalent.\n\nNow is it true--is it not true?--that if a man rightly regards the\nproportionate duration of these two diverse elements in his life, he\nmust come to the conclusion that the one is continuous and the other is\nbut transitory? A thunderstorm is very short when measured against the\nlong summer day in which it crashes; and very few days have them. It\nmust be a bad climate where half the days are rainy. If we were to take\nthe chart and prick out upon it the line of our sailing, we should find\nthat the spaces in which the weather was tempestuous were brief and few\nindeed as compared with those in which it was sunny and calm.\n\nBut then, man looks before and after, and has the terrible gift that by\nanticipation and by memory he can prolong the sadness. The proportion of\nsolid matter needed to colour the Irwell is very little in comparison\nwith the whole of the stream. But the current carries it, and half an\nounce will stain miles of the turbid stream. Memory and anticipation\nbeat the metal thin, and make it cover an enormous space. And the misery\nis that, somehow, we have better memories for sad hours than for joyful\nones, and it is easier to get accustomed to 'blessings,' as we call\nthem, and to lose the poignancy of their sweetness because they become\nfamiliar, than it is to apply the same process to our sorrows, and thus\nto take the edge off them. The rose's prickles are felt in the flesh\nlonger than its fragrance lives in the nostrils, or its hue in the eye.\nMen have long memories for their pains as compared with their\nremembrance of their sorrows.\n\nSo it comes to be a piece of very homely, well-worn, and yet always\nneedful, practical counsel to try not to magnify and prolong grief, nor\nto minimise and abbreviate gladness. We can make our lives, to our own\nthinking, very much what we will. We cannot directly regulate our\nemotions, but we can regulate them, because it is in our own power to\ndetermine which aspect of our life we shall by preference contemplate.\n\nHere is a room, for instance, papered with a paper with a dark\nbackground and a light pattern on it. Well, you can manoeuvre your eye\nabout so as either to look at the black background--and then it is all\nblack, with only a little accidental white or gilt to relieve it here\nand there; or you can focus your eye on the white and gold, and then\nthat is the main thing, and the other is background. We can choose, to a\nlarge extent, what we shall conceive our lives to be; and so we can very\nlargely modify their real character.\n\n  'There's nothing either good or bad\n     But thinking makes it so.'\n\nThey who will can surround themselves with persistent gladness, and they\nwho will can gather about them the thick folds of an everbrooding and\nenveloping sorrow. Courage, cheerfulness, thankfulness, buoyancy,\nresolution, are all closely connected with a sane estimate of the\nrelative proportions of the bright and the dark in a human life.\n\nII. And now consider, secondly, the inclusion of the 'moment' in the\n'life.'\n\nI do not know that the Psalmist thought of that when he gave utterance\nto my text, but whether he did it or not, it is true that the 'moment'\nspent in 'anger' is a part of the 'life' that is spent in the 'favour.'\nJust as within the circle of a life lies each of its moments, the same\nprinciple of inclusion may be applied to the other contrast presented\nhere. For as the 'moment' is a part of the 'life,' the 'danger' is a\npart of the love. The 'favour' holds the 'anger' within itself, for the\ntrue Scriptural idea of that terrible expression and terrible fact, the\n'wrath of God,' is that it is the necessary aversion of a perfectly pure\nand holy love from that which does not correspond to itself. So, though\nsometimes the two may be set against each other, yet at bottom, and in\nreality, they are one, and the 'anger' is but a mode in which the\n'favour' manifests itself. God's love is plastic, and if thrown back\nupon itself, grieved and wounded and rejected, becomes the 'anger' which\nignorant men sometimes seem to think it contradicts. There is no more\nantagonism between these two ideas when they are applied to God than\nwhen they are applied to you parents in your relations to a disobedient\nchild. You know, and it knows, that if there were no love there would be\nlittle 'anger.' Neither of you suppose that an irate parent is an\nunloving parent. 'If ye, being evil, know how,' in dealing with your\nchildren, to blend wrath and love, 'how much more shall your Father\nwhich is in heaven' be one and the same Father when His love manifests\nitself in chastisement and when it expands itself in blessings!\n\nThus we come to the truth which breathes uniformity and simplicity\nthrough all the various methods of the divine hand, that howsoever He\nchanges and reverses His dealings with us, they are one and the same.\nYou may get two diametrically opposite motions out of the same machine.\nThe same power will send one wheel revolving from right to left, and\nanother from left to right, but they are co-operant to grind out at the\nfar end the one product. It is the same revolution of the earth that\nbrings blessed lengthening days and growing summer, and that cuts short\nthe sun's course and brings declining days and increasing cold. It is\nthe same motion which hurls a comet close to the burning sun, and sends\nit wandering away out into fields of astronomical space, beyond the ken\nof telescope, and almost beyond the reach of thought. And so one uniform\ndivine purpose, the 'favour' which uses the 'anger,' fills the life, and\nthere are no interruptions, howsoever brief, to the steady continuous\nflow of His outpoured blessings. All is love and favour. Anger is masked\nlove, and sorrow has the same source and mission as joy. It takes all\nsorts of weathers to make a year, and all tend to the same issue, of\nripened harvests and full barns. O brethren! if we understand that God\nmeans something better for us than happiness, even likeness to Himself,\nwe should understand better how our deepest sorrows and bitterest tears,\nand the wounds that penetrate deepest into our bleeding hearts, all come\nfrom the same motive, and are directed to the same end as their most\njoyful contraries. One thing the Lord desires, that we may be partakers\nof His holiness, and so we may venture to give an even deeper meaning to\nthe Psalmist's words than he intended, and recognise that the 'moment'\nis an integral part of the 'life,' and the 'anger' a mode of the\nmanifestation of the 'favour.'\n\nIII. Lastly, notice the conversion of the sorrow into joy.\n\nI have already explained the picturesque image of the last part of my\ntext, which demands a little further consideration. There are two\nfigures presented before us, one dark robed and one bright garmented.\nThe one is the guest of the night, the other is the guest of the\nmorning. The verb which occurs in the first clause of the second half of\nmy text is not repeated in the second, and so the words may be taken in\ntwo ways. They may either express how Joy, the morning guest, comes, and\nturns out the evening visitant, or they may suggest how we took Sorrow\nin when the night fell, to sit by the fireside, but when morning\ndawned--who is this, sitting in her place, smiling as we look at her? It\nis Sorrow transfigured, and her name is changed into Joy. Either the\nsubstitution or the transformation may be supposed to be in the\nPsalmist's mind.\n\nBoth are true. No human heart, however wounded, continues always to\nbleed. Some gracious vegetation creeps over the wildest ruin. The\nroughest edges are smoothed by time. Vitality asserts itself; other\ninterests have a right to be entertained and are entertained. The\nrecuperative powers come into play, and the pang departs and poignancy\nis softened. The cutting edge gets blunt on even poisoned spears by the\ngracious influences of time. The nightly guest, Sorrow, slips away, and\nere we know, another sits in her place. Some of us try to fight against\nthat merciful process and seem to think that it is a merit to continue,\nby half artificial means, the first moment of pain, and that it is\ntreason to some dear remembrances to let life have its way, and to-day\nhave its rights. That is to set ourselves against the dealings of God,\nand to refuse to forgive Him for what His love has done for us.\n\nBut the other thought seems to me to be even more beautiful, and\nprobably to be what was in the Psalmist's mind--viz. the transformation\nof the evil, Sorrow itself, into the radiant form of Joy. A prince in\nrags comes to a poor man's hovel, is hospitably received in the\ndarkness, and being received and welcomed, in the morning slips off his\nrags and appears as he is. Sorrow is Joy disguised.\n\nIf it be accepted, if the will submit, if the heart let itself be\nuntwined, that its tendrils may be coiled closer round the heart of God,\nthen the transformation is sure to come, and joy will dawn on those who\nhave done rightly--that is, submissively and thankfully--by their\nsorrows. It will not be a joy like what the world calls\njoy--loud-voiced, boisterous, ringing with idiot laughter; but it will\nbe pure, and deep, and sacred, and permanent. A white lily is fairer\nthan a flaunting peony, and the joy into which sorrow accepted turns is\npure and refining and good.\n\nSo, brethren! remember that the richest vintages are grown on the rough\nslopes of the volcano, and lovely flowers blow at the glacier's edge;\nand all our troubles, big and little, may be converted into gladnesses\nif we accept them as God meant them. Only they must be so accepted if\nthey are to be thus changed.\n\nBut there may be some hearts recoiling from much that I have said in\nthis sermon, and thinking to themselves, 'Ah! there are two kinds of\nsorrows. There are those that _can_ be cured, and there are those that\n_cannot_. What have you got to say to me who have to bleed from an\nimmedicable wound till the end of my life?' Well, I have to say\nthis--look beyond earth's dim dawns to that morning when 'the Sun of\nRighteousness shall arise, to them that love His name, with healing in\nHis wings.' If we have to carry a load on an aching back till the end,\nbe sure that when the night, which is far spent, is over, and the day\nwhich is at hand hath broken, every raindrop will be turned into a\nflashing rainbow when it is smitten by the level light, and every sorrow\nrightly borne be represented by a special and particular joy.\n\nOnly, brother! if a life is to be spent in His favour, it must be spent\nin His fear. And if our cares and troubles and sorrows and losses are to\nbe transfigured hereafter, then we must keep very near Jesus Christ, who\nhas promised to us that His joy will remain with us, and that our\nsorrows shall be turned into joys. If we trust to Him, the voices that\nhave been raised in weeping will be heard in gladness, and earth's minor\nwill be transposed by the great Master of the music into the key of\nHeaven's jubilant praise. If only 'we look not at the things seen, but\nat the things which are not seen,' then 'our light affliction, which is\nbut for a moment, will work out for us a far more exceeding and eternal\nweight of glory'; and the weight will be no burden, but will bear up\nthose who are privileged to bear it.\n\n\n\n\n'BE ... FOR THOU ART'\n\n\n    'Be Thou to me a strong Rock, an house of defence to save me. 3. For\n    Thou art my Rock and my Fortress.'--PSALM xxxi. 2, 3 (R.V.).\n\nIt sounds strange logic, 'Be ... for Thou art,' and yet it _is_ the\nlogic of prayer, and goes very deep, pointing out both its limits and\nits encouragements. The parallelism between these two clauses is even\nstronger in the original than in our Version, for whilst the two words\nwhich designate the 'Rock' are not identical, their meaning is\nidentical, and the difference between them is insignificant; one being a\nrock of any shape or size, the other being a perpendicular cliff or\nelevated promontory. And in the other clause, 'for a house of defence to\nsave me,' the word rendered 'defence' is the same as that which is\ntranslated in the next clause 'fortress.' So that if we were to read\nthus: 'Be Thou a strong Rock to me, for a house, a fortress, for Thou\nart my Rock and my Fortress,' we should get the whole force of the\nparallelism. Of course the main idea in that of the 'Rock,' and\n'Fortress' is only an exposition of one phase of the meaning of that\nmetaphor.\n\nI. So let us look first at what God is.\n\n'A rock, a fortress-house.' Now, what is the force of that metaphor?\nStable being, as it seems to me, is the first thought in it, for there\nis nothing that is more absolutely the type of unchangeableness and\nsteadfast continuance. The great cliffs rise up, and the river glides at\ntheir base--it is a type of mutability, and of the fleeting generations\nof men, who are as the drops and ripples in its course--it eddies round\nthe foot of the rocks to which the old man looks up, and sees the same\ndints and streaks and fissures in it that he saw when he was a child.\nThe river runs onwards, the trees that root themselves in the clefts of\nthe rock bear their spring foliage, and drop their leaves like the\ngenerations of men, and the Rock is 'the same yesterday, and to-day, and\nfor ever.' And God the Unchangeable rises, if I may so say, like some\nmajestic cliff, round the foot of which rolls for ever the tide of human\nlife, and round which are littered the successive layers of the leaves\nof many summers.\n\nThen besides this stable being, and the consequences of it, is the other\nthought which is attached to the emblem in a hundred places in\nScripture, and that is defence. 'His place of defence shall be the\nmunitions of rocks.' When the floods are out, and all the plain is being\ndissolved into mud, the dwellers on it fly to the cliffs. When the\nenemy's banners appear on the horizon, and the open country is being\nharried and burned, the peasants hurry to the defence of the hills, and,\nsheltered there, are safe. And so for us this Name assures us that in\nHim, whatever floods may sweep across the low levels, and whatever foes\nmay storm over the open land and the unwalled villages, there is always\nthe fortress up in the hills, and thither no flood can rise, and there\nno enemy can come. A defence and a sure abode is his who dwells in God,\nand thus folds over himself the warm wings that stretch on either side,\nand shelter him from all assault. 'Lead me to the Rock that is higher\nthan I.'\n\nBut the Rock is a defence in another way. If a hard-pressed fugitive is\nbrought to a stand and can set his back against a rock, he can front his\nassailants, secure that no unseen foe shall creep up behind and deal a\nstealthy stab and that he will not be surrounded unawares. 'The God of\nIsrael shall be your rearward,' and he who has 'made the Most High his\nhabitation' is sheltered from 'the pestilence that walketh in darkness,'\nas well as from 'the destruction that wasteth at noon-day,' and will be\ncleansed from 'secret faults' if he keeps up unbroken his union with\nGod, for the 'faults' which are not recognised as faults by his\npartially illuminated conscience are known to God. But the Rock is a\ndefence in yet another way, for it is a sure foundation for our lives.\nWhoso builds on God need fear no change. When the floods rise, and the\nwinds blow, and the rain storms down, the house that is on the Rock will\nstand.\n\nAnd, then, in the Rock there is a spring, and round the spring there is\n'the light of laughing flowers,' amidst the stern majesty of the cliff.\nJust as the Law-giver of old smote the rock, and there gushed out the\nstream that satisfied the thirst of the whole travelling nation, so Paul\nwould have us Christians repeat the miracle by our faith. Of us, too, it\nmay be said, they drank 'of that Rock that followed them, and that Rock\nwas Christ.' Stable being, secure defence, a fountain of refreshment and\nsatisfaction: all these blessings lie in that great metaphor.\n\nII. Now, note our plea with God, from what He is.\n\n'Be Thou to me a Rock ... for Thou art a Rock.' Is that not illogical?\nNo, for notice that little word, 'to me'--be Thou _to me_ what Thou art\nin Thyself, and hast been to all generations.' That makes all the\ndifference. It is not merely 'Be what Thou art,' although that would be\nmuch, but it is 'be it to me,' and let _me_ have all which is meant in\nthat great Name.\n\nBut then, beyond that, let me point out to you how this prayer suggests\nto us that all true prayer will keep itself within God's revelation of\nwhat He is. We take His promises, and all the elements which make up His\nname or manifestation of His character to the world, whether by His acts\nor by the utterances of this Book, or by the inferences to be drawn from\nthe life of Jesus Christ, the great Revealer, or by what we ourselves\nhave experienced of Him. The ways by which God has revealed Himself to\nthe world define the legitimate subjects, and lay down the firm\nfoundation, of our petitions. In all His acts God reveals Himself, and\nif I may so say, when we truly pray, we catch these up, and send them\nback again to heaven, like arrows from a bow. It is only when our\ndesires and prayers foot themselves upon God's revelation of Himself,\nand in essence are, in various fashions, the repetition of this prayer\nof my text: 'Be ... for Thou art,' that we can expect to have them\nanswered. Much else may call itself prayer, but it is often but petulant\nand self-willed endeavour to force our wishes upon Him, and no answer\nwill come to that. We are to pray about everything; but we are to pray\nabout nothing, except within the lines which are marked out for us by\nwhat God has told us, in His words and acts, that He Himself is. Catch\nthese up and fling them back to Him, and for every utterance that He has\nmade of Himself, 'I am' so-and-so, let us go to Him and say 'Be Thou\nthat to me,' and then we may be sure of an answer.\n\nSo then two things follow. If we pray after the pattern of this prayer,\n'Be Thou to me what Thou art,' then a great many foolish and\npresumptuous wishes will be stifled in the birth, and, on the other\nhand, a great many feeble desires will be strengthened and made\nconfident, and we shall be encouraged to expect great things of God.\nHave you widened your prayers, dear friend!--and I do not mean by that\nonly your outward ones, but the habitual aspiration and expectation of\nyour minds--have you widened these to be as wide as what God has shown\nus that He is? Have you taken all God's revelation of Himself, and\ntranslated it into petition? And do you expect Him to be to you all that\nHe has ever been to any soul of man upon earth? Oh! how such a prayer as\nthis, if we rightly understand it and feel it, puts to shame the\nnarrowness and the poverty of our prayers, the falterings of our faith,\nand the absence of expectation in ourselves that we shall receive the\nfulness of God.\n\nGod owns that plea: 'Be ... what Thou art.' He cannot resist that. That\nis what the Apostle meant when he said, 'He abideth faithful, He cannot\ndeny Himself.' He must be true to His character. He can never be other\nthan He always has been. And that is what the Psalmist meant when he\ngoes on, after the words that I have taken for my text, and says, 'For\nThy Name's sake lead me and guide me,' What is God's Name? The\ncollocation of letters by which we designate Him? Certainly not. The\nName of God is the sum total of what God has revealed Himself as being.\nAnd 'for the sake of the Name,' that He may be true to that which He has\nshown Himself to be, He will always endorse this bill that you draw upon\nHim when you present Him with His own character, and say 'Be to me what\nThou art.'\n\nIII. Lastly, we have here the plea with God drawn from what we have\ntaken Him to be to us.\n\nThat is somewhat different from what I have already been dwelling upon.\nMark the words: 'Be Thou to me a strong Rock, for Thou art _my_ Rock and\n_my_ Fortress.' What does that mean? It means that the suppliant has, by\nhis own act of faith, taken God for his; that he has appropriated the\ngreat divine revelation, and made it his own. Now it seems to me that\nthat appropriation is, if not _the_ point, at least one of the points,\nin which real faith is distinguished from the sham thing which goes by\nthat name amongst so many people. A man by faith encloses a bit of the\ncommon for his very own. When God says that He 'so loved the world that\nHe gave His ... Son,' I should say, 'He loved _me_, and gave Himself for\n_me_.' When the great revelation is made that He is the Rock of Ages, my\nfaith says: '_My_ Rock and _my_ Fortress.' Having said that, and claimed\nHim for mine, I can then turn round to Him and say, 'Be to me what I\nhave taken Thee to be.'\n\nAnd that faith is expressed very beautifully and strikingly in one of\nthe Old Testament metaphors, which frequently goes along with this one\nof the Rock. For instance, in a great chapter in Isaiah we find the\noriginal of that phrase 'the Rock of Ages.' It runs thus, 'Trust ye in\nthe Lord for ever, for in the Lord JEHOVAH is the _Rock of Ages_.' Now\nthe word for trust there literally means, to flee into a refuge, and so\nthe true idea of faith is 'to fly for refuge,' as the Epistle to the\nHebrews has it, 'to the Hope set before us,'--that is (keeping to the\nmetaphor), to the cleft in the Rock.\n\nThat act of trust or flight will make it certain that God will be to us\nfor a house of defence, a fortress to save us. Other rock-shelters may\ncrumble. They may be carried by assault; they may be riven by\nearthquakes. 'The mountains shall depart, and the hills shall be\nremoved,' but this Rock is impregnable, and all who take refuge in it\nare safe for ever.\n\nAnd so the upshot of the whole matter is that God will be to us what we\nhave faith to believe that He is, and our faith will be the measure of\nour possession of the fulness of God. If we can only say in the fulness\nof our hearts--and keep to the saying: 'Be Thou to me a Rock, for Thou\nart my Rock,' then nothing shall ever hurt us; and 'dwelling in the\nsecret place of the Most High' we shall be kept in safety; our 'abode\nshall be the munitions of rocks, our bread shall be given us, and our\nwater shall be made sure.'\n\n\n\n\n'INTO THY HANDS'\n\n\n    'Into Thine hand I commit my spirit: Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord\n    God of truth.'--PSALM xxxi. 5.\n\nThe first part of this verse is consecrated for ever by our Lord's use\nof it on the Cross. Is it not wonderful that, at that supreme hour, He\ndeigned to take an unknown singer's words as His words? What an honour\nto that old saint that Jesus Christ, dying, should find nothing that\nmore fully corresponded to His inmost heart at that moment than the\nutterance of the Psalmist long ago! How His mind must have been\nsaturated with the Old Testament and with these songs of Israel! And do\nyou not think it would be better for us if ours were completely steeped\nin those heart-utterances of ancient devotion?\n\nBut, of course, the Psalmist was not thinking about his death. It was an\nact for his life that he expressed in these words:--'Into Thine hands I\ncommit my spirit.' If you will glance over the psalm at your leisure,\nyou will see that it is the heart-cry of a man in great trouble,\nsurrounded by all sorts of difficulties, with his very life threatened.\nHe was down in the very depths of darkness, and ringed about by all\nsorts of enemies at that moment, not sitting comfortably, as you and I\nare here, but in the midst of the hurly-burly and the strife, when by a\ndead lift of faith he flung himself clean out of his disasters, and, if\nI might so say, pitched himself into the arms of God. 'Into Thine hands\nI commit my spirit,' as a man standing in the midst of enemies, and\nbearing some precious treasure in his hand might, with one strong cast\nof his arm, fling it into the open hand of some mighty helper, and so\nbaulk the enemies of their prey. That is the figure.\n\nI. Now, let me say a word as to where to lodge a soul for safe keeping.\n\n'Into Thine hands'--a banker has a strong room, and a wise man sends his\nsecurities and his valuables to the bank and takes an acknowledgment,\nand goes to bed at night, quite sure that no harm will come to them, and\nthat he will get them when he wants them. And that is exactly what the\nPsalmist does here. He deposits his most precious treasure in the safe\ncustody of One who will take care of it. The great Hand is stretched\nout, and the little soul is put into it. It closes, and 'no man is able\nto pluck them out of My Father's hand.'\n\nNow that is only a picturesque way of putting the most threadbare, bald,\ncommonplace of religious teaching. The word faith, when it has any\nmeaning at all in people's minds when they hear it from the pulpit, is\nextremely apt, I fear, to create a kind of, if not disgust, at least a\nrevulsion of feeling, as if people said, 'Ah, there he is at the old\nstory again!' But will you freshen up your notions of what faith it\nmeans by taking that picture of my text as I have tried to expand and\nilluminate it a little by my metaphor? That is what is meant by 'Into\nThy hands I commit my spirit.' There are two or three ways in which that\nis to be done, and one or two ways in which it is not to be done.\n\nWe do it when we trust Him for the salvation of our souls. There are a\ngreat many good Christian people who go mourning all their days, or, at\nleast, sometimes mourning and sometimes indifferent. The most that they\nventure to say is, 'But I cannot be sure.' Our grandfathers used to\nsing:--\n\n  ''Tis a point I long to know,\n   Oft it causes anxious thought.'\n\nWhy should it cause anxious thought? Take your own personal salvation\nfor granted, and work from that. Do not work _towards_ it. If you have\ngone to Christ and said, 'Lord, I cannot save myself; save me. I am\nwilling to be saved,' be sure that you have the salvation that you ask,\nand that if you have put your soul in that fashion into God's hands, any\nincredible thing is credible, and any impossible thing is possible,\nrather than that you should fail of the salvation which, in the bottom\nof your hearts, you desire. Take the burden off your backs and put it on\nHis. Do not be for ever questioning yourselves, 'Am I a saved man?' You\nwill get sick of that soon, and you will be very apt to give up all\nthought about the matter at all. But take your stand on the fact, and\nwith emancipated and buoyant hearts, and grateful ones, work from it,\nand because of it. And when sin rises up in your soul, and you say to\nyourselves, 'If I were a Christian I could not have done that,' or, 'If\nI were a Christian I could not be so-and-so'; remember that all sin is\ninconsistent with being a Christian, but no sin is incompatible with it;\nand that after all the consciousness of shortcomings and failure, we\nhave just to come back to the old point, and throw ourselves on God's\nlove. His arms are open to clasp us round. 'Into Thy hands I commit my\nspirit.'\n\nFurther, the Psalmist meant, by committing himself to God, trusting Him\nin reference to daily life, and all its difficulties and duties. Our act\nof trust is to run through everything that we undertake and everything\nthat we have to fight with. Self-will wrenches our souls out of God's\nhands. A man who sends his securities to the banker can get them back\nwhen he likes. And if we undertake to manage our own affairs, or fling\nourselves into our work without recognition of our dependence upon Him,\nor if we choose our work without seeking to know what His will is, that\nis recalling our deposit. Then you _will_ get it back again, because God\ndoes not keep anybody's securities against his will--you will get it\nback again, and much good it will do you when you have got it!\nSelf-will, self-reliance, self-determination--these are the opposites of\ncommitting the keeping of our souls to God. And, as I say, if you\nwithdraw the deposit, you take all the burden and trouble of it on your\nown shoulders again. Do not fancy that you are 'living lives of faith in\nthe Son of God,' if you are not looking to Him to settle what you are to\ndo. You cannot expect that He will watch over you, if you do not ask Him\nwhere you are to go.\n\nBut now there is another thing that I would suggest, this committing of\nourselves to God which begins with the initial act of trust in Him for\nthe salvation of our souls, and is continued throughout life by the\ncontinual surrender of ourselves to Him, is to be accompanied with\ncorresponding work. The Apostle Peter's memory is evidently hovering\nround this verse, whether he is consciously quoting it or not, when he\nsays, 'Let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the\nkeeping of their souls to Him _in welldoing_,' which has to go along\nwith the act of trust and dependence. There must come the continual\nordering of the life in accordance with His will; for 'well-doing' does\nnot mean merely some works of beneficence and 'charity,' of the sort\nthat have monopolised to themselves the name in latter days, but it\nmeans the whole of righteous conduct in accordance with the will of God.\n\nSo Peter tells us that it is vain for us to talk about committing the\nkeeping of our soul to God unless we back up the committing with\nconsistent, Christlike lives. Of course it is vain. How can a man expect\nGod to take care of him when he plunges himself into something that is\ncontrary to God's laws? There are many people who say, 'God will take\ncare of me; He will save me from the consequences.' Not a bit of it--He\nloves us a great deal too well for that. If you take the bit between\nyour teeth, you will be allowed to go over the precipice and be smashed\nto pieces. If you wish to be taken care of, keep within the prescribed\nlimits, and consult Him before you act, and do not act till you are sure\nof His approval. God has never promised to rescue man when he has got\ninto trouble by his own sin. Suppose a servant had embezzled his\nmaster's money through gambling, and then expected God to help him to\nget the money to pay back into the till. Do you think that would be\nlikely to work? And how dare you anticipate that God will keep your\nfeet, if you are walking in ways of your own choosing? All sin takes a\nman out from the shelter of the divine protection, and the shape the\nprotection has to take then is chastisement. And all sin makes it\nimpossible for a man to exercise that trust which is the committing of\nhis soul to God. So it has to be 'in welldoing,' and the two things are\nto go together. 'What God hath joined let not man put asunder.' You do\nnot become a Christian by the simple exercise of trust unless it is\ntrust that worketh by love.\n\nBut let me remind you, further, that this committing of our souls into\nGod's hands does not mean that we are absolved from taking care of them\nourselves. There is a very false kind of religious faith, which seems to\nthink that it shuffles off all responsibility upon God. Not at all; you\nlighten the responsibility, but you do not get rid of it. And no man has\na right to say 'He will keep me, and so I may neglect diligent custody\nof myself.' He keeps us very largely by helping us to keep our hearts\nwith all diligence, and to keep our feet in the way of truth.\n\nSo let me now just say a word in regard to the blessedness of thus\nliving in an atmosphere of continual dependence on, and reference to,\nGod, about great things and little things. Whenever a man is living by\ntrust, even when the trust is mistaken, or when it is resting upon some\nmere human, fallible creature like himself, the measure of his\nconfidence is the measure of his tranquillity. You know that when a\nchild says, 'I do not need to mind, father will look after that,' he may\nbe right or wrong in his estimate of his father's ability and\ninclination; but as long as he says it, he has no kind of trouble or\nanxiety, and the little face is scarred by no deep lines of care or\nthought. So when we turn to Him and say, 'Why should I the burden bear?'\nthen there comes--I was going to say 'surging,' but 'trickling' is a\nbetter word--into my heart a settled peacefulness which nothing else can\ngive. Look at this psalm. It begins, and for the first half continues,\nin a very minor key. The singer was not a poet posing as in affliction,\nbut his words were wrung out of him by anguish. 'Mine eyes are consumed\nwith grief; my life is spent with grief'; 'I am ... as a dead man out of\nmind'; 'I am in trouble.' And then with a quick wheel about, 'But I\ntrusted in Thee, O Lord! I said, Thou art my God.' And what comes of\nthat? This--'O how great is Thy goodness which Thou hast laid up for\nthem that fear Thee!' 'Blessed be the Lord, for He hath showed me His\nmarvellous kindness in a strong city.' And then, at the end of all, his\npeacefulness is so triumphant that he calls upon 'all His saints' to\nhelp him to praise. And the last words are 'Be of good courage, and He\nshall strengthen your heart.' That is what you will get if you commit\nyour soul to God. There was no change in the Psalmist's circumstances.\nThe same enemy was round about him. The same 'net was privily laid for\nhim.' All that had seemed to him half an hour before as wellnigh\ndesperate, continued utterly unaltered. But what _had_ altered? God had\ncome into the place, and that altered the whole aspect of matters.\nInstead of looking with shrinking and tremulous heart along the level of\nearth, where miseries were, he was looking up into the heavens, where\nGod was; and so everything was beautiful. That will be our experience if\nwe will commit the keeping of our souls to Him in well doing. You can\nbring June flowers and autumn fruits into snowy January days by the\nexercise of this trust in God. It does not need that our circumstances\nshould alter, but only that our attitude should alter. Look up, and cast\nyour souls into God's hands, and all that is round you, of disasters and\ndifficulties and perplexities, will suffer transformation; and for\nsorrow there will come joy because there has come trust.\n\nI need not say a word about the other application of this verse, which,\nas I have said, is consecrated to us by our Lord's own use of it at the\nlast. But is it not beautiful to think that the very same act of mind\nand heart by which a man commits his spirit to God in life may be his\nwhen he comes to die, and that death may become a voluntary act, and the\nspirit may not be dragged out of us, reluctant, and as far as we can,\nresisting, but that we may offer it up as a libation, to use one\nmetaphor of St. Paul's, or may surrender it willingly as an act of\nfaith? It is wonderful to think that life and death, so unlike each\nother, may be made absolutely identical in the spirit in which they are\nmet. You remember how the first martyr caught up the words from the\nCross, and kneeling down outside the wall of Jerusalem, with the blood\nrunning from the wounds that the stones had made, said, 'Lord Jesus!\nreceive my spirit.' That is the way to die, and that is the way to live.\n\nOne word is all that time permits about the ground upon which this great\nventure of faith may be made. 'Thou hast redeemed me, Lord God of\nTruth.' The Psalmist, I think, uses that word 'redeemed' here, not in\nits wider spiritual New Testament sense, but in its frequent Old\nTestament sense, of deliverance from temporal difficulties and\ncalamities. And what he says is, in effect, this: 'I have had experience\nin the past which makes me believe that Thou wilt extricate me from this\ntrouble too, because Thou art the God of Truth.' He thinks of what God\nhas done, and of what God is. And Peter, whom we have already found\nechoing this text, echoes that part of it too, for he says, 'Let them\ncommit the keeping of their souls to Him in well doing, as _unto a\nfaithful Creator_,' which is all but parallel to 'Lord God of Truth.' So\nGod will continue as He has begun, and finish what He has begun.\n\n'A faithful Creator--' He made us to need what we do need, and He is not\ngoing to forget the wants that He Himself has incorporated with our\nhuman nature. He is bound to help us because He made us. He is the God\nof Truth, and He will help us. But if we take 'redeemed' in its highest\nsense, the Psalmist, arguing from God's past mercy and eternal\nfaithfulness, is saying substantially what the Apostle said in the\ntriumphant words, 'Whom He did foreknow, them He also did predestinate\nto be conformed to the image of His Son ... and whom He did predestinate\nthem He also ... justified, and whom He justified them He also\nglorified.' 'Thou hast redeemed me.' 'Thou art the God of Truth; Thou\nwilt not lift Thy hand away from Thy work until Thou hast made me all\nthat Thou didst bind Thyself to make me in that initial act of redeeming\nme.'\n\nSo we can say, 'He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for\nus all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?' You\nhave experiences, I have no doubt, in your past, on which you may well\nbuild confidence for the future. Let each of us consult our own hearts,\nand our own memories. Cannot _we_ say, 'Thou hast been my Help,' and\nought we not therefore to be sure that He will not 'leave us nor forsake\nus' until He manifests Himself as the God of our salvation?\n\nIt is a blessed thing to lay ourselves in the hands of God, but the New\nTestament tells us, 'It is a fearful thing to _fall into_ the hands of\nthe living God.' The alternative is one that we all have to\nface,--either 'into Thy hands I commit my spirit,' or into those hands\nto fall. Settle which of the two is to be your fate.\n\n\n\n\nGOODNESS WROUGHT AND GOODNESS LAID UP\n\n\n    'Oh how great is Thy goodness, which Thou hast laid up for them that\n    fear Thee; which Thou hast wrought for them that trust in Thee\n    before the sons of men!'--PSALM xxxi. 19.\n\nThe Psalmist has been describing, with the eloquence of misery, his own\ndesperate condition, in all manner of metaphors which he heaps\ntogether--'sickness,' 'captivity,' 'like a broken vessel,' 'as a dead\nman out of mind.' But in the depth of desolation he grasps at God's\nhand, and that lifts him up out of the pit. 'I trusted in Thee, O Lord!\nThou art my God.' So he struggles up on to the green earth again, and he\nfeels the sunshine; and then he breaks out--'Oh! how great is Thy\ngoodness which Thou hast laid up for them that fear Thee.' So the psalm\nthat began with such grief, ends with the ringing call, 'Be of good\ncourage, and He shall strengthen your heart, all ye that hope in the\nLord.'\n\nNow these great words which I have read for my text, and which derive\neven additional lustre from their setting, do not convey to the hasty\nEnglish reader the precise force of the antithesis which lies in them.\nThe contrast in the two clauses is between goodness laid up and goodness\nwrought; and that would come out a little more clearly if we transposed\nthe last words of the text, and instead of reading, as our Authorised\nVersion does, 'which Thou hast wrought for them that trusted in Thee\nbefore the sons of men,' read 'which Thou hast wrought before the sons\nof men for them that trusted in Thee.'\n\nSo I think there are, as it were, two great masses of what the Psalmist\ncalls 'goodness'; one of them which has been plainly manifested 'before\nthe sons of men,' the other which is 'laid up' in store. There are a\ngreat many notes in circulation, but there is far more bullion in the\nstrong-room. Much 'goodness' has been exhibited; far more lies\nconcealed.\n\nIf we take that antithesis, then, I think we may turn it in two or three\ndirections, like a light in a man's hand; and look at it as suggesting--\n\nI. First, the goodness already disposed--'wrought before the sons of\nmen'; and that 'laid up,' yet to be manifested.\n\nNow, that distinction just points to the old familiar but yet\nnever-to-be-exhausted thought of the inexhaustibleness of the divine\nnature. That inexhaustibleness comes out most wondrously and beautifully\nin the fundamental manifestation of God on which the Old Testament\nrevelation is built--I mean the vision given to Moses prior to his call,\nand as the basis of his message, of the bush that burned and was not\nconsumed. That lowly shrub flaming and not burning out was not, as has\noften been supposed, the symbol of Israel which in the furnace of\naffliction was not destroyed. It meant the same as the divine name, then\nproclaimed; 'I AM THAT I AM,' which is but a way of saying that God's\nBeing is absolute, dependent upon none, determined by Himself, infinite,\nand eternal, burns and is not burned up, lives and has no proclivity\ntowards death, works and is unwearied, 'operates unspent,' is revealed\nand yet hidden, gives and is none the poorer.\n\nAnd as we look upon our daily lives, and travel back in thought, some of\nus over the many years which have all been crowded with instances and\nillustrations of divine faithfulness and favouring care, we have to\ngrasp both these exclamations of our text, 'Oh! how great is Thy\ngoodness which Thou hast wrought,' how much greater 'is Thy goodness\nwhich is laid up!' The table has been spread in the wilderness, and the\nverities of Christian experience more than surpass the legends of hungry\nknights finding banquets prepared by unseen hands in desert places. It\nis as when Jesus made the multitude sit down on the green grass and\nfeast to the full, and yet abundance remained undiminished after\nsatisfying all the hungry applicants. The bread that was broken yielded\nmore basketfuls for to-morrow than the original quantity in the lad's\nhands. The fountain rises, and the whole camp, 'themselves and their\nchildren and their cattle,' slake their thirst at it, and yet it is full\nas ever. The goodness wrought is but the fringe and first beginnings of\nthe mass that is laid up. All the gold that has been coined and put into\ncirculation is as nothing compared with the wedges and ingots of massive\nbullion that lie in the strong room. God's riches are not like the\nworld's wealth. You very soon get to the bottom of its purse. Its\n'goodness,' is very soon run dry; and nothing will yield an\nunintermittent stream of satisfaction and blessing to a poor soul except\nthe 'river of the water of life that proceedeth out of the Throne of God\nand of the Lamb.'\n\nSo, dear brethren! that contrast may suggest to us how quietly and\npeacefully we may look forward to all the unknown future; and hold up to\nit so as to enable us to scan its general outlines, the light of the\nknown and experienced past. Let our trustful prayer be; 'Thou hast been\nmy help: leave me not, neither forsake me, O God of my salvation!' and\nthe answer will certainly be: 'I will not leave thee, till I have done\nunto thee that which I have spoken to thee of.' Our Memory ought to be\nthe mother of our Hope; and we should paint the future in the hues of\nthe past. Thou hast goodness 'laid up,' more than enough to match 'the\ngoodness Thou hast wrought.' God's past is the prophecy of God's future;\nand my past, if I understand it aright, ought to rebuke every fear and\ncalm every anxiety. We, and only we, have the right to say, 'To-morrow\nshall be as this day, and much more abundant.' That is delusion if said\nby any but by those that fear and trust in the Inexhaustible God.\n\nII. Now let us turn our light in a somewhat different direction. The\ncontrast here suggests the goodness that is publicly given and that\nwhich is experienced in secret.\n\nIf you will notice, in the immediate neighbourhood of my text there come\nother words which evidently link themselves with the thought of the\ngoodness laid up: 'Thou shalt hide them in the secret of Thy presence.'\nThat is where also the 'goodness' is. 'Thou shalt keep them secretly in\na pavilion ... blessed be the Lord! for He hath shewed me His marvellous\nkindness in a strong city.' So, then, the goodness which is wrought, and\nwhich can be seen by the sons of men, dwindles in comparison with the\ngoodness which lies in that secret place, and can only be enjoyed and\npossessed by those who dwell there, and whose feet are familiar with the\nway that leads to it. That is to say, if you wish the Psalmist's thought\nin plain prose, all these visible blessings of ours are but pale shadows\nand suggestions of the real wealth that we can have only if we live in\ncontinual communion with God. The spiritual blessings of quiet minds and\nstrength for work, the joys of communion with God, the sweetness of the\nhopes that are full of immortality, and all these delights and\nmanifestations of God's inmost love and sweetness which are granted only\nto waiting hearts that shut themselves off from the tumultuous delights\nof earth as the bases of their trust or the sources of their\ngladness--these are fuller, better than the selectest and richest of the\njoys that God's world can give. God does not put His best gifts, so to\nspeak, in the shop-windows; He keeps these in the inner chambers. He\ndoes not arrange His gifts as dishonest traders do their wares, putting\nthe finest outside or on the top, and the less good beneath. 'Thou hast\nkept the good wine until now.' It is they who inhabit 'the secret place\nof the Most High,' and whose lives are filled with communion with Him,\nrealising His presence, seeking to know His will, reaching out the\ntendrils of their hearts to twine round Him, and diligently, for His\ndear sake, doing the tasks of life; who taste the selected dainties from\nGod's gracious hands.\n\nHow foolish, then, to order life on the principle upon which we are all\ntempted to do it, and to yield to the temptation to which some of us\nhave yielded far too much, of fancying that the best good is the good\nthat we can touch and taste and handle and that men can see! No! no!\nDeep down in our hearts a joy that strangers never intermeddle with nor\nknow, a peace that passes understanding, a present Christ and a Heaven\nall but present, because Christ is present--these are the good things\nfor men, and these are the things which God does not, because He cannot,\nfling broadcast into the world, but which He keeps, because He must, for\nthose that desire them, and are fit for them. 'He causeth His sun to\nshine, and His rain to fall on the unthankful and on the disobedient,'\nbut the goodness laid up is better than the sunshine, and more\nrefreshing and fertilising and cleansing than the rain, and it comes,\nand comes only, to them that trust Him, and live near Him.\n\nIII. And so, lastly, we may turn our light in yet another direction, and\ntake this contrast as suggesting the goodness wrought on earth, and the\ngoodness laid up in heaven.\n\nHere we see, sometimes, the messengers coming with the one cluster of\ngrapes on the pole. There we shall live in the vineyard. Here we drink\nfrom the river as it flows; there we shall be at the fountain-head. Here\nwe are in the vestibule of the King's house, there we shall be in the\nthrone room, and each chamber as we pass through it is richer and fairer\nthan the one preceding. Heaven's least goodness is more than earth's\ngreatest blessedness. All that life to come, all its conditions and\neverything about it, are so strange to us, so incapable of being bodied\nforth or conceived by us, and the thought of Eternity is, it seems to\nme, so overwhelmingly awful that I do not wonder at even good people\nfinding little stimulus, or much that cheers, in the thought of passing\nthither. But if we do not know anything more--and we know very little\nmore--let us be sure of this, that when God begins to compare His\nadjectives He does not stop till He gets to the superlative degree and\nthat _good_ begets _better_, and the better of earth ensures the _best_\nof Heaven. And so out of our poor little experience here, we may gather\ngrounds of confidence that will carry our thoughts peacefully even into\nthe great darkness, and may say, 'What Thou didst work is much, what\nThou hast laid up is more.' And the contrast will continue for ever and\never; for all through that strange Eternity that which is wrought will\nbe less than that which is laid up, and we shall never get to the end of\nGod, nor to the end of His goodness.\n\nOnly let us take heed to the conditions--'them that fear Him, them that\ntrust in Him.' If we will do these things through each moment of the\nexperiences of a growing Christian life, and at the moment of the\nexperience of a Christian death, and through the eternities of the\nexperience of a Christian heaven, Jesus Christ will whisper to us, 'Thou\nshalt see greater things than these.'\n\n\n\n\nHID IN LIGHT\n\n\n    'Thou shall hide them in the secret of Thy presence from the pride\n    of man; Thou shalt keep them secretly in a pavilion from the strife\n    of tongues.'--PSALM xxxi. 20.\n\nThe word rendered 'presence' is literally 'face,' and the force of this\nvery remarkable expression of confidence is considerably marred unless\nthat rendering be retained. There are other analogous expressions in\nScripture, setting forth, under various metaphors, God's protection of\nthem that love Him. But I know not that there is any so noble and\nstriking as this. For instance, we read of His hiding His children 'in\nthe secret of His tabernacle,' or tent; as an Arab chief might do a\nfugitive who had eaten of his salt, secreting him in the recesses of his\ntent whilst the pursuers scoured the desert in vain for their prey.\nAgain, we read of His hiding them 'beneath the shadow of His wing';\nwhere the divine love is softened into the likeness of the maternal\ninstinct which leads a hen to gather her chickens beneath the shelter of\nher own warm and outspread feathers. But the metaphor of my text is more\nvivid and beautiful still. 'Thou shalt hide them in the secret of Thy\nface.' The light that streams from that countenance is the hiding-place\nfor a poor man. These other metaphors may refer, perhaps, the one to the\ntemple, and the other to the outstretched wings of the cherubim that\nshadowed the Mercy-seat. And, if so, this metaphor carries us still more\nnear to the central blaze of the Shekinah, the glory that hovered above\nthe Mercy-seat, and glowed in the dark sanctuary, unseen but once a year\nby one trembling high priest, who had to bear with him blood of\nsacrifice, lest the sight should slay. The Psalmist says, into that\nfierce light a man may go, and stand in it, bathed, hid, secure. 'Thou\nshalt hide them in the secret of Thy face.'\n\nI. Now, then, let us notice, first, this hiding-place.\n\nThe 'face' of God is so strongly figurative an expression that its\nmetaphorical character cannot but be obvious to the most cursory reader.\nThe very frankness, and, we may say, the grossness of the image, saves\nit from all misconception, and as with other similar expressions in the\nOld Testament, at once suggests its meaning. We read, for example, of\nthe 'arm,' the 'hand,' the 'finger' of God, and everybody feels that\nthese mean His power. We read of the 'eye' of God, and everybody knows\nthat that means His omniscience. We read of the 'ear' of God, and we all\nunderstand that that holds forth the blessed thought that He hears and\nanswers the cry of such as be sorrowful. And, in like manner, the 'face'\nof God is the apprehensible part of the divine nature which turns to\nmen, and by which He makes Himself known. It is roughly equivalent to\nthe other Old and New Testament expression, the 'name of the Lord,' the\nmanifested and revealed side of the divine nature. And that is the\nhiding-place into which men may go.\n\nWe have the other expression also in Scripture, 'the light of Thy\ncountenance,' and that helps us to apprehend the Psalmist's meaning.\n'The light of Thy face' is 'secret.' What a paradox! Can light conceal?\nLook at the daily heavens--filled with blazing stars, all invisible till\nthe night falls. The effulgence of the face is such that they that stand\nin it are lost and hid, like the lark in the blue sky. 'A glorious\nprivacy of light is Thine.' There is a wonderful metaphor in the New\nTestament of a woman 'clothed with the sun,' and caught up into it from\nher enemies to be safe there. And that is just an expansion of the\nPsalmist's grand paradox, 'Thou shalt hide them in the secret of Thy\nface.' Light conceals when the light is so bright as to dazzle. They who\nare surrounded by God are lost in the glory, and safe in that seclusion,\n'the secret of Thy face.'\n\nA thought may be suggested, although it is somewhat of a digression from\nthe main purpose of my text, but it springs naturally out of this\nparadox, and may just deserve a word. Revelation is real, but revelation\nhas its limits. That which is revealed is 'the face of God,' but we\nread, 'no man can see My face.' After all revelation He remains hidden.\nAfter all pouring forth of His beams He remains 'the God that dwelleth\nin the thick darkness,' and the light which is inaccessible is also a\ndarkness that can be felt. Apprehension is possible; comprehension is\nimpossible. What we know of God is valid and true, but we never shall\nknow all the depths that lie in that which we do know of Him. His face\nis 'the secret'; and though men may malign Him when they say, 'Verily,\nThou art a God that hidest Thyself, O God of Israel!' and He answers\nthem, 'I have not spoken in secret' in a dark 'place of the earth,' it\nstill remains true that revelation has its mysteries born of the\ngreatness of its effulgence, and that all which we know of God is 'dark\nwith excess of light.'\n\nBut that is aside from our main purpose. Let me rather remind you of how\nthe thought of the secret of God's face being the secure hiding-place of\nthem that love Him points to this truth--that that brightness of light\nhas a repellent power which keeps far away from all intermingling with\nit everything that is evil. The old Greek mythologies tell us that the\nradiant arrows of Apollo shot forth from his far-reaching bow, wounded\nto death the monsters of the slime and unclean creatures that crawled\nand revelled in darkness. And the myth has a great truth in it. The\nlight of God's face slays evil, of whatsoever kind it is; and just as\nthe unlovely, loathsome creatures that live in the dark and find\nthemselves at ease there writhe and wriggle in torment, and die when\ntheir shelter is taken away and they are exposed to the light beating on\ntheir soft bodies, so the light of God's face turned upon evil things\nsmites them into nothingness. Thus 'the secret of His countenance' is\nthe shelter of all that is good.\n\nNor need I remind you how, in another aspect of the phrase, the 'light\nof His face,' is the expression for His favour and loving regard, and\nhow true it is that in that favour and loving regard is the impregnable\nfortress into which, entering, any man is safe. I said that the\nexpression the 'face of the Lord' roughly corresponded to the other one,\n'the name of the Lord,' inasmuch as both meant the revealed aspect of\nthe divine nature. You may remember how we read, 'The name of the Lord\nis a strong tower into which the righteous runneth and is safe.' The\n'light' of the face of the Lord is His favour and loving regard falling\nupon men. And who can be harmed with that lambent light--like sunshine\nupon water, or upon a glittering shield--playing around Him?\n\nOnly let us remember that for us 'the face of God' is Jesus Christ. He\nis the 'arm' of the Lord; He is the 'name' of the Lord; He is the\n'face.' All that we know of God we know through and in Him; all that we\nsee of God we see by the shining upon us of Him who is 'the eradiation\nof His glory and the express image of His person.' So the open secret of\nthe 'face' of God is Jesus, the hiding-place of our souls.\n\nII. Secondly, notice God's hidden ones.\n\nMy text carries us back, by that word 'them,' to the previous verse,\nwhere we have a double description of those who are thus hidden in the\ninaccessible light of His countenance. They are 'such as fear Thee,' and\n'such as trust in Thee.' Now, that latter expression is congruous with\nthe metaphor of my text, in so far as the words on which we are now\nengaged speak about a 'hiding-place,' and the word which is translated\n'trust' literally means 'to flee to a refuge.' So they that flee to God\nfor refuge are those whom God hides in the 'secret of His face.' Let us\nthink of that for a moment.\n\nI said, in the beginning of these remarks, that there was here an\nallusion, possibly, to the Temple. All temples in ancient times were\nasylums. Whosoever could flee to grasp the horns of the altar, or to\nsit, veiled and suppliant, before the image of the god, was secure from\nhis foes, who could not pass within the limits of the Temple grounds, in\nwhich strife and murder were not permissible. We too often flee to other\ngods and other temples for our refuges. Ay! and when we get there we\nfind that the deity whom we have invoked is only a marble image that\nsits deaf, dumb, motionless, whilst we cling to its unconscious skirts.\nAs one of the saddest of our modern cynics once said, looking up at that\nlovely impersonation of Greek beauty, the Venus de Milo, 'Ah! she is\nfair; but she has no arms,' so we may say of all false refuges to which\nmen betake themselves. The goddess is powerless to help, however\nbeautiful the presentment of her may have seemed to our eyes. The evils\nfrom which we have fled to these false deities and shelterless\nsanctuaries will pursue us across the threshold; and as Elijah did with\nthe priests of Baal upon Carmel, will slay us at the very foot of the\naltar to which we have clung, and vexed with our vain prayers. There is\nonly one shrine where there is a sanctuary, and that is the shrine above\nwhich shines 'the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ'; into the\nbrightness of which poor men may pass and therein may hide themselves.\nGod hides us, and His hiding is effectual, in the secret of the light\nand splendour of His face.\n\nI said, too, that there was an allusion, as there is in all the psalms\nthat deal with men as God's guests, to the ancient customs of\nhospitality, by which a man who has once entered the tent of the chief,\nand partaken of food there, is safe, not only from his pursuers, but\nfrom his host himself, even though that host should be the\nkinsman-avenger. The red-handed murderer, who has eaten the salt of the\nman whose duty it otherwise would have been to slay him where he stood,\nis safe from his vengeance. And thus they who cast themselves upon God\nhave nothing to fear. No other hand can pluck them from the sanctuary of\nHis tent. He Himself, having admitted them to share His hospitality,\ncannot and will not lift a hand against them. We are safe _from_ God\nonly when we are safe _in_ God.\n\nBut remember the condition on which this security comes. 'Thou shalt\nhide _them_ in the secret of Thy face.' Whom? Those that flee for refuge\nto Thee. The act of simple faith is set forth there, by which a poor\nman, with all his imperfections on his head, may yet venture to put his\nfoot across the boundary line that separates the outer darkness from the\nbeam of light that comes from God's face. 'Who among us shall dwell with\nthe devouring fire? Who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?'\nThat question does not mean, as it is often taken to mean--What mortal\ncan endure the punishments of a future life? but, Who can venture to be\nGod's guests? and it is equivalent to the other interrogation, 'Who\nshall ascend to the hill of the Lord, or who shall stand in His holy\nplace?' The answer is, If you go to Him for refuge, knowing your danger,\nfeeling your impurity, _you_ may walk amidst all that light softened\ninto lambent beauty, as those Hebrew children did in the furnace of\nfire, being at ease there, and feeling it well with themselves, and\nhaving nothing about them consumed except the bonds that bound them.\n\nRemember that Jesus Christ is the Hiding-place, and that to flee to Him\nfor refuge is the condition of security, and all they who thus, from the\nsnares of life, from its miseries, disappointments, and burdens, from\nthe agitation of their own hearts, from the ebullition of their own\npassions, from the stings of their own conscience, or from other of the\nills that flesh is heir to, make their hiding-place--by the simple act\nof faith in Jesus Christ--in the light of God's face, are thereby safe\nfor evermore.\n\nBut the initial act of fleeing to the refuge must be continued by\nabiding in the refuge. It is of no use to take shelter in the light\nunless we abide in the light. It is of no use to go to the Temple for\nsanctuary unless we continue in it for sacrifice and worship. We must\n'walk in the light as God is in the light.' That is to say, the\ncondition of being hid in God is, first of all, to take refuge in Jesus\nChrist, and then to abide in Him by continual communion. 'Your life is\nhid with Christ in God.' Unless we have a hidden life, deep beneath, and\nhigh above, and far beyond the life of sense, we have no right to think\nthat the shelter of the Face will be security for us. The very essence\nof Christianity is the habitual communion of heart, mind, and will with\nGod in Christ. Do you live in the light, or have you only gone there to\nescape what you are afraid of? Do you live in the light by the continual\ndirection of thought and heart to Him, cultivating the habit of daily\nand hourly communion with Him amidst the distractions of necessary duty,\ncare, and changing circumstances?\n\nBut not only by communion, but also by conduct, must we keep in the\nlight. The fugitive found outside the city of refuge was fair game for\nthe avenger, and if he strayed beyond its bounds there was a sword in\nhis back before he knew where he was. Every Christian, by each sin,\nwhether it be acted or only thought, casts himself out of the light into\nthe darkness that rings it round, and out there he is a victim to the\nbeasts of prey that hunt in darkness. An eclipse of the sun is not\ncaused by any change in the sun, but by an opaque body, the offspring\nand satellite of the earth, coming between the earth and sun. And so,\nwhen Christian men lose the light of God's face, it is not because there\nis any 'variableness or shadow of turning' in Him, but because between\nHim and them has come the blackness--their own offspring--of their own\nsin. You are not safe if you are outside the light of His countenance.\nThese are the conditions of security.\n\nIII. Lastly, note what the hidden ones find in the light.\n\nThis burst of confidence in my text comes from the Psalmist immediately\nafter plaintively pouring out his soul under the pressure of\nafflictions. His experience may teach us the interpretation of his glad\nassurance.\n\nGod will keep all real evil from us if we keep near Him; but He will not\nkeep the externals that men call evil from us. I do not know whether\nthere is such a thing as filtering any poisons or malaria by means of\nlight, but I am sure that the light of God filters our atmosphere for\nus. Though it may leave the external form of evil it takes all the\npoison out of it and turns it into a harmless minister for our good. The\narrows that are launched at us may be tipped with venom when they leave\nthe bow, but if they pass through the radiant envelope of divine\nprotection that surrounds us--and they must have passed through that if\nthey reach us--it cleanses all the venom from the points though it\nleaves the sharpness there. The evil is not an evil if it has got our\nlength; and its having touched us shows that He who lets it pass into\nthe light where His children safely dwell, knows that it cannot harm\nthem.\n\nBut, again, we shall find if we live in continual communion with the\nrevealed Face of God, that we are elevated high above all the strife of\ntongues and the noise of earth. We shall 'outsoar the shadow of the\nnight,' and be lifted to an elevation from which all the clamours of\nearth will sound faint and poor, like the noises of the city to the\ndwellers on the mountain peak. Nor do we find only security there, for\nthe word in the second clause of my text, 'Thou shalt _keep_ them\n_secretly_,' is the same as is employed in the previous verse in\nreference to the treasures which God _lays up_ for them that fear Him.\nThe poor men that trust in God, and the wealth which He has to lavish\nupon them, are both hid, and they are hid in the same place. The\n'goodness wrought before the sons of men' has not emptied the reservoir.\nAfter all expenditure the massy ingots of gold in God's storehouse are\nundiminished. The mercy still to come is greater than that already\nreceived. 'To-morrow shall be as this day and much more abundant.' This\nriver broadens as we mount towards its source.\n\nBrethren! the Face of God must be either our dearest joy or our greatest\ndread. There comes a time when you and I must front it, and look into\nHis eyes. It is for us to settle whether at that day we shall 'call upon\nthe rocks and the hills to hide us' from it, or whether we shall say\nwith rapture, 'Thou hast made us most blessed with Thy countenance'!\nWhich is it to be? It must be one or other. When He says, 'Seek ye My\nFace,' may our hearts answer, 'Thy Face, Lord, will I seek,' that when\nwe see it hereafter, shining as the sun in his strength, its light may\nnot be darkness to our impure and horror-struck eyes.\n\n\n\n\nA THREEFOLD THOUGHT OF SIN AND FORGIVENESS\n\n\n    'Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is\n    covered. 2. Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not\n    iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.'\n    --PSALM xxxii. 1, 2.\n\nThis psalm, which has given healing to many a wounded conscience, comes\nfrom the depths of a conscience which itself has been wounded and\nhealed. One must be very dull of hearing not to feel how it throbs with\nemotion, and is, in fact, a gush of rapture from a heart experiencing in\nits freshness the new joy of forgiveness. It matters very little who\nwrote it. If we accept the superscription, which many of those who\nusually reject these ancient Jewish notes do in the present case, the\npsalm is David's, and it fits into some of the specific details of his\ngreat sin and penitence. But that is of very small moment. Whoever wrote\nit, he sings because he must.\n\nThe psalm begins with an exclamation, for the clause would be better\ntranslated, 'Oh! the blessedness of the man.' Then note the remarkable\naccumulation of clauses, all expressing substantially the same thing,\nbut expressing it with a difference. The Psalmist's heart is too full to\nbe emptied by one utterance. He turns his jewel, as it were, round and\nround, and at each turn it reflects the light from a different angle.\nThere are three clauses in my text, each substantially having the same\nmeaning, but which yet present that substantially identical meaning with\ndifferent shades. And that is true both in regard to the three words\nwhich are employed to describe the fact of transgression, and to the\nthree which are employed to describe the fact of forgiveness. It is\nmainly to these, and the large lessons which lie in observing the shades\nof significance in them, that I wish to turn now.\n\nI. Note the solemn picture which is here drawn of various phases of sin.\n\nThere are three words employed--'transgression,' 'sin,' 'iniquity.' They\nall mean the same thing, but they mean it with a different association\nof ideas and suggestions of its foulness. Let me take them in order. The\nword translated 'transgression' seems literally to signify separation,\nor rending apart, or departure, and hence comes to express the notion of\napostasy and rebellion.\n\nSo, then, here is this thought; all sin is a going away. From what?\nRather the question should be--from _whom_? All sin is a departure from\nGod. And that is its deepest and darkest characteristic. And it is the\none that needs to be most urged, for it is the one that we are most apt\nto forget. We are all ready enough to acknowledge faults; none of us\nhave any hesitation in saying that we have done wrong, and have gone\nwrong. We are ready to recognise that we have transgressed the law; but\nwhat about the Lawgiver? The personal element in every sin, great or\nsmall, is that it is a voluntary rending of a union which exists, a\ndeparture from God who is with us in the deepest recesses of our being,\nunless we drag ourselves away from the support of His enclosing arm, and\nfrom the illumination of His indwelling grace.\n\nSo, dear brethren! this was the first and the gravest aspect under which\nthe penitent and the forgiven man in my text thought of his past, that\nin it, when he was wildly and eagerly rushing after the low and sensuous\ngratification of his worst desires, he was rebelling against, and\nwandering far away from, the ever-present Friend, the all-encircling\nsupport and joy, the Lord, his life. You do not understand the gravity\nof the most trivial wrong act when you think of it as a sin against the\norder of Nature, or against the law written on your heart, or as the\nbreach of the constitution of your own nature, or as a crime against\nyour fellows. You have not got to the bottom of the blackness until you\nsee that it is flat rebellion against God Himself. This is the true\ndevilish element in all our transgression, and this element is in it\nall. Oh! if once we do get the habit formed and continued until it\nbecomes almost instinctive and spontaneous, of looking at each action of\nour lives in immediate and direct relation to God, there would come such\nan apocalypse as would startle some of us into salutary dread, and make\nus all feel that 'it is an evil and a bitter thing' (and the two\ncharacteristics must always go together), 'to depart from the living\nGod.' The great type of all wrongdoers is in that figure of the Prodigal\nSon, and the essence of his fault was, first, that he selfishly demanded\nfor his own his father's goods; and, second, that he went away into a\nfar country. Your sins have separated between you and God. And when you\ndo those little acts of selfish indulgence which you do twenty times a\nday, without a prick of conscience, each of them, trivial as it is, like\nsome newly-hatched poisonous serpent, a finger-length long, has in it\nthe serpent nature, it is rebellion and separation from God.\n\nThen another aspect of the same foul thing rises before the Psalmist's\nmind. This evil which he has done, which I suppose was the sin in the\nmatter of Bathsheba, was not only rebellion against God, but it was,\naccording to this text, in the second clause, 'a sin,' by which is meant\nliterally _missing an aim_. So this word, in its pregnant meaning,\ncorresponds with the signification of the ordinary New Testament word\nfor sin, which also implies error, or missing that which ought to be the\ngoal of our lives. That is to say, whilst the former word regarded the\nevil deed mainly in its relation to God, this word regards it mainly in\nits relation to ourselves, and that which before Him is rebellion, the\nassertion of my own individuality and my own will, and therefore in\nseparation from His will, is, considered in reference to myself, my\nfatally missing the mark to which my whole energy and effort ought to be\ndirected. All sin, big or little, is a blunder. It never hits what it\naims at, and if it did, it is aiming at the wrong thing. So doubly, all\ntransgression is folly, and the true name for the doer is 'Thou fool!'\nFor every evil misses the mark which, regard being had to the man's\nobvious destiny, he ought to aim at. 'Man's chief end is to glorify God\nand to enjoy Him for ever'; and whosoever in all his successes fails to\nrealise that end is a failure through and through, in whatever smaller\nmatters he may seem to himself and to others to succeed. He only strikes\nthe target in the bull's eye who lets his arrows be deflected by no\ngusts of passion, nor aimed wrong by any obliquity of vision; but with\nfirm hand and clear eye seeks and secures the absolute conformity of his\nwill to the Father's will, and makes God his aim and end in all things.\n'Thou hast created us for Thyself, and only in Thee can we find rest.' O\nbrother! whatever be your aims and ends in life, take this for the\nsurest verity, that you have fatally misunderstood the purpose of your\nbeing, and the object to which you should strain, if there is anything\nexcept God, who is the supreme desire of your heart and the goal of your\nlife. All sin is missing the mark which God has set up for man.\n\nTherefore let us press to the mark where hangs the prize which whoso\npossesses succeeds, whatsoever other trophies may have escaped his\ngrasp.\n\nBut there is another aspect of this same thought, and that is that every\npiece of evil misses its own shabby mark. 'A rogue is a round-about\nfool.' No man ever gets, in doing wrong, the thing he did the wrong for,\nor if he gets it, he gets something else along with it that takes all\nthe sweet taste out of it. The thief secures the booty, but he gets\npenal servitude besides. Sin tempts us with glowing tales of the delight\nto be found in drinking stolen waters and eating her bread in secret;\nbut sin lies by suppression of the truth, if not by suggestions of the\nfalse, because she says never a word about the sickness and the headache\nthat come after the debauch, nor about the poison that we drink down\nalong with her sugared draughts. The paltering fiend keeps the word of\npromise to the ear, and breaks it to the hope. All sin, great or little,\nis a blunder, and missing of the mark.\n\nAnd lastly, yet another aspect of the ugly thing rises before the\nPsalmist's eye. In reference to God, evil is separation and rebellion;\nin reference to myself, it is an error and missing of my true goal; and\nin reference to the straight standard and law of duty, it is, according\nto the last of the three words for sin in the text, 'iniquity,' or,\nliterally, _something twisted_ or distorted. It is thus brought into\ncontrast with the right line of the plain, straight path in which we\nought to walk. We have the same metaphor in our own language. We talk\nabout things being right and wrong, by which we mean, in the one case,\nparallel with the rigid law of duty, and in the other case, 'wrung,' or\nwavering, crooked and divergent from it. There is a standard as well as\na Judge, and we have not only to think of evil as being rebellion\nagainst God and separation from Him, and as, for ourselves, issuing in\nfatal missing of the mark, but also as being divergent from the one\nmanifest law to which we ought to be conformed. The path to God is a\nright line; the shortest road from earth to Heaven is absolutely\nstraight. The Czar of Russia, when railways were introduced into that\ncountry, was asked to determine the line between St. Petersburg and\nMoscow. He took a ruler and drew a straight line across the map, and\nsaid, 'There!' Our Autocrat has drawn a line as straight as the road\nfrom earth to Heaven, and by the side of it are 'the crooked, wandering\nways in which we live.'\n\nTake these three thoughts then--as for law, divergence; as for the aim\nof my life, a fatal miss; as for God, my Friend and my Life, rebellion\nand separation--and you have, if not the complete physiognomy of evil,\nat least grave thoughts concerning it, which become all the graver when\nwe think that they are true about us and about our deeds.\n\nII. And so let me ask you to look secondly at the blessed picture drawn\nhere of the removal of the sin.\n\nThere are three words here for forgiveness, each of which adds its quota\nto the general thought. It is 'forgiven,' 'covered,' 'not imputed.' The\naccumulation of synonyms not only sets forth various aspects of pardon,\nbut triumphantly celebrates the completeness and certainty of the gift.\n\nAs to the first, it means literally to lift and bear away a load or\nburden. As to the second, it means, plainly enough, to cover over, as\none might do some foul thing, that it may no longer offend the eye or\nsmell rank to Heaven. Bees in their hives, when there is anything\ncorrupt and too large for them to remove, fling a covering of wax over\nit, and hermetically seal it, and no foul odour comes from it. And so a\nman's sin is covered over and ceases to be _in evidence_, as it were\nbefore the divine Eye that sees all things. He Himself casts a merciful\nveil over it and hides it from Himself. A similar idea, though with a\nmodification in metaphor, is included in that last word, the sin is not\nreckoned. God does not write it down in His Great Book on the debit side\nof the man's account. And these three things, the lifting up and\ncarrying away of the load, the covering over of the obscene and ugly\nthing, the non-reckoning in the account of the evil deed; these three\nthings taken together do set forth before us the great and blessed truth\nthat a man's transgressions may become, in so far as the divine heart\nand the divine dealings with him are concerned, as if nonexistent.\n\nMen tell us that that is not possible and that it is immoral to preach a\ndoctrine of forgiveness. O dear brethren! there is no gospel to preach\nthat will touch a man's heart except the gospel that begins with\nthis--God bears away, covers over, does not reckon to a man, his\nrebellions, his errors, his departures from the law of right. Sin _is_\ncapable of forgiveness, and, blessed be God! every sin He is ready to\nforgive. I should be ashamed of myself to stand here, and not preach a\ngospel of pardon. I know not anything else that will touch consciences\nand draw hearts except this gospel, which I am trying in my poor way to\nlay upon your hearts.\n\nNotice how my text includes also a glance at the condition on our part\non which this absolute and utter annihilation of our wicked past is\npossible. That last clause of my text, 'In whose spirit there is no\nguile,' seems to me to refer to the frank sincerity of a confession,\nwhich does not try to tell lies to God, and, attempting to deceive Him,\nreally deceives only the self-righteous sinner. Whosoever opens his\nheart to God, makes a clean breast of it, and without equivocation or\nself-deception or the palliations which self-love teaches, says, 'I have\nplayed the fool and erred exceedingly,' to that man the Psalmist thinks\npardon is sure to come.\n\nNow remember that the very heart and centre of that Jewish system was an\naltar, and that on that altar was sacrificed the expiatory victim. I am\nnot going to insist upon any theory of an atonement, but I do want to\nurge this, that Christianity is nothing, if it have not explained and\ntaken up into itself that which was symbolised in that old ritual. The\nvery first words from human lips which proclaimed Christ's advent to man\nwere, 'Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world,'\nand amongst the last words which Christ spoke upon earth, in the way of\nteaching His disciples, were these, 'This is My blood, shed for many for\nthe remission of sins.' The Cross of Christ explains my psalm, the Cross\nof Christ answers the confidence of the Psalmist, which was fed upon the\nshadow of the good things to come. He has died, the Just for the unjust,\nthat the sins which were laid upon Him might be taken away, covered, and\nnot reckoned to us.\n\nBrethren! unless my sins are taken away by the Lamb of God they remain.\nUnless they are laid upon Christ, they crush me. Unless they are covered\nby His expiation, they lie there before the Throne of God, and cry for\npunishment. Unless His blood has wiped out the record that is against\nus, the black page stands for ever. And to you and me there will be said\none day, in a voice which we dare not dispute, 'Pay Me that thou owest!'\nThe blacker the sin the brighter the Christ. I would that I could lay\nupon all your hearts this belief, 'the blood of Jesus Christ,' and\nnothing else, 'cleanses from all sin!'\n\nIII. I will touch in a word only upon the last thought suggested by the\ntext, and that is the blessedness of this removal of sin.\n\nAs I said, my text is really an exclamation, a gush of rapture from a\nheart that is tasting the fresh-drawn blessedness of pardon. And the\nrest of the psalm is little more than an explanation of the various\naspects and phases of that blessedness. Let me just run over them in the\nbriefest possible manner.\n\nIf we receive this forgiveness through Jesus Christ and our faith in\nHim, then we have manifold blessedness in one. There is the blessedness\nof deliverance from sullen remorse and of the dreadful pangs of an\naccusing conscience. How vividly, and evidently as a transcript from a\npage in his own autobiography, the Psalmist describes that condition,\n'When I kept silence my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day\nlong'! When a man's heart is locked against confession he hears a tumult\nof accusing voices within himself, and remorse and dread creep over his\nheart. The pains of sullen remorse were never described more truly and\nmore dreadfully than in this context. 'Day and night Thy hand was heavy\nupon me, my moisture is turned into the drought of summer.' Some of us\nmay know something of that. But there is a worse state than that, and\none or other of the two states belongs to us. If we have not found our\nway into the liberty of confession and forgiveness, we have but a choice\nbetween the pains of an awakened conscience and the desolation of a dead\none. It is worse to have no voice within than to have an accusing one.\nIt is worse to feel no pressure of a divine Hand than to feel it. And\nthey whose consciences are seared as with a hot iron have sounded the\nlowest depths. They are perfectly comfortable, quite happy; they say all\nthese feelings that I am trying to suggest to you seem to them to be\nfolly. 'They make a solitude and call it peace.' It is an awful thing\nwhen a man has come to this point, that he has got past the accusations\nof conscience, and can swallow down the fiercest draughts without\nfeeling them burn. Dear brethren! there is only one deliverance from an\naccusing conscience which does not murder the conscience, and that is\nthat we should find our way into the peace of God which is through\nChrist Jesus and His atoning death.\n\nThen, again, my psalm goes on to speak about the blessedness of a close\nclinging to God in peaceful trust, which will ensure security in the\nmidst of all trials, and a hiding-place against every storm. The\nPsalmist uses a magnificent figure. God is to him as some rocky island,\nsteadfast and dry, in the midst of a widespread inundation; and taking\nrefuge there in the clefts of the rock, he looks down upon the tossing,\nshoreless sea of troubles and sorrows that breaks upon the rocky\nbarriers of his Patmos, and stands safe and dry. Only through\nforgiveness do we come into that close communion with God which ensures\nsafety in all disasters.\n\nAnd then there follows the blessedness of a gentle guidance and of a\nloving obedience. 'Thou shalt guide me with Thine eye.' No need for\nforce, no need for bit and bridle, no need for anything but the glance\nof the Father, which the child delights to obey. Docility, glad\nobedience unprompted by fear, based upon love, are the fruits of pardon\nthrough the blood of Christ.\n\nAnd, lastly, there is the blessedness of exuberant gladness; the joy\nthat comes from the sorrow according to God is a joy that will last. All\nother delights, in their nature, are perishable; all other raptures, by\nthe very necessity of their being and of ours, die down, sometimes into\nvanity, always into commonplace or indifference. But the joy that\nsprings in the pardoned heart, and is fed by closeness of communion with\nGod, and by continual obedience to His blessed guidance, has in it\nnothing that can fade, nothing that can burn out, nothing that can be\ndisturbed. The deeper the penitence the surer the rebound into gladness.\nThe more a man goes down into the depths of his own heart and learns his\nown evil, the more will he, trusting in Christ, rise into the serene\nheights of thankfulness, and live, if not in rapture, at least in the\ncalm joy of conscious communion and unending fellowship. Every tear may\nbe crystallised into a diamond that shall flash in the light. And they,\nand only they, who begin in the valley of weeping, confessing their sins\nand imploring forgiveness through the merits and mediation of Jesus\nChrist our Lord, will rise to heights of a joy that remains, and\nremaining, is full.\n\n\n\n\nTHE ENCAMPING ANGEL\n\n\n    'The Angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear Him, and\n    delivereth them.'--PSALM xxxiv. 7.\n\nIf we accept the statement in the superscription of this psalm, it dates\nfrom one of the darkest hours in David's life. His fortunes were never\nlower than when he fled from Gath, the city of Goliath, to Adullam. He\nnever appears in a less noble light than when he feigned madness to\navert the dangers which he might well dread there. How unlike the terror\nand self-degradation of the man who 'scrabbled on the doors,' and let\n'the spittle run down his beard,' is the heroic and saintly constancy of\nthis noble psalm! And yet the contrast is not so violent as to make the\nsuperscription improbable, and the tone of the whole well corresponds to\nwhat we should expect from a man delivered from some great peril, but\nstill surrounded with dangers. There, in the safety of his retreat among\nthe rocks, with the bit of level ground where he had fought Goliath just\nat his feet in the valley, and Gath, from which he had escaped, away\ndown at the mouth of the glen (if Conder's identification of Adullam be\ncorrect), he sings his song of trust and praise; he hears the lions roar\namong the rocks where Samson had found them in his day; he teaches his\n'children,' the band of broken men who there began to gather around him,\nthe fear of the Lord; and calls upon them to help him in his praise.\nWhat a picture of the outlaw and his wild followers tamed into something\nlike order, and lifted into something like worship, rises before us, if\nwe follow the guidance of that old commentary contained in the\nsuperscription!\n\nThe words of our text gain especial force and vividness by thus\nlocalising the psalm. Not only 'the clefts of the rock' but the presence\nof God's Angel is his defence; and round him is flung, not only the\nstrength of the hills, but the garrison and guard of heaven.\n\nIt is generally supposed that the 'Angel of the Lord' here is to be\ntaken collectively, and that the meaning is--the 'bright-harnessed'\nhosts of these divine messengers are as an army of protectors round them\nwho fear God. But I see no reason for departing from the simpler and\ncertainly grander meaning which results from taking the word in its\nproper force of a singular. True, Scripture does speak of the legions of\nministering spirits, who in their chariots of fire were once seen by\nsuddenly opened eyes 'round about' a prophet in peril, and are ever\nministering to the heirs of salvation. But Scripture also speaks of One,\nwho is in an eminent sense 'the Angel of the Lord'; in whom, as in none\nother, God sets His 'Name'; whose form, dimly seen, towers above even\nthe ranks of the angels that 'excel in strength'; whose offices and\nattributes blend in mysterious fashion with those of God Himself. There\nmay be some little incongruity in thinking of the single Person as\n'encamping round about' us; but that does not seem a sufficient reason\nfor obliterating the reference to that remarkable Old Testament\ndoctrine, the retention of which seems to me to add immensely to the\npower of the words.\n\nRemember some of the places in which the 'Angel of the Lord' appears, in\norder to appreciate more fully the grandeur of this promised protection.\nAt that supreme moment when Abraham 'took the knife to slay his son,'\nthe voice that 'called to him out of heaven' was 'the voice of the Angel\nof the Lord.' He assumes the power of reversing a divine command. He\nsays, 'Thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from _Me_,' and\nthen pronounces a blessing, in the utterance of which one cannot\ndistinguish His voice from the voice of Jehovah. In like manner it is\nthe Angel of the Lord that speaks to Jacob, and says, 'I am the God of\nBethel.' The dying patriarch invokes in the same breath 'the God which\nfed me all my life long,' 'the Angel which redeemed me from all evil,'\nto bless the boys that stand before him, with their wondering eyes\ngazing in awe on his blind face. It was that Angel's glory that appeared\nto the outcast, flaming in the bush that burned unconsumed. It was He\nwho stood before the warrior leader of Israel, sword in hand, and\nproclaimed Himself to be the Captain of the Lord's host, the Leader of\nthe armies of heaven, and the true Leader of the armies of Israel; and\nHis commands to Joshua, His lieutenant, are the commands of 'the Lord.'\nAnd, to pass over other instances, Isaiah correctly sums up the spirit\nof the whole earlier history in words which go far to lift the\nconception of this Angel of the Lord out of the region of created\nbeings--'In all their affliction He was afflicted, and the Angel of His\nface saved them,'\n\nIt is this lofty and mysterious Messenger, and not the hosts whom He\ncommands, that our Psalmist sees standing ready to help, as He once\nstood, sword-bearing by the side of Joshua. To the warrior leader, to\nthe warrior Psalmist, He appears, as their needs required, armoured and\nmilitant. The last of the prophets saw that dim, mysterious Figure, and\nproclaimed, 'The Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to His temple;\neven the Angel of the Covenant, whom ye delight in'; and to his gaze it\nwas wrapped in obscure majesty and terror of purifying flame. But for us\nthe true Messenger of the Lord is His Son, whom He has sent, in whom He\nhas put His name; who is the Angel of His face, in that we behold the\nglory of God in the face of Jesus Christ; who is the Angel of the\nCovenant, in that He has sealed the new and everlasting covenant with\nHis blood; and whose own parting promise, 'Lo! I am with you always,' is\nthe highest fulfilment to us Christians of that ancient confidence: 'The\nAngel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear Him.'\n\nWhatever view we adopt of the significance of the first part of the\ntext, the force and beauty of the metaphor in the second remain the\nsame. If this psalm were indeed the work of the fugitive in his rocky\nhold at Adullam, how appropriate the thought becomes that his little\nencampment has such a guard. It reminds one of the incident in Jacob's\nlife, when his timid and pacific nature was trembling at the prospect of\nmeeting Esau, and when, as he travelled along, encumbered with his\npastoral wealth, and scantily provided with means of defence, 'the\nangels of God met him, and he named the place Mahanaim,' that is, two\ncamps--his own feeble company, mostly made up of women and children, and\nthat heavenly host that hovered above them. David's faith sees the same\ndefence encircling his weakness, and though sense saw no protection for\nhim and his men but their own strong arms and their mountain fastness,\nhis opened eyes beheld the mountain full of the chariots of fire, and\nthe flashing of armour and light in the darkness of his cave.\n\nThe vision of the divine presence ever takes the form which our\ncircumstances most require. David's then need was safety and protection.\nTherefore he saw the Encamping Angel; even as to Joshua the leader He\nappeared as the Captain of the Lord's host; and as to Isaiah, in the\nyear that the throne of Judah was emptied by the death of the earthly\nking, was given the vision of the Lord sitting on a throne, the King\nEternal and Immortal. So to us all His grace shapes its expression\naccording to our wants, and the same gift is Protean in its power of\ntransformation; being to one man wisdom, to another strength, to the\nsolitary companionship, to the sorrowful consolation, to the glad\nsobering, to the thinker truth, to the worker practical force--to each\nhis heart's desire, if the heart's delight be God. So manifold are the\naspects of God's infinite sufficiency, that every soul, in every\npossible variety of circumstance, will find there just what will suit\nit. That armour fits every man who puts it on. That deep fountain is\nlike some of those fabled springs which give forth whatsoever precious\ndraught any thirsty lip asked. He takes the shape that our circumstances\nmost need. Let us see that we, on our parts, use our circumstances to\nhelp us in anticipating the shapes in which God will draw near for our\nhelp.\n\nLearn, too, from this image, in which the Psalmist appropriates to\nhimself the experience of a past generation, how we ought to feed our\nconfidence and enlarge our hopes by all God's past dealings with men.\nDavid looks back to Jacob, and believes that the old fact is repeated in\nhis own day. So every old story is true for us; though outward form may\nalter, inward substance remains the same. Mahanaim is still the name of\nevery place where a man who loves God pitches his tent. We may be\nwandering, solitary, defenceless, but we are not alone. Our feeble\nencampment may lie open to assault, and we be all unfit to guard it, but\nthe other camp is there too, and our enemies must force their way\nthrough it before they get at us. We are in its centre--as they put the\ncattle and the sick in the midst of the encampment on the prairies when\nthey fear an assault from the Indians--because we are so weak. Jacob's\nexperience may be ours: 'The Lord of Hosts is with us: the God of Jacob\nis our refuge.'\n\nOnly remember that the eye of faith alone can see that guard, and that\ntherefore we must labour to keep our consciousness of its reality fresh\nand vivid. Many a man in David's little band saw nothing but cold gray\nstone where David saw the flashing armour of the heavenly Warrior. To\nthe one all the mountain blazed with fiery chariots, to the other it was\na lone hillside, with the wind moaning among the rocks. We shall lose\nthe joy and the strength of that divine protection unless we honestly\nand constantly try to keep our sense of it bright. Eyes that have been\ngazing on earthly joys, or perhaps gloating on evil sights, cannot see\nthe Angel presence. A Christian man, on a road which he cannot travel\nwith a clear conscience, will see no angel, not even the Angel with the\ndrawn sword in His hand, that barred Balaam's path among the vineyards.\nA man coming out of some room blazing with light cannot all at once see\ninto the violet depths of the mighty heavens, that lie above him with\nall their shimmering stars. So this truth of our text is a truth of\nfaith, and the believing eye alone beholds the Angel of the Lord.\n\nNotice, too, that final word of deliverance. This psalm is continually\nrecurring to that idea. The word occurs four times in it, and the\nthought still oftener. Whether the date is rightly given, as we have\nassumed it to be, or not, at all events that harping upon this one\nphrase indicates that some season of great trial was its birth-time,\nwhen all the writer's thoughts were engrossed and his prayers summed up\nin the one thing--deliverance. He is quite sure that such deliverance\nmust follow if the Angel presence be there. But he knows too that the\nencampment of the Angel of the Lord will not keep away sorrows, and\ntrial, and sharp need. So his highest hope is not of immunity from\nthese, but of rescue out of them. And his ground of hope is that his\nheavenly Ally cannot let him be overcome. That He will let him be\ntroubled and put in peril he has found; that He will not let him be\ncrushed he believes. Shadowed and modest hopes are the brightest we can\nventure to cherish. The protection which we have is protection in, and\nnot protection from, strife and danger. It is a filter which lets the\nicy cold water of sorrow drop numbing upon us, but keeps back the poison\nthat was in it. We have to fight, but He will fight with us; to sorrow,\nbut not alone nor without hope; to pass through many a peril, but we\nshall get through them. Deliverance, which implies danger, need, and\nwoe, is the best we can hope for.\n\nIt is the least we are entitled to expect if we love Him. It is the\ncertain issue of His encamping round about us. Always with us, He will\nstrike for us at the best moment. The Lord God is in the midst of her\nalways; 'the Lord will help her, and that right early.' So like the\nhunted fugitive in Adullam we may lift up our confident voices even when\nthe stress of strife and sorrow is upon us; and though Gath be in sight\nand Saul just over the hills, and we have no better refuge than a cave\nin a hillside; yet in prophecy built upon our consciousness that the\nAngel of the Covenant is with us now, we may antedate the deliverance\nthat shall be, and think of it as even now accomplished. So the Apostle,\nwhen within sight of the block and the headsman's axe, broke into the\nrapture of his last words: 'The Lord shall deliver me from every evil\nwork, and will preserve me to His heavenly kingdom: to whom be glory for\never and ever. Amen.' Was he wrong?\n\n\n\n\nSTRUGGLING AND SEEKING\n\n\n    'The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they that seek the\n    Lord shall not want any good thing.'--PSALM xxxiv. 10.\n\nIf we may trust the superscription of this psalm, it was written by\nDavid at one of the very darkest days of his wanderings, probably in the\nCave of Adullam, where he had gathered around him a band of outlaws, and\nwas living, to all appearance, a life uncommonly like that of a brigand\nchief, in the hills. One might have pardoned him if, at such a moment,\nsome cloud of doubt or despondency had crept over his soul. But instead\nof that his words are running over with gladness, and the psalm begins\n'I will bless the Lord at all times, and His praise shall continually be\nin my mouth.' Similarly here he avers, even at a moment when he wanted a\ngreat deal of what the world calls 'good,' that 'they that seek the Lord\nshall not want any good thing.' There were lions in Palestine in David's\ntime. He had had a fight with one of them, as you may remember, and his\nlurking place was probably not far off the scene of Samson's exploits.\nVery likely they were prowling about the rocky mouth of the cave, and he\nweaves their howls into his psalm: 'The young lions do lack, and suffer\nhunger: but they that seek the Lord shall not want any good.'\n\nSo, then, here are the two thoughts--the struggle that always fails and\nthe seeking that always finds.\n\nI. The struggle that always fails.\n\n'The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger.' They are taken as the type\nof violent effort and struggle, as well as of supreme strength, but for\nall their teeth and claws, and lithe spring, 'they lack, and suffer\nhunger.' The suggestion is, that the men whose lives are one long fight\nto appropriate to themselves more and more of outward good, are living a\nkind of life that is fitter for beasts than for men. A fierce struggle\nfor material good is the true description of the sort of life that hosts\nof us live. What is the meaning of all this cry that we hear about the\nmurderous competition going on round us? What is the true character of\nthe lives of, I am afraid, the majority of people in a city like\nManchester, but a fight and a struggle, a desire to have, and a failure\nto obtain? Let us remember that that sort of existence is for the\nbrutes, and that there is a better way of getting what is good; the only\nfit way for man. Beasts of prey, naturalists tell us, are always lean.\nIt is the graminivorous order that meekly and peacefully crop the\npastures that are well fed and in good condition--'which things are an\nallegory.'\n\n'The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger'--and that, being\ninterpreted, just states the fact to which every man's experience, and\nthe observation of every man that has an eye in his head, distinctly\nsay, 'Amen, it is so.' For there is no satisfaction or success ever to\nbe won by this way of fighting and struggling and scheming and springing\nat the prey. For if we do not utterly fail, which is the lot of so many\nof us, still partial success has little power of bringing perfect\nsatisfaction to a human spirit. One loss counterbalances any number of\ngains. No matter how soft is the mattress, if there is one tiny thorn\nsticking up through it all the softness goes for nothing. There is\nalways a Mordecai sitting at the gate when Haman goes prancing through\nit on his white horse; and the presence of the unsympathetic and\nstiff-backed Jew, sitting stolid at the gate, takes the gilt off the\ngingerbread, and embitters the enjoyment. So men count up their\ndisappointments, and forget all their fulfilled hopes, count up their\nlosses and forget their gains. They think less of the thousands that\nthey have gained than of the half-crown that they were cheated of.\n\nIn every way it is true that the little annoyances, like a grain of dust\nin the sensitive eye, take all the sweetness out of mere material good,\nand I suppose that there are no more bitterly disappointed men in this\nworld than the perfectly 'successful men,' as the world counts them.\nThey have been disillusionised in the process of acquisition. When they\nwere young and lusted after earthly good things, these seemed to be all\nthat they needed. When they are old, and have them, they find that they\nare feeding on ashes, and the grit breaks their teeth, and irritates\ntheir tongues. The 'young lions do lack' even when their roar and their\nspring 'have secured the prey,' and 'they suffer hunger' even when they\nhave fed full. Ay! for if the utmost possible measure of success were\ngranted us, in any department in which the way of getting the thing is\nthis fighting and effort, we should be as far away from being at rest as\never we were.\n\nYou remember the old story of the _Arabian Nights_, about the wonderful\npalace that was built by magic, and all whose windows were set in\nprecious stones, but there was one window that remained unadorned, and\nthat spoiled all for the owner. His palace was full of treasures, but an\nenemy looked on all the wealth and suggested a previously unnoticed\ndefect by saying, 'You have not a roc's egg.' He had never thought about\ngetting a roc's egg, and did not know what it was. But the consciousness\nof something lacking had been roused, and it marred his enjoyment of\nwhat he had and drove him to set out on his travels to secure the\nmissing thing. There is always something lacking, for our desires grow\nfar faster than their satisfactions, and the more we have, the wider our\nlonging reaches out, so that as the wise old Book has it, 'He that\nloveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver, nor he that loveth\nabundance with increase.' You cannot fill a soul with the whole\nuniverse, if you do not put God in it. One of the greatest works of\nfiction of modern times ends, or all but ends, with a sentence something\nlike this, 'Ah! who of us has what he wanted, or having it, is\nsatisfied?' 'The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger'--and the\nstruggle always fails--'but they that seek the Lord shall not want any\ngood thing.'\n\nII. The seeking which always finds.\n\nNow, how do we 'seek the Lord'? It is a metaphorical expression, of\ncourse, which needs to be carefully interpreted in order not to lead us\ninto a great mistake. We do not seek Him as if He had not sought us, or\nwas hiding from us. But our search of Him is search after one who is\nnear every one of us, and who delights in nothing so much as in pouring\nHimself into every heart and mind, and will and life, if only heart,\nmind, will, life, are willing to accept Him. It is a short search that\nthe child by her mother's skirts, or her father's side, has to make for\nmother or father. It is a shorter search that we have to make for God.\n\nWe seek Him by desire. Do you want Him? A great many of us do not. We\nseek Him by communion, by turning our thoughts to Him, amidst all the\nrush of daily life, and such a turning of thought to Him, which is quite\npossible, will prevent our most earnest working upon things material\nfrom descending to the likeness of the lions' fighting for it. We seek\nHim by desire, by communion, by obedience. And they who thus seek Him\nfind Him in the act of seeking Him, just as certainly as if I open my\neye I see the sun, or as if I dilate my lungs the atmosphere rushes into\nthem. For He is always seeking us. That is a beautiful word of our\nLord's to which we do not always attach all its value, 'The Father\n_seeketh_ such to worship Him.' Why put the emphasis upon the 'such,' as\nif it was a definition of the only kind of acceptable worship? It is\nthat. But we might put more emphasis upon the 'seeketh' without spoiling\nthe logic of the sentence; and thereby we should come nearer the truth\nof what God's heart to us is, so that if we do seek Him, we shall surely\nfind. In this region, and in this region only, there is no search that\nis vain, there is no effort that is foiled, there is no desire\nunaccomplished, there is no failure possible. We each of us have,\naccurately and precisely, as much of God as we desire to have. If there\nis only a very little of the Water of Life in our vessels, it is because\nwe did not care to possess any more. 'Seek, and ye shall find.'\n\nWe shall be sure to find everything in God. Look at the grand\nconfidence, and the utterance of a life's experience in these great\nwords: 'Shall not want any good.' For God is everything to us, and\neverything else is nothing; and it is the presence of God in anything\nthat makes it truly able to satisfy our desires. Human love, sweet and\nprecious, dearest and best of all earthly possessions as it is, fails to\nfill a heart unless the love grasps God as well as the beloved dying\ncreature. And so with regard to all other things. They are good when God\nis in them, and when they are ours in God. They are nought when wrenched\naway from Him. We are sure to find everything in Him, for this is the\nvery property of that infinite divine nature that is waiting to impart\nitself to us, that, like water poured into a vessel, it will take the\nshape of the vessel into which it is poured. Whatever is my need, the\none God will supply it all.\n\nYou remember the old Rabbinical tradition which speaks a deep truth,\ndressed in a fanciful shape. It says that the manna in the wilderness\ntasted to every man just what he desired, whatever dainty or nutriment\nhe most wished; that the manna became like the magic cup in the old\nfairy legends, out of which could be poured any precious liquor at the\npleasure of the man who was to drink it. The one God is everything to us\nall, anything that we desire, and the thing that we need; Protean in His\nmanifestations, one in His sufficiency. With Him, as well as in Him, we\nare sure to have all that we require. 'Seek ye first the Kingdom ... and\nall these things shall be added unto you.'\n\nLet us begin, dear brethren! with seeking, and then our struggling will\nnot be violent, nor self-willed, nor will it fail. If we begin with\nseeking, and have God, be sure that all we need we shall get, and that\nwhat we do not get we do not need. It is hard to believe it when our\nvehement wishes go out to something that His serene wisdom does not\nsend. It is hard to believe it when our bleeding hearts are being\nwrenched away from something around which they have clung. But it is\ntrue for all that. And he that can say, 'Whom have I in heaven but Thee,\nand there is none upon earth that I desire beside Thee,' will find that\nthe things which he enjoys in subordination to his one supreme good are\na thousand times more precious when they are regarded as second than\nthey ever could be when our folly tried to make them first. 'Seek first\nthe Kingdom,' and be contented that the 'other things' shall be\nappendices, additions, over and above the one thing that is needful.\n\nNow, all that is very old-fashioned, threadbare truth. Dear brethren! if\nwe believed it, and lived by it, 'the peace of God which passes\nunderstanding' would 'keep our hearts and minds.' And, instead of\nfighting and losing, and desiring to have and howling out because we\ncannot obtain, we should patiently wait before Him, submissively ask,\nearnestly seek, immediately find, and always possess and be satisfied\nwith, the one good for body, soul, and spirit, which is God Himself.\n\n'There be many that cry, Oh! that one would show as any good.' The wise\ndo not cry to men, but pray to God. 'Lord! lift Thou the light of Thy\ncountenance upon us.'\n\n\n\n\nNO CONDEMNATION\n\n\n    'None of them that trust in Him shall be desolate.'\n    --PSALM xxxiv. 22.\n\nThese words are very inadequately represented in the translation of the\nAuthorised Version. The Psalmist's closing declaration is something very\nmuch deeper than that they who trust in God 'shall not be desolate.' If\nyou look at the previous clause, you will see that we must expect\nsomething more than such a particular blessing as that:--'The Lord\nredeemeth the soul of His servants.' It is a great drop from that\nthought, instead of being a climax, to follow it with nothing more than,\n'None of them that trust in Him shall be desolate.' But the Revised\nVersion accurately renders the words: 'None of them that trust in Him\nshall be _condemned_.' There we have something that is worthy to follow\n'The Lord redeemeth the soul of His servants,' and we have a most\nstriking anticipation of the clearest and most Evangelical teaching of\nthe New Testament.\n\nThe entirely New Testament tone of these words of the psalm comes out\nstill more clearly, if we recognise that, not only in the latter, but in\nthe former, part of the clause, we have one of the very keynotes of New\nTestament teaching. When we read in the New Testament that 'we are\njustified by faith,' the meaning is precisely the same as that of our\ntext. Thus, however it came about, here is this Psalmist, David or\nanother, standing away back amidst the shadows and symbols and\nritualisms of that Old Covenant, and rising at once above all the mists,\nright up into the sunshine, and seeing, as clearly as we see it nineteen\ncenturies after Jesus Christ, that the way to escape condemnation is\nsimple faith. Let us look at both of the parts of these great words. We\nconsider--\n\nI. The people that are spoken of here.\n\n'None of them that trust in Him'--I need not, I suppose, further dwell\nupon the absolute identity shown by this phrase between the Old and the\nNew Testament conceptions; but I should like to make a remark, which I\ndare say I have often made before--it cannot be made too often--that,\nwhatever be the differences between the Old and the New, this is not the\ndifference, that they present two different ways of approaching God.\nThere are a great many differences; the conception of the divine nature\nis no doubt infinitely deepened, made more tender and more lofty, by the\nthought of the Fatherhood of God. The contents of the revelation which\nour faith is to grasp are brought out far more definitely and\narticulately and fully in the New Testament. But in the Old, the road to\nGod was the same as it is to-day; and from the beginning there has only\nbeen, and through all Eternity there will only be, one path by which men\ncan have access to the Father, and that is by faith. 'Trust' is the Old\nTestament word, 'faith' is the New. They are absolutely identical, and\nthere would have been a flood of light--sorely needed by a great many\ngood people--cast upon the relations between those two complementary and\nharmonious halves of a consistent whole, if our translators had not been\ninfluenced by their unfortunate love for varying translations of the\nsame word, but had contented themselves with choosing one of these two\nwords 'trust' or 'faith,' and had used that one consistently and\nuniformly throughout the Old and New books. Then we should have\nunderstood, what anybody who will open his eyes can see now, that what\nthe New Testament magnifies as 'faith' is identical with what the Old\nTestament sets forth as 'trust.' 'None of them that trust in Him shall\nbe condemned.'\n\nBut there is one more remark to make on this matter, and that is that a\ngreat flood of light, and of more than light, of encouragement and of\nstimulus, is cast upon that saving exercise of trust by noticing the\nliteral meaning of the word that is rightly so rendered here. All those\nwords, especially in the Old Testament, that express emotions or acts of\nthe mind, originally applied to corporeal acts or material things. I\nsuppose that is so in all language. It is very conspicuously so in the\nHebrew. And the word that is here translated, rightly, 'trust,' means\nliterally to fly to a refuge, or to betake oneself to some defence in\norder to get shelter there.\n\nThere is a trace of both meanings, the literal and the metaphorical, in\nanother psalm, where we read, amidst the Psalmist's rapturous heaping\ntogether of great names for God: 'My Rock, in whom I will trust.' Now\nkeep to the literal meaning there, and you see how it flashes up the\nwhole into beauty: 'My Rock, to whom I will flee for refuge,' and put my\nback against it, and stand as impregnable as it; or get myself well into\nthe clefts of it, and then nothing can touch me.\n\n  'Rock of Ages! cleft for me,\n   Let me hide myself in Thee.'\n\nThen we find the same words, with the picture of flight and the reality\nof faith, used with another set of associations in another psalm, which\nsays: 'He shall cover thee with His feathers, and under His wings shalt\nthou trust.' That grates, one gets away from the metaphor too quickly;\nbut if we preserve the literal meaning, and read, 'under His wings shalt\nthou flee for refuge,' we have the picture of the chicken flying to the\nmother-bird when kites are in the sky, and huddling close to the warm\nbreast and the soft downy feathers, and so with the spread of the great\nwing being sheltered from all possibility of harm. This psalm is\nascribed to David when he was in hiding. The superscription says that it\nis 'a psalm of David, when he changed his behaviour before Abimelech;\nwho drove him away, and he departed.' And where did he go? To the cave\nin the rock. And as he sat in the mouth of it, with the rude arch\nstretching above him, like the wings of some great bird, feeling himself\nabsolutely safe, he said, 'None of them that take refuge in Thee shall\nbe condemned.'\n\nDoes not that metaphor teach us a great deal more of what faith is, and\nencourage us far more to exercise it, than much theological\nhair-splitting? What lies in the metaphor? Two things, the earnest\neagerness of the act of flight, and the absolute security which comes\nwhen we have reached the shadow of the great Rock in a weary land.\n\nBut there is one thing more that I would notice, and that is that this\ndesignation of the persons as 'them that trust in Him' follows last of\nall in a somewhat lengthened series of designations for good people.\nThey are these: 'the righteous'--'them that are of a broken\nheart'--'such as be of a contrite spirit'--'His servants,' and then,\nlastly, comes, as basis of all, as, so to speak, the keynote of all,\n'none of them that _trust_ in Him.' That is to say--righteousness, true\nand blessed pulverising of the obstinate insensibility of self alienated\nfrom God, true and blessed consciousness of sin, joyful surrender of\nself to loving and grateful submission to God's will, are all connected\nwith or flow from that act of trust in Him. And if you are trusting in\nHim, in anything more than the mere formal, dead way in which multitudes\nof nominal Christians in all our congregations are doing so, your trust\nwill produce all these various fruits of righteousness, and lowliness,\nand joyful service. 'Faith' or 'trust' is the mother of all graces and\nvirtues, and it produces them all because it directly kindles the\ncreative flame of an answering love to Him in whom we trust. So much,\nthen, for the first part of my remarks. Consider, next--\n\nII. The blessing here promised.\n\n'None of them that trust in Him shall be condemned.' The word which is\ninadequately rendered 'desolate,' and more accurately 'condemned,'\nincludes the following varying shades of meaning, which, although they\nare various, are all closely connected, as you will see--to incur guilt,\nto feel guilty, to be condemned, to be punished. All these four are\ninextricably blended together. And the fact that the one word in the Old\nTestament covers all that ground suggests some very solemn thoughts.\n\nFirst of all, it suggests this, that guilt, or sin, and condemnation and\npunishment, are, if not absolutely identical, inseparable. To be guilty\nis to be condemned. That is to say, since we live, as we do, under the\ncontinual grip of an infinitely wise and all-knowing law, and in the\npresence of a Judge who not only sees us as we are, but treats us as He\nsees us--sin and guilt go together, as every man knows that has a\nconscience. And sin and guilt and condemnation and punishment go\ntogether, as every man may see in the world, and experience in himself.\nTo be separated from God, which is the immediate effect of sin, is to\npass into hell here. 'Every transgression and disobedience,' not only\n'shall receive its just recompense,' away out yonder, in some misty,\nfar-off, hypothetical future, but down here to-day. All sin works\nautomatically, and to do wrong is to be punished for doing it.\n\nThen my text suggests another solemn thought, and that is that this\njudgment, this condemnation, is not only present, according to our\nLord's own great words, which perhaps are an allusion to these: 'He that\nbelieveth not is condemned already'; but it also suggests the\nuniversality of that condemnation. Our Psalmist says that only through\ntrusting Him can a man be taken and lifted away, as it were, from the\ndescent of the thundercloud, and its bolt that lies above his head.\n'They that trust Him are not condemned,' every one else is; not 'shall\nbe,' but is, to-day, here and now. If there is a man or woman in my\naudience now who is not exercising trust in God through Jesus Christ, on\nthat man or woman, young or old, cultivated or uncultivated, professing\nChristian or not, there is bound the burden of their sin, which is the\ncrushing weight of their condemnation.\n\nSo my text suggests, that the sole deliverance from this universal\npressure of the condemnatory influence of universal sin lies in that\nfleeing for refuge to God. And then comes in the Christian addition, 'to\nGod, as manifested in Jesus Christ.' The Psalmist did not know that. All\nthe more wonderful is it that without the knowledge he should have risen\nto the great thought of our text--all the more inexplicable unless you\nbelieve that 'holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy\nGhost.'\n\nWonderful it is still, but not unintelligible, if you believe that. But\nyou and I know more than this singer did; for we can listen to the\nMaster, who says, 'He that believeth on Him is not condemned'; and to\nthe servant who echoes--and perhaps both of them are alluding to our\npsalm--'There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in\nChrist Jesus.' My faith, if it knits me to Jesus Christ, unties the\nbonds by which my sin is bound upon me, for it makes me to share in His\nSpirit, in His righteousness, in His glory.\n\nAnd so, dear brethren! the Psalmist, though he did not know it, may\npoint us away to the truth hidden from him, but sunlight clear for us,\nthat by simple trust we may receive the Saviour through whom all our\ncondemnation will pass away, and may be found in Him having the\n'righteousness which is of God by faith.'\n\n'Not condemned'--Is that all? Are the blessings of the Gospel all to be\nreduced to this mere negative expression? Certainly not. The Psalmist\ncould have said a great deal more, and in the previous context he does\nsay a great deal more. But to that restrained and moderate statement of\nthe case, which is far less than the facts of the case, 'he that\ntrusteth is not condemned,' let us add Paul's expansion, 'whom He called\nthem He also justified, and whom He justified them He also glorified.'\n\n\n\n\nSKY, EARTH, AND SEA: A PARABLE OF GOD\n\n\n    'Thy mercy, O Lord, is in the heavens; and Thy faithfulness reacheth\n    unto the clouds. 6. Thy righteousness is like the great mountains;\n    Thy judgments are a great deep: O Lord, Thou preservest man and\n    beast. 7. How excellent is Thy loving-kindness, O God! therefore the\n    children of men put their trust under the shadow of Thy wings.'\n    --PSALM xxxvi. 5-7.\n\nThis wonderful description of the manifold brightness of the divine\nnature is introduced in this psalm with singular abruptness. It is set\nside by side with a vivid picture of an evildoer, a man who mutters in\nhis own heart his godlessness, and with obstinate determination plans\nand plots in forgetfulness of God. Without a word to break the violence\nof the transition, side by side with that picture, the Psalmist sets\nbefore us these thoughts of the character of God. He seems to feel that\nthat character was the only relief in the contemplation of the miserable\nsights of which the earth is only too full. We should go mad when we\nthink of man's wickedness unless we could look up and see, with one\nquick turn of the eye, the heaven opened and the throned Love that sits\nup there gazing on all the chaos, and working to soothe sorrow, and to\npurify evil.\n\nPerhaps there is another reason for this dramatic and striking swiftness\nof contrast between the godless man and the revealed God. The true test\nof a life is its power to bear the light of God being suddenly let in\nupon it. How would yours look, my friend! if all at once a window in\nheaven was opened, and God glared in upon you? Set your lives side by\nside with Him. They always are side by side with Him whether you know it\nor not; but you had better bring your 'deeds to the light that they may\nbe made manifest' now, than to have to do it as suddenly, and a great\ndeal more sorrowfully, when you are dragged out of the shows and\nillusions of time, and He meets you on the threshold of another world.\nWould a beam of light from God, coming in upon your life, be like a\nlight falling upon a gang of conspirators, that would make them huddle\nall their implements under their cloaks, and scuttle out of the way as\nfast as possible? Or would it be like a gleam of sunshine upon the\nflowers, opening out their petals and wooing from them fragrance? Which?\n\nBut I turn from such considerations as these to the more immediate\nsubject of my contemplations in this discourse. I have ventured to take\nso great words for my text, though each clause would be more than enough\nfor many a sermon, because my aim now is a very modest one. I desire\nsimply to give, in the briefest way, the connection and mutual relation\nof these wonderful words; not to attempt any adequate treatment of the\ngreat thoughts which they contain, but only to set forth the meaning and\ninterdependence of these manifold names for the beams of the divine\nlight, which are presented here. The chief part of our text sets before\nus God in the variety and boundlessness of His loving nature, and the\nclose of it shows us man sheltering beneath God's wings. These are the\ntwo main themes for our present consideration.\n\nI. We have, first, God in the boundlessness of His loving nature.\n\nThe one pure light of the divine nature is broken up, in the prism of\nthe psalm, into various rays, which theologians call, in their hard,\nabstract way, divine attributes. These are 'mercy, faithfulness,\nrighteousness.' Then we have two sets of divine acts--'judgments,' and\nthe 'preservation' of man and beast; and finally we have again\n'lovingkindness,' as our version has unfortunately been misled, by its\nlove for varying its translation, to render the same word which begins\nthe series and is there called 'mercy.'\n\nNow that 'mercy' or 'lovingkindness' of which my text thus speaks, is\nvery nearly equivalent to the New Testament 'love'; or, perhaps, still\nmore nearly equivalent to the New Testament 'grace.' Both the one and\nthe other mean substantially this--active love communicating itself to\ncreatures that are inferior and that might have expected something else\nto befall them. Mercy is a modification of love, inasmuch as it is love\nto an inferior. The hand is laid gently upon the man, because if it were\nlaid with all its weight it would crush him. It is the stooping goodness\nof a king to a beggar. And mercy is likewise love in its exercise to\npersons that might expect something else, being guilty. As a general\ncoming to a body of mutineers with pardon and favour upon his lips,\ninstead of with condemnation and death; so God comes to us forgiving and\nblessing. All His goodness is forbearance, and His love is mercy,\nbecause of the weakness, the lowliness, and the ill desert of us on whom\nthe love falls.\n\nNow notice that this same 'quality of mercy' stands here at the\nbeginning and at the end. All the attributes of the divine nature, all\nthe operations of the divine hand lie within the circle of His\nmercy--like diamonds set in a golden ring. Mercy, or love flowing out in\nblessings to inferior and guilty creatures, is the root and ground of\nall God's character; it is the foundation and impulse of all His acts.\nModern science reduces all modes of physical energy to one, for which it\nhas no name but--energy. We are taught by God's own revelation of\nHimself--and most especially by His final and perfect revelation of\nHimself in Jesus Christ--to trace all forms of divine energy back to one\nwhich David calls 'mercy,' which John calls 'love.'\n\nIt is last as well as first, the final upshot of all revelation. The\nlast voice that speaks from Scripture has for its special message 'God\nis Love.' The last voice that sounds from the completed history of the\nworld will have the same message, and the ultimate word of all\nrevelation, the end of the whole of the majestic unfolding of God's\npurposes will be the proclamation to the four corners of the universe,\nas from the trump of the Archangel, of the name of God as Love. The\nnorthern and the southern poles of the great sphere are one and the\nsame, a straight axle through the very heart of it, from which the\nbounding lines swell out to the equator, and towards which they converge\nagain on the opposite side of the world. So mercy is the strong\naxletree, the northern pole and the southern, on which the whole world\nof the divine perfections revolves and moves. The first and last, the\nAlpha and Omega of God, beginning and crowning and summing up all His\nbeing and His work, is His mercy, His lovingkindness.\n\nBut next to mercy comes faithfulness. 'Thy faithfulness reacheth unto\nthe clouds.' God's faithfulness is in its narrowest sense His adherence\nto His promises. It implies, in that sense, a verbal revelation, and\ndefinite words from Him pledging Him to a certain line of action. 'He\nhath said, and shall He not do it?' 'He will not alter the thing that is\ngone out of His lips.' It is only a God who has actually spoken to men\nwho can be a 'faithful God.' He will not palter with a double sense,\n'keeping His word of promise to the ear, and breaking it to the hope.'\n\nBut not only His articulate promises, but also His own past actions,\nbind Him. He is always true to these; and not only continues to do as He\nhas done, but discharges every obligation which His past imposes on Him.\nThe ostrich was said to leave its eggs to be hatched in the sand. Men\nbring men into positions of dependence, and then lightly shake\nresponsibility from careless shoulders. But God accepts the cares laid\nupon Him by His own acts, and discharges them to the last jot. He is a\n'faithful Creator.' Creation brings obligations with it; obligations for\nthe creature; obligations for the Creator. If God makes a being, God is\nbound to take care of the being that He has made. If He makes a being in\na given fashion, He is bound to provide for the necessities that He has\ncreated. According to the old proverb, if He makes mouths it is His\nbusiness to feed them. And He recognises the obligation. His past binds\nHim to certain conduct in His future. We can lay hold on the former\nmanifestation, and we can plead it with Him. 'Thou hast been, and\ntherefore Thou must be.' 'Thou hast taught me to trust in Thee;\nvindicate and warrant my trust by Thy unchangeableness.' So His word,\nHis acts, and His own nature, bind God to bless and help. His\nfaithfulness is the expression of His unchangeableness. 'Because He\ncould swear by no greater, He sware by Himself.'\n\nTake, then, these two thoughts of God's lovingkindness and of God's\nfaithfulness and weave them together, and see what a strong cord they\nare to which a man may cling, and in all His weakness be sure that it\nwill never give nor break. Mercy might be transient and arbitrary, but\nwhen you braid in 'faithfulness' along with it, it becomes fixed as the\npillars of heaven, and immutable as the throne of God. Only when we are\nsure of God's faithfulness can we lift up thankful voices to Him,\n'because His mercy endureth for ever.' A despotic monarch may be all\nfull of tenderness at this moment, and all full of wrath and sternness\nthe next. He may have a whim of favour to-day, and a whim of severity\nto-morrow, and no man can say, 'What doest thou?' But God is not a\ndespot. He has, so to speak, 'decreed a constitution.' He has limited\nHimself. He has marked out His path across the great wide region of\npossibilities of the divine action; He has buoyed out His channel on\nthat ocean, and declared to us His purposes. So we can reckon on God, as\nastronomers can foretell the motions of the stars. We can plead His\nfaithfulness along with His love, and feel that the one makes sure that\nthe other shall be from everlasting to everlasting.\n\nThe next beam of the divine brightness is righteousness. 'Thy\nrighteousness is like the great mountains.' Righteousness is not to be\ntaken here in its narrow sense of stern retribution which gives to the\nevildoer the punishment that he deserves. There is no thought here,\nwhatever there may be in other places in Scripture, of any opposition\nbetween mercy and righteousness, but the notion of righteousness here is\na broader and greater one. It is just this, to put it into other words,\nthat God has a law for His being to which He conforms; and that\nwhatsoever things are fair and lovely, and good, and pure down here,\nthose things are fair, and lovely, and good, and pure up there; that He\nis the Archetype of all excellence, the Ideal of all moral completeness:\nthat we can know enough of Him to be sure of this that what we call\nright He loves, and what we call right He practises.\n\nBrethren! unless we have that for the very foundation of our thoughts of\nGod, we have no foundation to rest on. Unless we feel and know that 'the\nJudge of all the earth doeth right,' and is right, and law and\nrighteousness have their home and seat in His bosom, and are the\nexpression of His inmost being, then I know not where our confidence can\nbe built. Unless 'Thy righteousness, like the great mountains,'\nsurrounds and guards the low plain of our lives, they will lie open to\nall foes.\n\nThen, next, we pass from the divine character to the divine acts. Mercy,\nfaithfulness, and righteousness all converge and flow into the great\nriver of the divine 'judgments.'\n\nBy judgments are not meant merely the acts of God's punitive\nrighteousness, the retributions that destroy evildoers, but all God's\ndecisions and acts in regard to man. Or, to put it into other and\nbriefer words, God's judgments are the whole of the 'ways,' the methods\nof the divine government. So Paul, alluding to this very passage when he\nsays 'How unsearchable are Thy judgments!' adds, as a parallel clause,\nmeaning the same thing, 'and Thy ways past finding out.' That includes\nall which men call, in a narrower sense, judgments, but it includes,\ntoo, all acts of kindness and loving gifts. God's judgments are the\nexpressions of His thoughts, and these thoughts are thoughts of good and\nnot of evil.\n\nBut notice, in the next place, the boundlessness of all these\ncharacteristics of the divine nature.\n\n'Thy mercy is in the heavens,' towering up above the stars, and dwelling\nthere, like some divine ether filling all space. The heavens are the\nhome of light, the source of every blessing, arching over every head,\nrimming every horizon, holding all the stars, opening into abysses as we\ngaze, with us by night and by day, undimmed by the mist and smoke of\nearth, unchanged by the lapse of centuries; ever seen, never reached,\nbending over us always, always far above us. So the mercy of God towers\nabove us, and stoops down towards us, rims us all about and arches over\nus all, sheds down its dewy benedictions by night and by day; is filled\nwith a million stars and light-points of duty and of splendour; is near\nus ever to bless and succour and help, and holds us all in its blue\nround.\n\n'Thy faithfulness reacheth to the clouds.' Strange that God's fixed\nfaithfulness should be compared to the very emblems of mutation. The\nclouds are unstable, they whirl and melt and change. Strange to think of\nthe unalterable faithfulness as reaching to them! May it not be that the\nvery mutability of the mutable may be the means of manifesting the\nunalterable sameness of God's faithful purpose, of His unchangeable\nlove, and of His ever consistent dealings? May not the apparent\nincongruity be a part of the felicity of the bold words? Is it not true\nthat earthly things, as they change their forms and melt away, leaving\nno track behind, phantomlike as they are, do still obey the behests of\nthat divine faithfulness, and gather and dissolve and break in brief\nshowers of blessing, or short, sharp crashes of storm, at the bidding of\nthat steadfast purpose which works out one unalterable design by a\nthousand instruments, and changeth all things, being in itself\nunchanged? The thing that is eternal, even the faithfulness of God,\ndwells amid, and shows itself through, the things that are temporal, the\nflying clouds of change.\n\nAgain, 'Thy righteousness is like the great mountains.' Like these, its\nroots are fast and stable; like these, it stands firm for ever; like\nthese, its summits touch the fleeting clouds of human circumstance; like\nthese, it is a shelter and a refuge, inaccessible in its steepest peaks,\nbut affording many a cleft in its rocks, where a man may hide and be\nsafe. But, unlike these, it knew no beginning, and shall know no end.\nEmblems of permanence as they are, though Olivet looks down on Jerusalem\nas it did when Melchizedek was its king, and Tabor and Hermon stand as\nthey did before human lips had named them, they are wearing away by\nwinter storms and summer heats. But, as Isaiah has taught us, when the\nearth is old, God's might and mercy are young; for 'the mountains shall\ndepart and the hills be removed, but My kindness shall not depart from\nthee.' 'The earth shall wax old like a garment, but My righteousness\nshall not be abolished.' It is more stable than the mountains, and\nfirmer than the firmest things upon earth.\n\nThen, with wonderful poetical beauty and vividness of contrast, there\nfollows upon the emblem of the great mountains of God's righteousness\nthe emblem of the 'mighty deep' of His judgments. Here towers Vesuvius;\nthere at its feet lie the waters of the bay. So the righteousness\nsprings up like some great cliff, rising sheer from the water's edge,\nwhile its feet are laved by the sea of the divine judgments,\nunfathomable and shoreless. The mountains and the sea are the two\ngrandest things in nature, and in their combination sublime; the one the\nhome of calm and silence, the other in perpetual motion. But the\nmountain's roots are deeper than the depths of the sea, and though the\njudgments are a mighty deep, the righteousness is deeper, and is the bed\nof the ocean.\n\nThe metaphor, of course, implies obscurity, but what sort of obscurity?\nThe obscurity of the sea. And what sort of obscurity is that? Not that\nwhich comes from mud, or anything added, but that which comes from\ndepth. As far as a man can see down into its blue-green depths they are\nclear and translucent; but where the light fails and the eye fails,\nthere comes what we call obscurity. The sea is clear, but our sight is\nlimited.\n\nAnd so there is no arbitrary obscurity in God's dealings, and we know as\nmuch about them as it is possible for us to know; but we cannot see to\nthe bottom. A man on the cliff can look much deeper into the ocean than\na man on the level beach. The higher you climb the further you will see\ndown into the 'sea of glass mingled with fire' that lies placid before\nGod's throne. Let us remember that it is a hazardous thing to judge of a\npicture before it is finished; of a building before the scaffolding is\npulled down, and it is as hazardous for us to say about any deed or any\nrevealed truth that it is inconsistent with the divine character. Wait a\nbit; wait a bit! 'Thy judgments are a great deep.' The deep will be\ndrained off one day, and you will see the bottom of it. 'Judge nothing\nbefore the time.'\n\nBut as an aid to patience and faith hearken how the Psalmist finishes up\nhis contemplations: 'O Lord! Thou preservest man and beast.' Very well\nthen, all this mercy, faithfulness, righteousness, judgment, high as the\nheavens, deep as the ocean, firm as the hills, it is all working for\nthis--to keep the millions of living creatures round about us, and\nourselves, in life and well-being. The mountain is high, the deep is\nprofound. Between the mountain and the sea there is a strip of level\nland. God's righteousness towers above us; God's judgments go down\nbeneath us; we can scarcely measure adequately the one or the other. But\nupon the level where we live there are the green fields where the cattle\nbrowse, and the birds sing, and men live and till and reap and are fed.\nThat is to say, we all have enough in the plain, patent facts of\ncreation and preservation of man and animal life in this world to make\nus quite sure of what is the principle that prevails up to the very top\nof the inaccessible mountains, and down to the very bottom of the\nunfathomable deep. What we know of Him, in the blessings of His love and\nprovidence, ought to interpret for us all that is perplexing. What we\nunderstand is good and loving. Let us be sure that what we do not yet\nunderstand is good and loving too. The web is of one texture throughout.\nThe least educated ear can catch the music of the simpler melodies which\nrun through the Great Composer's work. We shall one day be able to\nappreciate the yet fuller music of the more recondite parts, which to us\nat present seem only jangling and discord. It is not His melody but our\nears that are at fault. But we may well accept the obscurity of the\nmighty deep of God's judgment, when we can see plainly that, after all,\nthe earth is full of His mercy, and that 'the eyes of all things wait on\nGod, and He giveth them their meat in due season.'\n\nII. So much, then, for the great picture here of these boundless\ncharacteristics of the divine nature. Now let us look for a moment at\nthe picture of man sheltering beneath God's wings.\n\n'How excellent is Thy lovingkindness, O God! therefore the children of\nmen put their trust under the shadow of Thy wings.' God's\nlovingkindness, or mercy, as I explained the word might be rendered, is\n_precious_, for that is the true meaning of the word translated\n'excellent.' We are rich when we have that for ours; we are poor without\nit. Our true wealth is to possess God's love, and to know in thought and\nrealise in feeling and reciprocate in affection His grace and goodness,\nthe beauty and perfectness of His wondrous character. That man is\nwealthy who has God on his side; that man is a pauper who has not God\nfor his.\n\n'How precious is Thy lovingkindness, _therefore_ the children of men put\ntheir trust.' There is only one thing that will ever win a man's heart\nto love God, and that is that God should love him first, and let him see\nit. 'We love Him because He first loved us,' is the New Testament\nteaching. Is it not all adumbrated and foretold in these words: 'How\nprecious is Thy loving-kindness, O God! therefore the children of men\nput their trust'?\n\nWe may be driven to worship after a sort by power; we may be smitten\ninto some cold admiration, into some kind of reluctant subjection and\ntrembling reverence, by the manifestation of divine perfections. But\nthere is only one thing that wins a man's heart, and that is the sight\nof God's heart; and it is only when we know how precious His\nlovingkindness is that we shall be drawn towards Him.\n\nAnd then this last verse tells us how we can make God our own: 'They put\ntheir trust under the shadow of Thy wings.' The word here rendered, and\naccurately rendered, 'put their trust,' has a very beautiful literal\nmeaning. It means to flee for refuge, as the manslayer might flee into\nthe strong city, or as Lot did out of Sodom to the little city on the\nhill, or as David did into the cave from his enemies. So, with such\nhaste, with such intensity, staying for nothing, and with the effort of\nyour whole will and nature, flee to God. That is trust. Go to Him for\nrefuge from all evil, from all harm, from your own souls, from all sin,\nfrom hell, and death, and the devil.\n\nPut your trust under 'the shadow of His wings.' That is a beautiful\nimage, drawn, probably, from the grand words of Deuteronomy, where God\nis likened to the 'eagle stirring up her nest, fluttering over her\nyoung,' with tenderness in her fierce eye, and protecting strength in\nthe sweep of her mighty pinion. So God spreads the covert of His wing,\nstrong and tender, beneath which we may all gather ourselves and nestle.\n\nAnd how can we do that? By the simple process of fleeing unto Him, as\nmade known to us in Christ our Saviour; to hide ourselves there. For let\nus not forget how even the tenderness of this metaphor was increased by\nits shape on the tender lips of the Lord: 'How often would I have\ngathered thy children together, as a hen gathereth her chickens under\nher wings!' The Old Testament took the emblem of the eagle, sovereign,\nand strong, and fierce; the New Testament took the emblem of the\ndomestic fowl, peaceable, and gentle, and affectionate. Let us flee to\nthat Christ, by humble faith with the plea on our lips--\n\n  'Cover my defenceless head\n   With the shadow of Thy wing';\n\nand then all the Godhead in its mercy, its faithfulness, its\nrighteousness, and its judgments will be on our side; and we shall know\nhow precious is the lovingkindness of the Lord, and find in Him the home\nand hiding-place of our hearts for ever.\n\n\n\n\nWHAT MEN FIND BENEATH THE WINGS OF GOD\n\n\n    'They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of Thy house;\n    and Thou shalt make them drink of the river of Thy pleasures. 9. For\n    with Thee is the fountain of life: in Thy light shall we see light.'\n    --PSALM xxxvi. 8, 9.\n\nIn the preceding verses we saw a wonderful picture of the boundless\nperfections of God; His lovingkindness, faithfulness, righteousness, and\nof His twofold act, the depths of His judgments and the plainness of His\nmerciful preservation of man and beast. In these verses we have an\nequally wonderful picture of the blessedness of the godly, the elements\nof which consist in four things: satisfaction, represented under the\nemblem of a feast; joy, represented under the imagery of full draughts\nfrom a flowing river of delight; life, pouring from God as a fountain;\nlight, streaming from Him as source.\n\nAnd this picture is connected with the previous one by a very simple\nlink. Who are they who 'shall be abundantly satisfied'? The men 'who put\ntheir trust beneath the shadow of Thy wings.' That is to say, the simple\nexercise of confidence in God is the channel through which all the\nfulness of divinity passes into and fills our emptiness.\n\nObserve, too, that the whole of the blessings here promised are to be\nregarded as present and not future. 'They shall be abundantly satisfied'\nwould be far more truly rendered in consonance with the Hebrew: 'They\n_are_ satisfied'; and so also we should read 'Thou _dost_ make them\ndrink of the river of Thy pleasures; in Thy light _do_ we see light.'\nThe Psalmist is not speaking of any future blessedness, to be realised\nin some far-off, indefinite day to come, but of what is possible even in\nthis cloudy and sorrowful life. My text was true on the hills of\nPalestine, on the day when it was spoken; it may be true amongst the\nalleys of Manchester to-day. My purpose at this time is simply to deal\nwith the four elements in which this blessedness consists--satisfaction,\njoy, life, light.\n\nI. Satisfaction: 'They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of\nThy house.'\n\nNow, I suppose, there is a double metaphor in that. There is an\nallusion, no doubt, to the festal meal of priests and worshippers in the\nTemple, on occasion of the peace-offering, and there is also the simpler\nmetaphor of God as the Host at His table, at which we are guests. 'Thy\nhouse' may either be, in the narrower sense, the Temple; and then all\nlife is represented as being a glad sacrificial meal in His presence, of\nwhich 'the meek shall eat and be satisfied,' or Thy 'house' may be taken\nin a more general sense; and then all life is represented as the\ngathering of children round the abundant board which their Father's\nprovidence spreads for them, and as glad feasting in the 'mansions' of\nthe Father's house.\n\nIn either case the plain teaching of the text is, that by the might of a\ncalm trust in God the whole mass of a man's desires are filled and\nsatisfied. What do we want to satisfy us? It is something almost awful\nto think of the multiplicity, and the variety, and the imperativeness of\nthe raging desires which every human soul carries about within it. The\nheart is like a nest of callow fledglings, every one of them a great,\nwide open, gaping beak, that ever needs to have food put into it. Heart,\nmind, will, appetites, tastes, inclinations, weaknesses, bodily\nwants--the whole crowd of these are crying for their meat. The Book of\nProverbs says there are three things that are never satisfied: the\ngrave, the earth that is not filled with water, and the fire that never\nsays, 'It is enough.' And we may add a fourth, the human heart,\ninsatiable as the grave; thirsty as the sands, on which you may pour\nNiagara, and it will drink it all up and be ready for more; fierce as\nthe fire that licks up everything within reach and still hungers.\n\nSo, though we be poor and weak creatures, we want much to make us\nrestful. We want no less than that every appetite, desire, need,\ninclination shall be filled to the full; that all shall be filled to the\nfull at once, and that by one thing; that all shall be filled to the\nfull at once, by one thing that shall last for ever. Else we shall be\nlike men whose store of provision gives out before they are half-way\nacross the desert. And we need that all our desires shall be filled at\nonce by one thing that is so much greater than ourselves that we shall\ngrow up towards it, and towards it, and towards it, and yet never be\nable to exhaust or surpass it.\n\nWhere are you going to get that? There is only one answer, dear\nbrethren! to the question, and that is--God, and God alone is the food\nof the heart; God, and God alone, will satisfy your need. Let us bring\nthe full Christian truth to bear upon the illustration of these words.\nWho was it that said, 'I am the Bread of Life. He that cometh unto Me\nshall never hunger'? Christ will feed my mind with truth if I will\naccept His revelation of Himself, of God, and of all things. Christ will\nfeed my heart with love if I will open my heart for the entrance of His\nlove. Christ will feed my will with blessed commands if I will submit\nmyself to His sweet and gentle, and yet imperative, authority. Christ\nwill satisfy all my longings and desires with His own great fulness.\nOther food palls upon man's appetite, and we wish for change; and\nphysiologists tell us that a less wholesome and nutritious diet, if\nvaried, is better for a man's health than a more nutritious one if\nuniform and monotonous. But in Christ there are all constituents that\nare needed for the building up of the human spirit, and so we never\nweary of Him if we only know His sweetness. After a world of hungry men\nhave fed upon Him, He remains inexhaustible as at the beginning; like\nthe bread in His own miracles, of which the pieces that were broken and\nready to be given to the eaters were more than the original stock, as it\nappeared when the meal began, or like the fabled feast in the Norse\nWalhalla, to which the gods sit down to-day, and to-morrow it is all\nthere on the board, as abundant and full as ever. So if we have Christ\nto live upon, we shall know no hunger; and 'in the days of famine we\nshall be satisfied.'\n\nO brethren! have you ever known what it is to feel that your hungry\nheart is at rest? Did you ever know what it is to say, 'It is enough'?\nHave you anything that satisfies your appetite and makes you blessed?\nSurely, men's eager haste to get more of the world's dainties shows that\nthere is no satisfaction at its table. Why will you 'spend your money\nfor that which is not bread, and your labour for that which satisfieth\nnot,' as Indians in famine eat clay which fills their stomachs, but\nneither stays hunger, nor ministers strength? Eat and your soul shall\nlive.\n\nII. Now, turn to the next of the elements of blessedness here--Joy.\n'Thou makest them drink of the river of Thy pleasures.'\n\nThere may be a possible reference here, couched in the word 'pleasures,'\nto the Garden of Eden, with the river that watered it parting into four\nheads; for 'Eden' is the singular of the word which is here translated\n'pleasures' or 'delight.' If we take that reference, which is very\nquestionable, there would be suggested the thought that amidst all the\npain and weariness of this desert life of ours, though the gates of\nParadise are shut against us, they who dwell beneath the shadow of the\ndivine wing really have a paradise blooming around them; and have\nflowing ever by their side, with tinkling music, the paradisaical river\nof delights, in which they may bathe and swim, and of which they may\ndrink. Certainly the joys of communion with God surpass any which\nunfallen Eden could have boasted.\n\nBut, at all events, the plain teaching of the text is that the simple\nact of trusting beneath the shadow of God's wings brings to us an ever\nfresh and flowing river of gladness, of which we may drink. The whole\nconception of religion in the Bible is gladsome. There is no puritanical\ngloom about it. True, a Christian man has sources of sadness which other\nmen have not. There is the consciousness of his own sin, and the contest\nthat he has daily to wage; and all things take a soberer colouring to\nthe eye that has been accustomed to look, however dimly, upon God. Many\nof the sources of earthly felicity are dammed up and shut off from us if\nwe are living beneath the shadow of God's wings. Life will seem to be\nsterner, and graver, and sadder than the lives 'that ring with idiot\nlaughter solely,' and have no music because they have no melancholy in\nthem. That cannot be helped. But what does it matter though two or three\nsurface streams, which are little better than drains for sewage, be\nstopped up, if the 'pure river of the water of life' is turned into your\nhearts? Surely it will be a gain if the sadness which has joy for its\nvery foundation is yours, instead of the laughter which is only a\nmocking mask for a death's head, and of which it is true that even 'in\nlaughter the heart is sorrowful, and the end of that mirth is\nheaviness.' Better to be 'sorrowful, yet always rejoicing,' than to be\nglad on the surface, with a perpetual sorrow and unrest gnawing at the\nroot of your life.\n\nAnd if it be true that the whole Biblical conception of religion is of a\nglad thing, then, my brother! it is your duty, if you are a Christian\nman, to be glad, whatever temptations there may be in your way to be\nsorrowful. It is a hard lesson, and one which is not always insisted\nupon. We hear a great deal about other Christian duties. We do not hear\nso much as we ought about the Christian duty of gladness. It takes a\nvery robust faith to say, 'Though the fig-tree shall not blossom,\nneither shall fruit be in the vine, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I\nwill joy in the God of my salvation,' but unless we can say it, there is\nan attainment of Christian life yet unreached, to which we have to\naspire.\n\nBut be that as it may, my point is simply this--that all real and\nprofound possession of, and communion with, God in Christ will make us\nglad; glad with a gladness altogether unlike that of the world round\nabout us, far deeper, far quieter, far nobler, the sister and the ally\nof all great things, of all pure life, of all generous and lofty\nthought. And where is it to be found? Only in fellowship with Him. 'The\nriver of Thy pleasures' may mean something yet more solemn and wonderful\nthan pleasures of which He is the Author. It may mean pleasures _which\nHe shares_, the very delights of the divine nature itself. The more we\ncome into fellowship with Him, the more shall we share in the very joy\nof God Himself. And what is His joy? He delights in mercy; He delights\nin self-communication: He is the blessed, the happy God, because He is\nthe giving God. He delights in His love. He 'rejoices over' His penitent\nchild 'with singing,'\n\nIn that blessedness we may share; or if that be too high and mystical a\nthought, may we not remember who it was that said: 'These things speak I\nunto you that My joy may remain in you'; and who it is that will one day\nsay to the faithful servant: 'Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord'?\nChrist makes us drink of the river of His pleasures. The Shepherd and\nthe sheep drink from the same stream, and the gladness which filled the\nheart of the Man of Sorrows, and lay deeper than all His sorrows, He\nimparts to all them that put their trust in Him.\n\nSo, dear brethren! what a blessing it is for us to have, as we may have,\na source of joy, frozen by no winter, dried up by no summer, muddied and\ncorrupted by no iridescent scum of putrefaction which ever mantles over\nthe stagnant ponds of earthly joys! Like some citadel that has an\nunfailing well in its courtyard, we may have a fountain of gladness\nwithin ourselves which nothing that touches the outside can cut off. We\nhave but to lap a hasty mouthful of earthly joys as we run, but we\ncannot drink too full draughts of this pure river of water which makes\nglad the city of God.\n\nIII. We have the third element of the blessedness of the godly\nrepresented under the metaphor of Life, pouring from the fountain, which\nis God. 'With Thee is the fountain of life.'\n\nThe words are true in regard to the lowest meaning of 'life'--physical\nexistence--and they give a wonderful idea of the connection between God\nand all living creatures. The fountain rises, the spray on the summit\ncatches the sunlight for a moment, and then falls into the basin, jet\nafter jet springing up into the light, and in its turn recoiling into\nthe darkness. The water in the fountain, the water in the spray, the\nwater in the basin, are all one. Wherever there is life there is God.\nThe creature is bound to the Creator by a mystic bond and tie of\nkinship, by the fact of life. The mystery of life knits all living\nthings with God. It is a spark, wherever it burns, from the central\nflame. It is a drop, wherever it is found, from the great fountain. It\nis in man the breath of God's nostrils. It is not a gift given by a\nCreator who dwells apart, having made living things, as a watchmaker\nmight a watch, and then 'seeing them go.' But there is a deep mystic\nunion between the God who has life in Himself and all the living\ncreatures who draw their life from Him, which we cannot express better\nthan by that image of our text, 'With Thee is the fountain of life.'\n\nBut my text speaks about a blessing belonging to the men who put their\ntrust under the shadow of God's wing, and therefore it does not refer\nmerely to physical existence, but to something higher than that, namely,\nto that life of the spirit in communion with God, which is the true and\nthe proper sense of 'life'; the one, namely, in which the word is almost\nalways used in the Bible.\n\nThere is such a thing as death in life; living men may be 'dead in\ntrespasses and sins,' 'dead in pleasure,' dead in selfishness. The awful\nvision of Coleridge in the _Ancient Mariner_, of dead men standing up\nand pulling at the ropes, is only a picture of the realities of life;\nwhere, as on some Witches' Sabbath, corpses move about and take part in\nthe activities of this dead world. There are people full of energy in\nregard of worldly things, who yet are all dead to that higher region,\nthe realities of which they have never seen, the actions of which they\nhave never done, the emotions of which they have never felt. Am I\nspeaking to such living corpses now? There are some of my audience alive\nto the world, alive to animalism, alive to lust, alive to passion, alive\nto earth, alive perhaps to thought, alive to duty, alive to conduct of a\nhigh and noble kind, but yet dead to God, and, therefore, dead to the\nhighest and noblest of all realities. Answer for yourselves the\nquestion--do you belong to this class?\n\nThere is life for you in Jesus Christ, who '_is_ the Life.' Like the\ngreat aqueducts that stretch from the hills across the Roman Campagna,\nHis Incarnation brings the waters of the fountain from the mountains of\nGod into the lower levels of our nature, and the fetid alleys of our\nsins. The cool, sparkling treasure is carried near to every lip. If we\ndrink, we live. If we will not, we die in our sins, and are dead whilst\nwe live. Stop the fountain, and what becomes of the stream? It fades\nthere between its banks, and is no more. You cannot even live the animal\nlife except that life were joined to Him. If it could be broken away\nfrom God it would disappear as the clouds melt in the sky, and there\nwould be nobody, and you would be nowhere. You cannot break yourself\naway from God _physically_ so completely as to annihilate yourself. You\ncan do so _spiritually_, and some of you do it, and the consequence is\nthat you are dead, _dead_, DEAD! You can be made 'alive from the dead,'\nif you will lay hold on Jesus Christ, and get His life-giving Spirit\ninto your hearts.\n\nIV. Light. 'In Thy light shall we see light.'\n\nGod is 'the Father of lights.' The sun and all the stars are only lights\nkindled by Him. It is the very crown of revelation that 'God is light,\nand in Him is no darkness at all.' Light seems to the unscientific eye,\nwhich knows nothing about undulations of a luminiferous ether, to be the\nleast material of material things. All joyous things come with it. It\nbrings warmth and fruit, fulness and life. Purity, and gladness, and\nknowledge have been symbolised by it in all tongues. The Scripture uses\nlight, and the sun, which is its source, as an emblem for God in His\nholiness, and blessedness, and omniscience. This great word here seems\nto point chiefly to light as knowledge.\n\nThis saying is true, as the former clause was, in relation to all the\nlight which men have. 'The inspiration of the Almighty giveth him\nunderstanding.' The faculties by which men know, and all the exercise of\nthose faculties, are His gift. It is in the measure in which God's light\ncomes to the eye that the eye beholds. 'Light' may mean not only the\nfaculty, but the medium of vision. It is in the measure in which God's\nlight comes, and because His light comes, that all light of reason in\nhuman nature sees the truth which is its light. God is the Author of all\ntrue thoughts in all mankind. The spirit of man is a candle kindled by\nthe Lord.\n\nBut as I said about life, so I say about light. The material or\nintellectual aspects of the word are not the main ones here. The\nreference is to the spiritual gift which belongs to the men 'who put\ntheir trust beneath the shadow of Thy wings.' In communion with Him who\nis the Light as well as the Life of men, we see a whole universe of\nglories, realities, and brightnesses. Where other eyes see only\ndarkness, we behold 'the King in His beauty, and the land that is very\nfar off.' Where other men see only cloudland and mists, our vision will\npierce into the unseen, and there behold 'the things which are,' the\nonly real things, of which all that the eye of sense sees are only the\nfleeting shadows, seen as in a dream, while these are the true, and the\nsight of them is sight indeed. They who see by the light of God, and see\nlight therein, have a vision which is more than imagination, more than\nopinion, more than belief. It is certitude. Communication with God does\nnot bring with it superior intellectual perspicuity, but it does bring a\nperception of spiritual realities and relations, which, in respect of\nclearness and certainty, may be called sight. Many of us walk in\ndarkness, who, if we were but in communion with God, would see the lone\nhillside blazing with chariots and horses of fire. Many of us grope in\nperplexity, who, if we were but hiding under the shadow of God's wings,\nwould see the truth and walk at liberty in the light, which is knowledge\nand purity and joy.\n\nIn communication with God, we see light upon all the paths of duty. It\nis wonderful how, when a man lives near God, he gets to know what he\nought to do. That great Light, which is Christ, is like the star that\nhung over the Magi, blazing in the heavens, and yet stooping to the\nlowly task of guiding three wayfaring men along a muddy road upon earth.\nSo the highest Light of God comes down to be 'a lantern for our paths\nand a light for our feet.'\n\nAnd in the same communion with God, we get light in all seasons of\ndarkness and of sorrow. 'To the upright there ariseth light in the\ndarkness'; and the darkest hours of earthly fortune will be like a\nGreenland summer night, when the sun scarcely dips below the horizon,\nand even when it is absent, all the heaven is aglow with a calm\ntwilight.\n\nAll these great blessings belong to-day to those who take refuge under\nthe shadow of His wings. But blessed as the present experience is, we\nhave to look for the perfecting of it when we pass from the forecourt to\nthe inner sanctuary, and in that higher house sit with Christ at His\ntable and feast at 'the marriage supper of the Lamb.' Here we drink from\nthe river, but there we shall be carried up to the source. The life of\nGod in the soul is here often feeble in its flow, 'a fountain sealed'\nand all but shut up in our hearts, but there it will pour through all\nour being, a fountain springing up into everlasting life. The darkness\nis scattered even here by beams of the true light, but here we are only\nin the morning twilight, and many clouds still fill the sky, and many a\ndeep gorge lies in sunless shadow, but there the light shall be a broad\nuniversal blaze, and there shall be 'nothing hid from the heat thereof.'\n\nNow, dear brethren! the sum of the whole matter is, that all this\nfourfold blessing of satisfaction, joy, life, light, is given to you, if\nyou will take Christ. He will feed you with the bread of God; He will\ngive you His own joy to drink; He will be in you the life of your lives,\nand 'the master-light of all your seeing.' And if you will not have Him,\nyou will starve, and your lips will be cracked with thirst; and you will\nlive a life which is death, and you will sink at last into outer\ndarkness.\n\nIs that the fate which you are going to choose? Choose Christ, and He\nwill give you satisfaction, and joy, and life, and light.\n\n\n\n\nTHE SECRET OF TRANQUILLITY\n\n\n    'Delight thyself also in the Lord, and He shall give thee the\n    desires of thine heart 5. Commit thy way unto the Lord.... 7. Rest\n    in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him.'--PSALM xxxvii. 4, 5, 7.\n\n'I have been young, and now am old,' says the writer of this psalm. Its\nwhole tone speaks the ripened wisdom and autumnal calm of age. The dim\neyes have seen and survived so much, that it seems scarcely worth while\nto be agitated by what ceases so soon. He has known so many bad men\nblasted in all their leafy verdure, and so many languishing good men\nrevived, that--\n\n  'Old experience doth attain\n   To something of prophetic strain';\n\nand is sure that 'to trust in the Lord and do good' ever brings peace\nand happiness. Life with its changes has not soured but quieted him. It\ndoes not seem to him an endless maze, nor has he learned to despise it.\nHe has learned to see God in it all, and that has cleared its confusion,\nas the movements of the planets, irregular and apparently opposite, when\nviewed from the earth, are turned into an ordered whole, when the sun is\ntaken for the centre. What a contrast between the bitter cynicism put\ninto the lips of the son, and the calm cheerful godliness taught,\naccording to our psalm, by the father! To Solomon, old age is\nrepresented as bringing the melancholy creed, 'All is vanity'; David\nbelieves, 'Delight thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the\ndesires of thine heart.' Which style of old age is the nobler? what kind\nof life will lead to each?\n\nThese clauses, which I have ventured to isolate from their context,\ncontain the elements which secure peace even in storms and troubles. I\nthink that, if we consider them carefully, we shall see that there is a\nwell-marked progress in them. They do not cover the same ground by any\nmeans; but each of the later flows from the former. Nobody can 'commit\nhis way unto the Lord' who has not begun by 'delighting in the Lord';\nand nobody can 'rest in the Lord' who has not 'committed his way to the\nLord.' These three precepts, then, the condensed result of the old man's\nlifelong experience, open up for our consideration the secret of\ntranquillity. Let us think of them in order.\n\nI. Here is the secret of tranquillity in freedom from eager, earthly\ndesires--'Delight thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the\ndesires of thine heart.'\n\nThe great reason why life is troubled and restless lies not without, but\nwithin. It is not our changing circumstances, but our unregulated\ndesires, that rob us of peace. We are feverish, not because of the\nexternal temperature, but because of the state of our own blood. The\nvery emotion of desire disturbs us; wishes make us unquiet; and when a\nwhole heart, full of varying, sometimes contradictory longings, is\nboiling within a man, how can he but tremble and quiver? One desire\nunfulfilled is enough to banish tranquillity; but how can it survive a\ndozen dragging different ways? A deep lesson lies in that word\n_distraction_, which has come to be so closely attached to _desires_;\nthe lesson that all eager longing tears the heart asunder. Unbridled and\nvarying wishes, then, are the worst enemies of our repose.\n\nAnd, still further, they destroy tranquillity by putting us at the mercy\nof externals. Whatsoever we make necessary for our contentment, we make\nlord of our happiness. By our eager desires we give perishable things\nsupreme power over us, and so intertwine our being with theirs, that the\nblow which destroys them lets out our life-blood. And, therefore, we are\never disturbed by apprehensions and shaken by fears. We tie ourselves to\nthese outward possessions, as Alpine travellers to their guides, and so,\nwhen they slip on the icy slopes, their fall is our death. If we were\nnot eager to stand on the giddy top of fortune's rolling wheel, we\nshould not heed its idle whirl; but we let our foolish hearts set our\nfeet there, and thenceforward every lurch of the glittering instability\nthreatens to lame or kill us. He who desires fleeting joys is sure to be\nrestless always, and to be disappointed at the last. For, even at the\nbest, the heart which depends for peace on the continuance of things\nsubjected to a thousand accidents, can only know quietness by forcibly\nclosing its eyes against the inevitable; and, even at the best, such a\ncourse must end on the whole in failure. Disappointment is the law for\nall earthly desires; for appetite increases with indulgence, and as it\nincreases, satisfaction decreases. The food remains the same, but its\npower to appease hunger diminishes. Possession bring indifference. The\ndose that lulls into delicious dreams to-day must be doubled to-morrow,\nif it is to do anything; and there is soon an end of that. Each of your\nearthly joys fills but a part of your being, and all the other ravenous\nlongings either come shrieking at the gate of the soul's palace, like a\nmob yelling for bread, or are starved into silence; but either way there\nis disquiet. And then, if a man has fixed his happiness on anything\nlower than the stars, less stable than the heavens, less sufficient than\nGod, there does come, sooner or later, a time when it passes from him,\nor he from it. Do not venture the rich freightage of your happiness in\ncrazy vessels. If you do, be sure that, somewhere or other, before your\nlife is ended, the poor frail craft will strike on some black rock\nrising sheer from the depths, and will grind itself to chips there. If\nyour life twines round any prop but God your strength, be sure that,\nsome time or other, the stay to which its tendrils cling will be plucked\nup, and the poor vine will be lacerated, its clusters crushed, and its\nsap will bleed out of it.\n\nIf, then, our desires are, in their very exercise, a disturbance, and in\ntheir very fruition prophesy disappointment, and if that certain\ndisappointment is irrevocable and crushing when it comes, what shall we\ndo for rest? Dear brethren! there is but one answer--'Delight thyself in\nthe Lord.' These eager desires, transfer to Him; on Him let the\naffections fix and fasten; make Him the end of your longings, the food\nof your spirits. This is the purest, highest form of religious\nemotion--when we can say, 'Whom have I but Thee? possessing Thee I\ndesire none beside.' And this glad longing for God is the cure for all\nthe feverish unrest of desires unfulfilled, as well as for the ague fear\nof loss and sorrow. Quietness fills the soul which delights in the Lord,\nand its hunger is as blessed and as peaceful as its satisfaction.\n\nThink how surely rest comes with delighting in God. For that soul must\nneeds be calm which is freed from the distraction of various desires by\nthe one master-attraction. Such a soul is still as the great river above\nthe falls, when all the side currents and dimpling eddies and backwaters\nare effaced by the attraction that draws every drop in the one\ndirection; or like the same stream as it nears its end, and, forgetting\nhow it brawled among rocks and flowers in the mountain glens, flows with\na calm and equable motion to its rest in the central sea. Let the\ncurrent of your being set towards God, then your life will be filled and\ncalmed by one master-passion which unites and stills the soul.\n\nAnd for another reason there will be peace: because in such a case\ndesire and fruition go together. 'He shall give thee the desires of\nthine heart.' Only do not vulgarise that great promise by making it out\nto mean that, if we will be good, He will give us the earthly blessings\nwhich we wish. Sometimes we shall get them, and sometimes not; but our\ntext goes far deeper than that. God Himself is the heart's desire of\nthose who delight in Him; and the blessedness of longing fixed on Him is\nthat it ever fulfils itself. They who want God have Him. Your truest joy\nis in His fellowship and His grace. If, set free from creatural\ndelights, our wills reach out towards God, as a plant growing in\ndarkness to the light--then we shall wish for nothing contrary to Him,\nand the wishes which run parallel to His purposes, and embrace Himself\nas their only good, cannot be vain. The sunshine flows into the opened\neye, the breath of life into the expanding lung--so surely, so\nimmediately the fulness of God fills the waiting, wishing soul. To\ndelight in God is to possess our delight. Heart! lift up thy gates: open\nand raise the narrow, low portals, and the King of Glory will stoop to\nenter.\n\nOnce more: desire after God will bring peace by putting all other wishes\nin their right place. The counsel in our text does not enjoin the\nextinction, but the subordination, of other needs and appetites--'Seek\nye _first_ the kingdom of God.' Let that be the dominant desire which\ncontrols and underlies all the rest. Seek for God in everything, and for\neverything in God. Only thus will you be able to bridle those cravings\nwhich else tear the heart. The presence of the king awes the crowd into\nsilence. When the full moon is in the nightly sky, it sweeps the heavens\nbare of flying cloud-rack, and all the twinkling stars are lost in the\npeaceful, solitary splendour. So let delight in God rise in our souls,\nand lesser lights pale before it--do not cease to be, but add their\nfeebleness, unnoticed, to its radiance. The more we have our affections\nset on God, the more shall we enjoy, because we subordinate, His gifts.\nThe less, too, shall we dread their loss, the less be at the mercy of\ntheir fluctuations. The capitalist does not think so much of the year's\ngains as does the needy adventurer, to whom they make the difference\nbetween bankruptcy and competence. If you have God for your 'enduring\nsubstance,' you can face all varieties of condition, and be calm,\nsaying--\n\n  'Give what Thou canst, without Thee I am poor,\n   And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.'\n\nThe amulet that charms away disquiet lies here. Still thine eager\ndesires, arm thyself against feverish hopes, and shivering fears, and\ncertain disappointment, and cynical contempt of all things; make sure of\nfulfilled wishes and abiding joys. 'Delight thyself in the Lord, and He\nshall give thee the desires of thine heart.'\n\nII. But this is not all. The secret of tranquillity is found, secondly,\nin freedom from the perplexity of choosing our path.\n\n'Commit thy way unto the Lord'--or, as the margin says, 'roll' it upon\nGod; leave to Him the guidance of thy life, and thou shalt be at peace\non the road.\n\nThis is a word for all life, not only for its great occasions. Twice, or\nthrice, perhaps in a lifetime, a man's road leads him up to a high\ndividing point, a watershed as it were, whence the rain runs from the\none side of the ridge to the Pacific, and from the other to the\nAtlantic. His whole future may depend on his bearing the least bit to\nthe right hand or to the left, and all the slopes below, on either side,\nare wreathed in mist. Powerless as he is to see before him, he has yet\nto choose, and his choice determines the rest of his days. Certainly he\nneeds some guidance then. But he needs it not less in the small\ndecisions of every hour. Our histories are made up of a series of\ntrifles, in each of which a separate act of will and choice is involved.\nLooking to the way in which character is made, as coral reefs are built\nup, by a multitude of tiny creatures whose united labours are strong\nenough to breast the ocean; looking to the mysterious way in which the\ngreatest events in our lives have the knack of growing out of the\nsmallest; looking to the power of habit to make any action of the mind\nalmost instinctive: it is of far more importance that we should become\naccustomed to apply this precept of seeking guidance from God to the\nmillion trifles than to the two or three decisions which, at the time of\nmaking them, we know to be weighty. Depend upon it that, if we have not\nlearned the habit of committing the daily-recurring monotonous steps to\nHim, we shall find it very, very hard to seek His help, when we come to\na fork in the road. So this is a command for all life, not only for its\nturning-points.\n\nWhat does it prescribe? First, the subordination--not the extinction--of\nour own _inclinations_. We must begin by ceasing from self. Not that we\nare to cast out of consideration our own wishes. These are an element in\nevery decision, and often are our best helps to the knowledge of our\npowers and of our duties. But we have to take special care that they\nnever in themselves settle the question. They are second, not first.\n'Thus I will, and therefore thus I decide; my wish is enough for a\nreason,' is the language of a tyrant over others, but of a slave to\nhimself. Our first question is to be, not 'What should I like?' but\n'What does God will, if I can by any means discover it?' Wishes are to\nbe held in subordination to Him. Our will is to be master of our\npassions, and desires, and whims, and habits, but to be servant of God.\nIt should silence all their cries, and itself be silent, that God may\nspeak. Like the lawgiver-captain in the wilderness, it should stand\nstill at the head of the ordered rank, ready for the march, but\nmotionless, till the Pillar lifts from above the sanctuary. Yes! 'Commit\nthy way'--unto whom? Conscience? No: unto Duty? No: but 'unto\nGod'--which includes all these lower laws, and a whole universe besides.\nHold the will in equilibrium, that His finger may incline the balance.\n\nThen the counsel of our text prescribes the submission of our _judgment_\nto God, in the confidence that His wisdom will guide us. Committing our\nway unto the Lord does not mean shifting the trouble of patient thought\nabout our duty off our own shoulders. It is no cowardly abnegation of\nthe responsibility of choice which is here enjoined; nor is there any\nsanction of lazily taking the first vagrant impulse, wafted we know not\nwhence, that rises in the mind, for the voice of God. But, just because\nwe are to commit our way to Him, we are bound to the careful exercise of\nthe best power of our own brains, that we may discover what the will of\nGod is. He does not reveal that will to people who do not care to know\nit. I suppose the precursor of all visions of Him, which have calmed His\nservants' souls with the peace of a clearly recognised duty, has been\ntheir cry, 'Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?' God counsels men who\nuse their own wits to find out His counsel. He speaks to us through our\njudgments when they take all the ordinary means of ascertaining our\ncourse. The law is: Do your best to find out your duty; suppress\ninclination, and desire to do God's will, and He will certainly tell you\nwhat it is. I, for my part, believe that the Psalmist spoke a truth when\nhe said, 'In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy\nsteps.' Only let the eye be fixed on Him, and He will guide us in the\nway. If we chiefly desire, and with patient impartiality try, to be\ndirected by Him, we shall never want for direction.\n\nBut all this is possible only if we 'delight in the Lord.' Nothing else\nwill still our desires--the voice within, and the invitations without,\nwhich hinder us from hearing the directions of our Guide. Nothing else\nwill so fasten up and muzzle the wild passions and lusts that a little\nchild may lead them. To delight in Him is the condition of all wise\njudgment. For the most part, it is not hard to discover God's will\nconcerning us, if we supremely desire to know and do it; and such\nsupreme desire is but the expression of this supreme delight in Him.\nSuch a disposition wonderfully clears away mists and perplexities; and\nthough there will still remain ample scope for the exercise of our best\njudgment, and for reliance on Him to lead us, yet he whose single object\nis to walk in the way that God points, will seldom have to stand still\nin uncertainty as to what that way is. 'If thine eye be single, thy\nwhole body shall be full of light.'\n\nThus, dear brethren! these two keys--joy in God, and trust in His\nguidance--open for us the double doors of 'the secret place of the Most\nHigh'; where all the roar of the busy world dies upon the ear, and the\nstill small voice of the present God deepens the silence, and hushes the\nheart. Be quiet, and you will hear Him speak--delight in Him, that you\nmay be quiet. Let the affections feed on Him, the will wait mute before\nHim, till His command inclines it to decision, and quickens it into\naction; let the desires fix upon His all-sufficiency; and then the\nwilderness will be no more trackless, but the ruddy blaze of the guiding\npillar will brighten on the sand a path which men's hands have never\nmade, nor human feet trodden into a road. He will 'guide us with His\neye,' if our eyes be fixed on Him, and be swift to discern and eager to\nobey the lightest glance that love can interpret. Shall we be 'like the\nhorse or the mule, which have no understanding,' and need to be pulled\nwith bridles and beaten with whips before they know how to go; or shall\nwe be like some trained creature that is guided by the unseen cord of\ndocile submission, and has learned to read the duty, which is its joy,\nin the glance of its master's eye, or the wave of his hand? 'Delight\nthyself in the Lord: commit thy way unto Him.'\n\nIII. Our text takes one more step. The secret of tranquillity is found,\nthirdly, in freedom from the anxiety of an unknown future. 'Best in the\nLord, and wait patiently for Him.'\n\nSuch an addition to these previous counsels is needful, if all the\nsources of our disquiet are to be dealt with. The future is dim, after\nall our straining to see into its depths. The future is threatening,\nafter all our efforts to prepare for its coming storms. A rolling vapour\nveils it all; here and there a mountain peak seems to stand out; but in\na moment another swirl of the fog hides it from us. We know so little,\nand what we do know is so sad, that the ignorance of what may be, and\nthe certainty of what must be, equally disturb us with hopes which melt\ninto fears, and forebodings which consolidate into certainties. We are\nsure that in that future are losses, and sorrows, and death; thank God!\nwe are sure too, that He is in it. That certainty alone, and what comes\nof it, makes it possible for a thoughtful man to face to-morrow without\nfear or tumult. The only rest from apprehensions which are but too\nreasonable is 'rest in the Lord.' If we are sure that He will be there,\nand if we delight in Him, then we can afford to say, 'As for all the\nrest, let it be as He wills, it will be well.' That thought alone, dear\nfriends! will give calmness. What else is there, brethren! for a man\nfronting that vague future, from whose weltering sea such black,\nsharp-toothed rocks protrude? Shall we bow before some stern Fate, as\nits lord, and try to be as stern as It? Shall we think of some frivolous\nChance, as tossing its unguided waves, and try to be as frivolous as It?\nShall we try to be content with an animal limitation to the present, and\nheighten the bright colour of the little to-day by the black background\nthat surrounds it, saying, 'Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die'?\nIs it not better, happier, nobler, every way truer, to look into that\nperilous uncertain future, or rather to look past it to the loving\nFather who is its Lord and ours, and to wait patiently for Him?\nConfidence that the future will but evolve God's purposes, and that all\nthese are enlisted on our side, will give peace and power. Without it\nall is chaos, and we flying atoms in the anarchic mass; or else all is\ncoldblooded impersonal law, and we crushed beneath its chariot-wheels.\nHere, and here alone, is the secret of tranquillity.\n\nBut remember, brethren! that the peaceful confidence of this final\ncounsel is legitimate only when we have obeyed the other two. I have no\nbusiness, for instance, to expect God to save me from the natural\nconsequences of my own worldliness or folly. If I have taken up a course\nfrom eager desires for earthly good, or from obedience to any\ninclination of my own without due regard to His will, I have no right,\nwhen things begin to go awry, to turn round to God and say, 'Lord! I\nwait upon Thee to save me.' And though repentance, and forsaking of our\nevil ways at any point in a man's course, do ensure, through Jesus\nChrist, God's loving forgiveness, yet the evil consequences of past\nfolly are often mercifully suffered to remain with us all our days. He\nwho has delighted in the Lord, and committed his way unto Him, can\nventure to front whatever may be coming; and though not without much\nconsciousness of sin and weakness, can yet cast upon God the burden of\ntaking care of him, and claim from his faithful Father the protection\nand the peace which He has bound Himself to give.\n\nAnd O dear friends! what a calm will enter our souls then, solid,\nsubstantial, 'the peace of God,' gift and effluence from the 'God of\npeace'! How blessed then to leave all the possible to-morrow with a very\nquiet heart in His hands! How easy then to bear the ignorance, how\npossible then to face the certainties, of that solemn future! Change and\ndeath can only thin away and finally remove the film that separates us\nfrom our delight. Whatever comes here or yonder can but bring us\nblessing; for we must be glad if we have God, and if our wills are\nparallel with His, whose Will all things serve. Our way is traced by\nHim, and runs alongside of His. It leads to Himself. Then rest in the\nLord, and 'judge nothing before the time.' We cannot criticise the Great\nArtist when we stand before His unfinished masterpiece, and see dim\noutlines here, a patch of crude colour there. But wait patiently for\nHim, and so, in calm expectation of a blessed future and a finished\nwork, which will explain the past, in honest submission of our way to\nGod, in supreme delight in Him who is the gladness of our joy, the\nsecret of tranquillity will be ours.\n\n\n\n\nTHE BITTERNESS AND BLESSEDNESS OF THE BREVITY OF LIFE\n\n    'Surely every man walketh in a vain shew.... 12. I am a stranger\n    with Thee, and a sojourner, as all my fathers were.'\n    --PSALM xxxix. 6, 12.\n\nThese two sayings are two different ways of putting the same thing.\nThere is a common thought underlying both, but the associations with\nwhich that common thought is connected in these two verses are\ndistinctly different. The one is bitter and sad--a gloomy half truth.\nThe other, out of the very same fact, draws blessedness and hope. The\none may come from no higher point of view than the level of worldly\nexperience; the other is a truth of faith. The former is at best\npartial, and without the other may be harmful; the latter completes,\nexplains, and hallows it.\n\nAnd that this progress and variety in the thought is the key to the\nwhole psalm is, I think, obvious to any one who will examine it with\ncare. I cannot here enter on that task but in the hastiest fashion, by\nway of vindicating the connection which I trace between the two verses\nof our text. The Psalmist begins, then, with telling how at some time\nrecently passed--in consequence of personal calamity not very clearly\ndefined, but apparently some bodily sickness aggravated by mental sorrow\nand anxiety--he was struck dumb with silence, so that he 'held his peace\neven from good.' In that state there rose within him many sad and\nmiserable thoughts, which at last forced their way through his locked\nlips. They shape themselves into a prayer, which is more complaint than\npetition--and which is absorbed in the contemplation of the manifest\nmelancholy facts of human life--'Thou hast made my days as an\nhandbreadth; and mine age is as nothing before Thee.' And then, as that\nthought dilates and sinks deeper into his soul, he looks out upon the\nwhole race of man--and in tones of bitterness and hopelessness, affirms\nthat all are vanity, shadows, disquieted in vain. The blank hopelessness\nof such a view brings him to a standstill. It is true--but taken alone\nis too dreadful to think of. 'That way madness lies,'--so he breaks\nshort off his almost despairing thoughts, and with a swift turning away\nof his mind from the downward gaze into blackness that was beginning to\nmake him reel, he fixes his eyes on the throne above--'And now, Lord!\nwhat wait I for? my hope is in Thee.' These words form the turning-point\nof the psalm. After them, the former thoughts are repeated, but with\nwhat a difference--made by looking at all the blackness and sorrow, both\npersonal and universal, in the bright light of that hope which streams\nupon the most lurid masses of opaque cloud, till their gloom begins to\nglow with an inward lustre, and softens into solemn purples and reds. He\nhad said, 'I was dumb with silence--even from good.' But when his hope\nis in God, the silence changes its character and becomes resignation and\nsubmission. 'I opened not my mouth; because Thou didst it.' The variety\nof human life and its transiency is not less plainly seen than before;\nbut in the light of that hope it is regarded in relation to God's\npaternal correction, and is seen to be the consequence, not of a defect\nin His creative wisdom or love, but of man's sin. 'Thou with rebukes\ndost correct man for iniquity.' That, to him who waits on the Lord, is\nthe reason and the alleviation of the reiterated conviction, 'Every man\nis vanity.' Not any more does he say every man 'at his best state,' or,\nas it might be more accurately expressed, 'even when most firmly\nestablished,'--for the man who is established in the Lord is not vanity,\nbut only the man who founds his being on the fleeting present. Then,\nthings being so, life being thus in itself and apart from God so\nfleeting and so sad, and yet with a hope that brightens it like sunshine\nthrough an April shower--the Psalmist rises to prayer, in which that\nformerly expressed conviction of the brevity of life is reiterated, with\nthe addition of two words which changes its whole aspect, 'I am a\nstranger _with Thee_.' He is God's guest in his transient life. It is\nshort, like the stay of a foreigner in a strange land; but he is under\nthe care of the King of the Land--therefore he need not fear nor sorrow.\nPast generations, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob--whose names God 'is not\nashamed' to appeal to in His own solemn designation of Himself--have\nheld the same relation, and their experience has sealed His faithful\ncare of those who dwell with Him. Therefore, the sadness is soothed, and\nthe vain and fleeting life of earth assumes a new appearance, and the\nmost blessed and wisest issue of our consciousness of frailty and\ninsufficiency is the fixing of our desires and hopes on Him in whose\nhouse we may dwell even while we wander to and fro, and in whom our life\nbeing rooted and established shall not be vain, howsoever it may be\nbrief.\n\nIf, then, we follow the course of contemplation thus traced in the\npsalm, we have these three points brought before us--first, the thought\nof life common to both clauses; second, the gloomy, aimless hollowness\nwhich that thought breathes into life apart from God; third, the\nblessedness which springs from the same thought when we look at it in\nconnection with our Father in heaven.\n\nI. Observe the very forcible expression which is given here to the\nthought of life common to both verses.\n\n'Every man walketh in a vain show.' The original is even more striking\nand strong. And although one does not like altering words so familiar as\nthose of our translation, which have sacredness from association and a\nmelancholy music in their rhythm--still it is worth while to note that\nthe force of the expression which the Psalmist employs is correctly\ngiven in the margin, 'in an image'--or 'in a shadow.' The phrase sounds\nsingular to us, but is an instance of a common enough Hebrew idiom, and\nis equivalent to saying--he walks in the character or likeness of a\nshadow, or, as we should say, he walks as a shadow. That is to say, the\nwhole outward life and activity of every man is represented as fleeting\nand unsubstantial, like the reflection of a cloud which darkens leagues\nof the mountains' side in a moment, and ere a man can say, 'Behold!' is\ngone again for ever.\n\nThen, look at the other image employed in the other clause of our text\nto express the same idea, 'I am a stranger and a sojourner, as all my\nfathers.' The phrase has a history. In that most pathetic narrative of\nan old-world sorrow long since calmed and consoled, when 'Abraham stood\nup from before his dead,' and craved a burying-place for his Sarah from\nthe sons of Heth, his first plea was, 'I am a stranger and a sojourner\nwith you.' In his lips it was no metaphor. He was a stranger, a visitor\nfor a brief time to an alien land; he was a sojourner, having no rights\nof inheritance, but settled among them for a while, and though dwelling\namong them, not adopted into their community. He was a foreigner, not\nnaturalised. And such is our relation to all this visible frame of\nthings in which we dwell. It is alien to us; though we be in it, our\ntrue affinities are elsewhere; though we be in it, our stay is brief, as\nthat of 'a wayfaring man that turns aside to tarry for a night.'\n\nAnd there is given in the context still another metaphor setting forth\nthe same fact in that dreary generalisation which precedes my text,\n'Every man at his best state'--or as the word means, 'established,'--with\nhis roots most firmly struck in the material and visible--'is\nonly a breath.' It appears for a moment, curling from lip and nostril\ninto the cold morning air, and vanishes away, so thus vaporous, filmy,\nis the seeming solid fact of the most stable life.\n\nThese have been the commonplaces of poets and rhetoricians and moralists\nin all time. But threadbare as the thought is, I may venture to dwell on\nit for a moment. I know I am only repeating what we all believe--and all\nforget. It is never too late to preach commonplaces, until everybody\nacts on them as well as admits them--and this old familiar truth has not\nyet got so wrought into the structure of our lives that we can afford to\nsay no more about it.\n\n'Surely every man walketh in a shadow.' Did you ever stand upon the\nshore on some day of that 'uncertain weather, when gloom and glory meet\ntogether,' and notice how swiftly there went, racing over miles of\nbillows, a darkening that quenched all the play of colour in the waves,\nas if all suddenly the angel of the waters had spread his broad wings\nbetween sun and sea, and then how in another moment as swiftly it flits\naway, and with a burst the light blazes out again, and leagues of ocean\nflash into green and violet and blue. So fleeting, so utterly perishable\nare our lives for all their seeming solid permanency. 'Shadows in a\ncareer, as George Herbert has it--breath going out of the nostrils. We\nthink of ourselves as ever to continue in our present posture. We are\ndeceived by illusions. Mental indolence, a secret dislike of the\nthought, and the impostures of sense, all conspire to make us blind to,\nor at least oblivious of, the plain fact which every beat of our pulses\nmight preach, and the slow creeping hands of every parish clock confirm.\nHow awful that silent, unceasing footfall of receding days is when once\nwe begin to watch it! Inexorable, passionless--though hope and fear may\npray, 'Sun! stand thou still on Gibeon; and thou moon! in the valley of\nAjalon,'--the tramp of the hours goes on. The poets paint them as a\nlinked chorus of rosy forms, garlanded, and clasping hands as they dance\nonwards. So they may be to some of us at some moments. So they may seem\nas they approach; but those who come hold the hands of those who go, and\nthat troop has no rosy light upon their limbs, their garlands are faded,\nthe sunshine falls not upon the grey and shrouded shapes, as they steal\nghostlike through the gloom--and ever and ever the bright and laughing\nsisters pass on into that funereal band which grows and moves away from\nus unceasing. Alas! for many of us it bears away with it our lost\ntreasures, our shattered hopes, our joys from which all the bright\npetals have dropped! Alas! for many of us there is nothing but sorrow in\nwatching how all things become 'part and parcel of the dreadful past.'\n\nAnd how strangely sometimes even a material association may give new\nemphasis to that old threadbare truth. Some more permanent _thing_ may\nhelp us to feel more profoundly the shadowy fleetness of _man_. The\ntrifles are so much more lasting than their owners. Or, as 'the\nPreacher' puts it, with such wailing pathos, 'One generation passeth\naway, and another generation cometh, but the earth abideth for ever.'\nThis material is perishable--but yet how much more enduring than we are!\nThe pavements we walk upon, the coals in our grates--how many\nmillenniums old are they? The pebble you kick aside with your foot--how\nmany generations will it outlast? Go into a museum and you will see\nhanging there, little the worse for centuries, battered shields, notched\nswords, and gaping helmets--aye, but what has become of the bright eyes\nthat once flashed the light of battle through the bars, what has become\nof the strong hands that once gripped the hilts? 'The knights are dust,'\nand 'their good swords are' _not_ 'rust.' The material lasts after its\nowner. Seed corn is found in a mummy case. The poor form beneath the\npainted lid is brown and hard, and more than half of it gone to pungent\npowder, and the man that once lived has faded utterly: but the handful\nof seed has its mysterious life in it, and when it is sown, in due time\nthe green blade pushes above English soil, as it would have done under\nthe shadow of the pyramids four thousand years ago--and its produce\nwaves in a hundred harvest fields to-day. The money in your purses now,\nwill some of it bear the head of a king that died half a century ago. It\nis bright and useful--where are all the people that in turn said they\n'owned' it? Other men will live in our houses, will preach from this\npulpit, and sit in these pews, when you and I are far away. And other\nJune days will come, and the old rose-trees will flower round houses\nwhere unborn men will then be living, when the present possessor is gone\nto nourish the roots of the roses in the graveyard!\n\n'Our days are as a shadow, and there is none abiding.' So said David on\nother occasions. We know, dear brethren! how true it is, whether we\nconsider the ceaseless flux and change of things, the mystic march of\nthe silent-footed hours, or the greater permanence which attaches to the\n'things which perish,' than to our abode among them. We know it, and yet\nhow hard it is not to yield to the inducement to act and feel as if all\nthis painted scenery were solid rock and mountain. By our own\ninconsiderateness and sensuousness, we live in a lie, in a false dream\nof permanence, and so in a sadder sense we walk in 'a vain\nshow,'--deluding ourselves with the conceit of durability, and refusing\nto see that the apparent is the shadowy, and the one enduring reality\nGod. It is hard to get even the general conviction vivified in men's\nminds, hardest of all to get any man to reflect upon it as applying to\nhimself. Do not think that you have said enough to vindicate neglect of\nmy words now, when you call them commonplace. So they are. But did you\never take that well-worn old story, and press it on your own\nconsciousness--as a man might press a common little plant, whose juice\nis healing, against his dim eye-ball--by saying to yourself, 'It is true\nof _me_. _I_ walk as a shadow. _I_ am gliding onwards to my doom.\nThrough _my_ slack hands the golden sands are flowing, and soon _my_\nhour-glass will run out, and _I_ shall have to stop and go away.' Let me\nbeseech you for one half-hour's meditation on that fact before this day\ncloses. You will forget my words then, when with your own eyes you have\nlooked upon that truth, and felt that it is not merely a toothless\ncommonplace, but belongs to and works in _thy_ life, as it ebbs away\nsilently and incessantly from _thee_.\n\nII. Let me point, in the second place, to the gloomy, aimless hollowness\nwhich that thought, apart from God, infuses into life.\n\nThere is, no doubt, a double idea in the metaphor which the Psalmist\nemploys. He desires to set forth, by his image of a shadow, not only the\ntransiency, but the unsubstantialness of life. Shadow is opposed to\nsubstance, to that which is real, as well as to that which is enduring.\nAnd we may further say that the one of these characteristics is in great\npart the occasion of the other. Because life is fleeting, therefore, in\npart, it is so hollow and unsatisfying. The fact that men are dragged\naway from their pursuits so inexorably makes these pursuits seem, to any\none who cannot see beyond that fact, trivial and not worth the\nfollowing. Why should we fret and toil and break our hearts, 'and scorn\ndelights, and live laborious days' for purposes which will last so short\na time, and things which we shall so soon have to leave? What is all our\nbustle and business, when the sad light of that thought falls on it, but\n'labouring for the wind'? 'Were it not better to lie still?' Such\nthoughts have at least a partial truth in them, and are difficult to\nmeet as long as we think only of the facts and results of man's life\nthat we can see with our eyes, and our psalm gives emphatic utterance to\nthem. The word rendered 'walketh' in our text is not merely a synonym\nfor passing through life, but has a very striking meaning. It is an\nintensive frequentative form of the word--that is, it represents the\naction as being repeated over and over again. For instance, it might be\nused to describe the restless motion of a wild beast in a cage, raging\nfrom side to side, never still, and never getting any farther for all\nthe racing backward and forward. So here it signifies 'walketh to and\nfro,' and implies hurry and bustle, continuous effort, habitual unrest.\nIt thus comes to be parallel with the stronger words which follow,--'Surely\nthey are _disquieted_ in vain'; and one reason why all this\neffort and agitation are purposeless and sad, is because the man who is\nstraining his nerves and wearying his legs is but a shadow in regard to\nduration--'He heapeth up riches, and knoweth not who shall gather them.'\n\nYes! if we have said all, when we have said that men pass as a fleeting\nshadow--if my life has no roots in the Eternal, nor any consciousness of\na life that does not pass, and a light that never perishes, if it is\nderived from, directed to, 'cribbed, cabined, and confined' within this\nvisible diurnal sphere, then it is all flat and unprofitable, an\nillusion while it seems to last, and all its pursuits are folly, its\nhopes dreams, its substances vapours, its years a lie. For, if life be\nthus short, I who live it am conscious of, and possess whether I be\nconscious of them or no, capacities and requirements which, though they\nwere to be annihilated to-morrow, could be satisfied while they lasted\nby nothing short of the absolute ideal, the all-perfect, the\ninfinite--or, to put away abstractions, 'My soul thirsteth for God, the\nliving God!' 'He hath put eternity in their heart,' as the book of\nEcclesiastes says. Longings and aspirations, weaknesses and woes, the\nlimits of creature helps and loves, the disproportion between us and the\nobjects around us--all these facts of familiar experience do witness,\nalike by blank misgivings and by bright hopes, by many disappointments\nand by indestructible expectations surviving them all, that nothing\nwhich has a date, a beginning, or an end, can fill our souls or give us\nrest. Can you fill up the swamps of the Mississippi with any cartloads\nof faggots you can fling in? Can you fill your souls with anything which\nbelongs to this fleeting life? Has a flying shadow an appreciable\nthickness, or will a million of them pressed together occupy a space in\nyour empty, hungry heart?\n\nAnd so, dear brethren! I come to you with a message which may sound\ngloomy, and beseech you to give heed to it. No matter how you may get on\nin the world--though you may fulfil every dream with which you began in\nyour youth--you will certainly find that without Christ for your Brother\nand Saviour, God for your Friend, and heaven for your hope, life, with\nall its fulness, is empty. It lasts long, too long as it sometimes seems\nfor work, too long for hope, too long for endurance; long enough to let\nlove die, and joys wither and fade, and companions drop away, but\nwithout God and Christ, you will find it but 'as a watch in the night.'\nAt no moment through the long weary years will it satisfy your whole\nbeing; and when the weary years are all past, they will seem to have\nbeen but as one troubled moment breaking the eternal silence. At every\npoint _so_ profitless, and all the points making so thin and short a\nline! The crested waves seem heaped together as they recede from the eye\ntill they reach the horizon, where miles of storm are seen but as a line\nof spray. So when a man looks back upon his life, if it have been a\ngodless one, be sure of this, that he will have a dark and cheerless\nretrospect over a tossing waste, with a white rim of wandering barren\nfoam vexed by tempest, and then, if not before, he will sadly learn how\nhe has been living amidst shadows, and, with a nature that needs God,\nhas wasted himself upon the world. 'O life! as futile then as frail';\n'surely,' in such a case, 'every man walketh in a vain show.'\n\nIII. But note, finally, how our other text in its significant words\ngives us the blessedness which springs from this same thought of life,\nwhen it is looked at in connection with God.\n\nThe mere conviction of the brevity and hollowness of life is not in\nitself a religious or a helpful thought. Its power depends upon the\nother ideas which are associated with it. It is susceptible of the most\nopposite applications, and may tend to impel conduct in exactly opposite\ndirections. It may be the language of despair or of bright hope. It may\nbe the bitter creed of a worn-out debauchee, who has wasted his life in\nhunting shadows, and is left with a cynical spirit and a barbed tongue.\nIt may be the passionless belief of a retired student, or the fanatical\nfaith of a religious ascetic. It may be an argument for sensuous excess,\n'Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die'; or it may be the stimulus\nfor noble and holy living, 'I must work the works of Him that sent me\nwhile it is day. The night cometh.' The other accompanying beliefs\ndetermine whether it shall be a blight or a blessing to a man.\n\nAnd the one addition which is needed to incline the whole weight of that\nconviction to the better side, and to light up all its blackness, is\nthat little phrase in this text, 'I am a stranger _with Thee_, and a\nsojourner.' There seems to be an allusion here to remarkable words\nconnected with the singular Jewish institution of the Jubilee. You\nremember that by the Mosaic law, there was no absolute sale of land in\nIsrael, but that every half century the whole returned to the\ndescendants of the original occupiers. Important economical and social\npurposes were contemplated in this arrangement, as well as the\npreservation of the relative position of the tribes as settled at the\nConquest. But the law itself assigns a purely religious purpose--the\npreservation of the distinct consciousness of the tenure on which the\npeople held their territory, namely, obedience to and dependence on God.\n'The land shall not be sold for ever, for the land is Mine, for ye are\n_strangers and sojourners with Me_.' Of course, there was a special\nsense in which that was true with regard to Israel, but David thought\nthat the words were as true in regard to his whole relation to God, as\nin regard to Israel's possession of its national inheritance.\n\nIf we grasp these words as completing all that we have already said, how\ndifferent this transient and unsubstantial life looks! You must have the\nlight from both sides to stereoscope and make solid the flat surface\npicture. Transient! yes--but it is passed in the presence of God.\nWhether we know it or no, our brief days hang upon Him, and we walk, all\nof us, in the light of His countenance. That makes the transient\neternal, the shadowy substantial, the trivial heavy with solemn meaning\nand awful yet vast possibilities. 'In our embers is something that doth\nlive.' If we had said all, when we say 'We are as a shadow,' it would\nmatter very little, though even then it _would_ matter something, how we\nspent our shadowy days; but if these poor brief hours are spent 'in the\ngreat Taskmaster's eye,'--if the shadow cast on earth proclaims a light\nin the heavens--if from this point there hangs an unending chain of\nconscious being--Oh! then, with what awful solemnity is the brevity,\nwith what tremendous magnitude is the minuteness, of our earthly days\ninvested! 'With Thee'--then I am constantly in the presence of a\nsovereign Law and its Giver; 'with Thee'--then all my actions are\nregistered and weighed yonder; 'with Thee'--then 'Thou, God, seest me.'\nBrethren! it is the prismatic halo and ring of eternity round this poor\nglass of time that gives it all its dignity, all its meaning. The lives\nthat are lived before God cannot be trifles.\n\nAnd if this relation to time be recognised and accepted and held fast by\nour hearts and minds, then what calm blessedness will flow into our\nsouls!\n\n'A stranger with Thee,'--then we are the guests of the King. The Lord of\nthe land charges Himself with our protection and provision; we journey\nunder His safe conduct. It is for His honour and faithfulness that no\nharm shall come to us travelling in His territory, and relying on His\nword. Like Abraham with the sons of Heth, we may claim the protection\nand help which a stranger needs. He recognises the bond and will fulfil\nit. We have eaten of His salt, and He will answer for our safety.--'He\nthat toucheth you toucheth the apple of Mine eye.'\n\n'A stranger with Thee,'--then we have a constant Companion and an\nabiding Presence. We may be solitary and necessarily remote from the\npolity of the land. We may feel amid all the visible things of earth as\nif foreigners. We may not have a foot of soil, not even a grave for our\ndead. Companionships may dissolve and warm hands grow cold and their\nclose clasp relax--what then? He is with us still. He will join us as we\njourney, even when our hearts are sore with loss. He will walk with us\nby the way, and make our chill hearts glow. He will sit with us at the\ntable--however humble the meal, and He will not leave us when we discern\nHim. Strangers we are indeed here--but not solitary, for we are\n'strangers with Thee.' As in some ancestral home in which a family has\nlived for centuries--son after father has rested in its great chambers,\nand been safe behind its strong walls--so, age after age, they who love\nHim abide in God.--'Thou hast been our dwelling-place in all\ngenerations.'\n\n'Strangers with Thee,'--then we may carry our thoughts forward to the\ntime when we shall go to our true home, nor wander any longer in a land\nthat is not ours. If even here we come into such blessed relationships\nwith God, that fact is in itself a prophecy of a more perfect communion\nand a heavenly house. They who are strangers with Him will one day be\n'at home with the Lord,' and in the light of that blessed hope the\ntransiency of this life changes its whole aspect, loses the last trace\nof sadness, and becomes a solemn joy. Why should we be pensive and\nwistful when we think how near our end is? Is the sentry sad as the hour\nfor relieving guard comes nigh? Is the wanderer in far-off lands sad\nwhen he turns his face homewards? And why should not we rejoice at the\nthought that we, strangers and foreigners here, shall soon depart to the\ntrue metropolis, the mother-country of our souls? I do not know why a\nman should be either regretful or afraid, as he watches the hungry sea\neating away this 'bank and shoal of time' upon which he stands--even\nthough the tide has all but reached his feet--if he knows that God's\nstrong hand will be stretched forth to him at the moment when the sand\ndissolves from under him, and will draw him out of many waters, and\nplace him high above the floods in that stable land where there is 'no\nmore sea.'\n\nLives rooted in God through faith in Jesus Christ are not vanity. Let us\nlay hold of Him with a loving grasp--and 'we shall live also' _because_\nHe lives, _as_ He lives, _so long_ as He lives. The brief days of earth\nwill be blessed while they last, and fruitful of what shall never pass.\nWe shall have Him with us while we journey, and all our journeyings will\nlead to rest in Him. True, men walk in a vain show; true, 'the world\npasseth away and the lust thereof,' but, blessed be God! true, also, 'He\nthat doeth the will of God abideth for ever.'\n\n\n\n\nTWO INNUMERABLE SERIES\n\n\n    'Many, O Lord my God, are Thy wonderful works which Thou hast done,\n    and Thy thoughts which are to us-ward: they cannot be reckoned up in\n    order unto Thee: if I would declare and speak of them, they are more\n    than can be numbered ... 12. Innumerable evils have compassed me\n    about: mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not\n    able to look up; they are more than the hairs of mine head;\n    therefore my heart faileth me.'--PSALMS xl. 5, 12.\n\nSo then, there are two series of things which cannot be numbered, God's\nmercies, man's sins. This psalm has for its burden a cry for\ndeliverance; but the Psalmist begins where it is very hard for a\nstruggling man to begin, but where we always should begin, with grateful\nremembrance of God's mercy. His wondrous dealings seem to the Psalmist's\nthankful heart as numberless as the blades of grass which carpet the\nfields, or as the wavelets which glance in the moonlight and break in\nsilver upon the sand. They come pouring out continuously, like the\ninnumerable undulations of the ether which make upon the eyeballs the\nsingle sensation of light. He thinks not only of God's wonderful works,\nHis realised purposes of mercy, but of 'His thoughts which are to\nus-ward,' the purposes, still more wonderful, of a yet greater mercy\nwhich wait to be realised. He thinks not only of God's lovingkindness to\nHim, but his contemplations embrace God's goodness to his brethren--'Thy\nthoughts which are to us-ward.' And as he thinks of all this 'multitude\nof His tender mercies,' his lips break into this rapturous exclamation\nof my text.\n\nBut there is a wonderful change in tone, in the two halves of the psalm.\nThe deliverance that seems so complete in the earlier part is but\npartial. The triumph and the trust seem both to be clouded over. A\nfrowning mass lifts itself up against the immense mass of God's mercies.\nThe Psalmist sees himself ringed about by numberless evils, as a man\ntied to a stake might be by a circle of fire. 'Innumerable evils have\ncompassed me about.' His conscience tells him that the evils are\ndeserved; they are his iniquities transformed which have come back to\nhim in another shape, and have laid their hands upon him as a constable\ndoes upon a thief. 'Mine iniquities have taken hold upon me'--they hem\nhim in so that his vision is interrupted, the smoke from the circle of\nflame blinds his eyes--'I cannot see.' His roused conscience and his\nquivering heart conceive of them as 'more than the hairs of his head,'\nand so courage and confidence have ebbed away from him. 'My heart\nfaileth me----,' and there is nothing left for him but to fling himself\nin his misery out of himself and on to God.\n\nNow what I wish to do in this sermon is not so much to deal with these\ntwo verses separately as to draw some of the lessons from the very\nremarkable juxtaposition of these two innumerable things--God's tender\nmercies, and man's iniquity and evil.\n\nI. To begin with, let me remind you how, if we keep these two things\nboth together in our contemplations, they suggest for us very forcibly\nthe greatest mystery in the universe, and throw a little light upon it.\n\nThe difficulty of difficulties, the one insoluble problem is----, given\na good and perfect God, where does sorrow come from, and why is there\nany pain? Men have fumbled at that knot for all the years that there\nhave been men in the world, and they have not untied it yet. They have\ntried to cut it and it has resisted all their knives and all their\ningenuity. And there the question stands before us, grim, insoluble, the\ndespair of all thinkers and often the torture of our own hearts, in the\nhours of our personal experience. Is it true that 'God's mercies are\ninnumerable'? If it be, what is the meaning of all this that makes me\nwrithe and weep? Nobody has answered that question, and nobody ever\nwill.\n\nOnly let us beware of the temptation of blinking half of the facts by\nreason of the clearness of our confidence or the depth of our feeling of\nthe other half. That is always our temptation. You must have had a\nsingularly unruffled life if there has never come to you some moment\nwhen, in the depth of your agony, you have ground your teeth together,\nas you said to yourself, 'Is there a God then at all? And does He care\nfor me at all? And can He help me at all? And if there is, why in the\nname of pity does He not?'\n\nWell, my brother! when such moments come to us, and they come to us all\nsooner or later--and I was going to add a parenthesis, which you will\nthink strange, and say that they come to us all sooner or later, blessed\nbe God!--when such moments come to us, do not let the black mass hide\nthe light one from you, but copy this Psalmist, and in the energy of\nyour faith, even though it be the extremity of your pain, grasp and grip\nthem both; and though you have to say and to wail: 'Innumerable evils\nhave compassed me about,' be sure that you do not let that prevent you\nfrom saying, 'Many, O Lord my God! are Thy wonderful works which are to\nus-ward. They are more than can be numbered.'\n\nI do not enter upon this as a mere matter of philosophical speculation.\nIt is far too serious and important a matter to be so dealt with, in a\npulpit at any rate, but I would also add in one sentence that the mere\nthinker, who looks at the question solely from an intellectual point of\nview, has need to take the lesson of my two texts, and to be sure that\nhe keeps clear before him both halves of the facts--though they seem to\nbe as unlike each other as the eclipsed and the uneclipsed silver half\nof the moon--with which he has to deal.\n\nRemember, the one does not contradict the other; but let us ask\nourselves if the one does not _explain_ the other. If it be that these\nmercies are so innumerable as my first text says, may it not be that\nthey go deep down beneath, and include in their number, the experience\nthat seems most opposite to them, even the sorrow that afflicts our\nlives? Must it not be, that the innumerable sum of God's mercies has not\nto have subtracted from it, but has to have added to it, the sum which\nalso at intervals appears to us innumerable, of our sorrows and our\nburdens? Perhaps the explanation does not go to the bottom of the\nbottomless, but it goes a long way down towards it. 'Whom the Lord\nloveth, He chasteneth' makes a bridge across the gulf which seems to\npart the opposing cliffs, these two sets effect, and turn the darker\ninto a form in which the brighter reveals itself. 'All things work\ntogether for good.' And God's innumerable mercies include the whole sum\ntotal of my sorrows.\n\nII. So, again, notice how the blending of these two thoughts together\nheightens the impression of each.\n\nAll artists, and all other people know the power of contrast. White\nnever looks so white as when it is relieved against black; black never\nso intense as when it is relieved against white. A white flower in the\ntwilight gleams out in spectral distinctness, paler and fairer than it\nlooked in the blazing sunshine. So, if we take and put these two things\ntogether--the dark mass of man's miseries and the radiant brightness of\nGod's mercies, each heightens the colour of the other.\n\nOnly, let me observe, as I have already suggested that, in the second of\nmy two texts, whilst the Psalmist starts from the 'innumerable evils'\nthat have compassed him about, he passes from these to the earlier evils\nwhich he had done. It is pain that says, 'Innumerable evils have\ncompassed me about.' It is conscience that says, 'Mine iniquities have\ntaken hold upon me.' His wrong-doing has come back to him like the\nboomerang that the Australian savage throws, which may strike its aim\nbut returns to the hand that flung it. It has come back in the shape of\na sorrow. And so 'Mine iniquities have taken hold upon me' is the\ndeepening of the earliest word of my text. Therefore, I am not reading a\ndouble meaning into it, but the double meaning is in it when I see here\na reference both to a man's manifold sorrows and to a man's multiplied\ntransgressions. Taking the latter into consideration, the contrast\nbetween these two heightens both of them.\n\nGod's mercies never seem so fair, so wonderful, as when they are looked\nat in conjunction with man's sin. Man's sin never seems so foul and\nhideous as when it is looked at close against God's mercies. You cannot\nestimate the conduct of one of two parties to a transaction unless you\nhave the conduct of the other before you. You cannot understand a\nfather's love unless you take into account the prodigal son's sullen\nunthankfulness, or his unthankfulness without remembering his father's\nlove. You cannot estimate the clemency of a patient monarch unless you\nknow the blackness and persistency of the treason of his rebellious\nsubjects, nor their treason, except when seen in connection with his\nclemency. You cannot estimate the long-suffering of a friend unless you\nknow the crimes against friendship of which his friend has been guilty,\nnor the blackness of his treachery without the knowledge of the other's\nloyalty to him. So we do not see the radiant brightness of God's\nloving-kindness to us until we look at it from the depth of the darkness\nof our own sin. The stars are seen from the bottom of the well. The\nloving-kindness of God becomes wonderful when we think of the sort of\npeople on whom it has been lavished. And my evil is never apprehended in\nits true hideousness until I have set it black and ugly, but searched\nthrough and through, and revealed in every deformed outline, and in\nevery hideous lineament, by the light against which I see it. You must\ntake both in order to understand either.\n\nAnd not only so, but actually these two opposites, which are ever\nwarring with one another in a duel, most merciful, patient, and\nlong-suffering on His part--these two elements do intensify one another,\nnot only in our estimation but in reality. For it is man's sin that has\ndrawn out the deepest and most wonderful tenderness of the divine heart;\nand it is God's love partly recognised and rejected, which leads men to\nthe darkest evil. Man's sin has heightened God's love to this climax and\nconsummation of all tenderness, that He has sent us His Son. And God's\nlove thus heightened has darkened and deepened man's sin. God's chiefest\ngift is His Son. Man's darkest sin is the rejection of Christ. The\nclearest light makes the blackest shadow, the tenderer the love, the\nmore criminal the apathy and selfishness which oppose it.\n\nMy brother! let us put these two great things together, and learn how\nthe sin heightens the love, and how the love aggravates the sin.\n\nIII. That leads me to another point, that the keeping of these two\nthoughts together should lead us all to conscious penitence.\n\nThe Psalmist's words are not the mere complaint of a soul in affliction,\nthey are also the acknowledgment of a conscience repenting. The\ncontemplation of these two numberless series should affect us all in a\nlike manner.\n\nNow there is a superficial kind of popular religion which has a great\ndeal to say about the first of these texts; and very little or next to\nnothing about the second. It is a very defective kind of religion that\nsays:--'Many, O Lord my God! are Thy thoughts which are to us-ward,' but\nhas never been down on its knees with the confession 'Mine iniquities\nhave taken hold upon me.' But defective as it is, it is all the religion\nwhich many people have, and I doubt not, some of my hearers have no\nmore. I would press on you all this truth, that there is no deep\npersonal religion without a deep consciousness of personal\ntransgression. Have you got that, my brother? Have you ever had it? Have\nyou ever known what it is so to look at God's love that it smites you\ninto tears of repentance when you think of the way you have requited\nHim? If you have not, I do not think the sense of God's love has gone\nvery deeply into you, notwithstanding all that you say; and sure I am\nthat you have never got to the point where you can understand it most\nclearly and most deeply. The sense of sin, the consciousness of personal\ndemerit, the feeling that I have gone against Him and His loving\nlaw,--that is as important and as essential an element in all deep\npersonal religion as the clear and thankful apprehension of the love of\nGod. Nay, more; there never has been and there never will be in a man's\nheart, a worthy adequate apprehension of, and response to, the wonderful\nlove of God, except it be accompanied with a sense of sin. I, therefore,\nurge this upon you that, for the vigour of your own personal religion,\nyou must keep these two things well together. Beware of such a shallow,\neasy-going, matter-of-course, taking for granted God's infinite love,\nthat it makes you think very little of your own sins against that love.\n\nAnd remember, on the other hand, that the only way, or at least by far\nthe surest way, to learn the depth and the darkness of my own\ntransgression is by bringing my heart under the influence of that great\nlove of God in Jesus Christ. It is not preaching hell that will break a\nman's heart down into true repentance. It is not thundering over him\nwith the terrors of law and trying to prick his conscience that will\nbring him to a deep real knowledge of his sin. These may be subordinate\nand auxiliary, but the real power that convinces of sin is the love of\nGod. The one light which illuminates the dark recesses of one's own\nheart, and makes us feel how dark they are, and how full of creeping\nunclean things, is the light of the love of God that shines in Jesus\nChrist, the light that shines from the Cross of Calvary. Oh, dear\nfriends! if we are ever to know the greatness of God's love we must feel\nour personal sin which that great love has forgiven and purged away, and\nif we are ever to know the depth of our own evil, we must measure it by\nHis wonderful tenderness. We must set our 'sins in the light of His\ncountenance,' and contrast that supreme sacrifice with our own selfish\nloveless lives, that the contrast may subdue us to penitence and melt us\nto tears.\n\nIV. Lastly, looking at these two numberless series together will bring\ninto the deepest penitence a joyful confidence.\n\nThere are regions of experience the very opposite of that error of which\nI have just been speaking. There are some of us, perhaps, who have so\nprofound a sense of their own shortcomings and sins that the mists\nrising from these have blurred the sky to us and shut out the sun. Some\nof you, perhaps, may be saying to yourselves that you cannot get hold of\nGod's love because your sin seems to you to be so great, or may be\nsaying to yourselves that it is impossible that you should ever get the\nvictory over this evil of yours, because it has laid hold upon you with\nso tight a grasp. If there be in any heart listening to me now any\ninclination to doubt the infinite love of God, or the infinite\npossibility of cleansing from all sin, let me come with the simple word,\nBind these two texts together, and never so look at your own evil as to\nlose sight of the infinite mercy of God. It is safe to say--ay! it is\nblessed to say--'Mine iniquities are more than the hairs of mine head,'\nwhen we can also say, 'Thy thoughts to me are more than can be\nnumbered.'\n\nThere are not two innumerable series, there is only one. There is a\nlimit and a number to my sins and to yours, but God's mercies are\nproperly numberless. They overlap all our sins, they stretch beyond our\nsins in all dimensions. They go beneath them, they encompass them, and\nthey will thin them away and cause them to disappear. My sins may be\nmany, God's mercies are more. My sins may be inveterate, God's mercy is\nfrom everlasting. My sins may be strong, God's mercy is omnipotent. My\nsins may seem to 'have laid upon me,' God can rescue me from their grip.\nThey are a film on the surface of the deep ocean of His love. My sins\nmay be as the sand which is by the seashore, innumerable, the love of\nGod in Jesus Christ is like the great sea which rolls over the sands and\nburies them. My sins may rise mountains high, but His mercies are a\ngreat deep which will cover the mountains to their very summit. Ah! my\nsin is enormous, God's mercy is inexhaustible. 'With Thee is plenteous\nredemption, and He will redeem Israel from all his iniquities.'\n\n\n\n\nTHIRSTING FOR GOD\n\n\n    'My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God.'--PSALM xiii. 2.\n\nThis whole psalm reads like the sob of a wounded heart. The writer of it\nis shut out from the Temple of his God, from the holy soil of his native\nland. One can see him sitting solitary yonder in the lonely wilderness\n(for the geographical details that occur in one part of the psalm point\nto his situation as being on the other side of the Jordan, in the\nmountains of Moab)--can see him sitting there with long wistful gaze\nyearning across the narrow valley and the rushing stream that lay\nbetween him and the land of God's chosen people, and his eye resting\nperhaps on the mountaintop that looked down upon Jerusalem. He felt shut\nout from the presence of God. We need not suppose that he believed all\nthe rest of the world to be profane and God-forsaken, except only the\nTemple. Nor need we wonder, on the other hand, that his faith did cling\nto form, and that he thought the sparrows beneath the eaves of the\nTemple blessed birds! He was depressed, because he was shut out from the\ntokens of God's presence; and because he _was_ depressed, he shut\nhimself out from the reality of the presence. And so he cried with a cry\nwhich never is in vain, 'My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God!'\n\nTaken, then, in its original sense, the words of our text apply only to\nthat strange phenomenon which we call religious depression. But I have\nventured to take them in a wider sense than that. It is not only\nChristian men who are cast down, whose souls 'thirst for God.' It is not\nonly men upon earth whose souls thirst for God. All men, everywhere, may\ntake this text for theirs. Every human heart may breathe it out, if it\nunderstands itself. The longing for 'the living God' belongs to all men.\nThwarted, stifled, it still survives. Unconscious, it is our deepest\nmisery. Recognised, yielded to, accepted, it is the foundation of our\nhighest blessings. Filled to the full, it still survives unsatiated and\nexpectant. For all men upon earth, Christian or not Christian, for\nChristians here below, whether in times of depression or in times of\ngladness, and for the blessed and calm spirits that in ecstasy of\nlonging, full of fruition, stand around God's throne--it is equally true\nthat their souls 'thirst for God, for the living God.' Only with this\ndifference, that to some the desire is misery and death, and to some the\ndesire is life and perfect blessedness. So that the first thought I\nwould suggest to you now is, that there is an unconscious and\nunsatisfied longing after God, which is what we call the state of\nnature; secondly, that there is an imperfect longing after God, fully\nsatisfied, which is what we call the state of grace; and lastly, that\nthere is a perfect longing, perfectly satisfied, which is what we call\nthe state of glory. Nature; religion upon earth; blessedness in\nheaven--my text is the expression, in divers senses, of them all.\n\nI. In the first place, then, there is in every man an unconscious and\nunsatisfied longing after God, and that is the state of nature.\n\nExperience is the test of that assertion. And the most superficial\nexamination of the facts of daily life, as well as the questioning of\nour own souls, will tell us that _this_ is the leading feature of\nthem--a state of unrest. What is it that one of those deistic poets of\nour own land says, about 'Man never _is_, but always _to be_ blest'?\nWhat is the meaning of the fact that all round about us, and we\npartaking of it, there is ceaseless, gigantic activity going on? The\nvery fact that men work, the very fact of activity in the mind and life,\nnoble as it is, and root of all that is good, and beautiful as it is, is\nstill the testimony of nature to this fact that I by myself am full of\npassionate longings, of earnest desires, of unsupplied wants. 'I\nthirst,' is the voice of the whole world.\n\nNo man is made to be satisfied from himself. For the stilling of our own\nhearts, for the satisfying of our own nature, for the strengthening and\njoy of our being, we need to go beyond ourselves, and to fix upon\nsomething external to ourselves. We are not independent. None of us can\nstand by himself. No man carries within him the fountain from which he\ncan draw. If a heart is to be blessed, it must go out of the narrow\ncircle of its own individuality; and if a man's life is to be strong and\nhappy, he must get the foundation of his strength somewhere else than in\nhis own soul. And, my friends! especially you young men, all that modern\ndoctrine of self-reliance, though it has a true side to it, has also a\nfrightfully false side. Though it may he quite true that a man ought to\nbe, in one sense, sufficient for himself, and that there is no real\nblessedness of which the root does not lie within the nature and heart\nof the man; though all that be quite true, yet, if the doctrine means\n(as on the lips of many a modern eloquent and powerful teacher of it, it\ndoes mean) that we can do without God, that we may be self-reliant and\nself-sufficient, and proudly neglectful of all the divine forces that\ncome down into life to brighten and gladden it, it is a lie, false and\nfatal; and of all the falsehoods that are going about this world at\npresent, I know not one that is varnished over with more apparent truth,\nthat is smeared over with more of the honey that catches young, ardent,\ningenuous hearts, than that half-truth, and therefore most deceptive\nerror, which preaches independence, and self-reliance, and which\n_means_--a man's soul does not 'thirst for the living God.' Take care of\nit! We are made _not_ to be independent.\n\nWe are made, next, to need, not _things_, but _living beings_. 'My soul\nthirsteth'--for what? An abstraction, a possession, riches, a thing? No!\n'my soul thirsteth for God, for _the living God_.' Yes, hearts want\nhearts. The converse of Christ's saying is equally true; He said, 'God\nis a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit'; man\nhas a spirit, and man must have Spirit to worship, to lean upon, to live\nby, or all will be inefficient and unsatisfactory. Oh, lay this to\nheart, my brother!--no _things_ can satisfy a living soul. No\naccumulation of dead matter can become the life of an immortal being.\nThe two classes are separated by the whole diameter of the\nuniverse--matter and spirit, thing and person; and _you_ cannot feed\nyourself upon the dead husks that lie there round about you--wealth,\nposition, honour. Books, thoughts, though they are nobler than these\nother, are still inefficient. Principles, 'causes,' emotions springing\nfrom truth, these are not enough. I want more than that, I want\nsomething to love, something to lay a hand upon, that shall return the\ngrasp of the hand. A living man must have a living God, or his soul will\nperish in the midst of earthly plenty, and will thirst and die whilst\nthe water of earthly delights is running all around him. We are made to\nneed _persons_, not _things_.\n\nThen again, we need _one_ Being who shall be all-sufficient. There is no\ngreater misery than that which may ensue from the attempt to satisfy our\nsouls by the accumulation of objects, each of them imperfect and finite,\nwhich yet we fancy, woven together, will make an adequate whole. When a\nheart is diverted from its one central purpose, when a life is split up\nin a hundred different directions and into a hundred different emotions,\nit is like a beam of light passed through some broken surface where it\nis all refracted and shivered into fragments; there is no clear vision,\nthere is no perfect light. If a man is to be blessed, he must have one\nsource to which he can go. The merchantman that seeks for many goodly\npearls, may find the many; but until he has bartered them all for the\none, there is something lacking. Not only does the understanding require\nto pass through the manifold, up and up in ever higher generalisations,\ntill it reaches the One from whom all things come; but the heart\nrequires to soar, if it would be at rest, through all the diverse\nregions where its love may legitimately tarry for a while, until it\nreaches the sole and central throne of the universe, and there it may\ncease its flight, and fold its weary wings, and sleep like a bird within\nits nest. We want a _Being_, and we want _one Being_ in whom shall be\nsphered all perfection, in whom shall abide all power and blessedness;\nbeyond whom thought cannot pass, out of whose infinite circumference\nlove does not need to wander; besides whose boundless treasures no other\nriches can be required; who is light for the understanding, power for\nthe will, authority for the practical life, purpose for the efforts,\nmotive for the doings, end and object for the feelings, home of the\naffections, light of our seeing, life of our life, the love of our\nheart, the one living God, infinite in wisdom, power, holiness, justice,\ngoodness and truth; who is all in all, and without whom everything else\nis misery. 'My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God.'\n\nBrother! let me ask you the question, before I pass on--the question for\nthe sake of which I am preaching this sermon: Do _you_ know that Father?\nI know this much, that every heart here now answers an 'Amen' (if it\nwill be honest) to what I have been saying. Unrest; panting, desperate\nthirst, deceiving itself as to where it should go; slaking itself 'at\nthe gilded puddles that the beasts would cough at,' instead of coming to\nthe water of life!--that is the state of man without God. That is\nnature. That is irreligion. The condition in which every man is that is\nnot trusting in Jesus Christ, is this--thirsting for God, and not\nknowing _whom_ he is thirsting for, and so not getting the supply that\nhe wants.\n\nII. There is a conscious longing, imperfect, but answered; and that is\nthe state of grace--the beginning of religion in a man's soul.\n\nIf it be true that there are, as part of the universal human experience,\nhowever overlaid and stifled, these necessities of which I have been\nspeaking, the very existence of the necessities affords a presumption,\nbefore all evidence, that, somehow and somewhere, they shall be\nsupplied. There can be no deeper truth--none, I think, that ought to\nhave more power in shaping some parts of our Christian creed, than this,\nthat God is a faithful Creator; and where He makes men with longings, it\nis a prophecy that those longings are going to be supplied. The same\nground which avails to defend doctrines that cannot be so well defended\nby any other argument--the same ground on which we say that there is an\nimmortality, because men long for it and believe in it; that there is a\nGod because men cannot get rid of the instinctive conviction that there\nis; that there is a retribution, because men's consciences do ask for\nit, and cry out for it--the very same process which may be applied to\nthe buttressing and defending of all the grandest truths of the Gospel,\napplies also in this practical matter. If I, made by God who knew what\nHe was doing when He made me, am formed with these deep necessities,\nwith these passionate longings--then it cannot but be that it is\nintended that they should be to me a means of leading me to Him, and\nthat there they should be satisfied. For He is 'the faithful Creator,'\nand He remembers the conditions under which His making of us has placed\nus. 'He knoweth our frame,' and He remembereth what He has implanted\nwithin us. And the presumption is, of course, turned into an actual\ncertainty when we let in the light of the Gospel upon the thing. Then we\ncan say to every man that thus is yearning after a goodness dimly\nperceived, and does not know what it is that he wants, and we say to you\nnow, Brother! betake yourself to the cross of Christ go with those wants\nof yours to 'the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world': He\nwill interpret them to you. He will explain to you, as you do not now\nknow, what they mean; and, better than that, He will supply them all.\nYour souls are thirsting; and you look about, here and there, and\neverywhere, for springs of water. _There_ is the fountain--go to Christ.\nYour souls are thirsting for God. The unfathomed ocean of the Godhead\nlies far beyond my lip; but here is the channel through which there\nflows that river of water of life. Here is the manifested God, here is\nthe granted God, here is the Godhead coming into connection and union\nwith man, his wants and his sins--the 'living God' and His living Son,\nHis everlasting Word. 'He that believeth upon Him shall never hunger,\nand he that cometh unto Him shall never thirst.' God is the divine and\nunfathomable ocean; Christ the Son is the stream that brings salvation\nto every man's lips. All wants are supplied there. Take it as a piece of\nthe simplest prose, with no rhetorical exaggeration about it, that\nChrist is _everything_, everything that a man can want. We are made to\nrequire, and to be restless until we possess, perfect truth--there it\nis! We are made to want, and to be restless until we get, perfect,\ninfinite unchangeable love--there it is! We must have, or the burden of\nour own self-will will be a misery to us, a hand laid upon the springs\nof our conduct, authoritative and purifying, and have the blessedness of\nsome voice to say to us, 'I bid thee, and that is enough'--there it is!\nWe must have rest, purity, hope, gladness, life in our souls--there they\nall are! Whatever form of human nature and character be yours, my\nbrother!--whatever exigencies of life you may be lying under the\npressure of--man or woman, adult or child, father or son, man of\nbusiness or man of thought, struggling with difficulties or bright with\njoy--Oh! believe us, the perfecting of your character may be got in the\nLamb of God, and without Him it never can be possessed. Christ is\neverything, and 'out of His fulness all we receive grace for grace.'\n\nNot only in Christ is there the perfect supply of all these necessities,\nbut also that fulness _becomes ours_ on the simple condition of desiring\nit. The thirst for the living God in a man who has faith in Christ\nJesus, is not a thirst which amounts to pain, or arises from a sense of\nnon-possession. But in this divine region the principle of the giving is\nthis--to desire is to have; to long for is to possess. There is no wide\ninterval between the sense of thirst and the trickling of the stream\nover the parched lip; but ever it is flowing, flowing past us, and the\ndesire is but the opening of the lips to receive the limpid and\nlife-giving waters. No one ever desired the grace of God, really and\ntruly desired it; but just in proportion as he desired it, he got\nit--just in proportion as he thirsted, he was satisfied. Therefore we\nhave to preach that grand gospel that faith, simple, conscious longing,\nturned to Christ, avails to bring down the full and perfect supply.\n\nBut some Christian people here may reply, 'Ah! I wish it were so: what\nwas that you were saying at the beginning of your sermon, about men\nhaving religious depression, about Christians longing and not\npossessing?' Well, I have only this to say about that matter. Wherever\nin a heart that really believes on God in Christ, there is a thirst that\namounts to pain, and that has with it a sense of non-possession, that is\nnot because Christ's fulness has become shrunken; that is not because\nthere is a change in God's law, that the measure of the desire is the\nmeasure of the reception; but it is only because, for some reason or\nother that belongs to the man alone, the desire is not deep, genuine,\nsimple, but is troubled and darkened. What we ask, we get. If I am a\nChristian, however feeble I may be, the feebleness of my faith and the\nfeebleness of my desire may make my supplies of grace feeble; but if I\nam a Christian, there is no such thing as an earnest longing\nunsatisfied, no such thing as a thirst accompanied with a pain and sense\nof want, except in consequence of my own transgression.\n\nAnd thus there _is_ a longing imperfect in this life, but fully supplied\naccording to the measure of its intensity, a longing after 'the living\nGod'; and that is the state of a Christian man. And O my friend! that is\na widely different desire from the other that I have been speaking\nabout. It is blessed thus to say, 'My soul thirsteth for God.' It is\nblessed to feel the passionate wish for more light, more grace, more\npeace, more wisdom, more of God. That _is_ joy, that _is_ peace! Is that\n_your_ experience in this present life?\n\nIII. Lastly, there is a perfect longing perfectly satisfied; and that is\nheaven.\n\nWe shall not there be independent, of course, of constant supplies from\nthe great central Fulness, any more than we are here. One may see in one\naspect, that just as the Christian life here on earth is in a very true\nsense a state of never thirsting any more, because we have Christ, and\nyet in another sense is a state of continual longing and desire--so the\nChristian and glorified life in heaven, in one view of it, is the\nremoval of all that thirst which marked the condition of man upon earth,\nand in another is the perfecting of all those aspirations and desires.\nThirst, as longing, is eternal; thirst, as aspiration after God, is the\nglory of heaven; thirst, as desire for more of Him, is the very\ncondition of the celestial world, and the element of all its\nblessedness.\n\nThat future life gives us two elements, an infinite God, and an\nindefinitely expansible human spirit: an infinite God to fill, and a\nsoul to be filled, the measure and the capacity of which has no limit\nset to it that we can see. What will be the consequence of the contact\nof these two? Why this, for the first thing, that always, at every\nmoment of that blessed life, there shall be a perpetual fruition, a\nperpetual satisfaction, a deep and full fountain filling the whole soul\nwith the refreshment of its waves and the music of its flow. And yet,\nand yet--though at every moment in heaven we shall be satisfied, filled\nfull of God, full to overflowing in all our powers--yet the very fact\nthat the God who dwells in us, and fills our whole natures with\nunsullied and perfect blessedness, is an infinite God; and that we in\nwhom the infinite Father dwells, are men with souls that can grow, and\ncan grow for ever--will result in this, that at every moment our\ncapacities will expand; that at every moment, therefore, the desire will\ngrow and spring afresh; that at every moment God will be seen unveiling\nundreamed-of beauties, and revealing hitherto unknown heights of\nblessedness before us; and that the sight of that transcendent,\nunapproached, unapproachable, and yet attracting and transforming glory,\nwill draw us onward as by an impulse from above, and the possession of\nsome portion of it will bear us upward as by a power from within; and\nso, nearer, nearer, ever nearer to the throne of light, the centre of\nblessedness, the growing, and glorifying, and greatening souls of the\nperfectly and increasingly blessed shall 'mount up with wings as\neagles.' Heaven _is_ endless longing, accompanied with an endless\nfruition--a longing which is blessedness, a longing which is life!\n\nMy brother! let me put two sayings of Scripture side by side, 'My soul\nthirsteth for God, for the living God,'--'Father Abraham! send Lazarus,\nthat he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue.'\nThere be two thirsts, one, the longing for God, which, satisfied, is\nheaven; one, the longing for quenching of self-lit fires, and for one\ndrop of the lost delights of earth to cool the thirsty throat, which,\nunsatisfied, is hell. Then hearken to the final vision on the page of\nScripture, 'He showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as\ncrystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.' To us it\nis showed, and to us the whole revelation of God converges to that last\nmighty call, 'Let him that is athirst come, and whosoever will, let him\ntake the water of life freely!'\n\n\n\n\nTHE PSALMIST'S REMONSTRANCE WITH HIS SOUL\n\n\n    'Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted\n    within me? Hope in God: for I shall yet praise Him, the health of my\n    countenance, and my God.'--PSALM xliii. 5.\n\nThis verse, which closes this psalm, occurs twice in the previous one.\nIt is a kind of refrain. Obviously this little psalm, of which my text\nis a part, was originally united with the preceding one. That the two\nmade one is clear to anybody that will read them, by reason of\nstructure, and tone, and similarity of the singer's situation, and the\nrecurrence of many phrases, and especially of these significant words of\nmy text.\n\nThe Psalmist is in circumstances of trouble and sorrow. We need not\nenter upon them particularly, but the thing that I desire to point out\nis that three times does the Psalmist take himself to task and question\nhimself as to the reasonableness of the emotions that are surging in his\nsoul, and checks these by higher considerations. Thrice he does it;\ntwice in vain, for the trouble and anxiety come rolling back upon him in\nspite of the moment's respite, but the third time he triumphs.\n\nI. We note, then, first, that moods and emotions should be examined and\ngoverned by a higher self.\n\nIn the Psalmist's case, his gloom and despondency, which could plead\ngood reasons for their existence, had everything their own way at first,\nand swept over his soul like the first rush of waters which have burst\ntheir bounds. But, presently, the ruling part of his nature wakes, and\nbrings the feebler lower soul to its tribunal, and says, in effect,\n'Now! now that I am here, what hast thou to say about these sorrows that\nthou hast been complaining about? _Why_ art thou cast down, O my soul?\nWhy art thou disquieted? ... Hope in God!'\n\nI shall have a word or two to say presently about the details of this\nremonstrance, but the main point that I make, to begin with, is just\nthis, that however strong and reasonably occasioned by circumstances a\nman's emotions and feelings, either of the bright or the dark kind, may\nbe, they are not to be indulged, unless they have passed muster and\nexamination by that higher and better self. It is necessary to keep a\nvery tight hand upon _all_ our feelings, whether they be the natural\ndesires of the sensuous part of our nature, or whether they be the\nsentiments of sadness, or doubt, or anxiety, or perplexity, which are\nthe natural results of outward circumstances of trial; or whether, on\nthe contrary, they be the bright and buoyant ones which come, like\nangels, along with prosperous hours. But that necessity, commonplace as\nit is of all morals and all religion, is yet a thing which, day by day,\nwe so forget that we need to be ever and anon reminded of it.\n\nThere are hosts of people who, making profession of being Christians, do\nnot habitually put the brake on their moods and tempers, and who seem to\nthink that it is a sufficient vindication of gloom and sadness to say\nthat things are going badly with them in the outer world, and who act as\nif they supposed that no joy can be too exuberant and no elation too\nlofty if, on the other hand, things are going rightly. It is a miserable\ntravesty of the Christian faith to suppose that its prime purpose is\nanything else than to put into our hands the power of ruling ourselves\nbecause we let Christ rule us.\n\nAnd so, dear brethren! though it be the A B C of Christian teaching,\nsuffer this word of exhortation. It is only 'milk for babes,' but it is\nmilk that the babes are very unwilling to take. Learn from this verse\nbefore us the solemn duty of rigid control, by the higher self, of the\ntremulous, emotional lower self which responds so completely to every\nchange of temperature or circumstances in the world without. And\nremember that there should be a central heat which keeps the temperature\nsubstantially the same, whatever be the weather outside. As the\nwheel-house, and the steering gear, and the rudder of the ship proclaim\ntheir purpose of guidance and direction, so eloquently and unmistakably\ndoes the make of our inward selves tell us that emotions and moods and\ntempers are meant to be governed, often to be crushed, always to be\nmoderated, by sovereign will and reason. In the Psalmist's language, 'My\nsoul' has to give account of its tremors and flutterings to 'Me,' the\nruling Self, who should be Lord of temperament, and control the\nfluctuations of feeling.\n\nII. Note that there are two ways of looking at causes of dejection and\ndisquiet.\n\nThe whole preceding parts of both the psalms, before this refrain, are\nan answer to the question which my text puts. 'Why art thou cast down, O\nmy soul?' 'My soul' has been talking two whole psalms, to explain why it\nis cast down. And after all the eloquent torrent of words to vindicate\nand explain its reasons for sadness--separation from the sanctuary,\nbitter remembrances of bright days, which the poet tells us are 'a\nsorrow's crown of sorrow,' taunts of enemies and the like--after all\nthese have been said over and over again, the Psalmist says to himself:\n'Come now, let us hear it all once more. _Why_ art thou cast down? Why\nart thou disquieted within me? Thou hast been telling the reasons\nabundantly. Speak them once again, and let us have a look at them.'\n\nThere is a court of appeal in each man, which tests and tries his\nreasons for his moods; and these, which look very sufficient to the\nflesh, turn out to be very insufficient when investigated and tested by\nthe higher spirit or self. We should 'appeal from Philip drunk to Philip\nsober.' And if a man will be honest with himself, and tell himself why\nhe is in such a pucker of terror, or why he is in such a rapture of joy,\nnine times out of ten the attempt to tell the reasons will be the\ncondemnation of the mood which they are supposed to justify. If men\nwould only bring the causes or occasions of the tempers and feelings\nwhich they allow to direct them, to the bar of common sense, to say\nnothing of religious faith, half the furious boilings in their hearts\nwould stop their ebullition. It would be like pouring cold water into a\nkettle on the fire. It would end its bubbling. Everything has two\nhandles. The aspect of any event depends largely on the beholder's point\nof view. 'There's nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.'\n'Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted within\nme?' The answer is often very hard to give; the question is always very\nsalutary to ask.\n\nIII. Note that no reasons for being cast down are so strong as those for\nelation and calm hope.\n\n'Hope thou in God, for I shall yet praise Him, who is the health of my\ncountenance and my God.' I need not deal here with the fact that the\nfirst of the three occurrences of this refrain is, in our Bible, a\nlittle different from the other two. That is probably a mistake in the\ntext. In all three cases the words ought to stand the same.\n\nTry to realise what God is to yourselves--'My God' and 'the health of my\ncountenance.' That will stimulate sluggish feeling; that will calm\ndisturbed emotion. He that can say 'My God!' and in that possession can\nrepose, will not be easily moved, by the trivialities and\ntransitorinesses of this life, to excessive disquiet, whether of the\nexuberant or of the woful sort. There is a wonderful calming power in\nrealising our possession of God as our portion--not stagnating, but\nquieting. I am quite sure that the troubles of our lives, and the\ngladnesses of our lives, which often distract, would be far less\noperative in disturbing, if we felt more that God was ours and that we\nwere God's.\n\nBrethren! 'there is no joy but calm.' To be at rest is better than\nrapture. And there is no way of getting and keeping a fixed temper of\nstill tranquillity unless we go into that deep and hidden chamber, in\nthe secret place of the Most High, where we cannot 'hear the loud winds\nwhen they call,' but dwell in security, whatever storms harass the land.\n'Why art thou cast down,' or lifted 'up,' and, in either case,\n'disquieted'? 'Hope in God,' and be at rest.\n\nIV. Note that the effort to lay hold on the truth which calms is to be\nrepeated in spite of failures.\n\nThe words of our text are thrice repeated in these two psalms. In the\ntwo former instances they are followed by a fresh burst of pained\nfeeling. A moment of tranquillity interrupts the agitation of the\nPsalmist's soul, but is soon followed by the recurrence of 'the horrible\nstorm' that 'begins afresh.' A tiny island of blue appears in his sky,\nand then the pale, ugly, grey rack drives across it once more. But the\nguiding self keeps the hand firm on the tiller, notwithstanding the wash\nof the water and the rolling of the ship, and the dominant will conquers\nat last, and at the third time the yielding soul obeys and is quiet,\nbecause the Psalmist's will resolved that it should be quiet, and it\nhopes in God because He, by a dead lift of effort, lifts it up to hope.\n\nNo effort at tranquillising our hearts is wholly lost; and no attempt to\nlay hold upon God is wholly in vain. Men build a dam to keep out the\nsea, and the winter storms make a breach in it, but it is not washed\naway altogether, and next season they will not need to begin to build\nfrom quite so low down; but there will be a bit of the former left, to\nput the new structure upon, and so by degrees it will rise above the\ntide, and at last will keep it out.\n\nDid you ever see a child upon a swing, or a gymnast upon a trapeze? Each\noscillation goes a little higher; each starts from the same lowest\npoint, but the elevation on either side increases with each renewed\neffort, until at last the destined height is reached and the daring\nathlete leaps on to a solid platform. So we may, if I might say so, by\ndegrees, by reiterated efforts, swing ourselves up to that steadfast\nfloor on which we may stand high above all that breeds agitation and\ngloom. It is possible, in the midst of change and circumstances that\nexcite sad emotions, anxieties, and fears--it is possible to have this\ncalmness of hope in God. The rainbow that spans the cataract rises\nsteadfast above the white, tortured water beneath, and persists whilst\nall is hurrying change below, and there are flowers on the grim black\nrocks by the side of the fall, whose verdure is made greener and whose\nbrightness is made brighter, by the freshening of the spray of the\nwaterfall. So we may be 'as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing,' and may\nbid dejected and disquieted souls to hope in God and be still.\n\n\n\n\nTHE KING IN HIS BEAUTY\n\n\n    'Thou art fairer than the children of men; grace is poured into Thy\n    lips: therefore God hath blessed Thee forever. 3. Gird Thy sword\n    upon Thy thigh, O mighty one, Thy glory and Thy majesty. 4. And in\n    Thy majesty ride on prosperously, because of truth and meekness and\n    righteousness: and Thy right hand shall teach Thee terrible things.\n    5. Thine arrows are sharp; the peoples fall under Thee; they are in\n    the heart of the King's enemies. 6. Thy throne, O God, is for ever\n    and ever: a sceptre of equity is the sceptre of Thy kingdom. 7. Thou\n    hast loved righteousness, and hated wickedness: therefore God, Thy\n    God, hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above Thy fellows.'\n    --PSALM xlv. 2-7 (R.V.).\n\nThere is no doubt that this psalm was originally the marriage hymn of\nsome Jewish king. All attempts to settle who that was have failed, for\nthe very obvious reason that neither the history nor the character of\nany of them correspond to the psalm. Its language is a world too wide\nfor the diminutive stature and stained virtues of the greatest and best\nof them, and it is almost ludicrous to attempt to fit its glowing\nsentences even to a Solomon. They all look like little David in Saul's\narmour. So, then, we must admit one of two things. Either we have here a\npiece of poetical exaggeration far beyond the limits of poetic license,\nor 'a greater than Solomon is here.' Every Jewish king, by virtue of his\ndescent and of his office, was a living prophecy of the greatest of the\nsons of David, the future King of Israel. And the Psalmist sees the\nideal Person who, as he knew, was one day to be real, shining through\nthe shadowy form of the earthly king, whose very limitations and\ndefects, no less than his excellences and his glories, forced the devout\nIsraelite to think of the coming King in whom 'the sure mercies'\npromised to David should be facts at last. In plainer words, the psalm\ncelebrates Christ, not only although, but because, it had its origin and\npartial application in a forgotten festival at the marriage of some\nunknown king. It sees Him in the light of the Messianic hope, and so it\nprophesies of Christ. My object is to study the features of this\nportrait of the King, partly in order that we may better understand the\npsalm, and partly in order that we may with the more reverence crown Him\nas Lord of all.\n\nI. The Person of the King.\n\nThe old-world ideal of a monarch put special emphasis upon two\nthings--personal beauty and courtesy of address and speech. The psalm\nascribes both of these to the King of Israel, and from both of them\ndraws the conclusion that one so richly endowed with the most eminent of\nroyal graces is the object of the special favour of God. 'Thou art\nfairer than the children of men, grace is poured into Thy lips:\ntherefore God hath blessed Thee for ever.'\n\nHere, at the very outset, we have the keynote struck of superhuman\nexcellence; and though the reference is, on the surface, only to\nphysical perfection, yet beneath that there lies the deeper reference to\na character which spoke through the eloquent frame, and in which all\npossible beauties and sovereign graces were united in fullest\ndevelopment, in most harmonious co-operation and unstained purity.\n\n'Thou art fairer than the children of men.' Put side by side with that,\nwords which possibly refer to, and seem to contradict it. A later\nprophet, speaking of the same Person, said: 'His visage was so marred,\nmore than any man, and His form than the sons of men.... There is no\nform nor comeliness, and when we shall see Him there is no beauty that\nwe should desire Him.' We have to think, not of the outward form,\nhowsoever lovely with the loveliness of meekness and transfigured with\nthe refining patience of suffering it may have been, but of the beauty\nof a soul that was all radiant with a lustre of loveliness that shames\nthe fragmentary and marred virtues of the best of us, and stands before\nthe world for ever as the supreme type and high-water mark of the grace\nthat is possible to a human spirit. God has lodged in men's nature the\napprehension of Himself, and of all that flows from Him, as true, as\ngood, as beautiful; and to these three there correspond wisdom,\nmorality, and art. The latter, divorced from the other two, becomes\nearthly and devilish. This generation needs the lesson that beauty\nwrenched from truth and goodness, and pursued for its own sake, by\nartist or by poet or by _dilettante_, leads by a straight descent to\nugliness and to evil, and that the only true satisfying of the deep\nlonging for 'whatsoever things are lovely' is to be found when we turn\nto Christ and find in Him, not only wisdom that enlightens the\nunderstanding, and righteousness that fills the conscience, but beauty\nthat satisfies the heart. He is 'altogether lovely.' Nor let us forget\nthat once on earth 'the fashion of His countenance was altered, and His\nraiment did shine as the light,' as indicative of the possibilities that\nlay slumbering in His lowly Manhood, and as prophetic of that to which\nwe believe that the ascended Christ hath now attained--viz. the body of\nHis glory, wherein He reigns, filled with light and undecaying\nloveliness on the Throne of the Heaven. Thus He is fairer in external\nreality now, as He is, by the confession of an admiring, though not\nalways believing, world, fairer in inward character than the children of\nmen.\n\nAnother personal characteristic is 'Grace is poured into Thy lips.'\nKingly courtesy, and kingly graciousness of word, must be the\ncharacteristic of the Sovereign of men. The abundance of that bestowment\nis expressed by that word, 'poured.' We need only remember, 'All\nwondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth,' or how\neven the rough instruments of authority were touched and diverted from\ntheir appointed purpose, and came back and said, 'Never man spake like\nthis Man.' To the music of Christ's words all other eloquence is harsh,\npoor, shallow--like the piping of a shepherd boy upon some wretched\noaten straw as compared with the full thunder of the organ. Words of\nunmingled graciousness came from His lips. That fountain never sent\nforth 'sweet waters and bitter.' He satisfies the canon of St. James:\n'If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man.' Words of\nwisdom, of love, of pity, of gentleness, of pardon, of bestowment, and\nonly such, came from Him. 'Daughter! be of good cheer.' 'Son! thy sins\nbe forgiven thee.' 'Come unto Me all ye that labour and are\nheavy-laden.'\n\n'Grace is poured into Thy lips'; and, withal, it is the grace of a King.\nFor His language is authoritative even when it is most tender, and regal\nwhen it is most gentle. His lips, sweet as honey and the honeycomb, are\nthe lips of an Autocrat. 'He speaks, and it is done: He commands, and it\nstands fast.' He says to the tempest, 'Be still!' and it is quiet; and\nto the demons, 'Come out of him!' and they disappear; and to the dead,\n'Come forth!' and he stumbles from the tomb.\n\nAnother personal characteristic is--'God hath blessed Thee for ever.' By\nwhich we are to understand, not that the two preceding graces are the\nreasons for the divine benediction, but that the divine benediction is\nthe cause of them; and therefore they are the signs of it. It is not\nthat because He is lovely and gracious therefore God hath blessed Him;\nbut it is that we may know that God has blessed Him, since He is lovely\nand gracious. These endowments are the results, not the causes; the\nsigns or the proofs, not the reasons of the divine benediction. That is\nto say, the humanity so fair and unique shows by its beauty that it is\nthe result of the continual and unique operation and benediction of a\npresent God. We understand Him when we say, 'On Him rests the Spirit of\nGod without measure or interruption.' The explanation of the perfect\nhumanity is the abiding Divinity.\n\nII. We pass from the person of the King, in the next place, to His\nwarfare.\n\nThe Psalmist breaks out in a burst of invocation, calling upon the King\nto array Himself in His weapons of warfare, and then in broken clauses\nvividly pictures the conflict. The Invocation runs thus: 'Gird on thy\nsword upon thy thigh, O mighty hero! gird on thy glory and thy majesty,\nand ride on prosperously on behalf (or, in the cause) of truth and\nmeekness and righteousness.' The King, then, is the perfection of\nwarrior strength as well as of beauty and gentleness--a combination of\nqualities that speaks of old days when kings _were_ kings, and reminds\nus of many a figure in ancient song, as well as of a Saul and a David in\nJewish history.\n\nThe singer calls upon Him to bind on His side His glittering sword, and\nto put on, as His armour, 'glory and majesty.' These two words, in the\nusage of the psalms, belong to Divinity, and they are applied to the\nmonarch here as being the earthly representative of the divine\nsupremacy, on whom there falls some reflection of the glory and the\nmajesty of which He is the vice-regent and representative. Thus arrayed,\nwith His weapon by His side and glittering armour on His limbs, He is\ncalled upon to mount His chariot or His warhorse and ride forth.\n\nBut for what? 'On behalf of truth, meekness, righteousness.' If He be a\nwarrior, these are the purposes for which the true King of men must draw\nHis sword, and these only. No vulgar ambition or cruel lust of conquest,\nearth-hunger, or 'glory' actuates Him. Nothing but the spread through\nthe world of the gracious beauties which are His own can be the end of\nthe King's warfare. He fights for truth; He fights--strange paradox--for\nmeekness; He fights for righteousness. And He not only fights _for_ them,\nbut _with_ them, for they are His own, and by _reason_ of them He 'rides\nprosperously,' as well as 'rides prosperously' in order to establish\nthem.\n\nIn two or three swift touches the Psalmist next paints the tumult and\nhurry of the fight. 'Thy right hand shall teach Thee terrible things.'\nThere are no armies or allies, none to stand beside Him. The one mighty\nfigure of the Kingly Warrior stands forth, as in the Assyrian sculptures\nof conquerors, erect and solitary in His chariot, crashing through the\nranks of the enemy, and owing victory to His own strong arm alone.\n\nThen follow three short, abrupt clauses, which, in their hurry and\nfragmentary character, reflect the confusion and swiftness of battle.\n'Thine arrows are sharp.... The people fall under Thee.' ... 'In the\nheart of the King's enemies.' The Psalmist sees the bright arrow on the\nstring; it flies; he looks--the plain is strewed with prostrate forms,\nthe King's arrow in the heart of each.\n\nPut side by side with that this picture:--A rocky road; a great city\nshining in the morning sunlight across a narrow valley; a crowd of\nshouting peasants waving palm branches in their rustic hands; in the\ncentre the meek carpenter's Son, sitting upon the poor robes which alone\ndraped the ass's colt, the tears upon His cheeks, and His lamenting\nheard above the Hosannahs, as He looked across the glen and said, 'If\nthou hadst known the things that belong to thy peace!' That is the\nfulfilment, or part of the fulfilment, of this prophecy. The\nslow-pacing, peaceful beast and the meek, weeping Christ are the reality\nof the vision which, in such strangely contrasted and yet true form,\nfloated before the prophetic eye of this ancient singer, for Christ's\nhumiliation is His majesty, and His sharpest weapon is His\nall-penetrating love, and His cross is His chariot of victory and throne\nof dominion.\n\nBut not only in His earthly life of meek suffering does Christ fight as\na King, but all through the ages the world-wide conflict for truth and\nmeekness and righteousness is His conflict; and wherever that is being\nwaged, the power which wages it is His, and the help which is done upon\nearth He doeth it all Himself. True, He has His army, willing in the day\nof His power, and clad in priestly purity and armour of light, but all\ntheir strength, courage, and victory are from Him; and when they fight\nand conquer, it is not they, but He in them who struggles and overcomes.\nWe have a better hope than that built on 'a stream of tendency that\nmakes for righteousness.' We know a Christ crucified and crowned, who\nfights for it, and what He fights for will hold the field.\n\nThis prophecy of our psalm is not exhausted yet. I have set side by side\nwith it one picture--the Christ on the ass's colt. Put side by side with\nit this other. 'I beheld the heaven opened; and lo! a white horse. And\nHe that sat upon him was called Faithful and True; and in righteousness\nHe doth judge and make war.' The psalm waits for its completion still,\nand shall be fulfilled on that day of the true marriage supper of the\nLamb, when the festivities of the marriage chamber shall be preceded by\nthe last battle and crowning victory of the King of kings, the Conqueror\nof the world.\n\nIII. Lastly, we have the royalty of the King.\n\n'Thy throne, O God! is for ever and ever.' This is not the place nor\ntime to enter on the discussion of the difficulties of these words. I\nmust run the risk of appearing to state confident opinions without\nassigning reasons, when I venture to say that the translation in the\nAuthorised Version is the natural one. I do not say that others have\nbeen adopted by reason of doctrinal prepossessions; I know nothing about\nthat; but I do say that they are not by any means so natural a\ntranslation as that which stands before us. What it may mean is another\nmatter; but the plain rendering of the words, I venture to assert, is\nwhat our English Bible makes it--'Thy throne, O God! is for ever and\never.'\n\nThen it is to be remembered that, throughout the Old Testament, we have\noccasional instances of the use of that great and solemn designation in\nreference to persons in such place and authority as that they are\nrepresentatives of God. So kings and judges and lawyers and the like are\nspoken of more than once. Therefore there is not, in the language,\ntranslated as in our English Bible, necessarily the implication of the\nunique divinity of the persons so addressed. But I take it that this is\nan instance in which the prophet was 'wiser than he knew,' and in which\nyou and I understand him better than he understood himself, and know\nwhat God, who spoke through him, meant, whatsoever the prophet, through\nwhom He spoke, did mean. That is to say, I take the words before us as\ndirectly referring to Jesus Christ, and as directly declaring the\ndivinity of His person, and therefore the eternity of His kingdom.\n\nWe live in days when that perpetual sovereignty is being questioned. In\na revolutionary time like this it is well for Christian people, seeing\nso many venerable things going, to tighten their grasp upon the\nconviction that, whatever goes, Christ's kingdom will not go; and that,\nwhatever may be shaken by any storms, the foundation of His Throne\nstands fast. For our personal lives, and for the great hopes of the\nfuture beyond the grave, it is all-important that we should grasp, as an\nelementary conviction of our faith, the belief in the perpetual rule of\nthat Saviour whose rule is life and peace. In the great mosque of\nDamascus, which was a Christian church once, there may still be read,\ndeeply cut in the stone, high above the pavement where now Mohammedans\nbow, these words, 'Thy kingdom, O Christ! is an everlasting kingdom.' It\nis true, and it shall yet be known that He is for ever and ever the\nMonarch of the world.\n\nThen, again, this royalty is a royalty of righteousness. 'The sceptre of\nThy kingdom is a right sceptre. Thou lovest righteousness and hatest\nwickedness.' His rule is no arbitrary sway, His rod is no rod of iron\nand tyrannical oppression, His own personal character is righteousness.\nRighteousness is the very life-blood and animating principle of His\nrule. He loves righteousness, and, therefore, puts His broad shield of\nprotection over all who love it and seek after it. He hates wickedness,\nand therefore He wars against it wherever it is, and seeks to draw men\nout of it. And thus His kingdom is the hope of the world.\n\nAnd, lastly, this dominion of perennial righteousness is the dominion of\nunparalleled gladness. 'Therefore God, even Thy God, hath anointed Thee\nwith the oil of joy above Thy fellows.' Set side by side with that the\nother words, 'A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.' And remember\nhow, near the very darkest hour of the Lord's earthly experiences, He\nsaid:--'These things have I spoken unto you that My joy may remain in\nyou, and that your joy may be full.' Christ's gladness flowed from\nChrist's righteousness. Because His pure humanity was ever in touch with\nGod, and in conscious obedience to Him, therefore, though darkness was\naround, there was light within. He was 'sorrowful, yet always\nrejoicing,' and the saddest of men was likewise the gladdest, and\npossessed 'the oil of joy above His fellows.'\n\nBrother! that kingdom is offered to us; participation in that joy of our\nLord may belong to each of us. He rules that He may make us like\nHimself, lovers of righteousness, and so, like Himself, possessors of\nunfading joy. Make Him your King, let His arrow reach your heart, bow in\nsubmission to His power, take for your very life His words of\ngraciousness, lovingly gaze upon His beauty till some reflection of it\nshall shine from you, fight by His side with strength drawn from Him\nalone, own and adore Him as the enthroned God-man, Jesus Christ, the Son\nof God. Crown Him with the many crowns of supreme trust, heart-whole\nlove, and glad obedience. So shall you be honoured to share in His\nwarfare and triumph. So shall you have a throne close to His and eternal\nas it. So shall His sceptre be graciously stretched out to you to give\nyou access with boldness to the presence-chamber of the King. So shall\nHe give you too, 'the oil of joy for mourning,' even in the 'valley of\nweeping,' and the fulness of His gladness for evermore, when He sets you\nat His right hand.\n\n\n\n\nTHE PORTRAIT OF THE BRIDE\n\n    'Hearken, O daughter, and consider, and incline thine ear; forget\n    also thine own people, and thy father's house; 11. So shall the King\n    desire thy beauty: for He is thy Lord; and worship thou Him. 12. And\n    the daughter of Tyre shall be there with a gift; even the rich among\n    the people shall entreat thy favour. 13. The King's daughter within\n    the palace is all glorious: her clothing is inwrought with gold. 14.\n    She shall be led unto the King in broidered work: the virgins, her\n    companions, that follow her shall be brought unto thee. 15. With\n    gladness and rejoicing shall they be led; they shall enter into the\n    King's palace.'--PSALM xlv. 10-15 (R.V.).\n\nThe relation between God and Israel is constantly represented in the Old\nTestament under the emblem of a marriage. The tenderest promises of\nprotection and the sharpest rebukes of unfaithfulness are based upon\nthis foundation. 'Thy Maker is thy Husband'; or, 'I am married unto\nthee, saith the Lord.' The emblem is transferred in the New Testament to\nChrist and His Church. Beginning with John the Baptist's designation of\nHim as the Bridegroom, it reappears in many of our Lord's sayings and\nparables, is frequent in the writings of the Apostle Paul, and reaches\nits height of poetic splendour and terror in that magnificent\ndescription in Revelation of 'the Bride, the Lamb's wife,' and 'the\nmarriage supper of the Lamb.'\n\nSeeing, then, the continual occurrence of this metaphor, it is unnatural\nand almost impossible to deny its presence in this psalm. In a former\nsermon I have directed attention to the earlier portion of it, which\npresents us, in its portraiture of the King, a shadowy and prophetic\noutline of Jesus Christ. I desire, in a similar fashion, to deal now\nwith the latter portion, which, in its portrait of the bride, presents\nus with truths having their real fulfilment in the Church collectively\nand in the individual soul.\n\nOf course, inasmuch as the consort of a Jewish monarch was not an\nincarnate prophecy as her husband was, the transference of the\nhistorical features of this wedding-song to a spiritual purpose is not\nso satisfactory, or easy, in the latter part as in the former. There is\na thicker rind of prose fact, as it were, to cut through, and certain of\nthe features cannot be applied to the relation between Christ and His\nChurch without undue violence. But, whilst we admit that, it is also\nclear that the main, broad outlines of this picture do require as well\nas permit its higher application. Therefore I turn to them to try to\nbring out what they teach us so eloquently and vividly of Christ's gifts\nto, and requirements from, the souls that are wedded to Him.\n\nI. Now the first point is this--the all-surrendering Love that must mark\nthe Bride.\n\nThe language of the tenth verse is the voice of prophecy or inspiration;\nspeaking words of fatherly counsel to the princess--'Forget also thine\nown people and thy father's house.' Historically I suppose it points to\nthe foreign birth of the queen, who is called upon to abandon all old\nties, and to give herself with wholehearted consecration to her new\nduties and relations.\n\nIn all real wedded life, as those who have tasted it know, there comes,\nby sweet necessity, the subordination, in the presence of a purer and\nmore absorbing love, brought close by a will itself ablaze with the\nsacred glow.\n\nTherefore, while giving all due honour to other forms of Christian\nopposition to the prevailing unbelief, I urge the cultivation of a\nquickened spiritual life as by far the most potent. Does not history\nbear me out in that view? What, for instance, was it that finished the\ninfidelity of the eighteenth century? Whether had Butler's _Analogy_ or\nCharles Wesley's hymns, Paley's _Evidences_ or Whitefield's sermons,\nmost to do with it? A languid Church breeds unbelief as surely as a\ndecaying oak does fungus. In a condition of depressed vitality, the\nseeds of disease, which a full vigour would shake off, are fatal. Raise\nthe temperature, and you kill the insect germs. A warmer tone of\nspiritual life would change the atmosphere which unbelief needs for its\ngrowth. It belongs to the fauna of the glacial epoch, and when the\nrigours of that wintry time begin to melt, and warmer days to set in,\nthe creatures of the ice have to retreat to arctic wildernesses, and\nleave a land no longer suited for their life. A diffused unbelief, such\nas we see around us to-day, does not really arise from the logical basis\non which it seems to repose. It comes from something much deeper,--a\ncertain habit and set of mind which gives these arguments their force.\nFor want of a better name, we call it the spirit of the age. It is the\nresult of very subtle and complicated forces, which I do not pretend to\nanalyse. It spreads through society, and forms the congenial soil in\nwhich these seeds of evil, as we believe them to be, take root. Does\nanybody suppose that the growth of popular unbelief is owing to the\nlogical force of certain arguments? It is in the air; a wave of it is\npassing over us. We are in a condition in which it becomes shall drop\nthe toys of earth as easily and naturally as a child will some trinket\nor plaything, when it stretches out its little hand to get a better gift\nfrom its loving mother. Love will sweep the heart clean of its\nantagonists; and there is no real union between Jesus Christ and us\nexcept in the measure in which we joyfully, and not as a reluctant\ngiving up of things that we would much rather keep if we durst, 'count\nall things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus\nour Lord.'\n\nHave the terms of wedded life changed since my psalm was written? Is\nthere less need now than there used to be that, if we are to possess a\nheart, we should give a whole heart? And have the terms of Christian\nliving altered since the old days, when He said, 'Whosoever he be of you\nthat forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be My disciple'? Ah! I\nfear me that it is no uncharitable judgment to say that the bulk of\nso-called Christians are playing at being Christians, and have never\npenetrated into the depths either of the sweet all-sufficiency of the\nlove which they say that they possess, or the constraining necessity\nthat is in it for the surrender of all besides. Many happy husbands and\nwives, if they would only treat Jesus Christ as they treat one another,\nwould find out a power and a blessedness in the Christian life that they\nknow nothing about at present. 'Daughter! forget thine own people and\nthy father's house!'\n\nII. Again, the second point here is that which directly follows--the\nKing's love and the Bride's reverence. 'So shall the King greatly desire\nthy beauty: for He is thy Lord; and worship thou Him.'\n\nThe King is drawn, in the outgoings of His affection, by the sweet trust\nand perfect love which has surrendered everything for him and happily\nfollowed him from the far-off land. And then, in accordance with\nOriental ideas, and with His royal rank, the bride is exhorted, in the\nmidst of the utter trust and equality born of love, to remember, 'He is\nthy Lord, and reverence thou Him.' So, then, here are two thoughts that\ngo, as I take it, very deep into the realities of the Christian life.\nThe first is that, in simple literal fact, Jesus Christ is affected, in\nHis relation to us, by the completeness of our dependence upon Him, and\nsurrender of all else for Him. We do not believe that half vividly\nenough. We have surrounded Jesus Christ with a halo of mystery and of\nremoteness which neither lets us think of Him as being really man or\nreally God. And I press on you this as a plain fact, no piece of pulpit\nrhetoric, that His relation to us as Christians hinges upon our\nsurrender to Him. Of course, there is a love with which He pours Himself\nout over the unworthy and the sinful--blessed be His name!--and the more\nsinful and the more unworthy, the deeper the tenderness and the more\nyearning the pity and pathos of invitation which He lavishes upon us.\nBut that is a different thing from this other, which is that He is\npleased or displeased, actually drawn to or repelled from us, in the\nmeasure of the completeness and gladness of our surrender of ourselves\nto Him. That is what Paul means when he says that he labours that\n'whether present or absent he may be pleasing to Christ.' And this is\nthe highest and strongest motive that I know for all holy and noble\nliving, that we shall bring a smile into our Master's face and draw Him\nnearer to ourselves thereby. '_So_ shall the King greatly desire thy\nbeauty.'\n\nAgain, in the measure in which we live out our Christianity, in\nwhole-hearted and thorough surrender, in that measure shall we be\n_conscious_ of His nearness and feel His love.\n\nThere are many Christian people that have only religion enough to make\nthem uncomfortable, only enough to make religion to them a system of\nregulations, negative and positive, the reasonableness and sweetness of\nwhich they but partially apprehend. They must not do _this_ because it\nis forbidden; they ought to do _that_ because it is commanded. They\nwould much rather do the forbidden thing, and they have no wish to do\nthe commanded thing, and so they live in twilight, and when they come\nbeside a man who really has been walking in the light of Christ's face,\nthe language of his experience, though it be but a transcript of facts,\nsounds to them all unreal and fanatical. They miss the blessing that is\nwaiting for them, just because they have not really given up themselves.\nIf by resolute and continual opening of our hearts to Christ's real love\nand presence, and by consequent casting off of our false and foolish\nself-dependence, we were to blow away the clouds that come between us\nand Him, we should feel the sunshine. But as it is, a miserable\nmultitude of professing Christians 'walk in the darkness, and have no\nlight,' or, at the most, but some wintry sunshine that struggles through\nthe thick mist, and does little more than reveal the barrenness that\nlies around. Brethren! if you want to be happy Christians, be\nout-and-out ones; and if you would have your hands and your hearts\nfilled with Christ, empty them of the trash that they grip so closely\nnow.\n\nThen, on the other side, there is the reminder and exhortation: 'He is\nthy Lord, worship thou Him.' The beggar-maid that, in the old ballad,\nmarried the king, in all her love was filled with reverence; and the\nragged, filthy souls, whom Jesus Christ stoops to love, and wash, and\nmake His own, are never to forget, in the highest rapture of their joy,\ntheir lowly adoration, nor in the glad familiarity of their loving\napproach to Him, cease to remember that the test of love is, 'Keep My\ncommandments.'\n\nThere are types of emotional and sentimental religion that have a great\ndeal more to say about love than about obedience; that are full of half\nwholesome apostrophes to a 'dear Lord,' and almost forget the '_Lord_'\nin the emphasis which they put on the '_dear_.' And I want you to\nremember this, as by no means an unnecessary caution, and of especial\nvalue in some quarters to-day, that the test of the reality of Christian\nlove is its lowliness, and that all that which indulges in heated\nemotion, and forgets practical service, is rotten and spurious. Though\nthe King desire her beauty, still, when He stretches out the golden\nsceptre, Esther must come to Him with lowly guise and a reverent heart.\n'He is thy Lord, worship thou Him.'\n\nIII. The next point in this portraiture is the reflected honour and\ninfluence of the bride.\n\nThere are difficulties about the translation of the 12th verse of our\npsalm with which I do not need to trouble you. We may take it for our\npurpose as it stands before us. 'The daughter of Tyre' (representing the\nwealthy, outside nations) 'shall be there with a gift; even the rich\namong the people shall entreat thy favour.'\n\nThe bride being thus beloved by the King, thus standing by His side,\nthose around recognise her dignity and honour, and draw near to secure\nher intercession. Translate that out of the emblem into plain words, and\nit comes to this--if Christian people, and communities of such, are to\nhave influence in the world, they must be thorough-going Christians. If\nthey are, they will get hatred sometimes; but men know honest people and\nreligious people when they see them, and such Christians will win\nrespect and be a power in the world. If Christian men and Christian\ncommunities are despised by outsiders, they very generally earn the\ncontempt and deserve it, both from men and from heaven. The true\nevangelist is Christian character. They that manifestly live with the\nsunshine of the Lord's love on their faces, and whose hands are plainly\nclear from worldly and selfish graspings, will have the world\nrecognising the fact and honouring them accordingly. 'The sons of them\nthat afflicted thee shall come bending unto thee, and all they that\ndespised thee shall bow themselves down to the soles of thy feet.' When\nthe Church has cast the world out of its heart, it will conquer the\nworld--and not till then.\n\nIV. The next point in this picture is the fair adornment of the bride.\nThe language is in part ambiguous; and if this were the place for\ncommenting would require a good deal of comment. But we take it as it\nstands in our Bible, 'The King's daughter is all glorious within'--not\nwithin her nature, but within the innermost recesses of the palace--'her\nclothing is of wrought gold. She shall be brought unto the King in\nraiment of needlework.'\n\nIt is an easy and well-worn metaphor to talk about people's character as\ntheir dress. We speak about the 'habits' of a man, and we use that word\nto express both his customary manners and his costume. Custom and\ncostume, again, are the same word. So here, without any departure from\nthe well-trodden path of Scriptural emblem, we cannot but see in the\nglorious apparel the figure of the pure character with which the bride\nis clothed. The Book of the Revelation dresses her in the fine linen\nclean and white, which symbolises the lustrous radiance and snowy purity\nof righteousness. The psalm describes her dress as partly consisting in\ngarments gleaming with gold, which suggests splendour and glory, and\npartly in robes of careful and many-coloured embroidery, which suggests\nthe patience with which the slow needle has been worked through the\nstuff, and the variegated and manifold graces and beauties with which\nshe is adorned.\n\nSo, putting all the metaphors together, the true Christian character,\nwhich will be ours if we really are the subjects of that divine love,\nwill be lustrous and snowy as the snows on Hermon, or as was the garment\nwhose whiteness outshone the neighbouring snows when He was\n'transfigured before them.' Our characters will be splendid with a\nsplendour far above the tawdry beauties and vulgar conspicuousness of\nthe 'heroic' and worldly ideals, and will be endowed with a purity and\nharmony of colouring in richly various graces, such as no earthly looms\ncan ever weave.\n\nWe are not told here how the garment is attained. It is no part of the\npurpose of the psalm to tell us that, but it is part of its purpose to\ninsist that there is no marriage between Christ and the soul except that\nsoul be pure, none except it be robed in the beauty of righteousness and\nthe splendour of consecration, and the various gifts of an all-giving\nSpirit. The man that came into the wedding-feast, with his dirty,\nevery-day clothes on, was turned out as a rude insulter. But what of the\nqueen that should come foully dressed? There would be no place for her\namidst its solemnities. You will never stand at the right hand of\nChrist, unless jour souls here are clothed in the fine linen clean and\nwhite, and over it the flashing wealth and the harmonised splendour of\nthe gold and embroidery of Christlike graces. We know how to get the\ngarment. Faith strips the rags and puts the best robe on us; and effort\nbased upon faith enables us day by day to put off the old man with his\ndeeds and to put on the new man. The bride 'made _herself_ ready,' and\n'to her was _granted_ that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean\nand white.'\n\nV. Lastly, we have the picture of the homecoming of the bride. 'She\nshall be brought unto the King.... with gladness and rejoicing shall\nthey be brought; they shall enter into the King's palace.'\n\nThe presence of virgin companions waiting on the bride is no more\ndifficult to understand here than it is in Christ's parable of the Ten\nVirgins. It is a characteristic of all parabolical representation to be\nelastic, and sometimes to duplicate its emblems for the same thing; and\nthat is the case here. But the main point to be insisted upon is this,\nthat, according to the perspective of Scripture, the life of the\nChristian Church here on earth is, if I may so say, a betrothal in\nrighteousness and loving-kindness; and that the betrothal waits for its\nconsummation in that great future when the bride shall pass into the\npresence of the King. The whole collective body of sinful souls redeemed\nby His blood, and who know the sweetness of His partially received love,\nshall be drawn within the curtains of that upper house, and enter into a\nunion with Christ Jesus ineffable, incomprehensible till experienced;\nand of which the closest union of loving souls on earth is but a dim\nshadow. 'He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit'; and the reality\nof our union with Him rises above the emblem of a marriage, as high as\nspirit rises above flesh.\n\nThe psalm stops at the palace-gate. 'Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,\nneither have entered into the heart of man the things which God hath\nprepared for them that love Him.' But there is a solemn prelude to that\ncompleted union and its deep rapture. Before it there comes the last\ncampaign of the conquering King on the white horse, who wars in\nrighteousness. Dear friends! you must choose now whether you will be of\nthe company of the Bride or of the company of the enemy. 'They that were\nready went in with Him unto the marriage, and the door was shut.'\n\nWhich side of the door do _you_ mean to be on?\n\n\n\n\nTHE CITY AND RIVER OF GOD\n\n\n    'There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of\n    God, the holy place of the tabernacles of the most High. 5. God is\n    in the midst of her; she shall not be moved: God shall help her, and\n    that right early. 6. The heathen raged, the kingdoms were moved: He\n    uttered His voice, the earth melted. 7. The Lord of hosts is with\n    us; the God of Jacob is our refuge.'--PSALM xlvi 4-7.\n\nThere are two remarkable events in the history of Israel, one or other\nof which most probably supplied the historical basis upon which this\npsalm rests. One is that wonderful deliverance of the armies of\nJehoshaphat from the attacking forces of the bordering nations, which is\nrecorded in the twentieth chapter of the Book of Chronicles. There you\nwill find that, by a singular arrangement, the sons of Korah, members of\nthe priestly order, were not only in the van of the battle, but\ncelebrated the victory by hymns of gladness. It is possible that this\nmay be one of those hymns; but I think rather that the more ordinary\nreference is the correct one, which sees in this psalm and in the two\nsucceeding ones, echoes of that supernatural deliverance of Israel in\nthe time of Hezekiah, when\n\n  'The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold,'\n\nand Sennacherib and all his army were, by the blast of the breath of His\nnostrils, swept into swift destruction.\n\nThe reasons for that historical reference may be briefly stated. We\nfind, for instance, a number of remarkable correspondences between these\nthree psalms and portions of the Book of the prophet Isaiah, who, as we\nknow, lived in the period of that deliverance. The comparison, for\nexample, which is here drawn with such lofty, poetic force between the\nquiet river which 'makes glad the city of God,' and the tumultuous\nbillows of the troubled sea, which shakes the mountain and moves the\nearth, is drawn by Isaiah in regard to the Assyrian invasion, when he\nspeaks of Israel refusing 'the waters of Shiloah, which go softly,' and,\ntherefore, having brought upon them the waters of the river--the power\nof Assyria--'which shall fill the breadth of Thy land, O Immanuel!'\nNotice, too, that the very same consolation which was given to Isaiah,\nby the revelation of that significant appellation, 'Immanuel, God with\nus,' appears in this psalm as a kind of refrain, and is the foundation\nof all its confident gladness, 'The Lord of Hosts is with us.' Besides\nthese obvious parallelisms, there are others to which I need not refer,\nwhich, taken together, seem to render it at least probable that we have\nin this psalm the devotional echo of the great deliverance of Israel\nfrom Assyria in the time of Hezekiah.\n\nNow, these verses are the cardinal central portion of the song. We may\ncall them The Hymn of the Defence and Deliverance of the City of God. We\ncannot expect to find in poetry the same kind of logical accuracy in the\nprocess of thought which we require in treatises; but the lofty emotion\nof devout song obeys laws of its own: and it is well to surrender\nourselves to the flow, and to try to see with the Psalmist's eyes for a\nmoment his sources of consolation and strength.\n\nI take the four points which seem to be the main turning-points of these\nverses--first, the gladdening river; second, the indwelling Helper;\nthird, the conquering voice; and fourth, the alliance of ourselves by\nfaith with the safe dwellers in the city of God.\n\nI. First, we have the gladdening river--an emblem of many great and\njoyous truths.\n\nThe figure is occasioned by, or at all events derives much of its\nsignificance from, a geographical peculiarity of Jerusalem. Alone among\nthe great cities and historical centres of the world, it stood upon no\nbroad river. One little perennial stream, or rather rill of living\nwater, was all which it had; but Siloam was mightier and more blessed\nfor the dwellers in the rocky fortress of the Jebusites than the\nEuphrates, Nile, or Tiber for the historical cities which stood upon\ntheir banks. One can see the Psalmist looking over the plain eastward,\nand beholding in vision the mighty forces which came against them,\nsymbolised and expressed by the breadth and depth and swiftness of the\ngreat river upon which Nineveh sat as a queen, and then thinking upon\nthe little tiny thread of living water that flowed past the base of the\nrock upon which the temple was perched. It seems small and\nunconspicuous--nothing compared to the dash of the waves and the rise of\nthe floods of those mighty secular empires, still, 'There is a river the\nstreams whereof shall make glad the city of God.' Its waters shall never\nfail, and thirst shall flee whithersoever this river comes.\n\nIt is also to be remembered that the psalm is running in the track of a\ncertain constant symbolism that pervades all Scripture. From the first\nbook of Genesis down to the last chapter of Revelation, you can hear the\ndashing of the waters of the river. 'It went out from the garden and\nparted into four heads.' 'Thou makest them drink of the river of Thy\npleasures.' 'Behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the\nhouse eastward,' and 'everything shall live whithersoever the river\ncometh.' 'He that believeth on me, out of His belly shall flow rivers of\nliving water.' 'And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as\ncrystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.' Isaiah,\nwho has already afforded some remarkable parallels to the words of our\npsalm, gives another very striking one to the image now under\nconsideration, when he says, 'The glorious Lord will be unto us a place\nof broad rivers and streams, wherein shall go no galley with oars.' The\npicture in that metaphor is of a stream lying round Jerusalem, like the\nmoated rivers which girdle some of the cities in the plains of Italy,\nand are the defence of those who dwell enclosed in their flashing links.\n\nGuided, then, by the physical peculiarity of situation which I have\nreferred to, and by the constant meaning of Scriptural symbolism, I\nthink we must conclude that this river, 'the streams whereof make glad\nthe city of God,' is God Himself in the outflow and self-communication\nof His own grace to the soul. The stream is the fountain in flow. The\ngift of God, which is living water, is God Himself, considered as the\never-imparting Source of all refreshment, of all strength, of all\nblessedness. 'This spake He of the Spirit, which they that believe\nshould receive.'\n\nWe must dwell for a moment or two still further upon these words, and\nmark how this metaphor, in a most simple and natural way, sets forth\nvery grand and blessed spiritual truths with regard to this\ncommunication of God's grace to them that love Him and trust Him. First,\nI think we may see here a very beautiful suggestion of the manner, and\nthen of the variety, and then of the effects of that communication of\nthe divine love and grace.\n\nWe have only to read the previous verses to see what I mean. 'God is our\nrefuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not\nwe fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be\ncarried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be\ntroubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof.' There\nyou can hear the wild waves dashing round the base of the firm hills,\nsapping their strength, and toppling their crests down in the bubbling,\nyeasty foam. Remember how, not only in Scripture but in all poetry, the\nsea has been the emblem of endless unrest. Its waters, those barren,\nwandering fields of foam, going moaning round the world with\nunprofitable labour, how they have been the emblem of unbridled power,\nof tumult and strife, and anarchy and rebellion! Then mark how our text\nbrings into sharpest contrast with all that hurly-burly of the tempest,\nand the dash and roar of the troubled waters, the gentle, quiet flow of\nthe river, 'the streams whereof make glad the city of God'; the\ntranslucent little ripples purling along beds of golden pebbles, and the\nenamelled meadows drinking the pure stream as it steals by them. Thus,\nsays our psalm, not with noise, not with tumult, not with conspicuous\nand destructive energy, but in silent, secret underground communication,\nGod's grace, God's love, His peace, His power, His almighty and gentle\nSelf flow into men's souls. Quietness and confidence on our sides\ncorrespond to the quietness and serenity with which He glides into the\nheart. Instead of all the noise of the sea you have within the quiet\nimpartations of the voice that is still and small, wherein God dwells.\nThe extremest power is silent. The mightiest force in all the universe\nis the force which has neither speech nor language. The parent of all\nphysical force, as astronomers seem to be more and more teaching us, is\nthe great central sun which moveth all things, which operates all\nphysical changes, whose beams are all but omnipotent, and yet fall so\nquietly that they do not disturb the motes that dance in their path.\nThunder and lightning are child's play compared with the energy that\ngoes to make the falling dews and quiet rains. The power of the sunshine\nis the root power of all force which works in material things. And so we\nturn, with the symbol in our hands, to the throne of God, and when He\nsays, 'Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit,' we are aware of an\nenergy, the signature of whose might is its quietness, which is\nomnipotent because it is gentle and silent. The seas may roar and be\ntroubled, the tiny thread of the river is mightier than them all.\n\nAnd then, still further, in this first part of our text there is also\nset forth very distinctly the number and the variety of the gifts of\nGod. 'The streams whereof,' literally, 'the divisions whereof,'--that is\nto say, going back to Eastern ideas, the broad river is broken up into\ncanals that are led off into every man's little bit of garden ground;\ncoming down to modern ideas, the water is carried by pipes into every\nman's household and chamber. The stream has its divisions; listen to\nwords that are a commentary upon the meaning of this verse, 'All these\nworketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing unto every man\nseverally as He will'--an infinite variety, an endless diversity,\naccording to all the petty wants of each that is supplied thereby. As\nyou can divide water all but infinitely, and it will take the shape of\nevery containing vessel, so into every soul according to its capacities,\naccording to its shape, according to its needs, this great gift, this\nblessed presence of the God of our strength, will come. The varieties of\nHis gifts are as much the mark of His omnipotence as the gentleness and\nstillness of them.\n\nAnd then I need only touch upon the last thought, the effects of this\ncommunicated God. 'The streams make glad'--with the gladness which comes\nfrom refreshment, with the gladness which comes from the satisfying of\nall thirsty desires, with the gladness which comes from the contact of\nthe spirit with absolute completeness; of the will, with perfect\nauthority; of the heart, with changeless love; of the understanding,\nwith pure incarnate truth; of the conscience, with infinite peace; of\nthe child, with the Father; of my emptiness, with His fulness; of my\nchangeableness, with His immutability; of my incompleteness, with His\nperfectness. They to whom this stream passes shall know no thirst; they\nwho possess it from them it shall come. Out of him 'shall flow rivers of\nliving water.' That all-sufficient Spirit not only becomes to its\npossessor the source of individual refreshment, and slakes his own\nthirst, but flows out from him for the gladdening of others.\n\n  'The least flower with a brimming cup may stand,\n     And share its dew-drop with another near.'\n\nThe city thus supplied may laugh at besieging hosts. With the deep\nreservoir in its central fortress, the foe may do as they list to all\nsurface streams, its water shall be sure, and no raging thirst shall\never drive it to surrender. The river breaks from the threshold of the\nTemple, within its walls, and when all beyond that safe enclosure is\ncracked and parched in the fierce heat, and no green thing can be seen\nin the dry and thirsty land, that stream shall 'make glad the city of\nour God,' and 'everything shall live whithersoever the river cometh.'\n'Thou shalt be as a well-watered garden, and as a river whose streams\nfail not.'\n\nII. Then notice, secondly, substantially the same general thought, but\nmodified and put in plain words--the indwelling Helper.\n\n'God is in the midst of her, she shall not be moved: God shall help her,\n_and that_ right early,' or, as the latter clause had better be\ntranslated, as it is given in the margin of some of our Bibles, 'God\nshall help her at the appearance of the morning.' There are two promises\nhere: first of all, the constant presence; and second, help at the right\ntime. Whether there be actual help or no, there is always with us the\npotential help of God, and it flashes into energy at the moment that He\nknows to be the right one. The 'appearing of the morning' He determines;\nnot you or I. Therefore, we may be confident that we have God ever by\nour sides. Not that that Presence is meant to avert outward or inward\ntrouble and trial, and painfulness and weariness; but in the midst of\nthese, and while they last, here is the assurance, 'She shall not be\nmoved'; and that it will not always last, here is the ground of the\nconfidence, 'God shall help her when the morning dawns.'\n\nI need not point out to you the contrast here between the tranquillity\nof the city which has for its central Inhabitant and Governor the\nomnipotent God, and the tumult of all that turbulent earth. The waves of\nthe troubled waters break everywhere,--they run over the flat plains and\nsweep over the mountains of secular strength and outward might, and\nworldly kingdoms, and human polities and earthly institutions, acting on\nthem all either by slow corrosive action at the base, or by the tossing\nfloods swirling against them, until they shall be lost in the ocean of\ntime. For 'the history of the world is the judgment of the world.' When\nHe wills the plains are covered and mountains disappear, but one rock\nstands fast--'The mountain of the Lord's house is exalted above the top\nof the mountains'; and when everything is rocking and swaying in the\ntempests, here is fixity and tranquillity. 'She shall not be moved.'\nWhy? Because of her citizens? No. Because of her guards and gates? No!\nBecause of her polity? No! Because of her orthodoxy? No! But because God\nis in her, and she is safe, and where He dwells no evil can come. 'Thou\ncarriest Caesar and his fortunes.' The ship of Christ carries the Lord\nand His fortunes; and, therefore, whatsoever becomes of the other little\nships in the wild dash of the tempest, this with the Lord on board\narrives at its desired haven--'God is in the midst of her, she shall not\nbe moved.'\n\nThen, still further, that Presence which is always the pledge of\nstability, and unmoved calm, even while causes of agitation are storming\naround, will, as I said, flash into energy, and be a Helper and a\nDeliverer at the right moment. And when will that right moment be? At\nthe appearing of the morning. 'And when they arose early in the morning,\nthey were all dead corpses'; in the hour of greatest extremity, but ere\nthe foe has executed his purposes; not too soon for fear and faith, not\ntoo late for hope and help; when the morning dawns, when the appointed\nhour of deliverance, which He alone determines, has struck. 'It is not\nfor you to know the times and seasons'; but this we may know, that He\nwho is the Lord of time will ever save at the best possible moment. He\nwill not come so quickly as to prevent us from feeling our need; He will\nnot tarry so long as to make us sick with hope deferred, or so long as\nto let the enemy fulfil his purposes of destruction. 'Lord, behold! he\nwhom Thou lovest is sick. Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and\nLazarus. When He had heard therefore that he was sick, He abode two days\nstill in the same place where He was.... Lord, if Thou hadst been here,\nmy brother had not died. Jesus saith unto her, Thy brother shall rise\nagain.... And he that was dead came forth.'\n\nThe Lord may seem to sleep on His hard wooden pillow in the stern of the\nlittle fishing boat, and even while the frail craft begins to fill may\nshow no sign of help. But ere the waves have rolled over her, the cry of\nfear that yet trusts, and of trust that yet fears, wakes Him who knew\nthe need, even while He seemed to slumber, and one mighty word, as of a\nmaster to some petulant slave, 'Peace! be still,' hushes the confusion,\nand rebukes the fear, and rewards the faith.\n\n'The Lord is in the midst of her'--that is the perennial fact. 'The Lord\nshall help her, and that right early'--that is the 'grace for seasonable\nhelp.'\n\nIII. The psalm having set forth these broad grounds of confidence, goes\non to tell the story of actual deliverance which confirms them, and of\nwhich they are indeed but the generalised expression.\n\nThe condensed narrative moves to its end by a series of short crashing\nsentences like the ring of the destructive axe at the roots of trees. We\nsee the whole sequence of events as by lightning flashes, which give\nbrief glimpses and are quenched. The grand graphic words seem to pant\nwith haste, as they record Israel's deliverance. That deliverance comes\nfrom the Conquering Voice. 'The heathen raged' (the same word, we may\nnote, as is found a verse or two back, 'Though the waters thereof\n_roar_'), 'the kingdoms were moved; He uttered His voice, the earth\nmelted.' With what vigour these hurried sentences describe, first, the\nwild wrath and formidable movements of the foe, and then the One\nSovereign Word which quells them all, as well as the instantaneous\nweakness that dissolves the seeming solid substance when the breath of\nHis lips smites it!\n\nAnd where will you find a grander or loftier thought than this, that the\nsimple word--the utterance of the pure will of God conquers all\nopposition, and tells at once in the sphere of material things? He\nspeaks, and it is done. At the sound of that thunder-voice, hushed\nstillness and a pause of dread fall upon all the wide earth, deeper and\nmore awe-struck than the silence of the woods with their huddling\nleaves, when the feebler peals roll through the sky. 'The depths are\ncongealed in the heart of the sea'--as if you were to lay hold of\nNiagara in its wildest plunge, and were with a word to freeze all its\ndescending waters and stiffen them into immovableness in fetters of\neternal ice. So He utters His voice, and all meaner noises are hushed.\n'The lion hath roared, who shall not fear?'\n\nHe speaks--no weapon, no material vehicle is needed. The point of\ncontact between the pure divine will and the material creatures which\nobey its behests is ever wrapped in darkness, whether these be the\nsettled ordinances which men call nature, or the less common which the\nBible calls miracle. In all alike there is, to every believer in a God\nat all, an incomprehensible action of the spiritual upon the material,\nwhich allows of no explanations to bridge over the gulf recognised in\nthe broken utterances of our psalm, 'He uttered His voice: the earth\nmelted.'\n\nHow grandly, too, these last words give the impression of immediate and\nutter dissolution of all opposition! All the Titanic brute forces are,\nat His voice, disintegrated, and lose their organisation and solidity.\n'The hills melted like wax'; 'The mountains flowed down at Thy\npresence.' The hardness and obstinacy is all liquefied and enfeebled,\nand parts with its consistency and is lost in a fluid mass. As two\ncarbon points when the electric stream is poured upon them are gnawed to\nnothingness by the fierce heat, and you can see them wasting before your\neyes, so the concentrated ardour of His breath falls upon the hostile\nevil, and lo! it is not.\n\nThe Psalmist is generalising the historical fact of the sudden and utter\ndestruction of Sennacherib's host into a universal law. And it _is_ a\nuniversal law--true for us as for Hezekiah and the sons of Korah, true\nfor all generations. Martin Luther might well make this psalm the battle\ncry of the Reformation, and we may well make our own the rugged music\nand dauntless hope of his rendering of these words:--\n\n  And let the Prince of Ill\n  Look grim as e'er he will,\n  He harms us not a whit.\n  For why? His doom is writ.\n  A word shall quickly slay him.'\n\nIV. Then note, finally, how the psalm shows us the act by which we enter\nthe City of God.\n\n'The Lord of Hosts is with _us_; the God of Jacob is _our_ refuge.' It\nis not enough to lay down general truths, however true and however\nblessed, about the safe and sacred city of God--not enough to be\ntheoretically convinced of the truth of the supreme governance and\never-present aid of God. We must take a further step that will lead us\nfar beyond the regions of barren intellectual apprehension of the great\ntruths of God's love and care. These truths are nothing to us, brethren!\nunless, like the Psalmist here, we make them our own, and losing the\nburden of self in the very act of grasping them by faith, unite\nourselves with the great multitude who are joined together in Him, and\nsay, 'He is _my_ God: He is _our_ refuge.' That living act of\n'appropriating faith' presupposes, indeed, the presence of these truths\nin our understandings, but in the very act they are changed into powers\nin our lives. They pass into the affections and the will. They are no\nmore empty generalities. Bread nourishes, not when it is looked at, but\nwhen it is eaten. 'He that eateth Me, even he shall live by Me.' We feed\non Christ when we make Him ours by faith, and each of us is sustained\nand blessed by Him when we can say, 'My Lord and my God!'\n\nMark, too, how there is here set forth the twofold ground for our\ncalmest confidence in these two mighty names of God.\n\n'The Lord of Hosts is with us.' That majestic name includes all the\ndeepest and most blessed thoughts of God which the earlier revelation\nimparted. That name of 'Jehovah' proclaims at once His Eternal Being and\nHis covenant relation--manifesting Him by its mysterious meaning as He\nwho dwells above time, the tideless sea of absolute unchanging\nexistence, from whom all the stream of creatural life flows forth\nmany-coloured and transient, to whom it all returns, who, Himself\nunchanging, changeth all things, and declaring Him, by the historical\nassociations connected with it, as having unveiled His purposes in firm\nwords, to which men may trust, and as having entered into that solemn\nleague with Israel which underlay their whole national life. He is _the\nLord_ the Eternal,--the covenant name.\n\nHe is the Lord of Hosts, the 'Imperator,' absolute Master and Commander,\nCaptain and King of all the combined forces of the universe, whether\nthey be personal or impersonal, spiritual or material, who, in serried\nranks, wait on Him, and move harmonious, obedient to His will. And this\nEternal Master of the legions of the universe is with us, weak and poor,\nand troubled and sinful as we are. Therefore, we will not fear: what can\nman do unto us?\n\nAgain, when we say, 'The God of Jacob is our refuge,' we reach back into\nthe past, and lay hold of the mercies promised to, and received by, the\nlong vanished generations who trusted in Him and were lightened. As, by\nthe one name, we appeal to His own Being and uttered pledge, so, by the\nother, we appeal to His ancient deeds--past as we call them, but present\nwith Him, who lives and loves in the undivided eternity above the low\nfences of time. All that He has been, He is; all that He has done, He is\ndoing. We on whom the ends of the earth are come have the same Helper,\nthe same Friend that 'the world's grey fathers' had. They that go before\ndo not prevent them that come after. The river is full still. The van of\nthe pilgrim host did, indeed, long, long ago drink and were satisfied,\nbut the bright waters are still as pellucid, still as near, still as\nrefreshing, still as abundant as they ever were. Nay, rather, they are\nfuller and more accessible to us than to patriarch and Psalmist, 'God\nhaving provided some better thing for us, that they without us should\nnot be made perfect.'\n\nFor we, brethren! have a fuller revelation of that mighty name, and a\nmore wondrous and closer divine presence by our sides. The psalm\nrejoices in that 'The Lord of Hosts is with us'; and the choral answer\nof the Gospel swells into loftier music, as it tells of the fulfilment\nof psalmists' hopes and prophets' visions in Him who is called\n'Immanuel,' which is, being interpreted, 'God with us.' The psalm is\nconfident in that God dwelt in Zion, and our confidence has the more\nwondrous fact to lay hold of, that even now the Word who dwelt among us\nmakes His abode in every believing heart, and gathers them all together\nat last in that great city, round whose flashing foundations no tumult\nof ocean beats, whose gates of pearl need not be closed against any\nfoes, with whose happy citizens 'God will dwell, and they shall be His\npeople, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE LORD OF HOSTS, THE GOD OF JACOB\n\n\n    'The Lord of Hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our Refuge.'\n    --PSALM xlvi. 11.\n\nSome great deliverance, the details of which we do not know, had been\nwrought for Israel, and this psalmist comes forth, like Miriam with her\nchoir of maidens, to hymn the victory. The psalm throbs with exultation,\nbut no human victor's name degrades the singer's lips. There is only one\nConqueror whom he celebrates. The deliverance has been 'the work of the\nLord'; the 'desolations' that have been made on the 'earth' 'He has\nmade.' This great refrain of the song, which I have chosen for my text,\ntakes the experience of deliverance as a proof in act of an astounding\ntruth, and as a hope for the future. 'The Lord of hosts is with us; the\nGod of Jacob is our Refuge.'\n\nThere is in these words a significant duplication of idea, both in\nregard to the names which are given to God, and to that which He is\nconceived as being to us; and I desire now simply to try to bring out\nthe force of the consolation and strength which lie in these two\nepithets of His, and in the double wonder of His relation to us men.\n\nI. First, then, I ask you to look at the twin thoughts of God that are\nhere. 'The Lord of hosts ... The God of Jacob.'\n\nNow, with regard to the former of these grand names, it may be observed\nthat it does not occur in the earliest stages of Revelation as recorded\nin the Old Testament. The first instance in which we find it is in the\nsong of Hannah in the beginning of the first Book of Samuel; and it\nre-appears in the Davidic psalms and in psalms and prophecies of later\ndate.\n\nWhat 'hosts' are they of which God is the Lord? Is that great title a\nmere synonym for the half-heathenish idea of the 'God of battles'? By no\nmeans. True! He is the Lord of the armies of Israel, but the hosts which\nthe Psalmist sees ranged in embattled array, and obedient to the command\nof the great Captain, are far other and grander than any earthly armies.\nIf we would understand the whole depth and magnificent sweep of the idea\nenshrined in this name, we cannot do better than recall one or two other\nScripture phrases. For instance, the account of the Creation in the Book\nof Genesis is ended by, 'Thus the heavens and the earth were finished,\nand all the host of them.' Then, remember that, throughout the Old\nTestament, we meet constantly with the idea of the celestial bodies as\nbeing 'the hosts of heaven.' And, still further, remember how, in one of\nthe psalms, we hear the invocation to 'all ye His hosts, ye ministers of\nHis that do His pleasure,' 'the angels that excel in strength,' to\npraise and bless Him. If we take account of all these and a number of\nsimilar passages, I think we shall come to this conclusion, that by that\ntitle, 'the Lord of hosts,' the prophets and psalmists meant to express\nthe universal dominion of God over the whole universe in all its\nbattalions and sections, which they conceived of as one ranked army,\nobedient to the voice of the great General and Ruler of them all.\n\nSo the idea contained in the name is precisely parallel with that to\nwhich the heathen centurion in the Gospels had come, by reflecting upon\nthe teaching of the legion in which he himself commanded, when he said,\n'I am a man under authority, having servants under me; and I say to this\none, Go, and he goeth; to another, Come, and he cometh; to another, Do\nthis, and he doeth it--speak Thou the word!' To him Jesus Christ was\nCaptain of the Lord's hosts, and Ruler of all the ordered forces of the\nuniverse. The Old Testament name enshrines the same idea. The universe\nis an ordered whole. Science tells us that. Modern thought emphasises\nit. But how cruel, relentless, crushing, that conception may be unless\nwe grasp the further thought which is presented in this great Name, and\nsee, behind all the play of phenomena, the one Will which is the only\npower in the universe, and sways and orders all besides! The armies of\nheaven and every creature in the great _Cosmos_ are the servants of this\nLord. Then we can stand before the dreadful mysteries and the all but\ninfinite complications of this mighty Whole, and say, 'These are His\nsoldiers, and He is their Captain, the Lord of hosts.'\n\nNext we turn, by one quick bound, from the wide sweep of that mighty\nName to the other, 'The God of Jacob.' The one carries us out among the\nglories of the universe, and shows us, behind them all, the personal\nWill of which they are the servants, and the Character of which they are\nthe expressions. The other brings us down to the tent of the solitary\nwanderer, and shows us that that mighty Commander and Emperor enters\ninto close, living, tender, personal relations with one poor soul, and\nbinds Himself by that great covenant, which is rooted in His love alone,\nto be the God who cares for and keeps and blesses the man in all his\nwanderings. Neither does the command of the mighty Whole hinder the\nclosest relation to the individual, nor does the care of the individual\ninterfere with the direction of the Whole. The single soul stands out\nclear and isolated, as if there were none in the universe but God and\nhimself; and the whole fulness of the divine power, and all the\ntenderness of the God-heart, are lavished upon the individual, even\nthough the armies of the skies wait upon His nod.\n\nSo, if we put the two names together, we get the completion of the great\nidea; and whilst the one speaks to us of infinite power, of absolute\nsupremacy, of universal rule, and so delivers us from the fear of\nnature, and from the blindness which sees only the material operations\nand not the working Hand that underlies them, the other speaks to us of\ngentle and loving and specific care, and holds out the hope that,\nbetween man and God, there may be a bond of friendship and of mutual\npossession so sweet and sacred that nothing else can compare with it.\nThe God of Jacob is the Lord of hosts. More wondrous still, the Lord of\nhosts is the God of Jacob.\n\nII. Note, secondly, the double wonder of our relation to this great God.\n\nThere is almost a tone of glad surprise, as well as of triumphant\nconfidence, in this refrain of our psalm, which comes twice in it, and\npossibly ought to have come three times--at the end of each of its\nsections. The emphasis is to be laid on the 'us' and the 'our,' as if\nthat was the miracle, and the fact which startled the Psalmist into the\nhighest rapture of astonished thankfulness.\n\n'The Lord of hosts is with _us_.' What does that say? It proclaims that\nwondrous truth that no gulf between the mighty Ruler of all and us, the\ninsignificant little creatures that creep upon the face of this tiny\nplanet, has any power of separating us from Him. It is always hard to\nbelieve that. It is harder to-day than it was when our Psalmist's heart\nbeat high at the thought. It is hard by reason of our sense-bound\nblindness, by reason of our superficial way of looking at things, which\nonly shows us the nearest, and veils with their insignificances the\nmagnitude of the furthest. Jupiter is blazing in our skies every night\nnow; he is not one-thousandth part as great or bright as any one of the\nlittle needle-points of light, the fixed stars, that are so much further\naway; but he is nearer, and the intrusive brightness of the planet hides\nthe modest glories of the distant and shrouded suns. Just so it is hard\nfor us ever to realise, and to walk in the light of the realisation of,\nthe fact that the Lord of hosts, the Emperor of all things, is of a\ntruth with each of us.\n\nIt is harder to-day than ever it was; for we have learned to think\nrightly--or at least more rightly and approximately rightly--of the\nposition and age of man upon this earth. The Psalmist's ancient question\nof devout thankfulness is too often travestied to-day into a question of\nscoffing or of melancholy unbelief: 'When I consider the heavens, the\nwork of Thy hands; what is man? Art Thou mindful of him?' This psalm\ncomes to answer that. 'The Lord of hosts is with us.' True, we are but\nof yesterday, and know nothing. True, earth is but a pin-point amidst\nthe universe's glories. True, we are crushed down by sorrow and by care;\nand in some moods it seems supremely incredible that we should be of\nsuch worth in the scale of Creation as that the Lord of all things\nshould, in a deeper sense than the Psalmist knew, have dwelt with us and\nbe with us still. But bigness is not greatness, and there is nothing\nincredible in the belief that men, lower than the angels, and needing\nGod more because of their sin, do receive His visitations in an\naltogether special sense, and that, passing by the lofty and the great\nthat may inhabit His universe, His chariot wheels stoop to us, and that,\nbecause we are sinners, God is with us.\n\nLet me remind you, dear brethren! of how this great thought of my text\nis heightened and transcended by the New Testament teaching. We believe\nin One whose name is 'Immanuel, _God with us_.' Jesus Christ has come to\nbe with men, not only during the brief years of His earthly ministry, in\ncorporeal reality, but to be with all who love Him and trust Him, in a\nfar closer, more real, more deep, more precious, more operative Presence\nthan when He dwelt here. Through all the ages Christ Himself is with\nevery soul that loves Him; and He will dwell beside _us_ and bless _us_\nand keep _us_. God's presence means God's sympathy, God's knowledge,\nGod's actual help, and these are ours if we will. Instead of staggering\nat the apparent improbability that so transcendent and mighty a Being\nshould stoop from His throne, where He lords it over the universe, and\nenter into the narrow room of our hearts, let us rather try to rise to\nthe rapture of the astonished Psalmist when, looking upon the\ndeliverance that had been wrought, this was the leading conviction that\nwas written in flame upon his heart, 'The Lord of hosts is with _us_.'\n\nAnd then the second of the wonders that are here set forth in regard to\nour relations to Him is, 'the God of Jacob is _our_ Refuge.'\n\nThat carries for us the great truth that, just as the distance between\nus and God makes no separation, and the gulf is one that is bridged over\nby His love, so distance in time leads to no exhaustion of the divine\nfaithfulness and care, nor any diminution of the resources of His grace.\n'The God of Jacob is _our_ Refuge.' The story of the past is the\nprophecy of the future. What God has been to any man He will be to every\nman, if the man will let Him. There is nothing in any of these grand\nnarratives of ancient days which is not capable of being reproduced in\nour lives. God drew near to Jacob when he was lying on the stony ground,\nand showed him the ladder set upon earth, with its top in the heavens,\nand the bright-winged soldiers and messengers of His will ascending and\ndescending upon it, and His own face at the top. God shows you and me\nthat vision to-day. It was no vanishing splendour, no transient\nillumination, no hallucination of the man's own thoughts seeking after a\nhelper, and the wish being father to the vision. But it was the\nunveiling for a moment, in supernatural fashion, of the abiding reality.\n'The God of Jacob is _our_ Refuge'; and whatever He was to His servant\nof old He is to-day to you and me.\n\nWe say that miracle has ceased. Yes. But that which the miracle effected\nhas not ceased; and that from which the miracle came has not ceased. The\nrealities of a divine protection, of a divine supply, of a divine\nguidance, of a divine deliverance, of a divine discipline, and of a\ndivine reward at the last, are as real to-day as when they were mediated\nby signs and wonders, by an open heaven and by an outstretched hand.\nThey who went before have not emptied the treasures of the Father's\nhouse, nor eaten all the bread that He spreads upon the table. God has\nno stepchildren, and no favourite and spoiled ones. All that the elder\nbrethren have had, we, on whom the ends of the dispensation are come,\nmay have just as really; and whatever God has been to the patriarch He\nis to us to-day.\n\nRemember the experience of the man of whom our text speaks. The God of\nJacob manifested Himself to him as being a God who would draw near to,\nand care for, and help, a very unworthy and poor creature. Jacob was no\nsaint at the beginning. Selfishness and cunning and many a vice clung\nvery close to his character; but for all that, God drew near to him and\ncared for him and guided him, and promised that He would not leave him\ntill He had done that which He had spoken to him of. And He will do the\nsame for us--blessed be His name!--with all our faults and weaknesses\nand craftiness and worldliness and sins. If He cared for that\nhuckstering Jew, as He did, even in his earlier days, He will not put us\naway because He finds faults in us. 'The God of Jacob,' the supplanter,\nthe trickster, 'is our Refuge.'\n\nBut remember how the divine Presence with that man had to be, because of\nhis faults, a Presence that wrought him sorrows and forced him to\nundergo discipline. So it will be with us. He will not suffer sin upon\nus; He will pass us through the fire and the water; and do anything with\nus short of destroying us, in order to destroy the sin that is in us. He\ndoes not spare His rod for His child's crying, but smites with judgment,\nand sends us sorrows 'for our profit, that we should be partakers of His\nholiness.' We may write this as the explanation over most of our\ngriefs--'the God of Jacob is our Refuge,' and He is disciplining us as\nHe did him.\n\nAnd remember what the end of the man was. 'Thy name shall no more be\ncalled Jacob, but Israel; for as a prince thou hast power with God, and\nhast prevailed.' So if we have God, who out of such a sow's ear made a\nsilk purse, out of such a stone raised up a servant for Himself, we may\nbe sure that His purpose in all discipline will be effected on us\nsubmissive, and we shall end where His ancient servant ended, and shall\nbe in our turn princes with God.\n\nLet me recall to you also the meaning which Jesus Christ found in this\nname. He quoted 'the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob' as being\nthe great guarantee and proof to us of immortality. 'The God of Jacob is\nour Refuge.' If so, what can the grim and ghastly phantom of death do to\nus? He may smite upon the gate, but he cannot enter the fortress. The\nman who has knit himself to God by saying to God, 'Lo! I am Thine, and\nThou art mine,' in that communion has a proof and a pledge that nothing\nshall ever break it, and that death is powerless. The fact of\nreligion--true, heartfelt religion, with its communion, its prayer, its\nconsciousness of possessing and of being possessed, makes the idea that\ndeath ends a man's conscious existence an absurdity and an\nimpossibility.\n\n'The God of Jacob is our Refuge,' and so we may say to the storms of\nlife, and after them to the last howling tornado of death--Blow winds\nand crack your cheeks, and do your worst, you cannot touch me in the\nfortress where I dwell. The wind will hurtle around the stronghold, but\nwithin there shall be calm.\n\nDear brethren! make sure that you are in the refuge. Make sure that you\nhave fled for 'Refuge to the hope set before you in the Gospel.' The\nLord of hosts is with us,' but you may be parted from Him. He is our\nRefuge, but you may be standing outside the sanctuary, and so be exposed\nto all the storms. Flee thither, cast yourselves on Him, trust in that\ngreat Saviour who has given Himself for us, and who says to us, 'Lo! I\nam with you always.' Take Christ for your hiding-place by simple faith\nin Him and loving obedience born of faith, and then the experience of\nour Psalmist will be yours. Your life will not want for deliverances\nwhich will thrill your heart with thankfulness, and turn the truth of\nfaith into a truth of experience. So you may set to your seals the great\nsaying of our psalm, which is fresh to-day, though centuries have passed\nsince it came glowing fiery from the lips of the ancient seer, and may\ntake up as yours the great words in which Luther has translated it for\nour times, the 'Marseillaise' of the Reformation--\n\n  'A safe stronghold our God is still;\n     A trusty shield and weapon;\n   He'll help us clear from all the ill\n     That hath us now o'ertaken.'\n\n\n\n\nA SONG OF DELIVERANCE\n\n\n    'Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised in the city of our\n    God, in the mountain of His holiness. 2. Beautiful for situation,\n    the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the\n    north, the city of the great King. 3. God is known in her palaces\n    for a refuge. 4. For, lo, the kings were assembled, they passed by\n    together. 5. They saw it, and so they marvelled; they were troubled,\n    and hasted away. 6. Fear took hold upon them there, and pain, as of\n    a woman in travail. 7. Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an\n    east wind. 8. As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the\n    Lord of hosts, in the city of our God: God will establish it for\n    ever. 9. We have thought of Thy loving-kindness, O God, in the midst\n    of Thy temple. 10. According to Thy name, O God, so is Thy praise\n    unto the ends of the earth: Thy right hand is full of righteousness.\n    11. Let mount Zion rejoice, let the daughters of Judah be glad,\n    because of Thy judgments. 12. Walk about Zion, and go round about\n    her: tell the towers thereof. 13. Mark ye well her bulwarks,\n    consider her palaces; that ye may tell it to the generation\n    following. 14. For this God is our God for ever and ever: He will be\n    our guide even unto death.'--PSALM xlviii. 1-14.\n\nThe enthusiastic triumph which throbs in this psalm, and the specific\ndetails of a great act of deliverance from a great peril which it\ncontains, sufficiently indicate that it must have had some historical\nevent as its basis. Can we identify the fact which is here embalmed?\n\nThe psalm gives these points--a formidable muster before Jerusalem of\nhostile people under confederate kings, with the purpose of laying siege\nto the city; some mysterious check which arrests them before a sword is\ndrawn, as if some panic fear had shot from its towers and shaken their\nhearts; and a flight in wild confusion from the impregnable\ndwelling-place of the Lord of hosts. The occasion of the terror is\nvaguely hinted at, as if some solemn mystery brooded over it. All that\nis clear about it is that it was purely the work of the divine\nhand--'Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind'; and that\nin this deliverance, in their own time, the Levite minstrels recognised\nthe working of the same protecting grace which, from of old, had\n'commanded deliverances for Jacob.'\n\nNow there is one event, and only one, in Jewish history, which\ncorresponds, point for point, to these details--the crushing destruction\nof the Assyrian army under Sennacherib. There, there was the same\nmustering of various nations, compelled by the conqueror to march in his\ntrain, and headed by their tributary kings. There, there was the same\narrest before an arrow had been shot, or a mound raised against the\ncity. There, there was the same purely divine agency coming in to\ndestroy the invading army.\n\nI think, then, that from the correspondence of the history with the\nrequirements of the psalm, as well as from several similarities of\nexpression and allusion between the latter and the prophecies of Isaiah,\nwho has recorded that destruction of the invader, we may, with\nconsiderable probability, regard this psalm as the hymn of triumph over\nthe baffled Assyrian, and the marvellous deliverance of Israel by the\narm of God.\n\nWhatever may be thought, however, of that allocation of it to a place in\nthe history, the great truths that it contains depend upon no such\nidentification. They are truths for all time; gladness and consolation\nfor all generations. Let us read it over together now, if, perchance,\nsome echo of the confidence and praise that is found in it may be called\nforth from our hearts! If you will look at your Bibles you will find\nthat it falls into three portions. There is the glory of Zion, the\ndeliverance of Zion, and the consequent grateful praise and glad trust\nof Zion.\n\nI. There is the glory of Zion.\n\nHearken with what triumph the Psalmist breaks out: 'Great is the Lord,\nand greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of His\nholiness. Beautiful for situation (or rather elevation), the joy of the\nwhole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the\ngreat King.' Now these words are something more than mere patriotic\nfeeling. The Jew's glory in Jerusalem was a different thing altogether\nfrom the Roman's pride in Rome. To the devout men amongst them, of whom\nthe writer of this psalm was one, there was one thing, and one only,\nthat made Zion glorious. It was beautiful indeed in its elevation,\nlifted high upon its rocky mountain. It was safe indeed, isolated from\nthe invader by the precipitous ravines which enclosed and guarded the\nangle of the mountain plateau on which it stood; but _the one_ thing\nthat gave it glory was that in _it_ God abode. The name even of that\nearthly Zion was 'Jehovah-Shammah, the Lord is there.' And the emphasis\nof these words is entirely pointed in that direction. What they\ncelebrate concerning _Him_ is not merely the general thought that the\nLord is great, but that the Lord is _great in Zion_. What they celebrate\nconcerning _it_ is that it is His city, the mountain of His holiness,\nwhere He dwells, where He manifests Himself. Because there is His\nself-manifestation, therefore He is there greatly to be praised. And\nbecause the clear voice of His praise rings out from Zion, therefore is\nshe 'the joy of the whole earth.' The glory of Zion, then, is that it is\nthe dwelling-place of God.\n\nNow, remember, that when the Old Testament Scripture speaks about God\nabiding in Jerusalem, it means no heathenish or material localising of\nthe Deity, nor does it imply any depriving of the rest of the earth of\nthe sanctity of His presence. The very psalm which most distinctly\nembodies the thought of God's abode protests against that narrowness,\nfor it begins, 'The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof: the\nworld and they that dwell therein.' The very ark which was the symbol of\nHis presence, protests by its name against all such localising, for the\nname of it was 'the ark of the covenant of the God of the whole earth.'\nWhen the Bible speaks of Zion as the dwelling-place of God, it is but\nthe expression of the fact that there, between the cherubim, was the\nvisible sign of His presence--that there, in the Temple, as from the\ncentre of the whole land, He ruled, and 'out of Zion, the perfection of\nbeauty, God shone.'\n\nWe are, then, not 'spiritualising,' or forcing a New Testament meaning\ninto these words, when we see in them an Eternal Truth. We are but\nfollowing in the steps of history and prophecy, and of Christ and His\nApostles, and of that last vision of the Apocalypse. We are but\ndistinguishing between an idea and the fact which more or less perfectly\nembodies it. An idea may have many garments, may transmigrate into many\ndifferent material forms. The idea of the dwelling of God with men had\nits less perfect embodiment, has its more perfect embodiment, will have\nits absolutely perfect embodiment. It had its less perfect in that\nancient time. It has its real but partial embodiment in this present\ntime, when, in the midst of the whole community of believing and loving\nsouls, which stretches wider than any society that calls itself a\nChurch, the living God abides and energises by His Spirit and by His Son\nin the souls of them that believe upon Him. 'Ye are come unto Mount Zion\nand unto the city of the living God.' And we wait for the time when,\nfilling all the air with its light, there shall come down from God a\nperfect and permanent form of that dwelling; and that great city, the\nNew Jerusalem, 'having the glory of God,' shall appear, and He will\ndwell with men and be their God.\n\nBut in all these stages of the embodiment of that great truth the glory\nof Zion rests in this, that in it God abides, that from it He flames in\nthe greatness of His manifestations, which are 'His praise in all the\nearth.' It is that presence which makes her fair, as it is that presence\nwhich keeps her safe. It is that light shining within her palaces--not\ntheir own opaque darkness, which streams out far into the waste night\nwith ruddy glow of hospitable invitation. It is God in her, not anything\nof her own, that constitutes her 'the joy of the whole earth.' 'Thy\nbeauty was perfect, through My comeliness, which I had put upon thee,\nsaith the Lord.' Zion is where hearts love and trust and follow Christ.\nThe 'city of the great King' is a permanent reality in a partial form\nupon earth--and that partial form is itself a prophecy of the perfection\nof the heavens.\n\nII. Still further, there is a second portion of this psalm which,\npassing beyond these introductory thoughts of the glory of Zion,\nrecounts with wonderful power and vigour the process of the deliverance\nof Zion.\n\nIt extends from the fourth to the eighth verses. Mark the dramatic\nvigour of the description of the deliverance. There is, first, the\nmustering of the armies--'The kings were assembled.' Some light is\nthrown upon that phrase by the proud boast which the prophet Isaiah puts\ninto the lips of the Assyrian invader, 'Are not my princes altogether\nkings?' The subject-monarchs of the subdued nationalities that were\ngathered round the tyrant's standard were used, with the wicked craft of\nconquerors in all ages, to bring still other lands under the same iron\ndominion. 'The kings were assembled'--we see them gathering their\nfar-reaching and motley army, mustered from all corners of that gigantic\nempire. They advance together against the rocky fortress that towers\nabove its girdling valleys. 'They saw it, they marvelled'--in wonder,\nperhaps, at its beauty, as they first catch sight of its glittering\nwhiteness from some hill crest on their march; or, perhaps, stricken by\nsome strange amazement, as if, basilisk-like, its beauty were deadly,\nand a beam from the Shechinah had shot a nameless awe into their\nsouls--'they were troubled, they hasted away.'\n\nI need not dilate on the power of this description, nor do more than\nnotice how the abruptness of the language, huddled together, as it were,\nwithout connecting particles, conveys the impression of hurry and\nconfusion, culminating in the rush of fugitives fleeing under the\ninfluence of panic-terror. They are like the well-known words, 'I came,\nI saw, I conquered,' only that here we have to do with swift\ndefeat--they came, they saw, they were conquered. They are, in regard to\nvivid picturesqueness, arising from the broken construction, singularly\nlike other words which refer to the same event in the forty-sixth psalm,\n'The heathen raged, the kingdoms were moved; He uttered His voice, the\nearth melted.' In their scornful emphasis of triumph they remind us of\nIsaiah's description of the end of the same invasion--'So Sennacherib,\nking of Assyria, departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh.'\n\nMark, still further, the eloquent silence as to the cause of the panic\nand the flight. There is no appearance of armed resistance. This is no\n'battle of the warrior with garments rolled in blood,' and the shock of\ncontending hosts. But an unseen Hand smites once--'and when the morning\ndawned they were all dead corpses.' The impression of terror produced by\nsuch a blow is increased by the veiled allusion to it here. The silence\nmagnifies the deliverance. If we might apply the grand words of Milton\nto that night of fear--\n\n  'The trumpet spake not to the armed throng,\n   But kings sat still, with awful eye,\n   As if they surely knew their sovereign Lord was by.'\n\nThe process of the deliverance is not told here, as there was no need it\nshould be in a hymn which is not history, but the lyrical echo of what\nis told in history; one image explains it all--'Thou breakest the ships\nof Tarshish with an east wind.' The metaphor--one that does not need\nexpansion here--is that of a ship like a great unwieldy galleon, caught\nin a tempest. However strong for fight, it is not fit for sailing. It is\nlike some of those turret ships of ours, if they venture out from the\ncoast and get into a storm, their very strength is their destruction,\ntheir armour wherein they trusted ensures that they shall sink. And so,\nthis huge assailant of Israel, this great 'galley with oars,' washing\nabout there in the trough of the sea, as it were--God broke it in two\nwith the tempest, which is His breath. You remember how on the medal\nthat commemorated the destruction of the Spanish Armada--our English\ndeliverance--there were written the words of Scripture: 'God blew upon\nthem and they were scattered.' What was there true, literally, is here\ntrue in figure. The Psalmist is not thinking of any actual scattering of\nhostile fleets--from which Jerusalem was never in danger; but is using\nthe shipwreck of 'the ship of Tarshish' as a picture of the utter,\nswift, God-inflicted destruction which ground that invading army to\npieces, as the savage rocks and wild seas will do the strongest craft\nthat is mangled between them.\n\nAnd then, mark how from this dramatic description there rises a loftier\nthought still. The deliverance thus described links the present with the\npast. 'As we have heard so have we seen in the city of the Lord of\nhosts, in the city of our God.' Yes, brethren! God's merciful\nmanifestation for ourselves, as for those Israelitish people of old, has\nthis blessed effect, that it changes hearsay and tradition into living\nexperience;--this blessed effect, that it teaches us, or ought to teach\nus, the inexhaustibleness of the divine power, the constant repetition\nin every age of the same works of love. Taught by it, we learn that all\nthese old narratives of His grace and help are ever new, not past and\ngone, but ready to be reproduced in their essential characteristics in\nour lives too. 'We have heard with our ears, O Lord, our fathers have\ntold us what work Thou didst in their days.' But is the record only a\nmelancholy contrast with our own experience? Nay, truly. 'As we have\nheard so have we seen.' We are ever tempted to think of the present as\ncommonplace. The sky right above our heads is always farthest from\nearth. It is at the horizon behind and the horizon in front, where earth\nand heaven seem to blend. We think of miracles in the past, we think of\na manifest presence of God in the future, but the present ever seems to\nour sense-bound understandings as beggared and empty of Him, devoid of\nHis light. But this verse suggests to us how, if we mark the daily\ndealings of that loving Hand with us, we have every occasion to say, Thy\nloving-kindness of old lives still. Still, as of old, the hosts of the\nLord encamp round about them that fear Him to deliver them. Still, as of\nold, the voice of guidance comes from between the cherubim. Still, as of\nold, the pillar of cloud and fire moves before us. Still, as of old,\nangels walk with men. Still, as of old, His hand is stretched forth, to\nbless, to feed, to guard. Nothing in the past of God's dealings with men\nhas passed away. The eternal present embraces what we call the past,\npresent, and future. They that went before do not prevent us on whom the\nends of the ages are come. The table that was spread for them is as\nfully furnished for the latest guests. The light, which was so magical\nand lustrous in the morning beauty, for us has not faded away into the\nlight of common day. The river which flowed in these past ages has not\nbeen drunk up by the thirsty sands. The fire that once blazed so clear\nhas not died down into grey ashes. 'The God of _Jacob_ is _our_ refuge.'\n'As we have heard so have we seen.'\n\nAnd then, still further, the deliverance here is suggested as not only\nlinking most blessedly the present with the past, but also linking it\nfor our confidence with all the _future_. 'God will establish it for\never.'\n\n  'Old experience doth attain\n   To something of prophetic strain.'\n\nIn the strength of what that moment had taught of God and His power, the\nsinger looks onward, and whatever may be the future he knows that the\ndivine arm will be outstretched. God will establish Zion; or, as the\nword might be translated, God will hold it erect, as if with a strong\nhand grasping some pole or banner-staff that else would totter and\nfall--He will keep it up, standing there firm and steadfast.\n\nIt would lead us too far to discuss the bearing of such a prophecy upon\nthe future history and restoration of Israel, but the bearing of it upon\nthe security and perpetuity of the Church is unquestionable. The city is\nimmortal because God dwells in it. For the individual and for the\ncommunity, for the great society and for each of the single souls that\nmake it up, the history of the past may seal the pledge which He gives\nfor the future. If it had been possible to destroy the Church of the\nliving God, it had been gone long, long ago. Its own weakness and sin,\nthe ever-new corruptions of its belief and paring of its creed, the\nimperfections of its life and the worldliness of its heart, the\nabounding evils that lie around it and the actual hostility of many that\nlook upon it and say, Raze it, even to the ground, would have smitten it\nto the dust long since. It lives, it has lived in spite of all, and\ntherefore it shall live. 'God will establish it for ever.'\n\nIn almost every land there is some fortress or other, which the pride of\nthe inhabitants calls 'the maiden fortress,' and whereof the legend is,\nthat it has never been taken, and is inexpugnable by any foe. It is true\nabout the tower of the flock, the stronghold of the daughter of Zion.\nThe grand words of Isaiah about this very Assyrian invader are our\nanswer to all fears within and foes without: 'Say unto him, the virgin,\nthe daughter of Zion, hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn; the\ndaughter of Jerusalem hath shaken her head at thee.... I will defend\nthis city to save it for My own sake, and for My servant David's sake.'\n'God will establish it for ever,' and the pledges of that eternal\nstability are the deliverances of the past and of the present.\n\nIII. Then, finally, there is still another section of this psalm to be\nlooked at for a moment, which deals with the consequent grateful praise\nand glad trust of Zion.\n\nI must condense what few things I have to say about these closing\nverses. The deliverance, first of all, deepens the glad meditation on\nGod's favour and defence. 'We have thought,' say the ransomed people, as\nwith a sigh of rejoicing, 'we have thought of Thy loving-kindness in the\nmidst of Thy temple.' The scene of the manifestation of His power is the\nscene of their thankfulness, and the first issue of His mercy is His\nservants' praise.\n\nThen, the deliverance spreads His fame throughout the world. 'According\nto Thy name, O God! so is Thy praise unto the ends of the earth. Thy\nright hand is full of righteousness.' The name of God is God's own\nmaking known of His character, and the thought of these words is double.\nThey most beautifully express the profoundest trust in that blessed name\nthat it only needs to be known in order to be loved. There is nothing\nwanted but His manifestation of Himself for His praise and glory to\nspread. Why is the Psalmist so sure that according to the revelation of\nHis character will be the revenue of His praise? Because the Psalmist is\nso sure that that character is purely, perfectly, simply good--nothing\nelse but good and blessing--and that He cannot act but in such a way as\nto magnify Himself. That great sea will cast up nothing on the shores of\nthe world but pearls and precious things. He is all 'light, and in Him\nis no darkness at all.' There needs but the shining forth in order that\nthe light of His character shall bring gladness and joy, and the song of\nbirds, and opening flowers wheresoever it falls.\n\nStill further, there is the other truth in the words, that we\nmisapprehend the purpose of our own deliverances, and the purpose of\nGod's mercy to Zion, if we confine these to any personal objects or lose\nsight of the loftier end of them all--that men may learn to know and\nlove Him. Brethren! we neither rightly thank Him for His gifts to us nor\nrightly apprehend the meaning of His dealings, unless the sweetest\nthought to us, even in the midst of our own personal joy for\ndeliverance, is not 'we are saved,' but 'God is exalted.'\n\nAnd then, beyond that, the deliverance produces in Zion, the mother city\nand her daughter villages, a triumph of rapture and gladness. 'Let mount\nZion rejoice, let the daughters of Judah be glad because of Thy\njudgments.' Yes, even though an hundred and four score and five thousand\ndead men lay there, they were to be glad. Solemn and awful as is the\nbaring of His righteous sword, it is an occasion for praise. It is right\nto be glad when men and systems that hinder and fight against God are\nswept away as with the besom of destruction. 'When the wicked perish\nthere is shouting,' and the fitting epitaph for the oppressors to whom\nthe surges of the Red Sea are shroud and gravestone is, 'Sing ye to the\nLord, for He hath triumphed gloriously.'\n\nThe last verses set forth, more fully than even the preceding ones, the\nheight and perfectness of the confidence which the manifold mercies of\nGod ought to produce in men's hearts. The citizens who have been cooped\nup during the invasion, and who, in the temple, as we have seen, have\nbeen rendering the tribute of their meditation and thankful gratitude to\nGod for His loving-kindness, are now called upon to come forth from the\nenclosure of the besieged city, and free from all fear of the invading\narmy, to 'walk about Zion, and go round about her and tell the towers,'\nand 'mark her bulwarks and palaces.'\n\nThey look first at the defences, on which no trace of assault appears,\nand then at the palaces guarded by them, that stand shining and\nunharmed. The deliverance has been so complete that there is not a sign\nof the peril or the danger left. It is not like a city besieged, and the\nsiege raised when the thing over which contending hosts have been\nquarrelling has become a ruin, but not one stone has been smitten from\nthe walls, nor one agate chipped in the windows of the palaces. It is\nunharmed as well as uncaptured.\n\nThus, we may say, no matter what tempests assail us, the wind will but\nsweep the rotten branches out of the tree. Though war should arise,\nnothing will be touched that belongs to Thee. We have a city which\ncannot be moved; and the removal of the things which can be shaken but\nmakes more manifest its impregnable security, its inexpugnable peace. As\nin war they will clear away the houses and the flower gardens that have\nbeen allowed to come and cluster about the walls and fill up the moat,\nyet the walls will stand; so in all the conflicts that befall God's\nchurch and God's truth, the calming thought ought to be ours that if\nanything perishes it is a sign that it is not His, but man's excrescence\non His building. Whatever is His will stand for ever.\n\nAnd then, with wonderful tenderness and beauty, the psalm in its last\nwords drops, as one might say, in one aspect, and in another, _rises_\nfrom its contemplations of the immortal city and the community to the\nthought of the individuals that make it up: 'For this God is our God for\never and ever; He will be our guide _even_ unto death.' Prosaic\ncommentators have often said that these last two words are an\ninterpolation, that they do not fit into the strain of the psalm, and\nhave troubled themselves to find out what meaning to attach to them,\nbecause it seemed to them so unlikely that, in a hymn that had only to\ndo with the community, we should find this expression of individual\nconfidence in anticipation of that most purely personal of all evils.\nThat seems to me the very reason for holding fast by the words as being\na genuine part of the psalm, because they express a truth, without which\nthe confident hope of the psalm, grand as it is, is but poor consolation\nfor each heart. It is not enough for passing, perishing men to say,\n'Never mind your own individual fate: the society, the community, will\nstand fast and firm.'\n\nI want something more than to know that God will establish Zion for\never. What about _me_, my own individual self? And these last words\nanswer that question. Not merely the city abides, but 'He will be our\nguide even unto death.' And surely, if so--if His loving hand will lead\nthe citizens of His eternal kingdom even to the edge of that great\ndarkness--He will not lose them even in its gloom. Surely there is here\nthe veiled hope that if the city be eternal and the gates of the grave\ncannot prevail against _it_, the community cannot be eternal unless the\nindividuals be immortal.\n\nSuch a hope is vindicated by the blessed words of a newer revelation:\n'God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He hath prepared for\nthem a city.'\n\nDear brethren! remember the last words, or all but the last words of\nScripture which, in their true text and reading, tell us how, instead of\naliens from the commonwealth of Israel, we may become fellow-citizens\nwith the saints. 'Blessed are they that wash their robes that they may\nhave a right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gate into\nthe city!'\n\n\n\n\nTWO SHEPHERDS AND TWO FLOCKS\n\n\n    'Like sheep they are laid in the grave; Death shall feed on them.'\n    --PSALM xlix. 14.\n\n    'The Lamb which is in the midst of the Throne shall feed them.'\n    --REV. vii. 17.\n\nThese two verses have a much closer parallelism in expression than\nappears in our Authorised Version. If you turn to the Revised Version\nyou will find that it rightly renders the former of my texts, 'Death\nshall be their shepherd,' and the latter, 'The Lamb which is in the\nmidst of the throne shall be their Shepherd.' The Old Testament Psalmist\nand the New Testament Seer have fallen upon the same image to describe\ndeath and the future, but with how different a use! The one paints a\ngrim picture, all sunless and full of shadow; the other dips his pencil\nin brilliant colours, and suffuses his canvas with a glow as of molten\nsunlight. The difference between the two is partly due to the progress\nof revelation and the light cast on life and immortality by Christ\nthrough the Gospel. But it is much more due to the fact that the two\nwriters have different classes in view. The one is speaking of men whose\nportion is in this life, the other of men who have washed their robes\nand made them white in the blood of the Lamb. And it is the characters\nof the persons concerned, much more than the degree of enlightenment\npossessed by the writers, that makes the difference between these two\npictures. Life and death and the future are what each man makes of them\nfor himself. We shall best deal with these two pictures if we take them\nseparately, and let the gloom of the one enhance the glory of the other.\nThey hang side by side, like a Rembrandt beside a Claude or a Turner,\neach intensifying by contrast the characteristics of the other. So let\nus look at the two--first, the grim picture drawn by the Psalmist;\nsecond, the sunny one drawn by the Seer. Now, with regard to the former,\n\nI. The grim picture drawn by the Psalmist.\n\nWe too often forget that a psalmist is a poet, and misunderstand his\nspirit by treating his words as matter-of-fact prose. His imagination is\nat work, and our sympathetic imagination must be at work too, if we\nwould enter into his meaning. Death a shepherd--what a grim and bold\ninversion of a familiar metaphor! If this psalm is, as is probable, of a\ncomparatively late date, then its author was familiar with many sweet\nand tender strains of early singers, in which the blessed relation\nbetween a loving God and an obedient people was set forth under that\nmetaphor. 'The Lord is _my_ Shepherd' may have been ringing in his ears\nwhen he said, 'Death is _their_ shepherd.' He lays hold of the familiar\nmetaphor, and if I may so speak, turns it upside down, stripping it of\nall that is beautiful, tender, and gracious, and draping it in all that\nis harsh and terrible. And the very contrast between the sweet relation\nwhich it was originally used to express, and the opposite kind of one\nwhich he uses it to set forth, gives its tremendous force to the daring\nmetaphor.\n\n'Death is their shepherd.' Yes, but what manner of shepherd? Not one\nthat gently leads his flock, but one that stalks behind the huddled\nsheep, and drives them fiercely, club in hand, on a path on which they\nwould not willingly go. The unwelcome necessity, by which men that have\ntheir portion in this world are hounded and herded out of all their\nsunny pastures and abundant feeding, is the thought that underlies the\nimage. It is accentuated, if we notice that in the former clause, 'like\nsheep they are laid in the grave,' the word rendered in the Authorised\nVersion 'laid,' and in the Revised Version 'appointed,' is perhaps more\nproperly read by many, 'like sheep they are _thrust down_.' There you\nhave the picture--the shepherd stalking behind the helpless creatures,\nand coercing them on an unwelcome path.\n\nNow that is the first thought that I suggest, that to one type of man,\nDeath is an unwelcome necessity. It is, indeed, a necessity to us all,\nbut necessities accepted cease to be painful; and necessities\nresisted--what do they become? Here is a man being swept down a river,\nthe sound of the falls is in his ears, and he grasps at anything on the\nbank to hold by, but in vain. That is how some of us feel when we face\nthe thought, and will feel more when we front the reality, of that awful\n'must.' 'Death shall be their shepherd,' and coerce them into darkness.\nAsk yourself the question, Is the course of my life such as that the end\nof it cannot but be a grim necessity which I would do anything to avoid?\n\nThis first text suggests not only a shepherd but a fold: 'Like sheep\nthey are thrust down to the grave.' Now I am not going to enter upon\nwhat would be quite out of place here: a critical discussion of the Old\nTestament conception of a future life. That conception varies, and is\nnot the same in all parts of the book. But I may, just in a word, say\nthat 'the grave' is by no means the adequate rendering of the thought of\nthe Psalmist, and that 'Hell' is a still more inadequate rendering of\nit. He does not mean either the place where the body is deposited, or a\nplace where there is punitive retribution for the wicked, but he means a\ndim region, or, if I might so say, a localised condition, in which all\nthat have passed through this life are gathered, where personality and\nconsciousness continue, but where life is faint, stripped of all that\ncharacterises it here, shadowy, unsubstantial, and where there is\ninactivity, absolute cessation of all the occupations to which men were\naccustomed. But there may be restlessness along with inactivity; may\nthere not? And there is no such restlessness as the restlessness of\ncompulsory idleness. That is the main idea that is in the Psalmist's\nmind. He knows little about retribution, he knows still less about\ntransmutation into a glorious likeness to that which is most glorious\nand divine. But he conceives a great, dim, lonely land, wherein are\nprisoned and penned all the lives that have been foamed away vainly on\nearth, and are now settled into a dreary monotony and a restless\nidleness. As one of the other books of the Old Testament puts it, it is\na 'land of the shadow of death, without order, and in which the light is\nas darkness.'\n\nI know, of course, that all that is but the imperfect presentation of\npartially apprehended, and partially revealed, and partially revealable\ntruth. But what I desire to fix upon is that one dreary thought of this\nfold, into which the grim shepherd has driven his flock, and where they\nlie cribbed and huddled together in utter inactivity. Carry that with\nyou as a true, though incomplete thought.\n\nLet me remind you, in the next place, with regard to this part of my\nsubject, of the kind of men whom the grim shepherd drives into that grim\nfold. The psalm tells us that plainly enough. It is speaking of men who\nhave their portion in this life, who 'trust in their wealth, and boast\nthemselves in the multitude of their riches ... whose inward thought is\nthat their house shall continue for ever ... who call their lands after\ntheir own names.' Of every such man it says: 'when he dieth he shall\ncarry nothing away'--none of the possessions, none of the forms of\nactivity which were familiar to him here on earth. He will go into a\nstate where he finds nothing which interests him, and nothing for him to\ndo.\n\nMust it not be so? If we let ourselves be absorbed and entangled by the\naffairs of this life, and permit our whole spirits to be bent in the\ndirection of these transient things, what is to become of us when the\nthings that must pass have passed, and when we come into a region where\nthere are none of them to occupy us any more? What would some Manchester\nmen do if they were in a condition of life where they could not go on\n'Change on Tuesdays and Fridays? What would some of us do if the\nprofessions and forms of mental activity in which we have been occupied\nas students and scholars were swept away? 'Whether there be knowledge it\nshall cease; whether there be tongues they shall vanish away,' and what\nare you going to do then, you men that have only lived for intellectual\npursuits connected with this transient state? We are going to a world\nwhere there are no books, no pens nor ink, no trade, no dress, no\nfashion, no amusements; where there is nothing but things in which some\nof us have no interest, and a God who 'is not in all our thoughts.'\nSurely we shall be 'fish out of water' there. Surely we shall feel that\nwe have been banned and banished from everything that we care about.\nSurely men that boasted themselves in their riches, and in the multitude\nof their wealth, will be necessarily condemned to inactivity. Life is\ncontinuous, and all on one plane. Surely if a man knows that he must\nsome day, and may any day, be summoned to the other side of the world,\nhe would be a wise man if he got his outfit ready, and made some effort\nto acquire the customs and the arts of the land to which he was going.\nSurely life here is mainly given to us that we may develop powers which\nwill find their field of exercise yonder, and acquire characters which\nshall be in conformity with the conditions of that future life. Surely\nthere can be no more tragic folly than the folly of letting myself be so\nabsorbed and entangled by this present world, as that when the transient\nhas passed, I shall feel homeless and desolate, and have nothing that I\ncan do or care about amidst the activities of Eternity. Dear friend,\nshould _you_ feel homeless if you were taken, as you will be taken, into\nthat world?\n\nTurn now to\n\nII. The sunny landscape drawn by the Seer.\n\nNote the contrast presented by the shepherds. 'Death shall be their\nshepherd.' 'The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall be their\nShepherd.' I need not occupy your time in trying to show, what has\nsometimes been doubted, that the radiant picture of the Apocalyptic Seer\nis dealing with nothing in the present, but with the future condition of\ncertain men. I would just remind you that the words in which it is\ncouched are to a large extent a quotation from ancient prophecy, a\ndescription of the divine watchfulness over the pilgrim's return from\ncaptivity to the Land of Promise. But the quotation is wonderfully\nelevated and spiritualised in the New Testament vision; for instead of\nreading, as the Original does: 'He that hath mercy on them shall lead\nthem,' we have here, 'the Lamb which is in the midst of the Throne shall\nbe their Shepherd,' and instead of their being led merely to 'the\nsprings of water,' here we read that He 'leads them to the fountains of\nthe water of life.'\n\nWe have to think, first, of that most striking, most significant and\nprofound modification of the Old Testament words, which presents the\nLamb as 'the Shepherd.' All Christ's shepherding on earth and in heaven\ndepends, as do all our hopes for heaven and earth, upon the fact of His\nsacrificial death. It is only because He is the 'Lamb that was slain'\nthat He is either the 'Lamb in the midst of the Throne,' or the Shepherd\nof the flock. And we must make acquaintance with Him first in the\ncharacter of 'the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world,'\nbefore we can either follow in His footsteps as our Guide, or be\ncompassed by His protection as our Shepherd.\n\nHe is the Lamb, and He is the Shepherd--that suggests not only that the\nsacrificial work of Jesus Christ is the basis of all His work for us on\nearth and in heaven, but the very incongruity of making One, who bears\nthe same nature as the flock to be the Shepherd of the flock, is part of\nthe beauty of the metaphor. It is His humanity that is our guide. It is\nHis continual manhood, all through eternity and its glories, that makes\nHim the Shepherd of perfected souls. They follow Him because He is one\nof themselves, and He could not be the Shepherd unless he were the Lamb.\n\nBut then this Shepherd is not only gracious, sympathetic, kin to us by\nparticipation in a common nature, and fit to be our Guide because He has\nbeen our Sacrifice and the propitiation of our sins, but He is the Lamb\n'in the midst of the throne,' wielding therefore all divine power, and\nstanding--not as the rendering in our Bible leads an English reader to\nsuppose, on the throne, but--in the middle point between it and the ring\nof worshippers, and so the Communicator to the outer circumference of\nall the blessings that dwell in the divine centre. He shall be their\nShepherd, not coercing, not driving by violence, but leading to the\nfountains of the waters of life, gently and graciously. It is not\ncompulsory energy which He exercises upon us, either on earth or in\nheaven, but it is the drawing of a divine attraction, sweet to put forth\nand sweet to yield to.\n\nThere is still another contrast. Death huddled and herded his reluctant\nsheep into a fold where they lay inactive but struggling and restless.\nChrist leads His flock into a pasture. He shall guide them 'to the\nfountains of waters of life.' I need not dwell at any length on the\nblessed particulars of that future, set forth here and in the context.\nBut let me suggest them briefly. There is joyous activity. There is\nconstant progression. He goeth before; they follow. The perfection of\nheaven begins at entrance into it, but it is a perfection which can be\nperfected, and is being perfected, through the ages of Eternity, and the\npicture of the Shepherd in front and the flock behind, is the true\nconception of all the progress of that future life. 'They shall follow\nthe Lamb whithersoever He goeth'--a sweet guidance, a glad following, a\nprogressive conformity! 'In the long years liker must they grow.'\n\nFurther, there is the communication of life more and more abundantly.\nTherefore there is the satisfaction of all desire, so that 'they shall\nhunger no more, neither thirst any more.' The pain of desire ceases\nbecause desire is no sooner felt than it is satisfied, the joy of desire\ncontinues, because its satisfaction enables us to desire more, and so,\nappetite and eating, desire and fruition, alternate in ceaseless\nreciprocity. To us, being every moment capable of more, more will be\ngiven; and 'to-morrow shall be as this day, and much more abundant.'\n\nThere is one point more in regard to that pasture into which the Lamb\nleads the happy flock, and that is, the cessation of all pains and\nsorrows. Not only shall they 'hunger no more, neither thirst any more';\nbut 'the sun shall not smite them, nor any heat, and God shall wipe away\nall tears from their eyes.' Here the Shepherd carried rod and staff, and\nsometimes had to strike the wandering sheep hard: there these are needed\nno more. Here He had sometimes to move them out of green pastures, and\naway from still waters, into valleys of the shadow of death; but\n'there,' as one of the prophets has it: 'they shall lie in a good fold,\nand in a fat pasture shall they feed.'\n\nBut now, we must note, finally, the other kind of men whom this other\nShepherd leads into His pastures, 'They have washed their robes and made\nthem white in the blood of the Lamb.' Aye! that is it. That is why He\ncan lead them where He does lead them. Strange alchemy which out of two\ncrimsons, the crimson of our sins and the crimson of His blood, makes\none white! But it is so, and the only way by which we can ever be\ncleansed, either with the initial cleansing of forgiveness, or with the\ndaily cleansing of continual purifying and approximation to the divine\nholiness, is by our bringing the foul garment of our stained personality\nand character into contact with the blood which, 'shed for many,' takes\naway their sins, and infused into their veins, cleanses them from all\nsin.\n\nYou have yourselves to bring about that contact. '_They_ have washed\ntheir robes.' And how did they do it? By faith in the Sacrifice first,\nby following the Example next. For it is not merely a forgiveness for\nthe past, but a perfecting, progressive and gradual, for the future,\nthat lies in that thought of washing their robes and making them white\nin the blood of the Lamb.\n\nDear brethren, life here and life hereafter are continuous. They are\nhomogeneous, on one plane though an ascending one. The differences there\nare great--I was going to say, and it would be true, that the\nresemblances are greater. As we have been, we shall be. If we take\nChrist for our Shepherd here, and follow Him, though from afar and with\nfaltering steps, amidst all the struggles and windings and rough ways of\nlife, then and only then, will He be our Shepherd, to go with us through\nthe darkness of death, to make it no reluctant expulsion from a place in\nwhich we would fain continue to be, but a tranquil and willing following\nof Him by the road which He has consecrated for ever, and deprived for\never of its solitude, because Himself has trod it.\n\nThose two possibilities are before each of us. Either of them may be\nyours. One of them must be. Look on this picture and on this; and\nchoose--God help you to choose aright--which of the two will describe\nyour experience. Will you have Christ for your Shepherd, or will you\nhave Death for your shepherd? The answer to that question lies in the\nanswer to the other--have you washed your robes, and made them white in\nthe blood of the Lamb; and are you following Him? You can settle the\nquestion which lot is to be yours, and only you can settle it. See that\nyou settle it aright, and that you settle it soon.\n\nEND OF VOL. I.\n\n\n\n\n\nVOLUME II: PSALMS _LI to CXLV_\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nDAVID'S CRY FOR PARDON (Psalm li. 1, 2)\n\nDAVID'S CRY FOR PURITY (Psalm li. 10-12)\n\nFEAR AND FAITH (Psalm lvi. 3, 4)\n\nA SONG OF DELIVERANCE (Psalm lvi. 13, R.V.)\n\nTHE FIXED HEART (Psalm lvii. 7)\n\nWAITING AND SINGING (Psalm lix. 9, 17)\n\nSILENCE TO GOD (Psalm lxii, 1-5)\n\nTHIRST AND SATISFACTION (Psalm lxiii. 1, 5, 8)\n\nSIN OVERCOMING AND OVERCOME (Psalm lxv. 8)\n\nTHE BURDEN-BEARING GOD (Psalm lxviii. 19, A.V. and R.V.)\n\nREASONABLE RAPTURE (Psalm lxxiii. 25, 26)\n\nNEARNESS TO GOD THE KEY TO LIFE'S PUZZLE (Psalm lxxiii. 28)\n\nMEMORY, HOPE, AND EFFORT (Psalm lxxviii. 7)\n\nSPARROWS AND ALTARS (Psalm lxxxiv. 3)\n\nHAPPY PILGRIMS (Psalm lxxxiv. 5-7)\n\nBLESSED TRUST (Psalm lxxxiv. 12)\n\n'THE BRIDAL OF THE EARTH AND SKY' (Psalm lxxxv. 10-13)\n\nA SHEAF OF PRAYER ARROWS (Psalm lxxxvi. 1-5)\n\nCONTINUAL SUNSHINE (Psalm lxxxix. 15)\n\nTHE CRY OF THE MORTAL TO THE UNDYING (Psalm xc. 17)\n\nTHE SHELTERING WING (Psalm xci. 4)\n\nTHE HABITATION OF THE SOUL (Psalm xci. 9, 10)\n\nTHE ANSWER TO TRUST (Psalm xci. 14)\n\nWHAT GOD WILL DO FOR US (Psalm xci. 15, 16)\n\nFORGIVENESS AND RETRIBUTION (Psalm xcix. 8)\n\nINVIOLABLE MESSIAHS AND PROPHETS (Psalm cv. 14, 15)\n\nGOD'S PROMISES TESTS (Psalm cv. 19)\n\nSOLDIER PRIESTS (Psalm cx. 3)\n\nGOD AND THE GODLY (Psalms cxi. 3; cxii. 3)\n\nEXPERIENCE, RESOLVE, AND HOPE (Psalm cxvi. 8, 9)\n\nREQUITING GOD (Psalm cxvi. 12, 13)\n\nA CLEANSED WAY (Psalm cxix. 9)\n\nLIFE HID AND NOT HID (Psalm cxix. 11; xl. 10)\n\nA STRANGER IN THE EARTH (Psalm cxix. 19, 64)\n\n'TIME FOR THEE TO WORK' (Psalm cxix. 126-128)\n\nSUBMISSION AND PEACE (Psalm cxix. 165)\n\nLOOKING TO THE HILLS (Psalm cxxi. 1, 2)\n\nMOUNTAINS ROUND MOUNT ZION (Psalm cxxv. 1, 2)\n\nTHE CHARGE OF THE WATCHERS IN THE TEMPLE (Psalm cxxxiv. 1-3)\n\nGOD'S SCRUTINY LONGED FOR (Psalm cxxxix. 23, 24)\n\nTHE INCENSE OF PRAYER (Psalm cxli. 2)\n\nTHE PRAYER OF PRAYERS (Psalm cxliii. 10)\n\nTHE SATISFIER OF ALL DESIRES (Psalm cxlv. 16, 19)\n\n\n\n\nDAVID'S CRY FOR PARDON\n\n\n    '... Blot out my transgressions. 2. Wash me throughly from mine\n    iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.'--PSALM li. 1, 2.\n\nA whole year had elapsed between David's crime and David's penitence. It\nhad been a year of guilty satisfaction not worth the having; of sullen\nhardening of heart against God and all His appeals. The thirty-second\nPsalm tells us how _happy_ David had been during that twelvemonth, of\nwhich he says, 'My bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long.\nFor day and night Thy hand was heavy on me.' Then came Nathan with his\napologue, and with that dark threatening that 'the sword should never\ndepart from his house,' the fulfilment of which became a well-head of\nsorrow to the king for the rest of his days, and gave a yet deeper\npoignancy of anguish to the crime of his spoiled favourite Absalom. The\nstern words had their effect. The frost that had bound his soul melted\nall away, and he confessed his sin, and was forgiven then and there. 'I\nhave sinned against the Lord' is the confession as recorded in the\nhistorical books; and, says Nathan, 'The Lord hath made to pass from\nthee the iniquity of thy sin.' Immediately, as would appear from the\nnarrative, that very same day, the child of Bathsheba and David was\nsmitten with fatal disease, and died in a week. And it is _after_ all\nthese events--the threatening, the penitence, the pardon, the\npunishment--that he comes to God, who had so freely forgiven, and\nlikewise so sorely smitten him, and wails out these prayers: 'Blot out\nmy transgressions, wash me from mine iniquity, cleanse me from my sin.'\n\nOne almost shrinks from taking as the text of a sermon words like these,\nin which a broken and contrite spirit groans for deliverance, and which\nare, besides, hallowed by the thought of the thousands who have since\nfound them the best expression of their sacredest emotions. But I would\nfain try not to lose the feeling that breathes through the words, while\nseeking for the thoughts which are in them, and hope that the light\nwhich they throw upon the solemn subjects of guilt and forgiveness may\nnot be for any of us a mere cold light.\n\nI. Looking then at this triad of petitions, they teach us first how\nDavid thought of his sin.\n\nYou will observe the reiteration of the same earnest cry in all these\nclauses, and if you glance over the remainder of this psalm, you will\nfind that he asks for the gifts of God's Spirit, with a similar\nthreefold repetition. Now this characteristic of the whole psalm is\nworth notice in the outset. It is not a mere piece of Hebrew\nparallelism. The requirements of poetical form but partially explain it.\nIt is much more the earnestness of a soul that cannot be content with\nonce asking for the blessings and then passing on, but dwells upon them\nwith repeated supplication, not because it thinks that it shall be heard\nfor its 'much speaking,' but because it longs for them so eagerly.\n\nAnd besides that, though the three clauses do express the same general\nidea, they express it under various modifications, and must be all taken\ntogether before we get the whole of the Psalmist's thought of sin.\n\nNotice again that he speaks of his evil as 'transgressions' and as\n'sin,' first using the plural and then the singular. He regards it first\nas being broken up into a multitude of isolated acts, and then as being\nall gathered together into one knot, as it were, so that it is one\nthing. In one aspect it is 'my transgressions'--'that thing that I did\nabout Uriah, that thing that I did about Bathsheba, those other things\nthat these dragged after them.' One by one the acts of wrongdoing pass\nbefore him. But he does not stop there. They are not merely a number of\ndeeds, but they have, deep down below, a common root from which they all\ncame--a centre in which they all inhere. And so he says, not only 'Blot\nout my _transgressions_,' but 'Wash me from mine _iniquity_.' He does\nnot merely generalise, but he sees and he feels what you and I have to\nfeel, if we judge rightly of our evil actions, that we cannot take them\nonly in their plurality as so many separate deeds, but that we must\nrecognise them as coming from a common source, and we must lament before\nGod not only our 'sins' but our 'sin'--not only the outward acts of\ntransgression, but that alienation of heart from which they all come;\nnot only sin in its manifold manifestations as it comes out in the life,\nbut in its inward roots as it coils round our hearts. You are not to\nconfess acts alone, but let your contrition embrace the principle from\nwhich they come.\n\nFurther, in all the petitions we see that the idea of his own single\nresponsibility for the whole thing is uppermost in David's mind. It is\n_my_ transgression, it is _mine_ iniquity, and _my_ sin. He has not\nlearned to say with Adam of old, and with some so-called wise thinkers\nto-day: 'I was tempted, and I could not help it.' He does not talk about\n'circumstances,' and say that they share the blame with him. He takes it\nall to himself. 'It was _I_ did it. True, I was tempted, but it was my\nsoul that made the occasion a temptation. True, the circumstances led me\nastray, but they would not have led me astray if I had been right, and\n_where_ as well as _what_ I ought to be.' It is a solemn moment when\nthat thought first rises in its revealing power to throw light into the\ndark places of our souls. But it is likewise a blessed moment, and\nwithout it we are scarcely aware of ourselves. Conscience quickens\nconsciousness. The sense of transgression is the first thing that gives\nto many a man the full sense of his own individuality. There is nothing\nthat makes us feel how awful and incommunicable is that mysterious\npersonality by which every one of us lives alone after all\ncompanionship, so much as the contemplation of our relations to God's\nlaw. 'Every man shall bear his own burden.' 'Circumstances,' yes;\n'bodily organisation,' yes; 'temperament,' yes; 'the maxims of society,'\n'the conventionalities of the time,' yes,--all these things have\nsomething to do with shaping our single deeds and with influencing our\ncharacter; but after we have made all allowances for these influences\nwhich affect _me_, let us ask the philosophers who bring them forward as\ndiminishing or perhaps annihilating responsibility, 'And what about that\n_me_ which these things influence?' After all, let me remember that the\ndeed is _mine_, and that every one of us shall, as Paul puts it, give\naccount of _himself_ unto God.\n\nPassing from that, let me point for one moment to another set of ideas\nthat are involved in these petitions. The three words which the Psalmist\nemploys for sin give prominence to different aspects of it.\n'Transgression' is not the same as 'iniquity,' and 'iniquity' is not the\nsame as 'sin.' They are not aimless, useless synonyms, but they have\neach a separate thought in them. The word rendered 'transgression'\nliterally means rebellion, a breaking away from and setting oneself\nagainst lawful authority. That translated 'iniquity' literally means\nthat which is twisted, bent. The word in the original for 'sin'\nliterally means missing a mark, an aim. And this threefold view of sin\nis no discovery of David's, but is the lesson which the whole Old\nTestament system had laboured to print deep on the national\nconsciousness. That lesson, taught by law and ceremonial, by\ndenunciation and remonstrance, by chastisement and deliverance, the\npenitent king has learned. To all men's wrongdoings these descriptions\napply, but most of all to his. Sin is ever, and his sin especially is,\nrebellion, the deflection of the life from the straight line which God's\nlaw draws so clearly and firmly, and hence a missing the aim.\n\nThink how profound and living is the consciousness of sin which lies in\ncalling it _rebellion_. It is not merely, then, that we go against some\nabstract propriety, or break some impersonal law of nature when we do\nwrong, but that we rebel against a rightful Sovereign. In a special\nsense this was true of the Jew, whose nation stood under the government\nof a divine king, so that sin was treason, and breaches of the law acts\nof rebellion against God. But it is as true of us all. Our theory of\nmorals will be miserably defective, and our practice will be still more\ndefective, unless we have learned that morality is but the garment of\nreligion, that the definition of virtue is obedience to God, and that\nthe true sin in sin is not the yielding to impulses that belong to our\nnature, but the assertion in the act of yielding, of our independence of\nGod and of our opposition to His will. And all this has application to\nDavid's sin. He was God's viceroy and representative, and he sets to his\npeople the example of revolt, and lifts the standard of rebellion. It is\nas if the ruler of a province declared war against the central authority\nof which he was the creature, and used against it the very magazines and\nweapons with which it had intrusted him. He had rebelled, and in an\neminent degree, as Nathan said to him, given to the enemies of God\noccasion to blaspheme.\n\nNot less profound and suggestive is that other name for sin, that which\nis twisted, or bent, mine 'iniquity.' It is the same metaphor which lies\nin our own word 'wrong,' that which is wrung or warped from the straight\nline of right. To that line, drawn by God's law, our lives should run\nparallel, bending neither to the right hand nor to the left. But instead\nof the firm directness of such a line, our lives show wavering\ndeformity, and are like the tremulous strokes in a child's copy-book.\nDavid had the pattern before him, and by its side his unsteady purpose,\nhis passionate lust, had traced this wretched scrawl. The path on which\nhe should have trodden was a straight course to God, unbending like one\nof these conquering Roman roads, that will turn aside for neither\nmountain nor ravine, nor stream nor bog. If it had been thus straight,\nit would have reached its goal. Journeying on that way of holiness, he\nwould have found, and we shall find, that on it no ravenous beast shall\nmeet us, but with songs and everlasting joy upon their lips the happy\npilgrims draw ever nearer to God, obtaining joy and gladness in all the\nmarch, until at last 'sorrow and sighing shall flee away.' But instead\nof this he had made for himself a crooked path, and had lost his road\nand his peace in the mazes of wandering ways. 'The labour of the foolish\nwearieth every one of them, because he knoweth not how to come to the\ncity.'\n\nAnother very solemn and terrible thought of what sin is, lies in that\nfinal word for it, which means 'missing an aim.' How strikingly that\nputs a truth which siren voices are constantly trying to sing us out of\nbelieving! Every sin is a blunder as well as a crime. And that for two\nreasons, because, first, God has made us for Himself, and to take\nanything besides for our life's end or our heart's portion is to divert\nourselves from our true destiny; and because, second, that being so,\nevery attempt to win satisfaction or delight by such a course is and\nmust be a failure. Sin misses the aim if we think of our proper\ndestination. Sin misses its own aim of happiness. A man never gets what\nhe hoped for by doing wrong, or, if he seem to do so, he gets something\nmore that spoils it all. He pursues after the fleeing form that seems so\nfair, and when he reaches her side, and lifts her veil, eager to embrace\nthe tempter, a hideous skeleton grins and gibbers at him. The siren\nvoices sing to you from the smiling island, and their white arms and\ngolden harps and the flowery grass draw you from the wet boat and the\nweary oar; but when a man lands he sees the fair form end in a slimy\nfish, and she slays him and gnaws his bones. 'He knows not that the dead\nare there, and that her guests are in the depths of hell.' Yes! every\nsin is a mistake, and the epitaph for the sinner is 'Thou fool!'\n\nII. These petitions also show us, in the second place, How David thinks\nof forgiveness.\n\nAs the words for sin expressed a threefold view of the burden from which\nthe Psalmist seeks deliverance, so the triple prayer, in like manner,\nsets forth that blessing under three aspects. It is not merely pardon\nfor which he asks. He is making no sharp dogmatic distinction between\nforgiveness and cleansing.\n\nThe two things run into each other in his prayer, as they do, thank God!\nin our own experience, the one being inseparable, in fact, from the\nother. It is absolute deliverance from the power of sin, in all forms of\nthat power, whether as guilt or as habit, for which he cries so\npiteously; and his accumulative petitions are so exhaustive, not because\nhe is coldly examining his sin, but because he is intensely feeling the\nmanifold burden of his great evil.\n\nThat first petition conceives of the divine dealing with sin as being\nthe erasure of a writing, perhaps of an indictment. There is a special\nsignificance in the use of the word here, because it is also employed in\nthe description of the Levitical ceremonial of the ordeal, where a curse\nwas written on a scroll and blotted out by the priest. But apart from\nthat the metaphor is a natural and suggestive one. Our sin stands\nwritten against us. The long gloomy indictment has been penned by our\nown hands. Our past is a blurred manuscript, full of false things and\nbad things. We have to spread the writing before God, and ask Him to\nremove the stained characters from its surface, that once was fair and\nunsoiled.\n\nAh, brethren! some people tell us that the past is irrevocable, that the\nthing once done can never be undone, that the life's diary written by\nour own hands can never be cancelled. The melancholy theory of some\nthinkers and teachers is summed up in the words, infinitely sad and\ndespairing when so used, 'What I have written I have written.' Thank\nGod! we know better than that. We know who blots out the handwriting\n'that is against us, nailing it to His Cross.' We know that of God's\ngreat mercy our future may 'copy fair our past,' and the past may be all\nobliterated and removed. And as sometimes you will find in an old\nmonkish library the fair vellum that once bore lascivious stories of\nancient heathens and pagan deities turned into the manuscript in which a\nsaint has penned his Contemplations, an Augustine his Confessions, or a\nJerome his Translations, so our souls may become palimpsests. The old\nwicked heathen characters that we have traced there may be blotted out,\nand covered over by the writing of that divine Spirit who has said, 'I\nwill put My laws into their minds, and write them in their hearts.' As\nyou run your pen through the finished pages of your last year's diaries,\nas you seal them up and pack them away, and begin a new page in a clean\nbook on the first of January, so it is possible for every one of us to\ndo with our lives. Notwithstanding all the influence of habit,\nnotwithstanding all the obstinacy of long-indulged modes of thought and\naction, notwithstanding all the depressing effect of frequent attempts\nand frequent failures, we may break ourselves off from all that is\nsinful in our past lives, and begin afresh, saying, 'God helping me! I\nwill write another sort of biography for myself for the days that are to\ncome.'\n\nWe cannot erase these sad records from our past. The ink is indelible;\nand besides all that we have visibly written in these terrible\nautobiographies of ours, there is much that has sunk into the page,\nthere is many a 'secret fault,' the record of which will need the fire\nof that last day to make it legible, Alas for those who learn the black\nstory of their own lives for the first time then! Learn it now, my\nbrother! and learn likewise that Christ can wipe it all clean off the\npage, clean out of your nature, clean out of God's book. Cry to Him,\nwith the Psalmist, 'Blot out my transgressions!' and He will calm and\nbless you with the ancient answer, 'I have blotted out as a thick cloud\nthy transgressions, and as a cloud thy sins.'\n\nThen there is another idea in the second of these prayers for\nforgiveness: '_Wash me throughly_ from mine iniquity.' That phrase does\nnot need any explanation, except that the word expresses the antique way\nof cleansing garments by treading and beating. David, then, here uses\nthe familiar symbol of a robe, to express the 'habit' of the soul, or,\nas we say, the character. That robe is all splashed and stained. He\ncries to God to make it a robe of righteousness and a garment of purity.\n\nAnd mark that he thinks the method by which this will be accomplished is\na protracted and probably a painful one. He is not praying for a mere\ndeclaration of pardon, he is not asking only for the one complete,\ninstantaneous act of forgiveness, but he is asking for a process of\npurifying which will be long and hard. 'I am ready,' says he, in effect,\n'to submit to any sort of discipline, if only I may be clean. Wash me,\nbeat me, tread me down, hammer me with mallets, dash me against stones,\nrub me with smarting soap and caustic nitre--do anything, anything with\nme, if only those foul spots melt away from the texture of my soul!' A\nsolemn prayer, my brethren! if we pray it aright, which will be answered\nby many a sharp application of God's Spirit, by many a sorrow, by much\nvery painful work, both within our own souls and in our outward lives,\nbut which will be fulfilled at last in our being clothed like our Lord,\nin garments which shine as the light.\n\nWe know, dear brethren! who has said, 'I counsel thee to buy of Me white\nraiment, that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear.' And we know\nwell who were the great company before the throne of God, that had\n'washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.'\n'Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though\nthey be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.' 'Wash me throughly\nfrom mine iniquity.'\n\nThe deliverance from sin is still further expressed by that third\nsupplication, 'Cleanse me from my sin.' That is the technical word for\nthe priestly act of declaring ceremonial cleanness--the cessation of\nceremonial pollution, and for the other priestly act of making, as well\nas declaring, clean from the stains of leprosy. And with allusion to\nboth of these uses, the Psalmist employs it here. That is to say, he\nthinks of his guilt not only as a blotted past record which he has\nwritten, not only as a garment spotted by the flesh which his spirit\nwears, but he thinks of it too as inhering in himself, as a leprosy and\ndisease of his own personal nature. He thinks of it as being, like that,\nincurable, fatal, twin sister to and precursor of death; and he thinks\nof it as capable of being cleansed only by a sacerdotal act, only by the\ngreat High Priest and by His finger being laid upon it. And we know who\nit was that--when the leper, whom no man in Israel was allowed to touch\non pain of uncleanness, came to His feet--put out His hand in triumphant\nconsciousness of power, and touched him, and said, 'I _will_! be thou\nclean.' Let this be thy prayer, 'Cleanse me from my sin'; and Christ\nwill answer, 'Thy leprosy hath departed from thee.'\n\nIII. These petitions likewise show us whence the Psalmist draws his\nconfidence for such a prayer.\n\n'According to the multitude of Thy tender mercies, blot out my\ntransgressions.' His whole hope rests upon God's own character, as\nrevealed in the endless continuance of His acts of love. He knows the\nnumber and the greatness of his sins, and the very depth of his\nconsciousness of sin helps him to a corresponding greatness in his\napprehension of God's mercy. As he says in another of his psalms,\n'Innumerable evils have compassed me about; they are more than the hairs\nof my head.... Many, O Lord my God! are Thy wonderful works.... They are\nmore than can be numbered.' This is the blessedness of all true\npenitence, that the more profoundly it feels its own sore need and great\nsinfulness, in that very proportion does it recognise the yet greater\nmercy and all-sufficient grace of our loving God, and from the lowest\ndepths beholds the stars in the sky, which they who dwell amid the\nsurface-brightness of the noonday cannot discern.\n\nGod's own revealed character, His faithfulness and persistency,\nnotwithstanding all our sins, in that mode of dealing with men which has\nblessed all generations with His tender mercies--these were David's\npleas. And for us who have the perfect love of God perfectly expressed\nin His Son, that same plea is incalculably strengthened, for we can say,\n'According to Thy tender mercy in Thy dear Son, for the sake of Christ,\nblot out my transgressions.' Is the depth of our desire, and is the\nfirmness of our confidence, proportioned to the increased clearness of\nour knowledge of the love of our God? Does the Cross of Christ lead us\nto as trustful a penitence as David had, to whom meditation on God's\nprovidences and the shadows of the ancient covenant were chiefest\nteachers of the multitude of His tender mercies?\n\nRemember further that a comparison of the narrative in the historical\nbooks seems to show, as I said, that this psalm followed Nathan's\ndeclaration of the divine forgiveness, and that therefore these\npetitions of our text are the echo and response to that declaration.\n\nThus we see that the revelation of God's love precedes, and is the cause\nof, the truest penitence; that our prayer for forgiveness is properly\nthe appropriating, or the effort to appropriate, the divine promise of\nforgiveness; and that the assurance of pardon, so far from making a man\nthink lightly of his sin, is the thing that drives it home to his\nconscience, and first of all teaches him what it really is. As long as\nyou are tortured with thoughts of a possible hell because of guilt, as\nlong as you are troubled by the contemplation of consequences affecting\nyour happiness as ensuing upon your wrongdoing, so long there is a\nforeign and disturbing element in even your deepest and truest\npenitence. But when you know that God has forgiven--when you come to see\nthe 'multitude of Thy tender mercies,' when the fear of punishment has\npassed out of your apprehension, then you are left with a heart at\nleisure from dread, to look the fact and not the consequences in the\nface, and to think of the moral nature, and not of the personal results,\nof your sin. And so one of the old prophets, with profound truth, says,\n'Thou shalt be ashamed and confounded, and never open thy mouth any more\nbecause of thy sin, when I am pacified towards thee for all thou hast\ndone.'\n\nDear friends! the wheels of God's great mill may grind us small, without\nour coming to know or to hate our sin. About His chastisements, about\nthe revelation of His wrath, that old saying is true to a great extent:\n'If you bray a fool in a mortar, his folly will not depart from him.'\nYou may smite a man down, crush him, make his bones to creep with the\npreaching of vengeance and of hell, and the result of it will often be,\nif it be anything at all, what it was in the case of that poor wretched\nJudas, who, because he only saw wrath, flung _himself_ into despair, and\nwas lost, not because he had betrayed Christ, but because he believed\nthat there was no forgiveness for the man that had betrayed.\n\nBut Love comes, and 'Love is Lord of all.' God's assurance, 'I have\nforgiven,' the assurance that we do not need to plead with Him, to bribe\nHim, to buy pardon by tears and amendment, but that it is already\nprovided for us--the blessed vision of an all-mighty love treasured in a\ndying Saviour, the proclamation 'God was in Christ, reconciling the\nworld unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them'--Oh! these\nare the powers that break, or rather that melt, our hearts; these are\nthe keen weapons that wound to heal our hearts; these are the teachers\nthat teach a 'godly sorrow that needeth not to be repented of.' Think of\nall the patient, pitying mercy of our Father, with which He has lingered\nabout our lives, and softly knocked at the door of our hearts! Think of\nthat unspeakable gift in which are wrapped up all His tender\nmercies--the gift of Christ who died for us all! Let it smite upon your\nheart with a rebuke mightier than all the thunders of law or terrors of\njudgment. Let it unveil for you not only the depths of the love of God,\nbut the darkness of your own selfish rebellion from Him. Measure your\ncrooked lives by the perfect rightness of Christ's. Learn how you have\nmissed the aim which He reached, who could say, 'I delight to do Thy\nwill, O my God!' And let that same infinite love that teaches sin\nannounce frank forgiveness and prophesy perfect purity. Then, with heart\nfixed upon Christ's Cross, let your cry for pardon be the echo of the\nmost sure promise of pardon which sounds from His dying lips; and as you\ngaze on Him who died that we might be freed from all iniquity, ask Him\nto blot out your transgressions, to wash you throughly from your\niniquity, and to cleanse you from your sins. Ask, for you cannot ask in\nvain; ask earnestly, for you need it sorely; ask confidently, for He has\npromised before you ask; but ask, for unless you do, you will not\nreceive. Ask, and the answer is sent already--'The blood of Jesus Christ\ncleanseth from all sin.'\n\n\n\n\nDAVID'S CRY FOR PURITY\n\n\n    '... Renew a right spirit within me. 11. ... And take not Thy Holy\n    Spirit from me. 12. ... And uphold me with Thy free Spirit.'\n    --PSALM li. 10-12.\n\nWe ought to be very thankful that the Bible never conceals the faults of\nits noblest men. David stands high among the highest of these. His words\nhave been for ages the chosen expression for the devotions of the\nholiest souls; and whoever has wished to speak longings after purity,\nlowly trust in God, the aspirations of love, or the raptures of\ndevotion, has found no words of his own more natural than those of the\npoet-king of Israel. And this man sins, black, grievous sin.\nSelf-indulgent, he stays at home while his army is in the field. His\nmoral nature, relaxed by this shrinking from duty, is tempted, and\neasily conquered. The sensitive poet nature, to which all delights of\neye and sense appeal so strongly, is for a time too strong for the\ndevout soul. One sin drags on another. As self-indulgence opened the\ndoor for lust, so lust, which dwells hard by hate, draws after it\nmurder. The king is a traitor to his subjects, the soldier untrue to the\nchivalry of arms, the friend the betrayer of the friend. Nothing can be\nblacker than the whole story, and the Bible tells the shameful history\nin all its naked ugliness.\n\nMany a precious lesson is contained in it. For instance, It is not\ninnocence which makes men good. 'This is your man after God's own heart,\nis it?' runs the common, shallow sneer. Yes; not that God thought little\nof his foul sin, nor that 'saints' make up for adultery and murder by\nmaking or singing psalms; not that 'righteousness' as a standard of\nconduct is lower than 'morality'; but that, having fallen, he learned to\nabhor his sin, and with deepened trust in God's mercy, and many tears,\nstruggled out of the mire, and with unconquered resolve and strength\ndrawn from a divine source, sought still to press towards the mark. It\nis not the attainment of purity, not the absence of sin, but the\npresence and operation, though it be partial, of an energy which is at\nwar with all impurity, that makes a man righteous. That is a lesson\nworth learning.\n\nAgain, David was not a hypocrite because of this fall of his. All sin is\ninconsistent with a religious character. But it is not for us to say\nwhat sin is incompatible with a religious character.\n\nAgain, the worst sin is not some outburst of gross transgression,\nforming an exception to the ordinary tenor of a life, bad and dismal as\nsuch a sin is; but the worst and most fatal are the small continuous\nvices, which root underground and honeycomb the soul. Many a man who\nthinks himself a Christian, is in more danger from the daily commission,\nfor example, of small pieces of sharp practice in his business, than\never was David at his worst. White ants pick a carcase clean sooner than\na lion will.\n\nMost precious of all is the lesson as to the possibility of all sin\nbeing effaced, and of the high hopes which even a man sunk in\ntransgression has a right to cherish, as to the purity and beauty of\ncharacter to which he may come. What a prayer these clauses contain to\nbe offered by one who has so sinned! What a marvellous faith in God's\npardoning love, and what a boldness of hope in his own future, they\ndisclose! They set forth a profound ideal of a noble character; they\nmake of that ideal a prayer; they are the prayer of a great\ntransgressor, who is also a true penitent. In all these aspects they are\nvery remarkable, and lead to valuable lessons. Let us look at them from\nthese points of view successively.\n\nI. Observe that here is a remarkable outline of a holy character.\n\nIt is to be observed that of these three gifts--a right spirit, Thy Holy\nSpirit, a free spirit--the central one alone is in the original spoken\nof as God's; the 'Thy' of the last clause of the English Bible being an\nunnecessary supplement. And I suppose that this central petition stands\nin the middle, because the gift which it asks is the essential and\nfundamental one, from which there flow, and as it were, diverge on the\nright hand and on the left, the other two. God's Holy Spirit given to a\nman makes the human spirit holy, and then makes it 'right' and 'free.'\nLook then at the petitions, not in the order in which they stand in the\ntext, but in the order which the text indicates as the natural one.\n\nNow as to that fundamental petition, 'Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me,'\none thing to notice is that David regards himself as possessing that\nSpirit. We are not to read into this psalm the fully developed New\nTestament teaching of a personal Paraclete, the Spirit whom Christ\nreveals and sends. To do that would be a gross anachronism. But we are\nto remember that it is an anointed king who speaks, on whose head there\nhas been poured the oil that designated him to his office, and in its\ngentle flow and sweet fragrance, symbolised from of old the inspiration\nof a divine influence that accompanied every divine call. We are to\nremember, too, how it had fared with David's predecessor. Saul had been\nchosen by God; had been for a while guided and upheld by God. But he\nfell into sin, and--not because he fell into it, but because he\ncontinued in it; not because he did wrong, but because he did not\nrepent--the solemn words are recorded concerning him, that 'the Spirit\nof the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord\ntroubled him.' The divine influence which came on the towering head of\nthe son of Kish, through the anointing oil that Samuel poured upon his\nraven hair, left him, and he stood God-forsaken because he stood\nGod-forsaking. And so David looks back from the 'horrible pit and miry\nclay' into which he had fallen, where, stained with blood and lust, he\nlies, to that sad gigantic figure, remembered so well and loved by him\nso truly--the great king who sinned away his soul, and bled out his life\non the heights of Gilboa. He sees in that blasted pine-tree, towering\nabove the forest but dead at the top, and barked and scathed all down\nthe sides by the lightning scars of passion, the picture of what he\nhimself will come to, if the blessing that was laid upon his ruddy locks\nand his young head by the aged Samuel's anointing should pass from him\ntoo as it had done from his predecessor. God had departed from Saul,\nbecause Saul had refused His counsel and departed from Him; and Saul's\nsuccessor, trembling as he remembers the fate of the founder of the\nmonarchy, and of his vanished dynasty, prays with peculiar emphasis of\nmeaning, 'Take not Thy Holy Spirit from _me_!'\n\nThat Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, had descended upon him when he was\nanointed king, but it was no mere official consecration which he had\nthereby received. He had been fitted for regal functions by personal\ncleansing and spiritual gifts. And it is the man as well as the king,\nthe sinful man much rather than the faulty king, that here wrestles with\nGod, and stays the heavenly Visitant whom his sin has made to seem as if\nHe would depart. What he desires most earnestly, next to that pardon\nwhich he has already sought and found, is that his spirit should be made\nholy by God's Spirit. That is, as I have said, the central petition of\nhis threefold prayer, from which the others come as natural\nconsequences.\n\nAnd what is this 'holiness' which David so earnestly desires? Without\nattempting any lengthened analysis of the various shades of meaning in\nthe word, our purpose will be served if I point out that in all\nprobability the primary idea in it is that of separation. God is\nholy--that is, separated by all the glory of His perfect nature from His\ncreatures. Things are holy--that is, separated from common uses, and\nappropriated to God's service. Whatever He laid His hand on and claimed\nin any especial manner for His, became thereby holy, whether it were a\nceremony, or a place, or a tool. Men are holy when they are set apart\nfor God's service, whether they be officially consecrated for certain\noffices, or have yielded themselves by an inward devotion based on love\nto be His.\n\nThe ethical signification which is predominant in our use of the word\nand has made it little more than a synonym for moral purity is certainly\nnot the original meaning, as is sufficiently clear from the fact that\nthe word is applied to material things which could have no moral\nqualities, and sometimes to persons who were not pure, but who were in\nsome sense or other set apart for God's service. But gradually that\nmeaning becomes more and more completely attached to the word, and\n'holiness' is not only separation for God, but separation from sin. That\nis what David longs for in this prayer; and the connection of these two\nmeanings of the word is worth pointing out in a sermon, for the sake of\nthe great truth which it suggests, that the basis of all rightness and\nrighteousness in a human spirit is its conscious and glad devotion to\nGod's service and uses. A reference to God must underlie all that is\ngood in men, and on the other hand, that consecration to God is a\ndelusion or a deception which does not issue in separation from evil.\n\n'Holiness' is a loftier and a truer word than 'morality,' 'virtue,' or\nthe like; it differs from these in that it proclaims that surrender to\nGod is the very essence of all good, while they seek to construct a\nstandard for human conduct, and to lay a foundation for human goodness,\nwithout regard to Him. Hence, irreligious moralists dislike the very\nword, and fall back upon pale, colourless phrases rather than employ it.\nBut these are inadequate for the purpose. Man's duties can never be\nsummed up in any expression which omits man's relation to God. How do I\nstand to Him? Do I belong to Him by joyous yielding of myself to be His\ninstrument? That, my friends! is the question, the answer to which\ndetermines everything about me. Rightly answered, there will come all\nfruits of grace and beauty in the character as a natural consequence;\n'whatsoever things are lovely and of good report,' every virtue and\nevery praise grow from the root of consecration to God. Wrongly\nanswered, there will come only fruits of selfishness and evil, which may\nsimulate virtue, but the blossom shall go up in dust, and the root in\nstubble. Do you seek purity, nobleness, strength, and beauty of soul?\nLearn that all these inhere in and flow from the one act of giving up\nyourself to God, and in their truest perfection are found only in the\nspirit that is His. Holiness considered as moral excellence is the\nresult of holiness considered as devotion to God. And learn too that\nholiness in both aspects comes from the operation and indwelling in our\nspirits of a divine Spirit, who draws away our love from self to fix it\non Him, which changes our blindness into sight, and makes us by degrees\nlike Himself, 'holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners.' The\nSpirit of the Lord is the energy which produces all righteousness and\npurity in human spirits.\n\nTherefore, all our desires after what is good and true should shape\nthemselves into the desire for that Spirit. Our prayer should be, 'Make\nme separate from evil, and that I may be so, claim and keep me for Thine\nown. As Thou hast done with the Sabbath amongst the days, with the bare\nsummit of the hill of the Lord's house among the mountains, with Israel\namidst the nations, so do with me; lay Thine hand upon me for Thine own.\nLet my spirit, O God! know its destination for Thee, its union with\nThee. Then being Thine, it will be clean. Dwell in me, that I may know\nmyself Thine. Seal me with that gracious influence which is the proof\nthat Thou possessest me, and the pledge that I possess Thee. \"Take not\nThy Holy Spirit from me.\"'\n\nSo much for the chief of these petitions, which gives the ideal\ncharacter in its deepest relations. There follow two other elements in\nthe character, which on either side flow from the central source. The\n_holy_ spirit in a man will be a _right_ spirit and a _free_ spirit.\nConsider these further thoughts in turn.\n\n'A right spirit.' You will observe that our translators have given an\nalternative rendering in the margin, and as is not seldom the case, it\nis a better one than that adopted in the text. 'A constant or firm\nspirit' is the Psalmist's meaning. He sees that a spirit which is\nconscious of its relation to God, and set free from the perturbations of\nsin, will be a spirit firm and settled, established and immovable in its\nobedience and its faith. For Him, the root of all steadfastness is in\nconsecration to God.\n\nAnd so this collocation of ideas opens the way for us to important\nconsiderations bearing upon the practical ordering of our natures and of\nour lives. For instance, there is no stability and settled persistency\nof righteous purpose possible for us, unless we are made strong because\nwe lay hold on God's strength, and stand firm because we are rooted in\nHim. Without that hold-fast, we shall be swept away by storms of\ncalamity or by gusts of passion. Without that to steady us, our own\nboiling lusts and desires will make every fibre of our being quiver and\ntremble. Without that armour, there will not be solidity enough in our\ncharacter to bear without breaking the steady pressure of the world's\nweight, still less the fierce hammering of special temptation. To stand\nerect, and in that sense to have a right spirit--one that is upright and\nunbent--we must have sure footing in God, and have His energy infused\ninto our shrinking limbs. If we are to be stable amidst earthquakes and\nstorms, we must be built on the rock, and build rock-like upon it. Build\nthy strength upon God. Let His Holy Spirit be the foundation of thy\nlife, and then thy tremulous and vagrant soul will be braced and fixed.\nThe building will become like the foundation, and will grow into 'a\ntower of strength that stands four-square to every wind.' Rooted in God,\nthou shalt be unmoved by 'the loud winds when they call'; or if still\nthe tremulous leaves are huddled together before the blast, and the\nswaying branches creak and groan, the bole will stand firm and the\ngnarled roots will not part from their anchorage, though the storm-giant\ndrag at them with a hundred hands. The spirit of holiness will be a firm\nspirit.\n\nBut there is another phase of connection between these two points of the\nideal character--if my spirit is to be holy and to preserve its\nholiness, it must be firm. That is to say, you can only get and keep\npurity by resistance. A man who has not learned to say 'No!'--who is not\nresolved that he _will_ take God's way in spite of every dog that can\nbay or bark at him, in spite of every silvery voice that woos him\naside--will be a weak and a wretched man till he dies. In such a world\nas this, with such hearts as ours, weakness _is_ wickedness in the long\nrun. Whoever lets himself be shaped and guided by anything lower than an\ninflexible will, fixed in obedience to God, will in the end be shaped\ninto a deformity and guided to wreck and ruin. Dreams however rapturous,\ncontemplations however devout, emotions however deep and sacred, make no\nman pure and good without hard effort, and that to a large extent in the\ndirection of resistance. Righteousness is not a mere negative idea, and\nScripture morality is something much deeper than prohibitions. But there\nis no law for us without prohibitions, and no righteousness without\ncasting out evil that is strong in us, and fighting against evil that is\nattractive around us. Therefore we need firmness to guard holiness, to\nbe the hard shell in which the rich fruit matures. We need a wholesome\nobstinacy in the right that will neither be bribed nor coaxed nor\nbullied, nor anyhow persuaded out of the road in which we know that we\nshould walk. 'Add to your faith manly vigour.' Learn that an\nindispensable requisite of holiness is prescribed in that command, 'Whom\nresist, steadfast in the faith.' And remember that the ground of all\nsuccessful resistance and the need for it are alike taught in that\nseries of petitions, which makes a holy spirit the foundation of a\nconstant spirit, and a constant spirit the guard of a holy spirit.\n\nThen consider, for a moment, the third element in the character which\nDavid longs to possess--a _free_ spirit. He who is holy because full of\nGod's Spirit, and constant in his holiness, will likewise be 'free.'\nThat is the same word which is in other places translated 'willing'--and\nthe scope of the Psalmist's desire is, 'Let my spirit be emancipated\nfrom sin by _willing_ obedience.' This goes very deep into the heart of\nall true godliness. The only obedience which God accepts is that which\ngladly, and almost as by an instinctive inward impulse, harmonises the\nhuman will with the divine. 'Lo! I come: in the volume of the book it is\nwritten of me, I delight to do Thy will, and Thy law is within my\nheart.' That is a blessed thought, that we may come to do Him service\nnot because we must, but because we like; not as serfs, but as sons; not\nthinking of His law as a slave-driver that cracks his whip over our\nheads, but as a friend that lets us know how we may please Him whom it\nis our delight to obey. And so the Psalmist prays, 'Let my obedience be\nso willing that I had rather do what Thou wilt than anything besides.'\n\n'_Then_,' he thinks, 'I shall be free.' Of course--for the correlative\nof freedom is lawful authority, and the definition of freedom is willing\nsubmission. If for us duty is joy, and all our soul's desires flow with\nan equable motion parallel to the will of God, then there is no sense of\nrestraint in keeping within the limits beyond which we do not seek to\ngo. The willing spirit sets us free, free from the 'ancient solitary\nreign' of the despot Self, free from the mob rule of passions and\nappetites, free from the incubus of evil habits, free from the authority\nof men's voices and examples. Obedience is freedom to them that have\nlearned to love the lips that command. We are set free that we may\nserve: 'O Lord! truly I am Thy servant; Thou hast loosed my bonds.' We\nare set free in serving: 'I will walk at liberty, for I keep Thy\nprecepts.' Let a willing, free spirit uphold me.\n\nII. Observe, too, that desires for holiness should become prayers.\n\nDavid does not merely long for certain spiritual excellences; he goes to\nGod for them. And his reasons for doing so are plain. If you will look\nat the former verses of this psalm, you will see that he had found out\ntwo things about his sin, both of which make him sure that he can only\nbe what he should be by God's help. He had learned what his crimes were\nin relation to God, and he had further learned what they indicated about\nhimself. The teaching of his bitter experience as to the former of these\ntwo matters lies in that saying which some people have thought strange.\n'Against _Thee only_ have I sinned.' What! Had he not committed a crime\nagainst human law? had he not harmed Uriah and Bathsheba? were not his\ndeeds an offence to his whole kingdom? Yes, he knew all that; but he\nfelt that over and above all that was black in his deed, considered in\nits bearing upon men, it was still blacker when it was referred to God;\nand a sadder word than 'crime' or 'fault' had to be used about it. I\nhave done wrong as against my fellows, but worse than that, I have\n_sinned_ against God. The notion of _sin_ implies the notion of God. Sin\nis wilful transgression of the law of _God_. An atheist can have no\nconception of sin. But bring God into human affairs, and men's faults\nimmediately assume the darker tint, and become men's sins. Therefore the\nneed of prayer if these evils are to be blotted out. If I had done crime\nagainst man only, I should not need to ask God for pardon or cleansing;\nbut I have sinned against Him, and done this evil in His sight,\ntherefore my desires for deliverance address themselves to Him, and my\nlongings for purity must needs break into the cry of entreaty to that\nGod with whom are forgiveness and redemption from all iniquity.\n\nAnd still further, looking at the one deed, he sees in it something more\nthan an isolated act. It leads him down to its motive; that motive\ncarries him to the state of mind in which it could have power; that\nstate of mind, in which the motive could have power, carries him still\ndeeper to the bias of his nature as he had received it from his parents.\nAnd thinking of how he had fallen, how upon his terraced palace roof\nthere the eye had inflamed the heart, and the heart had yielded so\nquickly to the temptations of the eye, he finds no profounder\nexplanation of the disastrous eclipse of goodness than this: 'Behold! I\nwas shapen in iniquity.'\n\nIs that a confession or a palliation, do you think? Is he trying to\nshuffle off guilt from his own shoulders? By no means, for these words\nare the motive for the prayer, 'Purge me, and I shall be clean.' That is\nto say, he has learned that isolated acts of sin inhere in a common\nroot, and that root a disposition inherited from generation to\ngeneration to which evil is familiar and easy, to which good, alas! is\nbut too alien and unwelcome. None the less is the evil done _his_ deed.\nNone the less has he to wail in full consciousness of his individual\nresponsibility: 'Against Thee have _I_ sinned.' But the effect of this\nsecond discovery, that sin has become so intertwisted with his being\nthat he cannot shake off the venomous beast into the fire and feel no\nharm, is the same as that of the former--to drive him to God, who alone\ncan heal the nature and separate the poison from his blood.\n\nDear friends! there are some of you who are wasting your lives in\nparoxysms of fierce struggle with the evil that you have partially\ndiscovered in yourselves, alternating with long languor, fits of\ncollapse and apathy, and who make no solid advance, just because you\nwill not lay to heart these two convictions--your sin has to do with\nGod, and your sins come from a sinful nature. Because of the one fact,\nyou must go to God for pardon; because of the other, you must go to God\nfor cleansing. There, in your heart, like some black well-head in a\ndismal bog, is the source of all the swampy corruption that fills your\nlife. You cannot stanch it, you cannot drain it, you cannot sweeten it.\nAsk Him, who is above your nature and without it, to change it by His\nown new life infused into your spirit. He will heal the bitter waters.\nHe alone can. Sin is against God; sin comes from an evil heart;\ntherefore, if your longings for that ideal perfectness are ever to be\nfulfilled, you must make prayers of them, and cry to Him who hears,\n'Create in me a clean heart, O God! take not Thy Holy Spirit from me.'\n\nIII. Finally, observe that prayers for perfect cleansing are permitted\nto the lips of the greatest sinners.\n\nSuch longings as these might seem audacious, when the atrocity of the\ncrime is remembered, and by man's standard they are so. Let the criminal\nbe thankful for escape, and go hide himself, say men's pardons. But here\nis a man, with the evil savour of his debauchery still tainting him,\ndaring to ask for no mere impunity, but for God's choicest gifts. Think\nof his crime, think of its aggravations from God's mercies to him, from\nhis official position, from his past devotion. Remember that this cruel\nvoluptuary is the sweet singer of Israel, who had taught men songs of\npurer piety and subtler emotion than the ruder harps of older singers\nhad ever flung from their wires. And this man, so placed, so gifted, set\nup on high to be the guiding light of the nation, has plunged into the\nfilth of these sins, and quenched all his light there. When he comes\nback penitent, what will he dare to ask? Everything that God can give to\nbless and gladden a soul. He asks for God's Spirit, for His presence,\nfor the joy of His salvation; to be made once again, as he had been, the\ninstrument that shall show forth His praise, and teach transgressors\nGod's ways. Ought he to have had more humble desires? Does this great\nboldness show that he is leaping very lightly over his sin? Is he\npresumptuous in such prayers? God be thanked--no! But, knowing all his\nguilt, and broken and contrite in heart (crushed and ground to powder,\nas the words mean), utterly loathing himself, aware of all the darkness\nof his deserts, he yet cherishes unconquerable confidence in the pitying\nlove of God, and believes that in spite of all his sin, he may yet be\npure as the angels of heaven--ay, even holy as God is holy.\n\nThank God we have such an example for our heartening! Lay it to heart,\nbrethren! You cannot believe too much in God's mercy. You cannot expect\ntoo much at His hands. He is 'able to do exceeding abundantly above all\nthat we ask or think.' No sin is so great but that, coming straight from\nit, a repentant sinner may hope and believe that all God's love will be\nlavished upon him, and the richest of God's gifts be granted to his\ndesires. Even if our transgression is aggravated by a previous life of\ngodliness, and have given the enemies great occasion to blaspheme, as\nDavid's did, yet David's penitence may in our souls lead on to David's\nhope, and the answer will not fail us. Let no sin, however dark, however\nrepeated, drive us to despair of ourselves, because it hides from us our\nloving Saviour. Though beaten back again and again by the surge of our\npassions and sins, like some poor shipwrecked sailor sucked back with\nevery retreating wave and tossed about in the angry surf, yet keep your\nface towards the beach, where there is safety, and you will struggle\nthrough it all, and though it were but on some floating boards and\nbroken pieces of the ship, will come safe to land. He will uphold you\nwith His Spirit, and take away the weight of sin that would sink you, by\nHis forgiving mercy, and bring you out of all the weltering waste of\nwaters to the solid shore.\n\nSo whatever thy evil behaviour, come with it all, and cast thyself\nbefore Him, with whom is plenteous redemption. Embrace in one act the\ntwo truths, of thine own sin and of God's infinite mercy in Jesus\nChrist. Let not the one blind you to the other; let not the one lead you\nto a morbid despondency, which is blind to Christ, nor the other to a\nsuperficial estimate of the deadliness of sin, which is blind to thine\nown self. Let the Cross teach thee what sin is, and let the dark\nbackground of thy sin bring into clear prominence the Cross that\nbringeth salvation. Know that thou art utterly black and sinful. Believe\nthat God is eternally, utterly, inconceivably, merciful. Learn both, in\nHim who is the Standard by which we can estimate our sin, and the Proof\nand Medium of God's mercy. Trust thyself and all thy foulness to Jesus\nChrist; and, so doing, look up from whatsoever horrible pit and miry\nclay thou mayest have fallen into, with this prayer, 'Create in me a\nclean heart, O God! and renew a right spirit within me, take not Thy\nHoly Spirit from me, and uphold me with Thy free Spirit.' Then the\nanswer shall come to you from Him who ever puts the best robe upon His\nreturning prodigals, and gives His highest gifts to sinners who repent.\n'From all your filthiness will I cleanse you, a new heart also will I\ngive you, and a new spirit will I put within you, and I will put My\nSpirit within you, and cause you to walk in My statutes.'\n\n\n\n\nFEAR AND FAITH\n\n\n    'What time I am afraid, I will trust in Thee. 4. ... In God I have\n    put my trust: I will not fear.'--PSALM lvi. 3, 4.\n\nIt is not given to many men to add new words to the vocabulary of\nreligious emotion. But so far as an examination of the Old Testament\navails, I find that David was the first that ever employed the word that\nis here translated, _I will trust_, with a religious meaning. It is\nfound occasionally in earlier books of the Bible in different\nconnections, never in regard to man's relations to God, until the\nPoet-Psalmist laid his hand upon it, and consecrated it for all\ngenerations to express one of the deepest relations of man to his Father\nin heaven. And it is a favourite word of his. I find it occurs\nconstantly in his psalms; twice as often, or nearly so, in the psalms\nattributed to David as in all the rest of the Psalter put together; and\nas I shall have occasion to show you in a moment, it is in itself a most\nsignificant and poetic word.\n\nBut, first of all, I ask you to notice how beautifully there comes out\nhere the _occasion_ of trust. 'What time I am afraid, I will put my\ntrust in Thee.'\n\nThis psalm is one of those belonging to the Sauline persecution. If we\nadopt the allocation in the superscription, it was written at one of the\nvery lowest points of David's fortunes. And there seem to be one or two\nof its phrases which acquire new force, if we regard the psalm as drawn\nforth by the perils of his wandering, hunted life. For instance--'Thou\ntellest my wanderings,' is no mere expression of the feelings with which\nhe regarded the changes of this early pilgrimage, but is the confidence\nof the fugitive that in the doublings and windings of his flight God's\neye marked him. 'Put thou my tears into Thy _bottle_'--one of the few\nindispensable articles which he had to carry with him, the water-skin\nwhich hung beside him, perhaps, as he meditated. So read in the light of\nhis probable circumstances, how pathetic and eloquent does that saying\nbecome--'What time I am afraid, I will trust in Thee.' That goes deep\ndown into the realities of life. It is when we are 'afraid' that we\ntrust in God; not in easy times, when things are going smoothly with us.\nNot when the sun shines, but when the tempest blows and the wind howls\nabout his ears, a man gathers his cloak round him, and cleaves fast to\nhis supporter. The midnight sea lies all black; but when it is cut into\nby the oar, or divided and churned by the paddle, it flashes up into\nphosphorescence, and so it is from the tumults and agitation of man's\nspirit that there is struck out the light of man's faith. There is the\nbit of flint and the steel that comes hammering against it; and it is\nthe contact of these two that brings out the spark. The man never knew\nconfidence who does not know how the occasion that evoked and preceded\nit was terror and need. 'What time I am _afraid_, I will trust.' That is\nno trust which is only fair weather trust. This principle--first fear,\nand only then, faith--applies all round the circle of our necessities,\nweaknesses, sorrows, and sins.\n\nThere must, first of all, be the deep sense of need, of exposedness to\ndanger, of weakness, of sorrow, and only then will there come the\ncalmness of confidence. A victorious faith will\n\n    'rise large and slow\n  From out the fluctuations of our souls,\n  As from the dim and tumbling sea\n  Starts the completed moon.'\n\nAnd then, if so, notice how there is involved in that the other\nconsideration, that a man's confidence is not the product of outward\ncircumstances, but of his own fixed resolves. 'I _will_ put my trust in\nThee.' Nature says, 'Be afraid!' and the recoil from that natural fear,\nwhich comes from a discernment of threatening evil, is only possible by\na strong effort of the will. Foolish confidence opposes to natural fear\na groundless resolve not to be afraid, as if heedlessness were security,\nor facts could be altered by resolving not to think about them. True\nfaith, by a mighty effort of the will, fixes its gaze on the divine\nHelper, and there finds it possible and wise to lose its fears. It is\nmadness to say, 'I will not to be afraid!' it is wisdom and peace to\nsay, 'I will trust, and not be afraid.' But it is no easy matter to fix\nthe eye on God when threatening enemies within arm's-length compel our\ngaze; and there must be a fixed resolve, not indeed to coerce our\nemotions or to ignore our perils, but to set the Lord before us, that we\nmay not be moved. When war desolates a land, the peasants fly from their\nundefended huts to the shelter of the castle on the hilltop, but they\ncannot reach the safety of the strong walls without climbing the steep\nroad. So when calamity darkens round us, or our sense of sin and sorrow\nshakes our hearts, we need effort to resolve and to carry into practice\nthe resolution, 'I flee unto Thee to hide me.' Fear, then, is the\noccasion of faith, and faith is fear transformed by the act of our own\nwill, calling to mind the strength of God, and betaking ourselves\nthereto. Therefore, do not wonder if the two things lie in your hearts\ntogether, and do not say, 'I have no faith because I have some fear,'\nbut rather feel that if there be the least spark of the former it will\nturn all the rest into its own bright substance. Here is the stifling\nsmoke, coming up from some newly-lighted fire of green wood, black and\nchoking, and solid in its coils; but as the fire burns up, all the\nsmoke-wreaths will be turned into one flaming spire, full of light and\nwarmth. Do you turn your smoke into fire, your fear into faith. Do not\nbe down-hearted if it takes a while to convert the whole of the lower\nand baser into the nobler and higher. Faith and fear do blend, thank\nGod! They are as oil and water in a man's soul, and the oil will float\nabove, and quiet the waves. 'What time I am afraid'--there speak nature\nand the heart; 'I will trust in Thee'--there speaks the better man\nwithin, lifting himself above nature and circumstances, and casting\nhimself into the extended arms of God, who catches him and keeps him\nsafe.\n\nThen, still further, these words, or rather one portion of them, give us\na bright light and a beautiful thought as to the _essence_ and inmost\ncentre of this faith or trust. Scholars tell us that the word here\ntranslated 'trust' has a graphic, pictorial meaning for its root idea.\nIt signifies literally to cling to or hold fast anything, expressing\nthus both the notion of a good tight grip and of intimate union. Now, is\nnot that metaphor vivid and full of teaching as well as of impulse? 'I\nwill trust in Thee.' 'And he exhorted them all, that with purpose of\nheart they should _cleave_ unto the Lord.' We may follow out the\nmetaphor of the word in many illustrations. For instance, here is a\nstrong prop, and here is the trailing, lithe feebleness of the vine.\nGather up the leaves that are creeping all along the ground, and coil\nthem around that support, and up they go straight towards the heavens.\nHere is a limpet in some pond or other, left by the tide, and it has\nrelaxed its grasp a little. Touch it with your finger and it grips fast\nto the rock, and you will want a hammer before you can dislodge it.\nThere is a traveller groping along some narrow broken path, where the\nchamois would tread cautiously, his guide in front of him. His head\nreels, and his limbs tremble, and he is all but over, but he grasps the\nstrong hand of the man in front of him, or lashes himself to him by the\nrope, and he can walk steadily. Or, take that story in the Acts of the\nApostles, about the lame man healed by Peter and John. All his life long\nhe had been lame, and when at last healing comes, one can fancy with\nwhat a tight grasp 'the lame man held Peter and John.' The timidity and\nhelplessness of a lifetime made him hold fast, even while, walking and\nleaping, he tried how the unaccustomed 'feet and ankle bones' could do\ntheir work. How he would clutch the arms of his two supporters, and feel\nhimself firm and safe only as long as he grasped them! That is faith,\ncleaving to Christ, twining round Him with all the tendrils of our\nheart, as the vine does round its pole; holding to Him by His hand, as a\ntottering man does by the strong hand that upholds.\n\nAnd there is one more application of the metaphor, which perhaps may be\nbest brought out by referring to a passage of Scripture. We find this\nsame expression used in that wonderfully dramatic scene in the Book of\nKings, where the supercilious messengers from the king of Assyria came\nup and taunted the king and his people on the wall. 'What confidence is\nthis wherein thou trustest? Now, on whom dost thou trust, that thou\nrebellest against me? Now, behold, thou trustest upon the staff of this\nbruised reed, even upon Egypt, on which, if a man lean, it will go into\nhis hand and pierce it: so is Pharaoh, king of Egypt, unto all that\ntrust on him,' The word of our text is employed there, and as the phrase\nshows, with a distinct trace of its primary sense. Hezekiah was leaning\nupon that poor paper reed on the Nile banks, that has no substance, or\nstrength, or pith in it. A man leans upon it, and it runs into the palm\nof his hand, and makes an ugly festering wound. Such rotten stays are\nall our earthly confidences. The act of trust, and the miserable issues\nof placing it on man, are excellently described there. The act is the\nsame when directed to God, but how different the issues. Lean all your\nweight on God as on some strong staff, and depend upon it that your\nsupport will never yield nor crack and no splinters will run into your\npalms from it.\n\nIf I am to cling with my hand I must first empty my hand. Fancy a man\nsaying, 'I cannot stand unless you hold me up; but I have to hold my\nbank book, and this thing, and that thing, and the other thing; I cannot\nput them down, so I have not a hand free to lay hold with, you must do\nthe holding.' That is what some of us are saying in effect. Now the\nprayer, 'Hold Thou me up, and I shall be safe,' is a right one; but not\nfrom a man who will not put his possessions out of his hands that he may\nlay hold of the God who lays hold of him.\n\n  'Nothing in my hand I bring.'\n\nThen, of course, and only then, when we are empty-handed, shall we be\nfree to grip and lay hold; and only then shall we be able to go on with\nthe grand words--\n\n  'Simply to Thy Cross I cling,'\n\nas some half-drowned, shipwrecked sailor, flung up on the beach, clasps\na point of rock, and is safe from the power of the waves that beat\naround him.\n\nAnd then one word more. These two clauses that I have put together give\nus not only the occasion of faith in fear, and the essence of faith in\nthis clinging, but they also give us very beautifully the _victory_ of\nfaith. You see with what poetic art--if we may use such words about the\nbreathings of such a soul--he repeats the two main words of the former\nverse in the latter, only in inverted order--'What time I am afraid, I\nwill trust in Thee.' He is possessed by the lower emotion, and resolves\nto escape from its sway into the light and liberty of faith. And then\nthe next words still keep up the contrast of faith and fear, only that\nnow he is possessed by the more blessed mood, and determines that he\nwill not fall back into the bondage and darkness of the baser. 'In God I\nhave put my trust; I will not fear.' He has confidence, and in the\nstrength of that he resolves that he will not yield to fear. If we put\nthat thought into a more abstract form it comes to this: that the one\ntrue antagonist and triumphant rival of all fear is faith, and faith\nalone. There is no reason why any man should be emancipated from his\nfears either about this world or about the next, except in proportion as\nhe has faith. Nay, rather it is far away more rational to be afraid than\nnot to be afraid, unless I have this faith in Christ. There are plenty\nof reasons for dread in the dark possibilities and not less dark\ncertainties of life. Disasters, losses, partings, disappointments,\nsicknesses, death, may any of them come at any moment, and some of them\nwill certainly come sooner or later. Temptations lurk around us like\nserpents in the grass, they beset us in open ferocity like lions in our\npath. Is it not wise to fear unless our faith has hold of that great\npromise, 'Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder; there shall no evil\nbefall thee'? But if we have a firm hold of God, then it is wise not to\nbe afraid, and terror is folly and sin. For trust brings not only\ntranquillity, but security, and so takes away fear by taking away\ndanger.\n\nThat double operation of faith in quieting and in defending is very\nstrikingly set forth by an Old Testament word, formed from the verb here\nemployed, which means properly _confidence_, and then in one form comes\nto signify both _in security_ and _in safety_, secure as being free from\nanxiety, safe as being sheltered from peril. So, for instance, the\npeople of that secluded little town of Laish, whose peaceful existence\namidst warlike neighbours is described with such singular beauty in the\nBook of Judges, are said to 'dwell _careless_, quiet, and _secure_.' The\nformer phrase is literally 'in trust,' and the latter is 'trusting.' The\nidea sought to be conveyed by both seems to be that double one of quiet\nfreedom from fear and from danger. So again, in Moses' blessing, 'The\nbeloved of the Lord shall dwell _in safety_ by Him,' we have the same\nphrase to express the same twofold benediction of shelter, by dwelling\nin God, from all alarm and from all attack:\n\n  'As far from danger as from fear,\n   While love, Almighty love is near.'\n\nThis thought of the victory of faith over fear is very forcibly set\nforth in a verse from the Book of Proverbs, which in our version runs\n'The righteous is bold as a lion.' The word rendered 'is bold' is that\nof our text, and would literally be 'trusts,' but obviously the metaphor\nrequires such a translation as that of the English Bible. The word that\nproperly describes the act of faith has come to mean the courage which\nis the consequence of the act, just as our own word _confidence_\nproperly signifies trust, but has come to mean the boldness which is\nborn of trust. So, then, the true way to become brave is to lean on God.\nThat, and that alone, delivers from otherwise reasonable fear, and Faith\nbears in her one hand the gift of outward safety, and in her other that\nof inward peace.\n\nPeter is sinking in the water; the tempest runs high. He looks upon the\nwaves, and is ready to fancy that he is going to be swallowed up\nimmediately. His fear is reasonable if he has only the tempest and\nhimself to draw his conclusions from. His helplessness and the scowling\nstorm together strike out a little spark of faith, which the wind cannot\nblow out, nor the floods quench. Like our Psalmist here, when Peter is\nafraid, he trusts. 'Save, Lord! or I perish.' Immediately the\noutstretched hand of his Lord grasps his, and brings him safety, while\nthe gentle rebuke, 'O thou of little faith! wherefore didst thou doubt?'\ninfuses courage into his beating heart. The storm runs as high as ever,\nand the waves beat about his limbs, and the spray blinds his eyes. If he\nleaves his hold for one moment down he will go. But, as long as he\nclasps Christ's hand, he is as safe on that heaving floor as if his feet\nwere on a rock; and as long as he looks in Christ's face and leans upon\nHis upholding arm, he does _not_ 'see the waves boisterous,' nor tremble\nat all as they break around him. His fear and his danger are both gone,\nbecause he holds Christ and is upheld by Him. In this sense, too, as in\nmany others, 'this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our\nfaith.'\n\n\n\n\nA SONG OF DELIVERANCE\n\n\n    'For Thou hast delivered my soul from death: hast Thou not delivered\n    my feet from falling? that I may walk before God in the light of the\n    living.'--PSALM lvi. 13 (R.V.).\n\nAccording to the ancient Jewish tradition preserved in the\nsuperscription of this psalm, it was written at the lowest ebb of\nDavid's fortunes, 'when the Philistines took him in Gath,' and as you\nmay remember, he saved himself by adding the fox's hide to the lion's\nskin, and by pretending to be an idiot, degraded as well as delivered\nhimself. Yet immediately after, if we accept the date given by the\nsuperscription, the triumphant confidence and devout hope of this psalm\nanimated his mind. How unlike the true man was to what he appeared to be\nto Achish and his Philistines! It is strange that the inside and the\noutside should correspond so badly; but yet, thank God! it is possible.\nWe note,\n\nI. The deliverance realised by faith before it is accomplished in fact.\n\nYou will observe that I have made a slight alteration in the translation\nof the words. In our Authorised Version they stand thus: 'Thou hast\ndelivered my soul from death; _wilt_ Thou not deliver my feet from\nfalling?' as if some prior deliverance was the basis upon which the\nPsalmist rested his expectation of that which was still to come. But\nthere is no authority in the original for that variation of tenses, and\nboth clauses obviously refer to the same period and the same\ndeliverance. Therefore we must read: 'Thou hast delivered my soul from\ndeath: _hast_ Thou not delivered,' etc.; the question being equivalent\nto a strong affirmation, 'Yea, Thou hast delivered my feet from\nfalling.' This reference of both clauses to the same period and the same\ndelivering act, is confirmed by the quotation of these words in a very\nmuch later psalm, the 116th, where we read, with an addition, 'Thou hast\ndelivered my soul from death, _mine eyes from tears_, and my feet from\nfalling.'\n\nSo, then, the Psalmist is so sure of the deliverance that is coming that\nhe sings of it as past. He is still in the very thick of the trouble and\nthe fight, and yet he says, 'It is as good as over. Thou _hast_\ndelivered.'\n\nHow does he come to that confidence? Simply because his future is God;\nand whoever has God for his future can turn else uncertain hopes into\ncertain confidences, and make sure of this, that however Achish and his\ngiant Philistines of Gath, wielding Goliath's arms, spears like a\nweaver's beam, and brazen armour, may compass him about, in the name of\nthe Lord he will destroy them. They are all as good as dead, though they\nare alive and hostile at this moment. In the midst of trouble we can\nfling ourselves into the future, or rather draw the future into the\npresent, and say, 'Thou _hast_ delivered my soul from death.' It is safe\nto reckon on to-morrow when we reckon on God. We to-day have the same\nreasons for the same confidence; and if we will go the right way about\nit, we, too, may bring June's sun into November's fogs, and bask in the\nwarmth of certain deliverance even when the chill mists of trouble\nenfold us.\n\nBut then note, too, here, the substance of this future intervention\nwhich, to the Psalmist's quiet faith, is present:--'My soul from death,'\nand after that he says, 'My feet from falling,' which looks very like an\nanticlimax and bathos. But yet, just because to deliver the feet from\nfalling is so much smaller a thing than delivering a life from death, it\ncomes here to be a climax and something greater. The storm passes over\nthe man. What then? After the storm has passed, he is not only alive,\nbut he is standing upright. It has not killed him. No, it has not even\nshaken him. His feet are as firm as ever they were, and just because\nthat is a smaller thing, it is a greater thing for the deliverance to\nhave accomplished than the other. God does not deliver by halves; He\ndoes not leave the delivered man maimed, or thrown down, though living.\n\nRemember, too, the expansion of the text in the psalm to which I have\nalready referred, one of a much later date, which by quoting these words\nreally comments upon them. The later Psalmist adds a clause. 'Mine eyes\nfrom tears,' and we may follow on in the same direction, and note the\nthree spheres in which the later poet hymns the delivering hand of God\nas spiritualising for us all our deeper Christian experience. 'Thou hast\ndelivered my soul from death,' in that great redemption by which the Son\nhas died that we may never know either the intensest bitterness of\nphysical death, or the true death of which it is the shadow and the\nemblem. 'Thou hast delivered mine eyes from tears'; God wipes away tears\nhere, even before we come to the time when He wipes away all tears from\noff all faces, and no eyes are delivered from tears, except eyes that\nhave looked through tears to God. 'And my feet from falling'--redeeming\ngrace which saves the soul; comforting grace which lightens sorrow;\nupholding grace which keeps us from sins--these are the elements of what\nGod has done for us all, if our poor feeble trust has rested on Him.\n\nHow did David get to this confidence? Why, he prayed himself into it. If\nyou will read the psalm, you will see very clearly the process by which\na man comes to that serene, triumphant trust that the battle is won even\nwhilst it is raging around him. The previous portion of the psalm falls\ninto two parts, on which I need only make this one remark, that in both\nwe have first of all an obvious disquieting fact, and then a flash of\nvictorious confidence. Let me just read a word or two to you. The\nPsalmist begins in a very minor key. 'Be merciful unto me, O God! for\nman would swallow me up'--that is Achish and his Philistines. 'He\nfighting daily oppresseth me; mine enemies daily would swallow me up.'\nHe reiterates the same thought with the dreary monotony of sorrow, 'for\nthere be many that fight against me, O Thou most High!' But swiftly his\nnote changes into 'What time I am afraid I will trust in Thee. In God I\nwill praise His word'; that is to say, His promise of deliverance, 'in\nGod I have put my trust.' He has climbed to the height, but only for a\nmoment, for down he drops again, and begins anew the old miserable\ncomplaint. The sorrow is too clinging to be cast off at one struggle. It\nhas been dammed out for the moment, but the flood rushes too heavily,\nand away goes the dam, and back pours the black water. 'Every day they\nwrest my words; all their thoughts are against me for evil.' And he goes\non longer on his depressing key this second time than he did the first,\nbut he rises above it once more in the same fashion, and the refrain\nwith which he had closed the first part of the psalm closes the second.\n'In God will I praise His word; in the Lord will I praise His word.' Now\nhe has won the height and keeps it, and breaks into a paean of victory in\nwords of the text.\n\nThat is to say, pray yourselves into confidence, and if it does not come\nat first, pray again. If the consolation seems to glide away, even\nwhilst you are laying hold of it, grasp it once more, and close your\nfingers more tightly on it. Do not be afraid of going down into the\ndepths a second time, but be sure that you try to rise out of them at\nthe same point as before, by grasping the assurance that in God, in His\nstrength, and by His grace, you will be able to set your seal to the\ntruth of His great promise. Thus will you rise to this confidence which\ncalleth things that are not as though they were, and brings the\nto-morrow that is sure to dawn with all its brightness and serenity into\nthe turbulent, tempestuous, and clouded atmosphere of to-day. We shall\none day escape from all that burdens, and tries, and tasks us; and until\nthen this blessed assurance, the fruit of prayer, is like the food that\nthe ravens brought to the prophet in the ravine, or the bread and water\nthat the angel awoke him to partake of when he was faint in the\nwilderness. The true answer to David's prayer was the immediate access\nof confidence unshaken, though the outward answer was a long time in\ncoming, and years lay between him and the cessation of his persecutions\nand troubles. So we may have brooks by the way, in quiet confidence of\ndeliverance ere yet the deliverance comes. Then note,\n\nII. The impulse to service which deliverance brings.\n\n'That I may walk before God in the light of the living'; that is God's\npurpose in all His deliverances, that we may thereby be impelled to\ntrustful and grateful service. And David makes that purpose into a vow,\nfor the words might almost as well be translated, 'I _will_ walk before\nHim.' Let us see to it that God's purpose is our resolve, and that we do\nnot lose the good of any of the troubles or discipline through which He\npasses us; for the worst of all sorrows is a wasted sorrow.\n\n'Thou hast delivered my feet that I may walk.' What are feet for?\nWalking. Further, notice the precise force of that phrase, 'that I may\nwalk _before God_.' It is not altogether the same as the cognate one\nwhich is used about Enoch, that 'he walked _with_ God.' That expresses\ncommunion as with a friend; this, the ordering of one's life before His\neye, and in the consciousness of His presence as Judge and as\nTaskmaster. So you find the expression used in almost the only other\noccasion where it occurs in the Old Testament, where God says to\nAbraham, 'Walk before Me, and'--because thou dost order thy life in the\nconsciousness that I am looking at thee--'be thou perfect.' So, to walk\nbefore God is to live even in all the distracting activities of daily\nlife, with the clear realisation, and the continued thought burning in\nour minds that we are doing them all in His presence. Think of what a\nregiment of soldiers on parade does as each file passes in front of the\nsaluting point where the commanding officer is standing. How each man\ndresses up, and they pull themselves together, keeping step, sloping\ntheir rifles rightly. We are not on parade, but about business a great\ndeal more serious than that. We are doing our fighting with the Captain\nlooking at us, and that should be a stimulus, a joy and not a terror.\nRealise God's eye watching you, and sin, and meanness, and negligence,\nand selfishness, and sensuality, and lust, and passion, and all the\nother devils that are in you will vanish like ghosts at cockcrow. 'Walk\nbefore Me,' and if you feel that I am beside you, you cannot sin. 'Walk\nbefore Me, and be thou perfect.' Notice,\n\nIII. The region in which that observance of the divine eye is to be\ncarried on.\n\n'In the light of the living,' says the Psalmist. That seems to\ncorrespond to the first clause of his hope; just as the previous word\nthat I have been commenting upon, 'walking before Him,' corresponds to\nthe second, where he speaks about his feet. 'Thou hast delivered my soul\nfrom death.... I will walk before Thee in the light of the\nliving'--where Thou dost still permit my delivered soul to be. And the\nphrase seems to mean the sunshine of human life contrasted with the\ndarkness of _Sheol_.\n\nThe expression is varied in the 116th Psalm, which reads 'the land of\nthe living.' The really living are they who live in Jesus, and the real\nlight of the living is the sunshine that streams on those who thus live,\nbecause they live in Him who not only pours His light upon their hearts,\nbut, by pouring it, turns themselves into 'light in the Lord.' We, too,\nmay have the brightness of His face irradiating our faces and\nilluminating our paths, as with the beneficence of a better sunshine.\nThe Psalmist points us the way thus to walk in light. He vows that,\nbecause his heart is full of the great mercies of his delivering God, he\nwill order all his active life as under the consciousness of God's eye\nupon him, and then it will all be lightened as by a burst of sunshine.\nOur brightest light is the radiance from the face of God whom we try to\nlove and serve, and the Psalmist's confidence is that a life of\nobservance of His commandments in which gratitude for deliverance is the\nimpelling motive to continual realisation of His presence, and an\naccordant life, will be a bright and sunny career. You will live in the\nsunshine if you live before His face, and however wintry the world may\nbe, it will be like a clear frosty day. There is no frost in the sky, it\ndoes not go above the atmosphere, and high above, in serene and wondrous\nblue, is the blaze of the sunshine. Such a life will be a guided life.\nThere will still remain many occasions for doubt in the region of\nbelief, and for perplexity as to duty. There will often be need for\npatient and earnest thought as to both, and there will be no lack of\ncalls for strenuous effort of our best faculties in order to apprehend\nwhat our Guide means us to do, and where He would have us go, but\nthrough it all there will be the guiding hand. As the Master, with\nperhaps a glance backwards to these words, said, 'He that followeth Me\nshall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.' If He is\nin the light let us walk in the light, and to us it will be purity and\nknowledge and joy.\n\n\n\n\nTHE FIXED HEART\n\n\n    'My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed; I will sing and give\n    praise.'--PSALM lvii. 7.\n\nIt is easy to say such things when life goes smoothly with us. But this\nPsalmist, whether David or another, says this, and means it, when all\nthings are dark and frowning around him. The superscription attributes\nthe words to David himself, fleeing from Saul, and hiding in the cave.\nWhether that be so or no, the circumstances under which the Psalmist\nsings are obviously those of very great difficulty and oppression. But\nhe sings himself into confidence and good cheer. In the dark he believes\nin the light. There are some flowers that give their perfumes after\nsunset and are sweetest when the night dews are falling. The true\nreligious life is like these. A heart really based upon God, and at rest\nin Him, never breathes forth such fragrant and strong perfume as in the\ndarkness of sorrow. The repetition of 'My heart is fixed' adds emphasis\nto the expression of unalterable determination. The fixed heart is\nresolved to 'sing and give praise' in spite of everything that might\nmake sobs and tears choke the song.\n\nI. Note the fixed heart.\n\nThe Hebrew uses the metaphor of the 'heart' to cover a great deal more\nof the inward self than we are accustomed to do. We mainly mean thereby\nthat in us which loves. But the Old Testament speaks of the 'thoughts\nand intents' as well as the 'affections' of the heart. And so to this\nPsalmist his 'heart' was not only that in him which loved, but that\nwhich purposed and which thought. When he says 'My heart is fixed' he\ndoes not merely mean that he is conscious of a steadfast love, but also\nand rather of a fixed and settled determination, and of an abiding\ncommunion of thought between himself and God. And he not only makes this\ndeclaration as the expression of his experience for the moment, but he\nmortgages the future, and in so far as any man dare, he ventures to say\nthat this temper of entire consecration, of complete communion, of fixed\nresolve to cleave to God, which is his present mood, will be his future\nwhatever may wait his outward life then. The lesson from that resolve is\nthat our religion, if it is worth anything, must be a continuous and\nuniformly acting force throughout our whole lives, and not merely\nsporadic and spasmodic, by fits and starts. The lines that a child's\nunsteady and untrained hand draws in its copy-book are too good a\npicture of the 'crooked, wandering ways in which we live,' in so far as\nour religion is concerned. The line should be firm and straight, uniform\nin breadth, unvarying in direction, like a sunbeam, homogeneous and\nequally tenacious like an iron rod. Unless it be thus strong and\nuniform, it will scarcely sustain the weights that it must bear, or\nresist the blows that it must encounter.\n\nFor a fixed heart I must have a fixed determination, and not a mere\nfluctuating and soon broken intention. I must have a steadfast\naffection, and not merely a fluttering love, that, like some butterfly,\nlights now on this, now on that, sweet flower, but which has a flight\nstraight as a carrier pigeon to its cot, which shall bear me direct to\nGod. And I must have a continuous realisation of my dependence upon God,\nand of God's sweet sufficiency, going with me all through the dusty day.\nA firm determination, a steadfast love, a constant thought, these at\nleast are inculcated in the words of my text. 'My heart is fixed, O God!\nmy heart is fixed.'\n\nAh, brethren! how unlike the broken, interrupted, divergent lines that\nwe draw! Our religious moments are not knit together, and touching one\nupon the other, but they are like the pools in the bed of a half dried\nup Australian stream--a pond here, and a stretch of white, blistering\npebbles there, and then a little drop of water, and then another reach\nof dryness. They should all be knit together by one continuous flow of a\nfixed love, desire, and thought. Is our average Christianity fairly\nrepresented by such words as these of my text? Do they not rather make\nus burn with shame when we think that a man who lived in the twilight of\nGod's revelation, and was weighed upon by distresses such as wrung this\npsalm out of him, should have poured out this resolve, which we who live\nin the sunlight and are flooded with blessings find it hard to echo with\nsincerity and truth? Fixed hearts are rare amongst the Christians of\nthis day.\n\nII. Notice the manifold hindrances to such a uniformity of our religious\nlife.\n\nThey are formidable enough, God knows, we all know it, and I do not need\nto dwell upon them. There is, for example, the tendency to fluctuation\nwhich besets all our feelings, and especially our religious emotions.\nWhat would happen to a steam-engine if the stoker now piled on coals and\nthen fell asleep by the furnace door? One moment the boiler would be\nready to burst; at another moment there would be no steam to drive\nanything. That is the sort of alternation that goes on amongst hosts of\nChristians to-day. Their springtime and summer are followed certainly by\nan autumn and a bitter winter. Every moment of elevation has a\ncorresponding moment of depression. They never catch a glimpse of God\nand of His love brighter and more sweet than ordinary without its being\nfollowed by long weariness and depression and darkness. That is the kind\nof life that many of you are contented to live as Christian people.\n\nBut is there any necessity for such alternations? Some degree of\nfluctuation there will always be. The very exercise of emotion tends to\nits extinction. Varying conditions of health and other externals will\naffect the buoyancy and clear-sightedness and vivacity of the spiritual\nlife. Only a barometer that is out of order will always stand at set\nfair. The vane which never points but to south is rusty and means\nnothing.\n\nBut while there cannot be absolute uniformity, there might and should be\na far nearer approach to an equable temperature of a much higher range\nthan the readings of most professing Christians give. There is, indeed,\na dismally uniform arctic temperature in many of them. Their hearts are\nfixed, truly, but fixed on earth. Their frost is broken by no thaw,\ntheir tepid formalism interrupted by no disturbing enthusiasm. We do not\nnow speak of these, but of those who have moments of illumination, of\ncommunion, of submission of will, which fade all too soon. To such we\nwould earnestly say that these moments may be prolonged and made more\ncontinuous. We  need not be at the mercy of our own unregulated\nfeelings. We can control our hearts, and keep them fixed, even if they\nshould wish to wander. If we would possess the blessing of an\napproximately uniform religious life, we must assert the control of\nourselves and use both bridle and spur. A great many religious people\nseem to think that 'good times' come and go, and that they can do\nnothing to bring or keep or banish them. But that is not so. If the fire\nis burning low, there is such a thing on the hearth as a poker, and\ncoals are at hand. If we feel our faith falling asleep, are we powerless\nto rouse it? Cannot we say 'I _will_ trust'? Let us learn that the\nvariations in our religious emotions are largely subject to our own\ncontrol, and may, if we will govern ourselves, be brought far nearer to\nuniformity than they ordinarily are.\n\nBesides the fluctuations due to our own changes of mood, there are also\nthe distracting influences of even the duties which God lays upon us. It\nis hard for a man with the material task of the moment that takes all\nhis powers, to keep a little corner of his heart clear, and to feel that\nGod is there. It is difficult in the clatter of the mill or in the\ncrowds on 'Change, to do our work as for and in remembrance of Christ.\nIt _is_ difficult; but it is possible. Distractions are made\ndistractions by our own folly and weakness. There is nothing that it is\nour duty to do which an honest attempt to do from the right motive could\nnot convert into a positive help to getting nearer God. It is for us to\ndetermine whether the tasks of life, and this intrusive external and\nmaterial world, shall veil Him from us, or shall reveal Him to us. It is\nfor us to determine whether we shall make our secular avocation and its\ntrials, little and great, a means to get nearer to God, or a means to\nshut Him out from us, and us from Him. There is nothing but sin\nincompatible with the fixed heart, the resolved will, the continual\ncommunion, nothing incompatible though there may be much that makes it\ndifficult to realise and preserve these.\n\nAnd then, of course, the trials and sorrows which strike us all make\nthis fixed heart hard to keep. It is easy, as I said, to vow, 'I will\nsing and give praise,' when flesh is comfortable and prosperity is\nspreading its bright sky over our heads. It is harder to say it when\ndisappointment and bitterness are in the heart, and an empty place there\nthat aches and will never be filled. It is harder for a man to say it\nwhen, like this Psalmist, his soul is 'amongst lions' and he 'lies\namongst them that are set on fire.' But still, rightly taken, sorrow is\nthe best ladder to God; and there is no such praise as comes from the\nlips that, if they did not praise, must sob, and that praise because\nthey are beginning to learn that evil, as the world calls it, is the\nstepping-stone to the highest good. 'My heart is fixed. I will sing and\ngive praise' may be the voice of the mourner as well as of the\nprosperous and happy.\n\nIII. Lastly, let me say just a word as to the means by which such a\nuniform character may be impressed upon our religious experience.\n\nThere is another psalm where this same phrase is employed with a very\nimportant and illuminating addition, in which we read, 'His heart is\nfixed, trusting in the Lord.' That is the secret of a fixed\nheart--continuous faith rooted and grounded in Him. This fluttering,\nchangeful, unreliable, emotional nature of mine will be made calm and\nsteadfast by faith, and duties done in the faith of God will bind me to\nHim; and sorrows borne and joys accepted in the faith of God will be\nlinks in the chain that knits Him to me.\n\nBut then the question comes, how to get this continuous faith? Brethren!\nI know no answer except the simple one, by continually making efforts\nafter it, and adopting the means which Christ enjoins to secure it. A\nman climbing a hill, though he has to look to his feet when in the\nslippery places, and all his energies are expended in hoisting himself\nupwards by every projection and crag, will do all the better if he lifts\nhis eye often to the summit that gleams above him. So we, in our upward\ncourse, shall make the best progress when we consciously and honestly\ntry to look beyond the things seen and temporal, even whilst we are\nworking in the midst of them, and to keep clear before us the summit to\nwhich our faith tends. If we lived in the endeavour to realise that\ngreat white throne, and Him that sits upon it, we should find it easier\nto say, 'My heart is fixed, O God! my heart is fixed.'\n\nBut be sure of this, there will be no such uniformity of religious\nexperience throughout our lives unless there be frequent times in them\nin which we go into our chambers and shut our doors about us, and hold\ncommunion with our Father in secret. Everything noble and great in the\nChristian life is fed by solitude, and everything poor and mean and\nhypocritical and low-toned is nourished by continual absence from the\nsecret place of the Most High. There must be moments of solitary\ncommunion, if there are to be hours of strenuous service and a life of\ncontinual consecration.\n\nWe need not ask ourselves the question whether the realisation of the\nideal of this fixedness in its perfect completeness is possible for us\nhere on earth or not. You and I are a long way on this side of that\nrealisation yet, and we need not trouble ourselves about the final\nstages until we have got on a stage or two more.\n\nWhat would you think of a boy if, when he had just been taught to draw\nwith a pencil, he said to his master, 'Do you think I shall ever be able\nto draw as well as Raphael?' His teacher would say to him, 'Whether you\nwill or not, you will be able to draw a good deal better than now, if\nyou try.' We need not trouble ourselves with the questions that disturb\nsome people until we are very much nearer to perfection than any of us\nyet are. At any rate, we can approach indefinitely to that ideal, and\nwhether it is possible for us in this life ever to have hearts so\ncontinuously fixed as that no attraction shall draw the needle aside one\npoint from the pole or not, it is possible for us all to have them a\ngreat deal steadier than in that wavering, fluctuating vacillation which\nnow rules them.\n\nSo let us pray the prayer, 'Unite my heart to fear Thy name,' make the\nresolve, 'My heart is fixed,' and listen obediently to the command, 'He\nexhorted them all that with purpose of heart they should cleave unto the\nLord.'\n\n\n\n\nWAITING AND SINGING\n\n\n    'Because of his strength will I wait upon Thee: for God is my\n    defence.... 17. Unto Thee, O my strength, will I sing: for God is my\n    defence, and the God of my mercy.'--PSALM lix. 9, 17.\n\nThere is an obvious correspondence between these two verses even as they\nstand in our translation, and still more obviously in the Hebrew. You\nobserve that in the former verse the words 'because of' are a supplement\ninserted by our translators, because they did not exactly know what to\nmake of the bare words as they stood. 'His strength, I will wait upon\nThee,' is, of course, nonsense; but a very slight alteration of a single\nletter, which has the sanction of several good authorities, both in\nmanuscripts and translations, gives an appropriate and beautiful\nmeaning, and brings the two verses into complete verbal correspondence.\nSuppose we read, 'My strength,' instead of 'His strength.' The change is\nonly making the limb of one letter a little shorter, and as you will\nperceive, we thereby get the same expressions in both verses.\n\nWe may then read our two texts thus: 'Upon Thee, O my Strength! I will\nwait.... Unto Thee, O my Strength, I will sing!' They are, word for\nword, parallel, with the significant difference that the waiting in the\none passes into song, in the other, the silent expectation breaks into\nmusic of praise. And these two words--_wait_ and _sing_--are in the\nHebrew the same in every letter but one, thus strengthening the\nimpression of likeness as well as emphasising, with poetic art, that of\ndifference. The parallel, too, obviously extends to the second half of\neach verse, where the reason for both the waiting and the praise is the\nsame--'For God is my defence'--with the further eloquent variation that\nthe song is built not only on the thought that 'God is my defence,' but\nalso on this, that He is 'the God of my mercy.'\n\nThese two parallel verses, then, are a kind of refrain, coming in at the\nclose of each division of the psalm; and if you examine its structure\nand general course of thought, you will see that the first stands at the\nend of a picture of the Psalmist's trouble and danger, and makes the\ntransition to the second part, which is mainly a prayer for deliverance,\nand finishes with the refrain altered and enlarged, as I have pointed\nout.\n\nThe heading of the psalm tells us that its date is the very beginning of\nSaul's persecution, when 'they watched the house to kill' David, and he\nfled by night from the city. There is a certain correspondence between\nthe circumstances and some part of the picture of his foes here which\nmakes the date probable. If so, this is one of David's oldest psalms,\nand is interesting as showing his faith and courage, even in the first\nburst of danger. But whether that be so or not, we have here, at any\nrate, the voice of a devout soul in sore sorrow, and we may well learn\nthe lesson of its twofold utterance. The man, overwhelmed by calamity,\nbetakes himself to God. 'Upon Thee, O my Strength! will I wait, for God\nis my defence.' Then, by dint of _waiting_, although the outward\ncircumstances keep just the same, his temper and feelings change. He\nbegan with, 'Deliver me from my enemies, O Lord! for they lie in wait\nfor my soul.' He passes through 'My Strength! I will wait upon Thee,'\nand so ends with 'My Strength! I will sing unto Thee.' We may then throw\nour remarks into two groups, and deal for a few moments with these two\npoints--the waiting on God, and the change of waiting into praise.\n\nNow, with regard to the first of these--the waiting on God--I must\nnotice that the expression here, 'I will _wait_,' is a somewhat\nremarkable one. It means accurately, 'I will watch Thee,' and it is the\nword that is generally employed, not about our looking up to Him, but\nabout His looking down to us. It would describe the action of a shepherd\nguarding his flock; of a sentry keeping a city; of the watchers that\nwatch for the morning, and the like. By using it, the Psalmist seems as\nif he would say--There are two kinds of watching. There is God's\nwatching over me, and there is my watching for God. I look up to Him\nthat He may bless; He looks down upon me that He may take care of me. As\nHe guards me, so I stand expectant before Him, as one in a besieged\ntown, upon the ramparts there, looks eagerly out across the plain to see\nthe coming of the long-expected succours. God 'waits to be\ngracious'--wonderful words, painting for us His watchfulness of fitting\ntimes and ways to bless us, and His patient attendance on our unwilling,\ncareless spirits. We may well take a lesson from His attitude in\nbestowing, and on our parts, wait on Him to be helped. For these two\nthings--vigilance and patience--are the main elements in the scriptural\nidea of waiting on God. Let me enforce each of them in a word or two.\n\nThere is no waiting on God for help, and there is no help from God,\nwithout watchful expectation on our parts. If ever we fail to receive\nstrength and defence from Him, it is because we are not on the outlook\nfor it. Many a proffered succour from heaven goes past us, because we\nare not standing on our watch-tower to catch the far-off indications of\nits approach, and to fling open the gates of our heart for its entrance.\nHe who expects no help will get none; he whose expectation does not lead\nhim to be on the alert for its coming will get but little. How the\nbeleaguered garrison, that knows a relieving force is on the march,\nstrain their eyes to catch the first glint of the sunshine on their\nspears as they top the pass! But how unlike such tension of watchfulness\nis the languid anticipation and fitful look, with more of distrust than\nhope in it, which we turn to heaven in our need! No wonder we have so\nlittle living experience that God is our 'strength' and our 'defence,'\nwhen we so partially believe that He is, and so little expect that He\nwill be either. The homely old proverb says, 'They that watch for\nprovidences will never want a providence to watch for,' and you may turn\nit the other way and say, 'They that do _not_ watch for providence will\nnever _have_ a providence to watch for.' Unless you put out your\nwater-jars when it rains you will catch no water; if you do not watch\nfor God coming to help you, God's watching to be gracious will be of no\ngood at all to you. His waiting is not a substitute for ours, but\nbecause He watches therefore we should watch. We say, we expect Him to\ncomfort and help us--well, are we standing, as it were, on tiptoe, with\nempty hands upraised to bring them a little nearer the gifts we look\nfor? Are our 'eyes ever towards the Lord'? Do we pore over His gifts,\nscrutinising them as eagerly as a gold-seeker does the quartz in his\npan, to detect every shining speck of the precious metal? Do we go to\nour work and our daily battle with the confident expectation that He\nwill surely come when our need is the sorest and scatter our enemies? Is\nthere any clear outlook kept by us for the help which we know must come,\nlest it should pass us unobserved, and like the dove from the ark,\nfinding no footing in our hearts drowned in a flood of troubles, be fain\nto return to the calm refuge from which it came on its vain errand?\nAlas, how many gentle messengers of God flutter homeless about our\nhearts, unrecognised and unwelcomed, because we have not been watching\nfor them! Of what avail is it that a strong hand from the beach should\nfling the safety-line with true aim to the wreck, if no eye on the deck\nis watching for it? It hangs there, useless and unseen, and then it\ndrops into the sea, and every soul on board is drowned. It is our own\nfault--and very largely the fault of our want of watchfulness for the\ncoming of God's help--if we are ever overwhelmed by the tasks, or\ndifficulties, or sorrows of life. We wonder that we are left to fight\nout the battle ourselves. But are we? Is it not rather, that while God's\nsuccours are hastening to our side we will not open our eyes to see, nor\nour hearts to receive them? If we go through the world with our hands\nhanging listlessly down instead of lifted to heaven, or full of the\ntrifles and toys of this present, as so many of us do, what wonder is it\nif heavenly gifts of strength do not come into our grasp?\n\nThat attitude of watchful expectation is vividly described for us in the\ngraphic words of another psalm, 'My soul waiteth for the Lord more than\nthey that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for\nthe morning.' What a picture that is! Think of a wakeful, sick man,\ntossing restless all the night on his tumbled bed, racked with pain made\nharder to bear by the darkness. How often his heavy eye is lifted to the\nwindow-pane, to see if the dawn has not yet begun to tint it with a grey\nglimmer! How he groans, 'Would God it were morning!' Or think of some\nunarmed and solitary man, benighted in the forest, and hearing the wild\nbeasts growl and scream and bark all round, while his fire dies down,\nand he knows that his life depends on the morning breaking soon. With\nyet more eager expectation are we to look for God, whose coming is a\nbetter morning for our sick and defenceless spirits. If we are not so\nlooking for His help, we need never be surprised that we do not get it.\nThere is no promise and no probability that it will come to men in their\nsleep, who neither desire it nor wait for it. And such vigilant\nexpectation will be accompanied with patience. There is no impatience in\nit, but the very opposite. 'If we hope for that we see not, then do we\nwith patience wait for it.' If we know that He will surely come, then if\nHe tarry we can wait for Him. The measure of our confidence is ever the\nmeasure of our patience. Being sure that He is always 'in the midst of'\nZion, we may be sure that at the right time He will flame out into\ndelivering might, helping her, and that right early. So waiting means\nwatchfulness and patience, both of which have their roots in trust.\n\nFurther, we have here set forth not only the nature, but also the object\nof this waiting. 'Upon Thee, O _my Strength_! will I wait, for God is\n_my Defence_.'\n\nThe object to which faith is directed, and the ground on which it is\nbased, are both set forth in these two names here applied to God. The\nname of the Lord is Strength, therefore I wait on Him in the confident\nexpectation of receiving of His power. The Lord is 'my Defence,'\ntherefore I wait on Him in the confident expectation of safety. The one\nname has respect to our condition of feebleness and inadequacy for our\ntasks, and points to God as infusing strength into us. The other points\nto our exposedness to danger and to enemies, and points to God as\ncasting His shelter around us. The word translated 'defence' is\nliterally 'a high fortress,' and is the same as closes the rapturous\naccumulation of the names of his delivering God, which the Psalmist\ngives us when he vows to love Jehovah, who has been his Rock, and\nFortress, and Deliverer; his God in whom he will trust, his Buckler, and\nthe Horn of his salvation, and his _High Tower_. The first name speaks\nof God dwelling in us, and His strength made perfect in our weakness;\nthe second speaks of our dwelling in God, and our defencelessness\nsheltered in Him. 'The name of the Lord is a strong tower; the righteous\nrunneth into it, and is safe.' As some outnumbered army, unable to make\nhead against its enemies in the open, flees to the shelter of some hill\nfortress, perched upon a crag, and taking up the drawbridge, cannot be\nreached by anything that has not wings, so this man, hard pressed by his\nfoes, flees into God to hide him, and feels secure behind these strong\nwalls.\n\nThat is the God on whom we wait. The recognition of His character as\nthus mighty and ready to help is the only thing that will evoke our\nexpectant confidence, and His character thus discerned is the only\nobject which our confidence can grasp aright. Trust Him as what He is,\nand trust Him because of what He is, and see to it that your faith lays\nhold on the living God Himself, and on nothing beside.\n\nBut waiting on God is not only the recognition of His character as\nrevealed, but it involves, too, the act of laying hold on all the power\nand blessing of that character for myself. '_My_ strength, _my_\ndefence,' says the Psalmist. Think of what He is, and believe that He is\nthat for _you_, else there is no true waiting on Him. Make God thy very\nown by claiming thine own portion in His might, by betaking thyself to\nthat strong habitation. We cannot wait on God in crowds, but one by one,\nmust say, '_My_ strength and _my_ defence.'\n\nAnd now turn to the second verse of our two texts: 'Unto Thee, O my\nStrength! will I sing, for God is my defence and the God of my mercy.'\n\nHere we catch, as it were, waiting expectation and watchfulness in the\nvery act of passing over into possession and praise. For remember the\naspect of things has not changed a bit between the first verse of our\ntext and the last. The enemies are all round about David just as they\nwere, 'making a noise like a dog,' as he says, and 'going round about\nthe city.' The evil that was threatening him and making him sad remains\nentirely unlightened. What has altered? He has altered. And how has he\naltered? Because his waiting on God has begun to work an inward change,\nand he has climbed, as it were, out of the depths of his sorrow up into\nthe sunlight. And so it ever is, my friends! There is deliverance in\nspirit before there is deliverance in outward fact. If our patient\nwaiting bring, as it certainly will bring, at the right time, an answer\nin the removal of danger, and the lightening of sorrow, it will bring\nfirst the better answer, 'the peace of God, which passeth all\nunderstanding,' to keep your hearts and minds. That is the highest\nblessing we have to seek for in our waiting on God, and that is the\nblessing which we get as soon as we wait on Him. The outward deliverance\nmay tarry, but ever there come before it, as heralds of its approach,\nthe sense of a lightened burden and the calmness of a strengthened\nheart. It may be long before the morning breaks, but even while the\ndarkness lasts, a faint air begins to stir among the sleeping leaves,\nthe promise of the dawn, and the first notes of half-awakened birds\nprelude the full chorus that will hail the sunrise.\n\nIt is beautiful, I think, to see how in the compass of this one little\npsalm the singer has, as it were, wrought himself clear, and sung\nhimself out of his fears. The stream of his thought, like some mountain\ntorrent, turbid at first, has run itself bright and sparkling. How all\nthe tremor and agitation have gone away, just because he has kept his\nmind for a few minutes in the presence of the calm thought of God and\nHis love. The first courses of his psalm, like those of some great\nbuilding, are laid deep down in the darkness, but the shining summit is\naway up there in the sunlight, and God's glittering glory is sparklingly\nreflected from the highest point. Whoever begins with, 'Deliver me--I\nwill wait upon Thee,' will pass very quickly, even before the outward\ndeliverance comes, into--'O my Strength! unto Thee will I sing!' Every\nsong of true trust, though it may begin with a minor, will end in a\nburst of jubilant gladness. No prayer ought ever to deal with\ncomplaints, as we know, without starting with thanksgiving, and, blessed\nbe God, no prayer need to deal with complaints without ending with\nthanksgiving. So, all our cries of sorrow, and all our acknowledgments\nof weakness and need, and all our plaintive beseechings, should be\ninlaid, as it were, between two layers of brighter and gladder thought,\nlike dull rock between two veins of gold. The prayer that begins with\nthankfulness, and passes on into waiting, even while in sorrow and sore\nneed, will always end in thankfulness, and triumph, and praise.\n\nIf we regard this second verse of our text as the expression of the\nPsalmist's emotion at the moment of its utterance, then we see in it a\nbeautiful illustration of the effect of faithful waiting to turn\ncomplaining into praise. If we regard it rather as an expression of his\nconfidence, that 'I shall yet praise Him for the help of His\ncountenance,' we see in it an illustration of the power of patient\nwaiting to brighten the sure hope of deliverance, and to bring summer\ninto the heart of winter. As resolve, or as prophecy, it is equally a\nwitness of the large reward of quiet waiting for the salvation of the\nLord.\n\nIn either application of the words their almost precise correspondence\nwith those of the previous verse is far more than a mere poetic\nornament, or part of the artistic form of the psalm. It teaches us this\nhappy lesson--that the song of accomplished deliverance, whether on\nearth, or in the final joy of heaven, will be but a sweeter, fuller\nrepetition of the cry that went up in trouble from our waiting hearts.\nThe object to which we shall turn with our thankfulness is He to whom we\nbetook ourselves with our prayers. There will be the same turning of the\nsoul to Him; only instead of wistful waiting in the longing look, joy\nwill light her lamps in our eyes, and thankfulness beam in our faces as\nwe turn to His light. We shall look to Him as of old, and name Him what\nwe used to name Him when we were in weakness and warfare,--our\n'Strength' and our 'Defence.' But how different the feelings with which\nthe delivered soul calls Him so, from those with which the sorrowful\nheart tried to grasp the comfort of the names. Then their reality was a\nmatter of faith, often hard to hold fast. Now it is a matter of memory\nand experience. 'I called Thee my strength when I was full of weakness;\nI tried to believe Thou wast my defence when I was full of fear; I\nthought of Thee as my fortress when I was ringed about with foes; I know\nThee now for that which I then trusted that Thou wast. As I waited upon\nThee that Thou mightest be gracious, I praise Thee now that Thou hast\nbeen more gracious than my hopes.' Blessed are they whose loftiest\nexpectations were less than their grateful memories and their rich\nexperience, and who can take up in their song of praise the names by\nwhich they called on God, and feel that they knew not half their depth,\ntheir sweetness, or their power!\n\nBut the praise is not merely the waiting transformed. Experience has not\nonly deepened the conception of the meaning of God's name; it has added\na new name. The cry of the suppliant was to God, his strength and\ndefence; the song of the saved is to the God who is also the God of his\nmercy. The experiences of life have brought out more fully the love and\ntender pity of God. While the troubles lasted it was hard to believe\nthat God was strong enough to brace us against them, and to keep us safe\nin them; it was harder still to think of them as coming from Him at all;\nit was hardest to feel that they came from His love. But when they are\npast, and their meaning is plainer, and we possess their results in the\nweight of glory which they have wrought out for us, we shall be able to\nlook back on them all as the mercies of the God of our mercy, even as\nwhen a man looks down from the mountain-top upon the mists and the\nclouds through which he passed, and sees them all smitten by the\nsunshine that gleams upon them from above. That which was thick and damp\nas he was struggling through it, is irradiated into rosy beauty; the\nretrospective and downward glance confirms and surpasses all that faith\ndimly discerned, and found it hard to believe. Whilst we are fighting\nhere, brethren! let us say, 'I will wait for Thee,' and then yonder we\nshall, with deeper knowledge of the love that was in all our sorrows,\nsing unto Him who was our strength in earth's weakness, our defence in\nearth's dangers, and is for ever more the 'God of our mercy,' amidst the\nlarge and undeserved favours of heaven.\n\n\n\n\nSILENCE TO GOD\n\n\n    'Truly my soul waiteth upon God.... 5. My soul, wait thou only upon\n    God.'\n        PSALM lxii. 1, 5.\n\nWe have here two corresponding clauses, each beginning a section of the\npsalm. They resemble each other even more closely than appears from the\nEnglish version, for the 'truly' of the first, and the 'only' of the\nsecond clause, are the same word; and in each case it stands in the same\nplace, namely, at the beginning. So, word for word, the two answer to\neach other. The difference is, that the one expresses the Psalmist's\npatient stillness of submission, and the other is his self-encouragement\nto that very attitude and disposition which he has just professed to be\nhis. In the one he speaks of, in the other to, his soul. He stirs\nhimself up to renew and continue the faith and resignation which he has,\nand so he sets before us both the temper which we should have, and the\neffort which we should make to prolong and deepen it, if it be ours. Let\nus look at these two points then--the expression of waiting, and the\nself-exhortation to waiting.\n\n'Truly my soul waiteth upon God.' It is difficult to say whether the\nopening word is better rendered 'truly,' as here, or 'only,' as in the\nother clause. Either meaning is allowable and appropriate. If, with our\nversion, we adopt the former, we may compare with this text the opening\nof another psalm (lxxiii.), 'Truly God is good to Israel,' and there, as\nhere, we may see in that vehement affirmation a trace of the struggle\nthrough which it had been won. The Psalmist bursts into song with a\nword, which tells us plainly enough how much had to be quieted in him\nbefore he came to that quiet waiting, just as in the other psalm he\npours out first the glad, firm certainty which he had reached, and then\nrecounts the weary seas of doubt and bewilderment through which he had\nwaded to reach it. That one word is the record of conflict and the\ntrophy of victory, the sign of the blessed effect of effort and struggle\nin a truth more firmly held, and in a submission more perfectly\npractised. It is as if he had said, 'Yes! in spite of all its\nwaywardness and fears, and self-willed struggles, my soul waits upon\nGod. I have overcome these, and now there is peace within.'\n\nIt is to be further observed that literally the words run, 'My soul is\nsilence unto God.' That forcible form of expression describes the\ncompleteness of the Psalmist's unmurmuring submission and quiet faith.\nHis whole being is one great stillness, broken by no clamorous passions,\nby no loud-voiced desires, by no remonstrating reluctance. There is a\nsimilar phrase in another psalm (cix. 4), which may help to illustrate\nthis: 'For my love they are my adversaries, but I am prayer'--his soul\nis all one supplication. The enemies' wrath awakens no flush of passion\non his cheek, or ripple of vengeance in his heart. He meets it all with\nprayer. Wrapped in devotion and heedless of their rage, he is like\nStephen, when he kneeled down among his yelling murderers, and cried\nwith a loud voice, 'Lord! lay not this sin to their charge.' So here we\nhave the strongest expression of the perfect consent of the whole inward\nnature in submission and quietness of confidence before God.\n\nThat silence is first a silence of the will. The plain meaning of this\nphrase is resignation; and resignation is just a silent will. Before the\nthrone of the Great King, His servants are to stand like those long rows\nof attendants we see on the walls of Eastern temples, silent, with\nfolded arms, straining their ears to hear, and bracing their muscles to\nexecute his whispered commands, or even his gesture and his glance. A\nman's will should be an echo, not a voice; the echo of God, not the\nvoice of self. It should be silent, as some sweet instrument is silent\ntill the owner's hand touches the keys. Like the boy-prophet in the hush\nof the sanctuary, below the quivering light of the dying lamps, we\nshould wait till the awful voice calls, and then answer, 'Speak, Lord!\nfor Thy servant heareth.' Do not let the loud utterances of your own\nwills anticipate, nor drown, the still, small voice in which God speaks.\nBridle impatience till He does. If you cannot hear His whisper, wait\ntill you do. Take care of running before you are sent. Keep your wills\nin equipoise till God's hand gives the impulse and direction.\n\nSuch a silent will is a strong will. It is no feeble passiveness, no\ndead indifference, no impossible abnegation that God requires, when He\nrequires us to put our wills in accord with His. They are not slain, but\nvivified, by such surrender; and the true secret of strength lies in\nsubmission. The secret of blessedness is there, too, for our sorrows\ncome because there is discord between our circumstances and our wills,\nand the measure in which these are in harmony with God is the measure in\nwhich we shall feel that all things are blessings to be received with\nthanksgiving. But if we will take our own way, and let our own wills\nspeak before God speaks, or otherwise than God speaks, nothing can come\nof that but what always has come of it--blunders, sins, misery, and\nmanifold ruin.\n\nWe must keep our _hearts_ silent too. The sweet voices of pleading\naffections, the loud cry of desires and instincts that roar for their\nfood like beasts of prey, the querulous complaints of disappointed\nhopes, the groans and sobs of black-robed sorrows, the loud hubbub and\nBabel, like the noise of a great city, that every man carries within,\nmust be stifled and coerced into silence. We have to take the animal in\nus by the throat, and sternly say, 'Lie down there and be quiet.' We\nhave to silence tastes and inclinations. We have to stop our ears to the\nnoises around, however sweet the songs, and to close many an avenue\nthrough which the world's music might steal in. He cannot say, 'My soul\nis silent unto God,' whose whole being is buzzing with vanities and\nnoisy with the din of the market-place. Unless we have something, at\nleast, of that great stillness, our hearts will have no peace, and our\nreligion no reality.\n\nThere must be the silence of the _mind_, as well as of the heart and\nwill. We must not have our thoughts ever occupied with other things, but\nmust cultivate the habit of detaching them from earth, and keeping our\nminds still before God, that He may pour His light into them. Surely if\never any generation needed the preaching--'Be still and let God\nspeak'--we need it. Even religious men are so busy with spreading or\ndefending Christianity, that they have little time, and many of them\nless inclination, for quiet meditation and still communion with God.\nNewspapers, and books, and practical philanthropy, and Christian effort,\nand business, and amusement, so crowd into our lives now, that it needs\nsome resolution and some planning to get a clear space where we can be\nquiet, and look at God.\n\nBut the old law for a noble and devout life is not altered by reason of\nany new circumstances. It still remains true that a mind silently\nwaiting before God is the condition without which such a life is\nimpossible. As the flowers follow the sun, and silently hold up their\npetals to be tinted and enlarged by his shining, so must we, if we would\nknow the joy of God, hold our souls, wills, hearts, and minds still\nbefore Him, whose voice commands, whose love warms, whose truth makes\nfair, our whole being. God speaks for the most part in such silence\nonly. If the soul be full of tumult and jangling noises, His voice is\nlittle likely to be heard. As in some kinds of deafness, a perpetual\nnoise in the head prevents hearing any other sounds, the rush of our own\nfevered blood, and the throbbing of our own nerves, hinder our catching\nHis tones. It is the calm lake which mirrors the sun, the least catspaw\nwrinkling the surface wipes out all the reflected glories of the\nheavens. If we would mirror God our souls must be calm. If we would hear\nGod our souls must be silence.\n\nAlas, how far from this is our daily life! Who among us dare to take\nthese words as the expression of our own experience? Is not the troubled\nsea which cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt, a truer\nemblem of our restless, labouring souls than the calm lake? Put your own\nselves by the side of this Psalmist, and honestly measure the contrast.\nIt is like the difference between some crowded market-place all full of\nnoisy traffickers, ringing with shouts, blazing in sunshine, and the\ninterior of the quiet cathedral that looks down on it all, where are\ncoolness and subdued light, and silence and solitude. 'Come, My people!\nenter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee.' 'Commune\nwith your own heart and be still.' 'In quietness and confidence shall be\nyour strength.'\n\nThis man's profession of utter resignation is perhaps too high for us;\nbut we can make his _self-exhortation_ our own. 'My soul! wait thou only\nupon God.' Perfect as he ventures to declare his silence towards God, he\nyet feels that he has to stir himself up to the effort which is needed\nto preserve it in its purity. Just because he can say, 'My soul waits,'\ntherefore he bids his soul wait.\n\nI need not dwell upon that self-stimulating as involving the great\nmystery of our personality, whereby a man exalts himself above himself,\nand controls, and guides, and speaks to his soul. But a few words may be\ngiven to that thought illustrated here, of the necessity for conscious\neffort and self-encouragement, in order to the preservation of the\nhighest religious emotion.\n\nWe are sometimes apt to forget that no holy thoughts or feelings are in\ntheir own nature permanent, and the illusion that they are so, often\ntends to accelerate their fading. It is no wonder if we in our selectest\nhours of 'high communion with the living God' should feel as if that\nlofty experience would last by virtue of its own sweetness, and need no\neffort of ours to retain it. But it is not so. All emotion tends to\nexhaustion, as surely as a pendulum to rest, or as an Eastern torrent to\ndry up. All our flames burn to their extinction. There is but one fire\nthat blazes and is not consumed. Action is the destruction of tissue.\nLife reaches its term in death. Joy and sorrow, and hope and fear,\ncannot be continuous. They must needs wear themselves out and fade into\na grey uniformity like mountain summits when the sun has left them.\n\nOur religious experience too will have its tides, and even those high\nand pure emotions and dispositions that bind us to God can only be\npreserved by continual effort. Their existence is no guarantee of their\npermanence, rather is it a guarantee of their transitoriness, unless we\nearnestly stir up ourselves to their renewal. Like the emotions kindled\nby lower objects, they perish while they glow, and there must be a\ncontinual recurrence to the one Source of light and heat if the\nbrilliancy is to be preserved.\n\nNor is it only from within that their continuance is menaced. Outward\nforces are sure to tell upon them The constant wash of the sea of life\nundermines the cliffs and wastes the coasts. The tear and wear of\nexternal occupations is ever acting upon our religious life. Travellers\ntell us that the constant friction of the sand on Egyptian hieroglyphs\nremoves every trace of colour, and even effaces the deep-cut characters\nfrom basalt rocks. So the unceasing attrition of multitudinous trifles\nwill take all the bloom off your religion, and efface the name of the\nKing cut on the tables of your hearts, if you do not counteract them by\nconstant earnest effort. Our devotion, our faith, our love are only\npreserved by being constantly renewed.\n\nThat vigorous effort is expressed here by the very form of the phrase.\nThe same word which began the first clause begins the second also. As in\nthe former it represented for us, with an emphatic 'Truly,' the struggle\nthrough which the Psalmist had reached the height of his blessed\nexperience, so here it represents in like manner the earnestness of the\nself-exhortation which he addresses to himself. He calls forth all his\npowers to the conflict, which is needed even by the man who has attained\nto that height of communion, if he would remain where he has climbed.\nAnd for us, brethren! who shrink from taking these former words upon our\nlips, how much greater the need to use our most strenuous efforts to\nquiet our souls. If the summit reached can only be held by earnest\nendeavour, how much more is needed to struggle up to it from the valleys\nbelow!\n\nThe silence of the soul before God is no mere passiveness. It requires\nthe intensest energy of all our being to keep all our being still and\nwaiting upon Him. So put all your strength into the task, and be sure\nthat your soul is never so intensely alive as when in deepest abnegation\nit waits hushed before God.\n\nTrust no past emotions. Do not wonder if they should fade even when they\nare brightest. Do not let their evanescence tempt you to doubt their\nreality. But always when our hearts are fullest of His love, and our\nspirits stilled with the sweetest sense of His solemn presence, stir\nyourselves up to keep firm hold of the else passing gleam, and in your\nconsciousness let these two words live in perpetual alternation: 'Truly\nmy soul waiteth upon God. My soul! wait thou only upon God.'\n\n\n\n\nTHIRST AND SATISFACTION\n\n\n    'My soul thirsteth for Thee.... 5. My soul shall be satisfied.... 8.\n    My soul followeth hard after Thee.'--PSALM lxiii. 1, 5, 8.\n\nIt is a wise advice which bids us regard rather what is said than who\nsays it, and there are few regions in which the counsel is more salutary\nthan at present in the study of the Old Testament, and especially the\nPsalms. This authorship has become a burning question which is only too\napt to shut out far more important things. Whoever poured out this sweet\nmeditation in the psalm before us, his tender longings for, and his\njubilant possession of, God remain the same. It is either the work of a\nking in exile, or is written by some one who tries to cast himself into\nthe mental attitude of such a person, and to reproduce his longing and\nhis trust. It may be a question of literary interest, but it is of no\nsort of spiritual or religious importance whether the author is David or\na singer of later date endeavouring to reproduce his emotions under\ncertain circumstances.\n\nThe three clauses which I have read, and which are so strikingly\nidentical in form, constitute the three pivots on which the psalm\nrevolves, the three bends in the stream of its thought and emotion. 'My\nsoul thirsts; my soul is satisfied; my soul follows hard after Thee.'\nThe three phases of emotion follow one another so swiftly that they are\nall wrapped up in the brief compass of this little song. Unless they in\nsome degree express our experiences and emotions, there is little\nlikelihood that our lives will be blessed or noble, and we have little\nright to call ourselves Christians. Let us follow the windings of the\nstream, and ask ourselves if we can see our own faces in its shining\nsurface.\n\nI. The soul that knows its own needs will thirst after God.\n\nThe Psalmist draws the picture of himself as a thirsty man in a\nwaterless land. That may be a literally true reproduction of his\ncondition, if indeed the old idea is correct, that this is a work of\nDavid's; for there is no more appalling desert than that in which he\nwandered as an exile. It is a land of arid mountains without a blade of\nverdure, blazing in their ghastly whiteness under the fierce sunshine,\nand with gaunt ravines in which there are no pools or streams, and\ntherefore no sweet sound of running waters, no shadow, no songs of\nbirds, but all is hot, dusty, glaring, pitiless; and men and beasts\nfaint, and loll out their tongues, and die for want of water. And, says\nthe Psalmist, such is life, if due regard be had to the deepest wants of\na soul, notwithstanding all the abundant supplies which are spread in\nsuch rich and loving luxuriance around us--we are thirsty men in a\nwaterless land. I need not remind you how true it is that a man is but a\nbundle of appetites, desires, often tyrannous, often painful, always\nactive. But the misery of it is--the reason why man's misery is great\nupon him is--mainly, I suppose, that he does not know what it is that he\nwants; that he thirsts, but does not understand what the thirst means,\nnor what it is that will slake it. His animal appetites make no\nmistakes; he and the beasts know that when they are thirsty they have to\ndrink, and when they are hungry they have to eat, and when they are\ndrowsy they have to sleep. But the poor instinct of the animal that\nteaches it what to choose and what to avoid fails us in the higher\nreaches; and we are conscious of a craving, and do not find that the\ncraving reveals to us the source from whence its satisfaction can be\nderived. Therefore 'broken cisterns that can hold no water' are at a\npremium, and 'the fountain of living waters' is turned away from, though\nit could slake so many thirsts. Like ignorant explorers in an enemy's\ncountry, we see a stream, and we do not stop to ask whether there is\npoison in it or not before we glue our thirsty lips to it. There is a\ngreat old promise in one of the prophets which puts this notion of the\nmisinterpretation of our thirsts, and the mistakes as to the sources\nfrom which they can be slaked, into one beautiful metaphor which is\nobscured in our English version. The prophet Isaiah says, according to\nour reading, 'the parched land shall become a pool.' The word which he\nuses is that almost technical one which describes the phenomenon known\nonly in Eastern lands, or at least known in them only in its superlative\ndegree; the mirage, where the dancing currents of ascending air simulate\nthe likeness of a cool lake, with palm-trees around it. And, says he,\n'the mirage shall become a pool,' the romance shall turn into a reality,\nthe mistakes shall be rectified, and men shall know what it is that they\nwant, and shall get it when they know. Brethren! unless we have listened\nto the teaching from above, unless we have consulted far more wisely and\nfar more profoundly than many of us have ever done the meaning of our\nown hearts when they cry out, we too shall only be able to take for ours\nthe plaintive cry of the half of this first utterance of the Psalmist,\nand say despairingly, 'My soul thirsteth.' Blessed are they who know\nwhere the fountain is, who know the meaning of the highest unrests in\ntheir own souls, and can go on to say with clear and true\nself-revelation, 'My soul thirsteth for God!'\n\nThat is religion. There is a great deal more in Christianity than\nlonging, but there is no Christianity worth the name without it. There\nis moral stimulus to activity, a pattern for conduct, and so on, in our\nreligion, and if our religion is only this longing--well then, it is\nworth very little; and I fancy it is worth a good deal less if there is\nnone of this felt need for God, and for more of God, in us.\n\nAnd so I come to two classes of my hearers; and to the first of them I\nsay, Dear friends! do not mistake what it is that you 'need,' and see to\nit that you turn the current of your longings from earth to God; and to\nthe second of them I say, Dear friends! if you have found out that God\nis your supreme good, see to it that you live in the good, see to it\nthat you live in the constant attitude of longing for more of that good\nwhich alone will slake your appetite.\n\n  'The thirst that from the soul doth rise\n     Doth ask a drink divine,'\n\nand unless we know what it is to be drawn outwards and upwards, in\nstrong aspirations after something--'afar from the sphere of our\nsorrow,' I know not why we should call ourselves Christians at all.\n\nBut, dear friends! let us not forget that these higher aspirations after\nthe uncreated and personal good which is God have to be cultivated very\nsedulously and with great persistence, throughout all our changing\nlives, or they will soon die out, and leave us. There has to be the\nclear recognition, habitual to us, of what is our good. There has to be\na continual meditation, if I may so say, upon the all-sufficiency of\nthat divine Lord and Lover of our souls, and there has to be a vigilant\nand a continual suppression, and often excision and ejection, of other\ndesires after transient and partial satisfactions. A man who lets all\nhis longings go unchecked and untamed after earthly good has none left\ntowards heaven. If you break up a river into a multitude of channels,\nand lead off much of it to irrigate many little gardens, there will be\nno force in its current, its bed will become dry, and it will never\nreach the great ocean where it loses its individuality and becomes part\nof a mightier whole. So, if we fritter away and divide up our desires\namong all the clamant and partial blessings of earth, then we shall but\nfeebly long, and feebly longing, shall but faintly enjoy, the cool,\nclear, exhaustless gush from the fountain of life--'My soul thirsteth\nfor God!'--in the measure in which that is true of us, and not one\nhairsbreadth beyond it, in spite of orthodoxy, and professions, and\nactivities, are we Christian people.\n\nII. The soul that thirsts after God is satisfied.\n\nThe Psalmist, by the magic might of his desire, changes, as in a sudden\ntransformation scene in a theatre, all the dreariness about him. One\nmoment it is a 'dry and barren land where no water is'; the next moment\na flash of verdure has come over the yellow sand, and the ghastly\nsilence is broken by the song of merry birds. The one moment he is\nhungering there in the desert; the next, he sees spread before him a\ntable in the wilderness, and his soul is 'satisfied as with marrow and\nwith fatness,' and his mouth praises God, whom he possesses, who has\ncome unto him swift, immediate, in full response to his cry. Now, all\nthat is but a picturesque way of putting a very plain truth, which we\nshould all be the happier and better if we believed and lived by, that\nwe can have as much of God as we desire, and that what we have of Him\nwill be enough.\n\nWe can have as much of God as we desire. There is a quest which finds\nits object with absolute certainty, and which finds its object\nsimultaneously with the quest. And these two things, the certainty and\nthe immediateness with which the thirst of the soul after God passes\ninto a satisfied fruition of the soul in God, are what are taught us\nhere in our text; and what you and I, if we comply with the conditions,\nmay have as our own blessed experience. There is one search about which\nit is true that it never fails to find. The certainty that the soul\nthirsting after God shall be satisfied with God results at once from His\nnearness to us, and His infinite willingness to give Himself, which He\nis only prevented from carrying into act by our obstinate refusal to\nopen our hearts by desire. It takes all a man's indifference to keep God\nout of his heart, 'for in Him we live, and move, and have our being,'\nand that divine love, which Christianity teaches us to see on the throne\nof the universe, is but infinite longing for self-communication. That is\nthe definition of true love always, and they fearfully mistake its\nessence, and take the lower and spurious forms of it for the higher and\nnobler, who think of love as being what, alas! it often is, in our\nimperfect lives, a fierce desire to have for our very own the thing or\nperson beloved. But that is a second-rate kind of love. God's love is an\ninfinite desire to give Himself. If only we open our hearts--and nothing\nopens them so wide as longing--He will pour in, as surely as the\natmosphere streams in through every chink and cranny, as surely as if\nsome great black rock that stands on the margin of the sea is blasted\naway, the waters will flood over the sands behind it. So unless we keep\nGod out, by not wishing Him in, in He will come.\n\nThe certitude that we possess Him when we desire Him is as absolute. As\nswift as Marconi's wireless message across the Atlantic and its answer;\nso immediate is the response from Heaven to the desire from earth. What\na contrast that is to all our experiences! Is there anything else about\nwhich we can say 'I am quite sure that if I want it I shall have it. I\nam quite sure that when I want it I have it'? Nothing! There may be\nwells to which a man has to go, as the Bedouin in the desert has to go,\nwith empty water-skins, many a day's journey, and it comes to be a fight\nbetween the physical endurance of the man and the weary distance between\nhim and the spring. Many a man's bones, and many a camel's, lie on the\ntrack to the wells, who lay down gasping and black-lipped, and died\nbefore they reached them. We all know what it is to have longing desires\nwhich have cost us many an effort, and efforts and desires have both\nbeen in vain. Is it not blessed to be sure that there is One whom to\nlong for is immediately to possess?\n\nThen there is the other thought here, too, that when we have God we have\nenough. That is not true about anything else. God forbid that one should\ndepreciate the wise adaptation of earthly goods to human needs which\nruns all through every life! but all that recognised, still we come back\nto this, that there is nothing here, nothing except God Himself, that\nwill fill all the corners of a human heart. There is always something\nlacking in all other satisfactions. They address themselves to sides,\nand angles, and facets of our complex nature; they leave all the others\nunsatisfied. The table that is spread in the world, at which, if I might\nuse so violent a figure, our various longings and capacities seat\nthemselves as guests, always fails to provide for some of them, and\nwhilst some, and those especially of the lower type, are feasting full,\nthere sits by their side another guest, who finds nothing on the table\nto satisfy his hunger. But if my soul thirsts for God, my soul will be\nsatisfied when I get Him. The prophet Isaiah modifies this figure in the\ngreat word of invitation which pealed out from him, where he says, 'Ho!\neveryone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters.' But that figure is not\nenough for him, that metaphor, blessed as it is, does not exhaust the\nfacts; and so he goes on, 'yea, come, buy wine'--and that is not enough\nfor him, that does not exhaust the facts, therefore he adds, 'and milk.'\nWater, wine, and milk; all forms of the draughts that slake the thirsts\nof humanity, are found in God Himself, and he who has Him needs seek\nnowhere besides.\n\nLastly--\n\nIII. The soul that is satisfied with God immediately renews its quest.\n\n'My soul followeth hard after Thee.' The two things come together,\nlonging and fruition, as I have said. Fruition begets longing, and there\nis swift and blessed alternation, or rather co-existence of the two.\nJoyful consciousness of possession and eager anticipation of larger\nbestowments are blended still more closely, if we adhere to the original\nmeaning of the words of this last clause, than they are in our\ntranslation, for the psalm really reads, 'My soul cleaveth after Thee.'\nIn the one word 'cleaveth,' is expressed adhesion, like that of the\nlimpet to the rock, conscious union, blessed possession; and in the\nother word 'after Thee' is expressed the pressing onwards for more and\nyet more. But now contrast that with the issue of all other methods of\nsatisfying human appetites, be they lower or be they higher. They result\neither in satiety or in a tyrannical, diseased appetite which increases\nfaster than the power of satisfying it increases. The man who follows\nafter other good than God, has at the end to say, 'I am sick, tired of\nit, and it has lost all power to draw me,' or he has to say, 'I\nravenously long for more of it, and I cannot get any more.' 'He that\nloveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver, nor he that loveth\nabundance with increase.' You have to increase the dose of the narcotic,\nand as you increase the dose, it loses its power, and the less you can\ndo without it the less it does for you. But to drink into the one God\nslakes all thirsts, and because He is infinite, and our capacity for\nreceiving Him may be indefinitely expanded; therefore,\n\n  'Age cannot wither, nor custom stale\n   His infinite variety';\n\nbut the more we have of God, the more we long for Him, and the more we\nlong for Him the more we possess Him.\n\nBrethren! these are the possibilities of the Christian life; being its\npossibilities they are our obligations. The Psalmist's words may well be\nturned by us into self-examining interrogations and we may--God grant\nthat we do!--all ask ourselves; 'Do I thus thirst after God?' 'Have I\nlearned that, notwithstanding all supplies, this world without Him is a\nwaterless desert? Have I experienced that whilst I call He answers, and\nthat the water flows in as soon as I open my heart? And do I know the\nhappy birth of fresh longings out of every fruition, and how to go\nfurther and further into the blessed land, and into my elastic heart\nreceive more and more of the ever blessed God?'\n\nThese texts of mine not only set forth the ideal for the Christian life\nhere, but they carry in themselves the foreshadowing of the life\nhereafter. For surely such a merely physical accident as death cannot be\nsupposed to break this golden sequence which runs through life. Surely\nthis partial and progressive possession of an infinite good, by a nature\ncapable of indefinitely increasing appropriation of, and approximation\nto it is the prophecy of its own eternal continuance. So long as the\nfountain springs, the thirsty lips will drink. God's servants will live\ntill God dies. The Christian life will go on, here and hereafter, till\nit has reached the limits of its own capacity of expansion, and has\nexhausted God. 'The water that I shall give him shall be in him a well\nof water, springing up into everlasting life.'\n\n\n\n\n\nSIN OVERCOMING AND OVERCOME\n\n\n    'Iniquities prevail against me: as for our transgressions, Thou\n    shalt purge them away.'--PSALM. lxv. 3.\n\nThere is an intended contrast in these two clauses more pointed and\nemphatic in the original than in our Bible, between man's impotence and\nGod's power in the face of the fact of sin. The words of the first\nclause might be translated, with perhaps a little increase of vividness,\n'iniquities are too strong for me'; and the 'Thou' of the next clause is\nemphatically expressed in the original, 'as for our transgressions'\n(which we cannot touch), '_Thou_ shalt purge them away.' Despair of self\nis the mother of confidence in God; and no man has learned the\nblessedness and the sweetness of God's power to cleanse, who has not\nlearned the impotence of his own feeble attempts to overcome his\ntransgression. The very heart of Christianity is redemption. There are a\ngreat many ways of looking at Christ's mission and Christ's work, but I\nventure to say that they are all inadequate unless they start with this\nas the fundamental thought, and that only he who has learned by serious\nreflection and bitter personal experience the gravity and the\nhopelessness of the fact of the bondage of sin, rightly understands the\nmeaning and the brightness of the Gospel of Christ. The angel voice that\ntold us His name, and based His name upon His characteristic work, went\ndeeper into the 'philosophy' of Christianity than many a modern thinker,\nwhen it said, 'Thou shalt call His name Jesus, because He shall save His\npeople from their sins.' So here we have the hopelessness and misery of\nman's vain struggles, and side by side with these the joyful confidence\nin the divine victory. We have the problem and the solution, the barrier\nand the overleaping of it; man's impotence and the omnipotence of God's\nmercy. My iniquities are too strong for me, but Thou art too strong for\nthem. As for our transgressions, of which I cannot purge the stain, with\nall my tears and with all my work, 'Thou shalt purge them away.' Note,\nthen, these two--first, the cry of despair; second, the ringing note of\nconfidence.\n\nI. The cry of despair.\n\n'Too strong for me,' and yet they _are_ me. Me, and _not_ me; mine, and\nyet, somehow or other, my enemies, although my children--too strong for\nme, yet I give them their strength by my own cowardly and feeble\ncompliance with their temptations; too strong for me and overmastering\nme, though I pride myself often on my freedom and spirit when I am\nyielding to them. Mine iniquities are mine, and yet they are not mine;\nme and yet, blessed be God! they can be separated from me.\n\nThe picture suggested by the words is that of some usurping power that\nhas mastered a man, and laid its grip upon him so that all efforts to\nget away from the grasp are hopeless. Now, I dare say, that some of you\nare half consciously thinking that this is a piece of ordinary pulpit\nexaggeration, and has no kind of application to the respectable and\ndecent lives that most of you live, and that you are ready to say, with\nas much promptitude and as much falsehood as the old Jews did, even\nwhilst the Roman eagles, lifted above the walls of the castle, were\ngiving them the lie: 'We were never in bondage to any man.' You do not\nknow or feel that anything has got hold of you which is stronger than\nyou. Well, let us see.\n\nConsider for a moment. You are powerless to master your evil, considered\nas habits. You do not know the tyranny of the usurper until a rebellion\nis got up against him. As long as you are gliding with the stream you\nhave no notion of its force. Turn your boat and try to pull against it,\nand when the sweat-drops come on your brow, and you are sliding\nbackwards, in spite of all your effort, you will begin to find out what\na tremendous down-sucking energy there is in that quiet, silent flow. So\nthe ready compliance of the worst part of my nature masks for me the\ntremendous force with which my evil tyrannises over me, and it is only\nwhen I face round and try to go the other way, that I find out what a\npower there is in its invisible grasp.\n\nDid you ever try to cure some trivial bad habit, some trick of your\nfingers, for instance? You know what infinite pains and patience and\ntime it took you to do that, and do you think that you would find it\neasier if you once set yourself to cure that lust, say, or that\npetulance, pride, passion, dishonesty, or whatsoever form of selfish\nliving in forgetfulness of God may be your besetting sin? If you will\ntry to pull the poison fang up, you will find how deep its roots are. It\nis like the yellow charlock in a field, which seems only to spread in\nconsequence of attempts to get rid of it--as the rough rhyme says; 'One\nyear's seeding, seven years' weeding'--and more at the end of the time\nthan at the beginning. Any honest attempt at mending character drives a\nman to this--'My iniquities are too strong for me.'\n\nI do not for a moment deny that there may be, and occasionally is, a\nmagnificent force of will and persistency of purpose in efforts at\nself-improvement on the part of perfectly irreligious men. But, if by\nthe occasional success of such effort, a man conquers one form of evil,\nthat does not deliver him from evil. You have the usurping dominion deep\nin your nature, and what does it matter in essence which part of your\nbeing is most conspicuously under its control? It may be some animal\npassion, and you may conquer that. A man, for instance, when he is\nyoung, lives in the sphere of sensuous excitement; and when he gets old\nhe turns a miser, and laughs at the pleasures that he used to get from\nthe flesh, and thinks himself ever so much wiser. Is he any better? He\nhas changed, so to speak, the kind of sin. That is all. The devil has\nput a new viceroy in authority, but it is the old government, though\nwith fresh officials. The house which is cleared of the seven devils\nwithout getting into it the all-filling and sanctifying grace of God and\nlove of Jesus Christ will stand empty. Nature abhors a vacuum, and so\ndoes Satan, and the empty house invites the seven ill-tenants, and back\nthey come in their diabolical completeness.\n\nSo, dear friends! though you may do a great deal--thank God!--in\nsubduing evil habits and inclinations, you cannot touch, so as to\nmaster, the central fact of sin unless you get God to help you to do it,\nand you have to go down on your knees before you can do that work.\n'Iniquities are too strong for me.'\n\nThen, again, consider our utter impotence in dealing with our own evil\nregarded as guilt. When we do wrong, the judge within, which we call\nconscience, says to us two things, or perhaps three. It says first,\n'That is wrong'; it says secondly, 'You have got to answer for it'; and\nI think it says thirdly, 'And you will be punished for it.' That is to\nsay, there is a sense of demerit that goes side by side with our evil,\nas certainly as the shadow travels with the substance. And though,\nsometimes, when the sun goes behind a cloud, there is no shadow, and\nsometimes, when the light within us is darkened, conscience does not\ncast the black shade of demerit across the mind; yet conscience is\nthere, though silent. When it does speak it says, 'You have done wrong,\nand you are answerable.' Answerable to whom? To it? No! To society? No!\nTo law? No! You can only be answerable to a person, and that is God.\nAgainst Him we have sinned. We do wrong; and if wrong were all that we\nhad to charge ourselves with, it would be because there was nothing but\nlaw that we were answerable to. We do unkind things, and if unkindness\nand inhumanity were all that we had to charge ourselves with, it would\nbe because we were only answerable to one another. We do suicidal\nthings, and if self-inflicted injury were all our definition of evil, it\nwould be because we were only answerable to our conscience and\nourselves. But we _sin_, and that means that every wrong thing, big or\nlittle, which we do, whether we think about God in the doing of it or\nno, is, in its deepest essence, an offence against Him.\n\nThe judgment of conscience carries with it the solemn looking for of\nfuture judgment. It says, 'I am only a herald: _He_ is coming.' No man\nfeels the burden of guilt without an anticipation of judgment. What are\nyou going to do with these two feelings? Do you think that _you_ can\ndeal with them? It is no use saying, 'I am not responsible for what I\ndid; I inherited such-and-such tendencies; circumstances are so-and-so.\nI could not help it; environment, and evolution, and all the rest of it\ndiminish, if they do not destroy, responsibility.' Be it so! And yet,\nafter all, this is left--the certainty in my own convictions that I had\nthe power to do or not to do. That is a fundamental part of a man's\nconsciousness. If it is a delusion, what is to be trusted, and how can\nwe be sure of anything? So that we are responsible for our action, and\ncan no more elude the guilt that follows sin than we can jump off our\nown shadow. And I want you to consider what you are going to do about\nyour guilt.\n\nOne thing you cannot do--you cannot remove it. Men have tried to do so\nby sacrifices, and false religions. They have swung in the air by means\nof hooks fastened into their bodies, and I do not know what besides, and\nthey have not managed it. You can no more get rid of your guilt by being\nsorry for your sin than you could bring a dead man to life again by\nbeing sorry for his murder. What is done is done. 'What I have written I\nhave written!' Nothing will ever 'wash that little lily hand white\nagain,' as the magnificent murderess in Shakespeare's great creation\nfound out. You can forget your guilt; you can ignore it. You can adopt\nsome of the easily-learned-by-rote and fashionable theories that will\nenable you to minimise it, and to laugh at us old-fashioned believers in\nguilt and punishment. You do not take away the rock because you blow out\nthe lamps of the lighthouse, and you do not alter an ugly fact by\nignoring it. I beseech you, as reasonable men and women, to open your\neyes to these plain facts about yourselves, that you have an element of\ndemerit and of liability to consequent evil and suffering which you are\nperfectly powerless to touch or to lighten in the slightest degree.\n\nConsider, again, our utter impotence in regard to our evil, looked upon\nas a barrier between us and God. That is the force of the context here.\nThe Psalmist has just been saying, 'O Thou that hearest prayer! unto\nThee shall all flesh come.' And then he bethinks himself how flesh\ncompassed with infirmities can come. And he staggers back bewildered.\nThere can be no question but that the plain dictate of common sense is,\n'We know that God heareth not sinners.' My evil not only lies like a\ngreat black weight of guilt and of habit on my consciousness and on my\nactivity, but it actually stands like a frowning cliff, barring my path\nand making a barrier between me and God. 'Your hands are full of blood;\nI hate your vain oblations,' says the solemn Voice through the prophet.\nAnd this stands for ever true--'The prayer of the wicked is an\nabomination.' There frowns the barrier. Thank God! mercies come through\nit, howsoever close-knit and impenetrable it may seem. Thank God! no sin\ncan shut Him out from us, but it can shut us out from Him. And though we\ncannot separate God from ourselves, and He is nearer us than our\nconsciousness and the very basis of our being, yet by a mysterious power\nwe can separate ourselves from Him. We may build up, of the black blocks\nof our sins flung up from the inner fires, and cemented with the\nbituminous mortar of our lusts and passions, a black wall between us and\nour Father. You and I have done it. We can build it--we cannot throw it\ndown; we can rear it--we cannot tunnel it. Our iniquities are too strong\nfor us.\n\nNow notice that this great cry of despair in my text is the cry of a\nsingle soul. This is the only place in the psalm in which the singular\nperson is used. 'Iniquities are too strong for us,' is not sufficient.\nEach man must take guilt to himself. The recognition and confession of\nevil must be an intensely personal and individual act. My question to\nyou, dear friend! is, Did you ever know it by experience? Going apart by\nyourself, away from everybody else, with no companions or confederates\nto lighten the load of your felt evil, forgetting tempters and\nassociates and all other people, did you ever stand, you and God,\nface to face, with nobody to listen to the conference? And did you\never feel in that awful presence that whether the world was full of\nmen, or deserted and you the only survivor, would make no difference\nto the personal responsibility and weight and guilt of your individual\nsin? Have you ever felt, 'Against Thee, Thee only, have\nI'--solitary--'sinned,' and confessed that iniquities are 'too strong\nfor me'?\n\nII. Now, let me say a word or two about the second clause of this great\nverse, the ringing cry of confident hope.\n\nThe confidence is, as I said, the child of despair. You will never go\ninto that large place of assured trust in God's effacing finger passed\nover all your evil until you have come through the narrow pass, where\nthe black rocks all but bar the traveller's foot, of conscious impotence\nto deal with your sin. You must, first of all, dear friends! go down\ninto the depths, and learn to have no trust in yourselves before you can\nrise to the heights, and rejoice in the hope of the glory and of the\nmercy of God. Begin with 'too strong for me,' and the impotent 'me'\nleads on to the almighty 'Thou.'\n\nThen, do not forget that what was confidence on the Psalmist's part is\nknowledge on ours. 'As for our transgressions, Thou wilt purge them\naway.' You and I know why, and know how. Jesus Christ in His great work\nfor us has vindicated the Psalmist's confidence, and has laid bare for\nthe world's faith the grounds upon which that divine power proceeds in\nits cleansing mercy. 'Thou wilt purge them away,' said he. 'Christ hath\nborne our sins in His own body on the tree,' says the New Testament. I\nhave spoken about our impotence in regard to our own evil, considered\nunder three aspects. I meant to have said more about Christ's work upon\nour sins, considered under the same three aspects. But let me just, very\nbriefly, touch upon them.\n\nJesus Christ, when trusted, will do for sin, as habit, what cannot be\ndone without Him. He will give the  motive to resist, which is lacking\nin the majority of cases. He will give the power to resist, which is\nlacking in all cases. He will put a new life and spirit into our nature\nwhich will strengthen and transform our feeble wills, will elevate and\nglorify our earthward trailing affections, will make us love that which\nHe loves, and aspire to that which He is, until we become, in the change\nfrom glory to glory, reflections of the image of the Lord. As habit and\nas dominant power within us, nothing will cast out the evil that we have\nentertained in our hearts except the power of the life of Christ Jesus,\nin His Spirit dwelling within us and making us clean. When 'a strong man\nkeeps his house, his goods are in peace, but when a stronger than he\ncometh he taketh from him all his implements in which he trusteth, and\ndivideth his spoil.' And so Christ has bound the strong man, in that one\ngreat sacrifice on the Cross. And now He comes to each of us, if we will\ntrust Him, and gives motives, power, pattern, hopes, which enable us to\ncast out the tyrant that has held dominion over us. 'If the Son make you\nfree, ye shall be free indeed.'\n\nAnd I tell all of you, especially you young men and women, who\npresumably have noble aspirations and desires, that the only way to\nconquer the world, the flesh, and the devil, is to let Christ clothe you\nwith His armour; and let Him lay His hand on your feeble hands whilst\nyou aim the arrows and draw the bow, as the prophet did in the old\nstory, and then you will shoot, and not miss. Christ, and Christ alone,\nwithin us will make us powerful to cast out the evil.\n\nIn like manner, He, and He only, deals with sin, considered as guilt.\nHere is the living secret and centre of all Christ's preciousness and\npower--that He died on the Cross; and in His spirit, which knew the\ndrear desolation of being forsaken by God, and in His flesh, which bore\nthe outward consequences of sin, in death as a sinful world knows it,\n'bare our sins and carried our sorrows,' so that 'by His stripes we are\nhealed.'\n\nIf you will trust yourselves to the mighty Sacrifice, and with no\nreservation, as if you could do anything, will cast your whole weight\nand burden upon Him, then the guilt will pass away, and the power of sin\nwill be broken. Transgressions will be buried--'covered,' as the\noriginal of my text has it--as with a great mound piled upon them, so\nthat they shall never offend or smell rank to heaven any more, but be\nlost to sight for ever.\n\nChrist can take away the barrier reared by sin between God and the human\nspirit. Solid and black as it stands, His blood dropped upon it melts\naway. Then it disappears like the black bastions of the aerial\nstructures in the clouds before the sunshine. He hath opened for us a\nnew and living way, that we might 'have access and confidence,' and,\nsinners as we are, that we might dwell for ever more at the side of our\nLord.\n\nSo, dear brother! whilst humanity cries--and I pray that all of us may\ncry like the Apostle, 'Oh, wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me\nfrom the body of this death?'--Faith lifts up, swift and clear, her\nringing note of triumph, which I pray God or rather, which I beseech you\nthat you will make your own, 'I thank God! I through Jesus Christ our\nLord.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE BURDEN-BEARING GOD\n\n\n    'Blessed be the Lord, who daily loadeth us with benefits.'--(A.V.).\n\n    'Blessed be the Lord, who daily beareth our burden.'\n    --PSALM lxviii. 19 (R.V.).\n\nThe difference between these two renderings seems to be remarkable, and\na person ignorant of any language but our own might find it hard to\nunderstand how any one sentence was susceptible of both. But the\nexplanation is extremely simple. The important words in the Authorised\nVersion, 'with benefits,' are a supplement, having nothing to represent\nthem in the original. The word translated '_loadeth_' in the one\nrendering and '_beareth_' in the other admits of both these meanings\nwith equal ease, and is, in fact, employed in both of them in other\nplaces in Scripture. It is clear, I think, that, in this case, at all\nevents, the Revision is an improvement. For the great objection to the\nrendering which has become familiar to us all, 'Who daily loadeth us\n_with benefits_,' is that these essential words are not in the original,\nand need to be supplied in order to make out the sense. Whereas, on the\nother hand, if we adopt the suggested emendation, 'Who daily beareth our\nburdens,' we get a still more beautiful meaning, which requires no\nforced addition in order to bring it out. So, then, I accept that varied\nform of our text as the one on which I desire to say a few words now.\n\nI. The first thing that strikes me in looking at it is the remarkable\nand eloquent blending of majesty and condescension.\n\nIt is not without significance that the Psalmist employs that name for\nGod in this clause, which most strongly expresses the idea of supremacy\nand dominion. Rule and dignity are the predominant ideas in the word\n'Lord,' as, indeed, the English reader feels in hearing it; and then,\nside by side with that, there lies this thought, that the Highest, the\nRuler of all, whose absolute authority stretches over all mankind,\nstoops to this low and servile office, and becomes the burden-bearer for\nall the pilgrims who will put their trust in Him. This blending together\nof the two ideas of dignity and condescension to lowly offices of help\nand furtherance is made even more emphatic if we glance back at the\ncontext of the psalm. For there is no place in Scripture in which there\nis flashed before the mind of the singer a grander picture of the\nmagnificence and the glory of God, than that which glitters and flames\nin the previous verses. We read in them of God 'riding through the\nheavens by His name Jehovah'; of Him as marching at the head of the\npeople, through the wilderness, and of the earth quivering at His tread,\nand the heavens dropping at His presence. We read of Zion itself being\nmoved at the presence of the Lord. We read of His word going forth so\nmightily as to scatter armies and their kings. We read of the chariots\nof God as 'twenty thousand, even thousands of angels.' All is gathered\ntogether in the great verse, 'Thou hast ascended on high, Thou hast led\ncaptivity captive.' And then, before he has taken breath almost, the\nPsalmist turns, with most striking and dramatic abruptness, from the\ncontemplation, awe-struck and yet jubilant, of all that tremendous,\nmagnificent, and earth-shaking power to this wonderful thought, 'Blessed\nbe the Lord! who daily beareth our burdens.' Not only does He march at\nthe head of the congregation through the wilderness, but He comes, if I\nmight so say, behind the caravan, amongst the carriers and the porters,\nand will bear anything that any of the weary pilgrims intrusts to His\ncare.\n\nOh, dear brethren! if familiarity did not dull the glory of it, what a\nthought that is--a God that carries men's loads! People talk much\nrubbish about the 'stern Old Testament Deity'; is there anything\nsweeter, greater, more heart-compelling and heart-softening, than such a\nthought as this? How all the majesty bows itself, and declares itself to\nbe enlisted on our side, when we think that 'He that sitteth on the\ncircle of the heavens, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers'\nis the God that 'daily beareth our burdens'!\n\nAnd that is the tone of the Old Testament throughout, for you will\nalways find braided together in the closest vital unity the\nrepresentation of these two aspects of the divine nature; and if ever we\nhear set forth a more than ordinarily magnificent conception of His\npower and majesty be sure that, if you look, you will find side by side\nwith it a more than ordinarily tender representation of His gentleness\nand His grace. And if we look deeper, this is not a case of contrast, it\nis not that there are sharply opposed to each other these two things,\nthe gentleness and the greatness, the condescension and the\nmagnificence, but that the former is the direct result of the latter;\nand it is just because He is Lord, and has dominion over all, that,\ntherefore, He bears the burdens of all. For the responsibilities of the\nCreator are in proportion to His greatness, and He that has made man has\nthereby made it necessary that He should, if they will let Him, be their\nBurden-bearer and their Servant. The highest must be the lowest, and\njust because God is high over all, blessed for ever, therefore is He the\nSupporter and Sustainer of all. So we may learn the true meaning of\nelevation of all sorts, and from the example of loftiest, may draw the\nlesson for our more insignificant varieties of height, that the higher\nwe are, the more we are bound to stoop, and that men are then likest\nGod, when their elevation suggests to them responsibility, and when he\nthat is chiefest becomes the servant.\n\nII. So, then, notice next the deep insight into the heart and ways of\nGod here.\n\n'He daily beareth our burdens.' If there is any meaning in this word at\nall, it means that He so knits Himself with us as that all which touches\nus touches Him, that He takes a share in all our pressing duties, and\nfeels the reflection from all our sorrows and pains. We have no\nimpassive God in the heavens, careless of mankind, nor is His settled\nand changeless and unshaded blessedness of such a sort as that there\ncannot pass across it--if I may not say a shadow, I may at least say--a\nripple from men's pangs and troubles and cares. Love is the\nidentification of oneself with the beloved object. We call it sympathy,\nwhen we are speaking about the fellow feeling between man and man that\nis kindled of love. But there is something deeper than sympathy in that\ngreat Heart, which gathers into itself all hearts, and in that great\nBeing, whose being underlies all our beings, and is the root from which\nwe all live and grow. God, in all our afflictions, is afflicted; and in\nsimple though profound verity, has that which is most truly represented\nto men, by calling it a fellow feeling with our infirmities and our\nsorrows.\n\n\n  'Think not thou canst sigh a sigh,\n   And thy Maker is not nigh;\n   Think not thou canst weep a tear,\n   And thy Maker is not near.'\n\nFor want of a better word, we speak of the sympathy of God: but we need\nsomething far more intimate and unwearied than we understand by that\nword, to express the community of feeling between all who trust Him and\nHis own infinite heart. If this bearing of our burden means anything, it\ngives us a deep insight, too, into His workings, as well as into His\nheart. For it covers over this great truth that He Himself comes to us,\nand by the communication of His own power to us, makes us able to bear\nthe burdens which we roll upon Him. The meaning of His 'lifting our\nload,' in so far as that expression refers to the divine act rather than\nthe divine heart, is that He breathes into us the strength by which we\ncan carry the heavy task of duties, and can endure the crushing pressure\nof our sorrows. All the endurance of the saints is God in them bearing\ntheir burdens.\n\nNotice, too, '_daily_ beareth,' or, as the Hebrew has it yet more\nemphatically because more simply, 'day by day beareth.' He travels with\nus, in the greatness of His might and the long-suffering of His\nunwearied patience, through all our tribulation, and as He has 'borne\nand carried' His people 'all the days of old,' so, at each new\nrecurrence of new weights, He is with us still. Like some river that\nruns by the wayside and ever cheers the traveller on the dusty path with\nits music, and offers its waters to cool his thirsty lips, so, day by\nday, in the slow iteration of our lingering sorrows, and in the\nmonotonous recurrence of our habitual duties, there is with us the\never-present help of the Ancient of Days, who measures out daily\nstrength for the daily load, and never sends the one without proffering\nthe other.\n\nIII. So, again, notice here the remarkable anticipation of the very\nheart of the Gospel.\n\n'The God who daily beareth our burdens,' says the Psalmist. He spoke\ndeeper things than he knew, and was wiser than he understood. For the\nhope that gleams in these words comes to fulfilment, in Him of whom it\nwas written in prophetic anticipation, so clear and definite that it\nreads like historical narrative--'He bare our grief and carried our\nsorrows. The chastisement of our peace was upon Him. The Lord hath laid\non Him the iniquity of us all.'\n\nAh! it were of small avail to know a God that bore the burden of our\nsorrows and the load of our duties, if we did not know a God who bore\nthe weight of our sins. For that is the real crushing weight that breaks\nmen's hearts and bows them to the earth. So the New Testament, with its\nmessage of a Christ on whom is laid the whole pressure of the world's\nsin, is the deepest fulfilment of the great words of my text.\n\nIV. Note, lastly, what we should therefore do with our burdens.\n\nFirst, we should cast them on God, and _let_ Him carry them. He cannot\nunless we do. One sometimes sees a petulant and self-confident little\nchild staggering along with some heavy burden by the parent's side, but\npushing away the hand that is put out to help it to carry its load. And\nthat is what too many of us do when God says to us, 'Here, My child! let\nMe help you, I will take the heavy end of it, and do you take the light\none.' 'Cast thy burden upon the Lord'--and do it by faith, by simple\ntrust in Him, by making real to yourselves the fact of His divine\nsympathy, and His sure presence, to aid and to sustain.\n\nHaving thus let Him carry the weight, do not you try to carry it too. As\nour good old hymn has it--\n\n  'Why should I the burden bear?'\n\nIt is a great deal more God's affair than yours. We have, indeed, in a\nsense, to carry it. 'Every man shall bear his own burden.' The weight of\nduty is not to be indolently shoved off our shoulders on to His, saying,\n'Let Him do the work.' We have indeed to carry the weight of sorrow.\nThere is no use in trying to deny its bitterness and its burden, and it\nwould not be well for us that it should be less bitter and less heavy.\nIn many lands the habit prevails, especially amongst the women, of\ncarrying heavy loads on their heads; and all travellers tell us that the\npractice gives a dignity and a grace to the carriage, and a freedom and\na swing to the gait, which nothing else will do. Depend upon it, that so\nmuch of our burdens of work and weariness as is left to us, after we\nhave cast them upon Him, is intended to strengthen and ennoble us. But\ndo not let there be the gnawings of anxiety. Do not let there be the\nself-torment of aimless prognostications of evil. Do not let there be\nthe chewing of the bitter morsel of irrevocable sorrows; but fling all\nupon God. And remember what the Master has said, and His servant has\nrepeated: 'Take no anxious care ... for your heavenly Father knoweth';\n'Cast your anxiety upon Him, for He careth for you.'\n\nAnd the last advice that comes from my text is, to see that your tongues\nare not silent in that great hymn of praise which ought to go up to 'the\nLord that daily beareth our burdens.' He wants only our trust and our\nthanks, and is best paid by the praise of our love, and of our heaping\nstill more upon His ever strong and ready arm. Bless the Lord! who\nbeareth our burdens, and see that you give Him yours to bear. Listen to\nHim who hath said, 'Come unto Me all ye that ... are heavy laden, and I\nwill give you rest.'\n\n\n\n\nREASONABLE RAPTURE\n\n\n    'Whom have I in heaven but Thee? and there is none upon earth that I\n    desire besides Thee. 26. My flesh and my heart faileth; but God is\n    the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.'\n    --PSALM lxxiii. 25, 26.\n\nWe have in this psalm the record of the Psalmist's struggle with the\ngreat standing difficulty of how to reconcile the unequal distribution\nof worldly prosperity with the wisdom and providence of God. That\ndifficulty pressed more acutely upon men of the Old Dispensation than\neven upon us, because the very promise of that stage of revelation was\nthat Godliness brought with it outward well-being. Our Psalmist reaches\na solution, not exactly by the same path by which the writers of the\nBooks of Job and Ecclesiastes find an answer to the problem. This man\ngives up the endeavour to solve the question by reflection and thought,\nand as he says, 'goes into the sanctuary of God,' gets into communion\nwith his Father in heaven, and by reason of that communion reaches a\nconclusion which is, at all events, an approximate solution of his\ndifficulty, viz. the belief of a future life, 'Then understood I their\nend.' The solemn vision of a life beyond the present, which should be\nthe outcome and retribution of this, rises before him from out of his\nagitated thoughts, like the moon, pale and phantom-like, from a stormy\nsea. That truth, if revealed at all to the Psalmist's contemporaries,\ncertainly did not occupy the same position of clearness or of prominence\nas it does in our religious beliefs. But here we see a soul led up by\nits wrestlings to apprehend it, and as was said of a statesman, 'calling\na new world into existence to redress the balance of the old.' So we get\nhere a soul taught by God, and filled with Him by communion, therefore\nlifted to the height of a faith in a future life, and so made able to\nlook out upon all the perplexities and staggering mysteries of earth's\nmingled ill and good, if not with distinct understanding, at least with\npatient faith.\n\nThe words of my text indicate for us the very high-water mark of\nreligious experience, the very apex and climax of what some people would\ncall mystical religion to which this man has climbed, because he fought\nwith his doubts, and by God's grace was able to lay them. To him the\nworld's uncertain ill or good becomes infinitely insignificant, because\nfor the future he has a clear vision of a continued life with God, and\nbecause for the present he knows that to have God in his heart is all\nthat he really needs.\n\nI. We have here, first, a necessity which, misdirected, is the source of\nman's misery.\n\n'Whom have I in heaven but Thee? there is none upon earth that I desire\nbesides Thee.' If men would interpret the deepest voices of their own\nsouls that is what they would all say, because, from the very make of\nour human nature there is not one of us, howsoever weak and sinful and\nsmall, but is great enough to be too great to be filled with anything\nsmaller than God. Our thoughts, even the thoughts of the least\nenlightened amongst us, go wandering through eternity; and as the writer\nof the Book of Ecclesiastes says:--'He hath set eternity in men's\nhearts.' We all of us need, though, alas! so few of us know that we\nneed, a living possession of a living perfect Person, for mind, for\nheart, for will. Nothing short of the 'fulness of God' is enough for the\nsmallest amongst us. So, because we do not believe this, because\nhundreds of you do not know what it is for which your souls are crying\nout, 'the misery of man is great upon him.' You try to fill that deep\nand aching void in your hearts, which is a sign of your possible\nnobleness, and a pledge of your possible blessedness, with all manner of\nminute rubbish, which can never fill up the gap that is there. Cartload\nafter cartload may be tilted into the bottomless bog, and there is no\nmore solid ground on the surface than there was at the beginning. Oh, my\nbrother! consult thine own deepest need; listen to that voice, often\nstifled, often neglected, and by some of you always misunderstood, which\nspeaks in your wills, minds, consciences, hopes, desires, hearts; and is\nit not this: 'My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God'?\n\nThere is none in the heaven, with all its stars and angels, enough for\nthee but Him. There is none upon earth, with all its flowers, and\ntreasures, and loves, that will calm and still thy soul but only God.\nThe words of my text spring from a necessity felt by every man,\nmisdirected by a tragical majority of men, and therefore the source of\nrestlessness and misery.\n\nII. Secondly, we see here the longing which, rightly directed and\ncherished, is the very spirit of religion.\n\nHe, and only he, is the religious man, who can take these words of my\ntext for the inmost words of his conscious effort and life. Only in the\nmeasure in which you and I recognise that God is our sole and\nall-sufficient good, in that measure have we any business to call\nourselves devout or Christian people. That is a sharp test, is it not?\nIs it not a valid and an accurate one? Is that not what really makes a\nreligious man, namely, the supreme admiration of, and aspiration after,\nand possession of God, and God alone? What a contrast that forms to our\nordinary notions of what religion is! High above all creeds which are\nvaluable as leading up to this enthusiasm of longing and rapture of\npossession, high above all preliminaries and preparations in the way of\noutward services and ceremonial or united acts of worship, which are\nonly helps to this inward possession, rises such a thought of religion\nas this. You are not a Christian because you believe a creed. The very\ndeath of Jesus Christ is a means to this end. In order that we might\ncome into personal, rapturous, and hallowing possession of God, His very\nSelf in our hearts and spirits, Jesus Christ died and rose again. Do not\nmistake the staircase for the presence-chamber. Do not fancy that you\nare Christian people because you hold certain opinions or beliefs in\nregard of certain doctrines. Do not fancy that religion consists in\neither the mere outward practice of, or abstinence from, certain forms\nof conduct. Such things are the means to, or the outcome of, this inward\ndevotion, but the true essence of our religion is that we recognise God\nas our only good, and that in Him we find absolute rest and perfect\nsufficiency.\n\nIs that your religion, my brother? What a contrast these words of my\ntext present not only to our notions of what constitutes religion, but\nto our practice! What is the thing that you and I crave most to have?\nWhat is the thing that we lament most of all when we lose? Where do our\ndesires go when we take the guiding hand off them, and let them run as\nthey will? For some of us there are dearer hearts on earth than His,\nPerhaps for some of us there are more dearly loved faces in heaven than\nHis. Taking the two extreme possible cases, and supposing at the one end\nof the scale a man that had everything but God, and at the other end a\nman that had nothing but God, do we live as if we believed that the man\nthat had everything _minus_ God is a pauper; and the other who has God\n_minus_ everything is 'rich to all the intents of bliss'? Let us shape\nour desires, aspirations, efforts, according to that certain truth.\n\nI do not need to remind you that this lofty height of conscious longing,\nnot unblest with contemporaneous fruition, is above the height to which\nwe habitually rise. But what I would now insist upon is only this, that\nwhilst there will be variations, whilst there will be ups and downs, the\nperiods in our lives when we do not consciously recognise Him as our\nsupreme and single good are the periods that drop below duty and\nblessedness. Acknowledge the imperfections, but Oh, my friends! you\nChristian men and women, who know that these hours of high communion\nwith a loving God are not diffused through your whole life, do not sit\ndown contented, and say that it must be so; but confess them as being\nimperfections which are your own fault, and remember that just as much,\nand not one hairsbreadth more than, we can take these words of my text\nfor ours, so much and no more, have we a right to call ourselves\nreligious men and women.\n\nIII. Again, we have here the blessed possession, which deadens earthly\ndesires.\n\nThat clause, 'There is none upon earth that I desire besides Thee,'\nmight, I think, be rendered more accurately 'With Thee'--that is to say,\n'possessing Thee,'--I desire none 'upon earth.' If we thus have been\nlonging after God, and fuller possession of Him, and if in some measure,\nin answer to the desire, as is always the case, we have received into\nmind and heart and will more of His preciousness and sweetness, then\nthat will kill the desires that otherwise would conflict with it. Our\ngreat poet, speaking about a supreme earthly love, says--\n\n    'That rich golden shaft\n  Hath killed the flock of all affections else,\n  That lived in her.'\n\nAnd the same thing is true about this higher life. This new affection\nwill deaden, and in some sense destroy, the desires that turn to lower\nand to earthly things. The sun when it rises quenches the brightest\nstars that can but fade in his light and die. And so when, in answer to\nour longing, God lifts the light of His countenance--a better\nsunrise--upon us, that new affection dims and quenches the brightness of\nthese little, though they be lustrous points, that shed a fragmentary\nand manifold twinkling over the darkness of our former night. 'Walk in\nthe light,' and your heaven will be naked of all competing brightness.\n\nOnly remember that this supreme, and in some sense exclusive, love and\nlonging does not destroy the sweetness of lower possessions and\nblessings. A new deep love in a man or a woman's heart does not make\ntheir former affections less, but more, sweet and noble and strong. And\nso when we get to love God best, and to love all other persons and\nthings in Him, and Him in them, then they become sources of dignity and\nnobleness, of sweetness and strength, in our lives, which they otherwise\nnever would be. If you want to make all your family affections, for\ninstance, more permanent, more lofty, and more blessed, let them be all\nin God:\n\n  'I trust he lives in God, and there\n   I find him worthier to be loved,'\n\nsays the poet about one that had been carried into the other life. It is\ntrue about us in our relations to one another, even whilst we remain\nhere. Let God be first, and the second rises higher in the scale than\nwhen we thought it first. The more our hearts are knit to Him and all\nother desires are subordinated to Him, the more do they become precious,\nand powers for good in our lives.\n\nIV. And so, lastly, we have here the possession which is the pledge of\nperpetuity.\n\nThe Psalmist, in the last verse of my text, supposes an extreme, and in\nsome sense, an impossible case. 'My flesh'--my bodily frame--'and my\nheart'--some portion of my immaterial being--'faileth.' The clause\nshould probably be taken as hypothetical. 'Even supposing that it has\ncome to this,' says he, 'that I had been separated from my body, and\nthat along with the body there had also been \"consumed\" (as is the\nmeaning of the original word) some portion of my spiritual being, even\nthen, though there were only a thin thread of personality left, enough\nto call \"me\" and no more, so to speak, I should cling with that to God,\nand I know that then I should have enough, for \"God is the Rock of my\nheart, and my Portion for ever.\"'\n\nThese two last words are obviously here to be taken in their widest\nextension. The whole context requires us to suppose that the Psalmist's\neye is looking across the black gorge of death to the shining table-land\nbeyond. So here we are admitted to see faith in the future life in the\nvery act of growth. The singer soars to that sunlit height of confidence\nin the endless blessedness of union with God, just because he feels so\ndeeply the sacredness and the blessedness of his present communion with\nGod.\n\nNext to the resurrection of Jesus Christ the best proof of immortality\nlies in the present experience of communion with God. Anything is more\nreasonable than to believe that a soul which can grasp God for its good,\nwhich can turn itself to, and be united with, an infinite Being; and\nitself is capable of indefinite approximation towards that Being, should\nhave its course and career cut short by such a surface thing as death.\nIf there be a God at all, anything is more reasonable than to believe\nthat the union, formed between Him and me by faith here, can ever come\nto an end until I have exhausted Him, and drawn all His fulness into\nmyself. This communion, by its 'very sweetness yieldeth proof that it\nwas born for immortality.' And the Psalmist here, just because to-day\nGod is the Rock of his heart, is sure that that relation must last on,\nthrough life, through death, ay! and for ever, 'when all that seems\nshall suffer shock.'\n\nSo, my brethren! here is the choice and alternative presented before us.\nAnd I ask you which is the wise man, he who clutches at external\npossessions which cannot abide, or he who hungers for that indwelling\nGod, who sinks into the very substance of his soul, and is more\ninseparable from him than his very body? Which is the wise man, he of\nwhom it shall one day be said, 'This night thy soul shall be required of\nthee,' and 'His glory shall not descend after him,' or the man who knows\nfor what his heart hungers, and knowing it turns to God in Christ, by\nsimple faith and lowly aspiration, as his enduring Treasure; and then,\nand therefore, can look out with a calm smile of security over all the\ntumbling sea of change, and beyond the dark horizon there where sight\nfails; and can say, 'I am persuaded that neither things present, nor\nthings to come, nor life, nor death, nor any other creature, shall be\nable to separate me from the God who is my Treasure, and the Life of my\nvery self'?\n\n\n\n\nNEARNESS TO GOD THE KEY TO LIFE'S PUZZLE\n\n\n    'It is good for me to draw near to God: I have put my trust in the\n    Lord God, that I may declare all Thy works.'--PSALM lxxiii. 28.\n\nThe old perplexity as to how it comes, if God is good and wise and\nstrong, that bad men should prosper and good men should suffer, has been\nmaking the Psalmist's faith reel. He does not answer the question\nexactly as the New Testament would have done, but he does find a\nsolution sufficient for himself in two thoughts, the transiency of that\noutward prosperity, and the eternal sufficiency of God. 'It was too\npainful for me until I went into the Sanctuary, then understood I their\nend'; and on the other hand: 'Thou art the Strength of my life, and my\nPortion for ever.' So he climbs at last to the calm height where he\nlearns that, whatever be a man's outward prosperity, if he is separated\nfrom God he ceases to be. As the context says: 'They that are far from\nThee shall perish.' 'Thou hast destroyed'--already, before they\ndie--'all them that go a-whoring from Thee.' And on the other hand,\nwhatever be the outward condition, God is enough. 'It is good for me,'\nrich or poor harassed or at rest, afflicted or prosperous, in health or\nsickness, solitary or compassed about with loving friends, 'it is good\nfor me to draw near to God'; and nothing else is good. Thus the river\nthat has had to fight its way through rocks, and has been chafed in the\nconflict, and has twisted its path through many a deep, dark, sunless\ngorge, comes out at last into the open, and flows with a broad sunlit\nbreast, peaceable and full, into the great ocean--'It is good for me to\ndraw near to God.'\n\nBut that is not all. The Psalmist goes on to tell how we are to draw\nnear to God: 'I have put my trust in Him.' And that is not all, for he\nfurther goes on to tell how, drawing near to God through faith, all\nthese puzzles and mysteries about men's condition cease to perplex, and\na beam of light falls upon the whole of them. 'I have put my trust in\nGod, that I may declare all Thy works.' There are no knots in the thread\nnow.\n\nI. So here we have, first the truth of experience that nearness to God\nis the one good.\n\nOf course, it is so in the Psalmist's view, since he believes, as we\nprofess to believe, that, to quote the words of another Psalmist, 'With\nThee is the fountain of life'; and therefore that to 'draw near to Thee'\nis to carry our little empty pitchers to that great spring that is\nalways flowing with waters ever sweet and clear. Union with God is life,\nin all senses of the word, according as the creature is capable of union\nwith Him. Why! there is no life in a plant except God's power is\nvitalising it. 'Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow' because\nGod makes them grow. There is no bodily life in a man, unless He\ncontinually breathes into the nostrils the breath of life. If you stop\nthe flow of the fountain, then all the pools are dry. There is no life\nintellectual in a man, except by the 'inspiration of the Almighty,' from\nwhom 'all just thoughts do proceed.' Above all these forms of life the\nreal life of a spirit is the life derived from the union with God\nHimself, whereby He pours Himself into it, and in the deepest sense of\nthe words it is true: 'Because I live ye shall live also.' 'It is good\nfor me to draw near to God,' because, unless I do, and if I am separated\nfrom Him, my true self is dead, even whilst I seem to live. All that are\nparted from Him perish; all that are joined to Him, and only they, do\nlive what is worth calling life. Cut off the sunbeam from the sun, and\nwhat becomes of it? It vanishes. Separate a soul from God, and it is\ndead. What is all the good of the world to you if your true self is\ndead? And what an absurdity it is to deck a corpse with riches and pomp\nof various kinds! That is what the men of the world are doing, who have\nchained themselves to earth, and cut themselves off from God. 'For me it\nis good to draw near to God.' Do you draw near? Because if you do not,\nno matter what prosperity you have, you do not know anything about the\ntrue life and real good for heart and spirit.\n\nI suppose I need scarcely go on pointing out other aspects of this\nsupreme--or more truly, this solitary--good. For instance, nothing is\nreally good to me unless I have it within me, so as that it can never be\nwrenched away from me. The blessings that we cannot incorporate with the\nvery substance of our being are only partial blessings after all; and\nall these things round us that do minister to our necessities, tastes,\naffections, and sometimes to our weaknesses, these good things fail just\nin this, that they stand outside us, and there is no real union between\nus and  them. So, changes come, and we have to unclasp hands, and the\nfootsteps that used to be planted by the side of ours cease, and our\ntrack across the sands is lonely; and losses come, and death comes, and\nall the glory and the good that were only externally possessed by us we\nleave behind us. As this psalm says: 'I considered their end ... how\nthey are brought into desolation, as in a moment!' What is the good of a\ngood that is not incorporated into any being? What is the good of a good\nabout which I cannot say, with a smile of confidence, 'I know that\nwhere-ever I may go, and whatever may befall me, that can never pass\nfrom me'? There is but one good of that sort. 'I am persuaded that ...\nneither life nor death ... nor any other creature, shall separate us\nfrom the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.' 'It is good\nfor me,' amidst the morasses and quicksands and bogs of life's uncertain\nand shifting ill and good, to set my feet upon the rock, and to say:\n'Here I stand, and my footing will never give way.' Do you, brother!\npossess a changeless, imperishable, inwrought good like that? You may if\nyou like.\n\nBut remember, too, that in regard to this Christian good, it is not only\nthe possession of it, but the aspiration after it, that is blessed. The\nPsalmist does not only say, 'It is good for me to be near to God,' but\nhe says, 'It is good for me to draw near.' There is one kind of life in\nwhich the seeking is all but as blessed as the finding. There is one\nkind of life in which to desire is all but as full of peace, and power,\nand joy as to possess. Therefore, another psalm, which begins by\ncelebrating the blessedness of the men that dwell in God's house, and\nare 'still praising Thee,' goes on to speak of the blessedness, not less\nblessed, of the men 'in whose heart are the ways.' They who have reached\nthe Temple are at rest, and blessed in their repose. They who are\njourneying towards it are in action, and blessed in their activity. 'It\nis good to draw near'; and the seeking after God is as far above the\npossession of all other good as heaven is above earth.\n\nBut then, notice further, how our Psalmist comes down to very plain,\npractical teaching. He seems to feel that he must explain what he means\nby drawing near to God. And here is his explanation. 'I have put my\ntrust in the Lord.'\n\nII. The way to nearness to God is twofold.\n\nOn the one hand the true path is Jesus Christ, on the other hand the\nmeans by which we walk upon that path is our faith. The Apostle puts it\nall in a nutshell when he says that his prayer for the Ephesian Church\nis that 'Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith,' and then, by a\nlinked chain which we have not now to consider, leads up to the final\nissues of that faith in that indwelling Christ--'that ye may be filled\nwith all the fulness of God.' So to draw near and to possess that good,\nthat only good which is God, all that is needed is--and it is\nneeded--that we should turn with the surrender of our hearts, with the\nsubmission of our wills, with the outgoing of our affections, and with\nthe conformity of our practical life, to Jesus. Seeing Him, we see the\nFather, and having Him near us, we feel the touch of the divine hand,\nand being joined to the Lord, we are separated from the vanities of\nlife, and united to the Supreme Good.\n\nDear brethren! this Psalmist shows us how hard it is for us to keep up\nthat continual attitude of faith, how many difficulties there are in\ndaily life, in the way of our continually being true to our deepest\nconvictions, and seeking after Him amidst all the distracting whirl and\nperplexities of our daily lives. But he shows us, too, how possible it\nis, even for men constituted as we are, moment by moment, day by day,\ntask by task, to keep vivid the consciousness of our dependence upon\nHim, and the blessed consciousness of our being beside Him, and how, if\nwe do, strength will come to us for everything. The secret of a joyous\nwalk lies in this, 'I have set the Lord always before me. Because He is\nat my right hand I shall not be moved.' We draw near to God when we\nclutch Christ in faith. Our faith manifests itself, not merely by a lazy\nreliance upon what He once did, long ago, on the Cross for us; but by\ndaily, effortful revivifying of our consciousness of His presence, of\nour consciousness of our dependence upon Him, and by the continual\nreference of thoughts, desires, plans, and actions to Himself.\n\nKeep God beside you so, and then there will follow what this Psalmist\nreached at last, a peaceful insight into what else are full of\nperplexity and difficulty, the ways of God in the world.\n\nTo myself, to my dear ones, to the nation, to the Church, to the world,\nthere come many perplexing riddles as to God's dealings, that cannot be\nsolved except by getting close to Him. Just as a little child nestling\non its mother's bosom, with its mother's arm around it, looks out with\npeaceful eye and a bright smile, upon everything beyond the safe nest,\nso they who are near to God can bear to look at difficulties and\nperplexities, and the mysteries of their own sorrows and of the world's\nmiseries, and say, 'All things work together for good'; 'I have put my\ntrust in the Lord, that I may declare _all_ Thy works.' Stand in the\nsun, and all the planets move around it manifestly in order. Take your\nplace anywhere else, and there is confusion. Get beside God, and look\nout on the world, and you will see it as He saw it when, 'Behold! it was\nvery good.'\n\nNow, dear friends! my text in its first part may become the description\nof our death. One man holds on to the world as it is slipping away from\nhim. I remember a story about a coast-guardsman that was flung over the\ncliffs once, and when they picked up his dead body, all under the nails\nwas full of chalk that he had scraped off the cliffs in his desperate\nattempts to clutch at something to hold by. That is like one kind of\ndeath. But another kind may be: 'It is good for me to draw near to God.'\nAnd when we reach His side, and see all the past from the centre, and in\nthe light of the Eternal Present, to which it has led, we shall be able\nto declare all His works, and to give thanks 'for all the way by which\nthe Lord our God hath led us' and the world 'these many years in the\nwilderness.'\n\n\n\n\nMEMORY, HOPE, AND EFFORT\n\n\n    'That they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of\n    God, but keep His commandments.'--PSALM lxxviii. 7.\n\nIn its original application this verse is simply a statement of God's\npurpose in giving to Israel the Law, and such a history of deliverance.\nThe intention was that all future generations might remember what He had\ndone, and be encouraged by the remembrance to hope in Him for the\nfuture; and by both memory and hope, be impelled to the discharge of\npresent duty.\n\nSo, then, the words may permissibly bear the application which I purpose\nto make of them in this sermon, re-echoing only (and aspiring to nothing\nmore) the thoughts which the season has already, I suppose, more or\nless, suggested to most of us. Smooth motion is imperceptible; it is the\njolts that tell us that we are advancing. Though every day be a New\nYear's Day, still the alteration in our dates and our calendars should\nset us all thinking of that continual lapse of the mysterious thing--the\ncreature of our own minds--which we call time, and which is bearing us\nall so steadily and silently onwards.\n\nMy text tells us how past, present, and future--memory, hope, and effort\nmay be ennobled and blessed. In brief, it is by associating them all\nwith God. It is as the field of His working that our past is best\nremembered. It is on Him that our hopes may most wisely be set. It is\nkeeping His commandments which is the consecration of the present. Let\nus, then, take the three thoughts of our text and cast them into New\nYear's recommendations.\n\nI. First, then, let us associate God with memory by thankful\nremembrance.\n\nNow I suppose that there are very few of the faculties of our nature\nwhich we more seldom try to regulate by Christian principles than that\ngreat power which we have of looking backwards. Did you ever reflect\nthat you are responsible for what you remember, and for how you remember\nit, and that you are bound to train and educate your memory, not merely\nin the sense of cultivating it as a means of carrying intellectual\ntreasures, but for a religious purpose? The one thing that all parts of\nour nature need is God, and that is as true about our power of\nremembrance as it is about any other part of our being. The past is then\nhallowed, noble, and yields its highest results and most blessed fruits\nfor us when we link it closely with Him, and see in it not only, nor so\nmuch, the play of our own faculties, whether we blame or approve\nourselves, as rather see in it the great field in which God has brought\nHimself near to our experience, and has been regulating and shaping all\nthat has befallen us. The one thing which will consecrate memory,\ndeliver it from its errors and abuses, raise it to its highest and\nnoblest power, is that it should be in touch with God, and that the past\nshould be regarded by each of us as it is, in deed and in truth, one\nlong record of what God has done for us.\n\nWe can see His presence more clearly when we look back over a\nlong-connected stretch of days, and when the excitement of feeling the\nagony or rapture have passed, than we could whilst they were hot, and\nlife was all hurry and bustle. The men on the deck of a ship see the\nbeauty of the city that they have left behind, better than when they\nwere pressing through its narrow streets. And though the view of the\nreceding houses from the far-off waters may be an illusion, our view of\nthe past, if we see God brooding over it all, and working in it all, is\nno illusion. The meannesses are hidden, the narrow places are invisible,\nall the pain and suffering is quieted, and we are able to behold more\ntruly than when we were in the midst of them, the bearing, the purpose,\nand the blessedness alike of our sorrows and of our joys.\n\nNot a few of us are old enough to have had a great many mysteries of our\nearly days cleared up. We have seen at least the beginnings of the\nharvest which the ploughshare of sorrow and the winter winds were\npreparing for us, and for the rest we can trust. Brethren! remember your\nmercies; remember your losses; and 'for all the way by which the Lord\nour God has led us these many years in the wilderness,' let us try to be\nthankful, including in our praises the darkness and the storm as well as\nthe light and the calm. Some of us are like people who, when they get\nbetter of their sicknesses, grudge the doctor's bill. We forget the\nmercies as soon as they are past, because we only enjoyed the sensuous\nsweetness of them whilst it tickled our palate, and did not think, in\nthe enjoyment of them, whose love it was that they spoke of to us.\nSorrows and joys, bring them all in your thanksgivings, and 'forget not\nthe works of God.'\n\nSuch a habit of cultivating the remembrance of God's hand as moving in\nall our past, will not, in the slightest degree, interfere with lower\nand yet precious exercises of that same faculty. We shall still be able\nto look back, and learn our limitations, mark our weaknesses, gather\ncounsels of prudence from our failures, tame our ambitions by\nremembering where we broke down. And such an exercise of grateful\nGod-recognising remembrance will deliver us from the abuses of that\ngreat power, by which so many of us turn our memories into a cause of\nweakness, if not of sin. There are people, and we are all tempted to be\nof the number, who look back upon the past and see nothing there but\nthemselves, their own cleverness, their own success; 'burning incense to\ntheir own net, and sacrificing to their own drag.' Another mood leads us\nto look back into the past dolefully and disappointedly, to say, 'I have\nbroken down so often; my resolutions have all gone to water so quickly;\nI have tried and failed over and over again. I may as well give it all\nup, and accept the inevitable, and grope on as well as I can without\nhope of self-advancement or of victory.' Never! If only we will look\nback to God we shall be able to look forward to a perfect self.\nTo-morrow need never be determined by the failures that have been. We\nmay still conquer where we have often been defeated. There is no worse\nuse of the power of remembrance than when we use it to bind upon\nourselves, as the permanent limitations of our progress, the failures\nand faults of the past. 'Forget the things that are behind.' Your old\nfragmentary goodness, your old foiled aspirations, your old frequent\nfailures--cast them all behind you!\n\nAnd there are others to whom remembrance is mainly a gloating over old\nsins, and a doing again of these--ruminating upon them; bringing up the\nchewed food once more to be masticated. Some of us gather only poisonous\nweeds, and carry them about in the _hortus siccus_ of our memories.\nAlas! for the man whose memory is but the paler portraiture of past\nsins. Some of us, I am sure, have our former evils holding us so tight\nin their cords that when we look back memory is defiled by the things\nwhich defiled the unforgettable past. Brethren! you may find a refuge\nfrom that curse of remembrance in remembering God.\n\nAnd some of us, unwisely and ungratefully, live in the light of departed\nblessings, so as to have no hearts either for present mercies or for\npresent duties. There is no more weakening and foolish misdirection of\nthat great gift of remembrance than when we employ it to tear down the\ntender greenery with which healing time has draped the ruins; or to turn\nagain in the wound which is beginning to heal the sharp and poisoned\npoint of the sorrow which once pierced it. For all these abuses--the\nmemory that gloats upon sin; the memory that is proud of success; the\nmemory that is despondent because of failures; the memory that is\ntearful and broken-hearted over losses--for all these the remedy is that\nwe should not forget the works of God, but see Him everywhere filling\nthe past.\n\nII. Again, let us live in the future by hope in Him.\n\nOur remembrances and our hopes are closely connected; one might almost\neven say that the power by which we look backwards and that by which we\nlook forwards are one and the same. At all events, Hope owes to Memory\nthe pigments with which it paints, the canvas on which it paints, and\nthe objects which it portrays there. But in all our earthly hopes there\nis a feeling of uncertainty which brings alarm as well as expectation,\nand he whose forward vision runs only along the low levels of earth, and\nis fed only by experience and remembrance, will never be able to say, 'I\nhope with certitude, and I know that my hope shall be fulfilled.' For\nhim 'hopes, and fears that kindle hopes,' will be 'an indistinguishable\nthrong'; and there will be as much of pain as of pleasure in his forward\nglance.\n\nBut if, according to my text, we set our hopes on God, then we shall\nhave a certainty absolute. What a blessing it is to be able to look\nforward to a future as fixed and sure, as solid and as real, as much our\npossession, as the irrevocable past! The Christian man's hope, if it be\nset on God, is not a 'may be,' but a 'will be'; and he can be as sure of\nto-morrow as he is of yesterday.\n\nThey whose hopes are set on God have a certain hope, a sufficient one,\nand one that fills all the future. All other expectations are fulfilled,\nor disappointed, as the case may be, but are left behind and outgrown.\nThis one only never palls, and is never accomplished, and yet is never\ndisappointed. So if we set our hopes on Him, we can face very quietly\nthe darkness that lies ahead of us. Earthly hopes are only the mirrors\nin which the past reflects itself, as in some king's palace you will\nfind a lighted chamber, with a great sheet of glass at each end, which\nperpetuates in shining rows the lights behind the spectator. A curtain\nveils the future, and earthly hope can only put a mirror in front of it\nthat reflects what has been. But the hope that is set on God draws back\nthe curtain, and lets us see enough of a fixed, eternal future to make\nour lives bright and our hearts calm. The darkness remains; what of\nthat, if\n\n  'I only know I cannot drift\n   Beyond His love and care'?\n\nSet your hopes on God, and they will not be ashamed.\n\nIII. Lastly, let us live in the present by strenuous obedience.\n\nAfter all, memory and hope are meant to fit us for work in the flying\nmoment. Both should impel us to this keeping of the commandments of God;\nfor both yield motives which should incline us thereto. A past full of\nblessing demands the sacrifice of loving hearts and of earnest hands. A\nfuture so fair, so far, so certain, so sovereign, and a hope that grasps\nit, and brings some of its sweet fragrance into the else scentless air\nof the poor present, ought to impel to service, vigorous and continual.\nBoth should yield motives which make such service a delight.\n\nIf my memory weakens me for present work, either because it depresses my\nhope of success, or because it saddens me with the remembrance of\ndeparted blessings, then it is a curse and not a good. And if I dream\nmyself away in any future, and forget the exigencies of the imperative\nand swiftly-passing moment, then the faculty of hope, too, is a curse\nand a weakening. But both are delivered from their possible abuses, if\nboth are made into means of helping us to fill the present with loving\nobedience. These two faculties are like the two wings that may lift us\nto God, like the two paddles, one on either side of the ship, that may\ndrive us steadily forward, through all the surges and the tempest. They\nfind their highest field in fitting us for the grinding tasks and the\nheavy burdens that the moment lays upon us.\n\nSo, dear friends! we are very different in our circumstances and\npositions. For some of us Hope's basket is nearly empty, and Memory's\nsack is very full. For us older men the past is long, the earthly future\nis short. For you younger people the converse is the case. It is Hope\nwhose hands are laden with treasures for you, Memory carries but a\nlittle store. Your past is brief; your future is probably long. The\ngrains of sand in some of our hour-glasses are very heaped and high in\nthe lower half, and running very low in the upper. But whichever\ncategory we stand in, one thing remains the same for us all, and that is\nduty, keeping God's commandments. That is permanent, and that is the one\nthing worth living for. 'Whether we live we live unto the Lord; or\nwhether we die we die unto the Lord.'\n\nSo let us front this New Year, with all its hidden possibilities, with\nquiet, brave hearts, resolved on present duty, as those ought who have\nsuch a past to remember and such a future to hope for. It will probably\nbe the last on earth for some of us. It will probably contain great\nsorrows for some of us, and great joys for others. It will probably be\ncomparatively uneventful for others. It may make great outward changes\nfor us, or it may leave us much as it found us. But, at all events, God\nwill be in it, and work for Him should be in it. Well for us if, when\nits hours have slidden away into the grey past, they continue to witness\nto us of His love, even as, while they were wrapped in the mists of the\nfuture, they called on us to hope in Him! Well for us if we fill the\npassing moment with deeds of loving obedience! Then a present of keeping\nHis commandments will glide into a past to be thankfully remembered, and\nwill bring us nearer to a future in which hope shall not be put to\nshame. To him who sees God in all the divisions and particles of his\ndays, and makes Him the object of memory, hope, and effort, past,\npresent, and future are but successive calm ripples of that mighty river\nof Time which bears him on the great ocean of Eternity, from which the\ndrops that make its waters rose, and to which its ceaseless flow\nreturns.\n\n\n\n\nSPARROWS AND ALTARS\n\n\n    'Yea, the sparrow hath found an house, and the swallow a nest for\n    herself, where she may lay her young, even Thine altars, O Lord of\n    Hosts, my King, and my God.'--PSALM lxxxiv. 3.\n\nThe well-known saying of the saintly Rutherford, when he was silenced\nand exiled from his parish, echoes and expounds these words. 'When I\nthink,' said he, 'upon the sparrows and swallows that build their nests\nin the kirk of Anwoth, and of my dumb Sabbaths, my sorrowful, bleared\neyes look asquint upon Christ, and present Him as angry.' So sighed the\nPresbyterian minister in his compelled idleness in a prosaic\nseventeenth-century Scotch town, answering his heart's-brother away back\nin the far-off time, and in such different circumstances. The Psalmist\nwas probably a member of the Levitical family of the Sons of Korah, who\nwere 'doorkeepers in the house of the Lord.' He knew what he was saying\nwhen he preferred his humble office to all honours among the godless. He\nwas shut out by some unknown circumstances from external participation\nin the Temple rites, and longs to be even as one of the swallows or\nsparrows that twitter and flit round the sacred courts. No doubt to him\nfaith was much more inseparably attached to form than it should be for\nus. No doubt place and ritual were more to him than they can permissibly\nbe to those who have heard and understood the great charter of spiritual\nworship spoken first to an outcast Samaritan of questionable character:\n'Neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem shall men worship the\nFather.' But equally it is true that what he wanted was what the outward\nworship brought him, rather than the worship itself. And the psalm,\nwhich begins with 'longing' and 'fainting' for the courts of the Lord,\nand pronouncing benedictions on 'those that dwell in Thy house,' works\nitself clear, if I might so say, and ends with 'O Lord of Hosts! Blessed\nis the man that trusteth in Thee'--for he shall 'dwell in Thy house,'\nwherever he is. So this flight of imagination in the words of my text\nmay suggest to us two or three lessons.\n\nI. I take it first as pointing a bitter and significant contrast.\n\n'The sparrow hath found a house, and the swallow a nest for herself,'\nwhile I! We do not know what the Psalmist's circumstances were, but if\nwe accept the conjecture that he may have accompanied David in his\nflight during Absalom's rebellion, we may fancy him as wandering on the\nuplands across Jordan, and sharing the agitations, fears, and sorrows of\nthose dark hours, and in the midst of all, as the little company hurried\nhither and thither for safety, thinking, with a touch of bitter envy, of\nthe calm restfulness and serene services of the peaceful Temple.\n\nBut, pathetic as is the complaint, when regarded as the sigh of a\nminister of the sanctuary exiled from the shrine which was as his home,\nand from the worship which was his occupation and delight, it sounds a\ndeeper note and one which awakens echoes in our hearts, when we hear in\nit, as we may, the complaint of humanity contrasting its unrest with the\nhappier lot of lower creatures. Do you remember who it was that\nsaid--and on what occasion He said it--'Foxes have holes, and birds of\nthe air have roosting-places, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay\nHis head'? That saying, like our text, has a narrower and a wider\napplication. In the former it pathetically paints the homeless Christ, a\nwanderer in a land peculiarly 'His own,' and warns His enthusiastic\nwould-be follower of the lot which he was so light-heartedly undertaking\nto share. But when Jesus calls Himself 'Son of Man,' He claims to be the\nrealised ideal of humanity, and when, as in that saying, He contrasts\nthe condition of 'the Son of Man' with that of the animal creation, we\ncan scarcely avoid giving to the words their wider application to the\nsame contrast between man's homelessness and the creatures' repose which\nwe have found in the Psalmist's sigh.\n\nYes! There is only one being in this world that does not fit the world\nthat he is in, and that is man, chief and foremost of all. Other beings\nperfectly correspond to what we now call their 'environment.' Just as\nthe soft mollusc fits every convolution of its shell, and the hard shell\nfits every curve of the soft mollusc, so every living thing corresponds\nto its place and its place to it, and with them all things go smoothly.\nBut man, the crown of creation, is an exception to this else universal\ncomplete adaptation. 'The earth, O Lord! is full of Thy mercy,' but the\nonly creature who sees and says that is the only one who has further to\nsay, 'I am a stranger on the earth.' He and he alone is stung with\nrestlessness and conscious of longings and needs which find no\nsatisfaction here. That sense of homelessness may be an agony or a joy,\na curse or a blessing, according to our interpretation of its meaning,\nand our way of stilling it. It is not a sign of inferiority, but of a\nhigher destiny, that we alone should bear in our spirits the 'blank\nmisgivings' of those who, amid unsatisfying surroundings, have blind\nfeelings after 'worlds not realised,' which elude our grasp. It is no\nadvantage over us that every fly dancing in the treacherous gleams of an\nApril sun, and every other creature on the earth except ourselves, on\nwhom the crown is set, is perfectly proportioned to its place, and has\ndesire and possessions absolutely conterminous.\n\n'The son of man hath not where to lay his head.' Why must he alone\nwander homeless on the bleak moorland, whilst the sparrows and the\nswallows have their nests and their houses? Why? Because they _are_\nsparrows and swallows, and he is man, and 'better than many sparrows.'\nSo let us lay to heart the sure promises, the blessed hopes, the\nstimulating exhortations, which come from that which, at first sight,\nseems to be a mystery and half an arraignment of the divine wisdom, in\nthe contrast between the restlessness of humanity and the reposeful\ncontentment of those whom we call the lower creatures. Be true to the\nunrest, brother! and do not mistake its meaning, nor seek to still it,\nuntil it drives you to God.\n\nII. These words bring to us a plea which we may use, and a pledge on\nwhich we may rest.\n\n'Thine altars, O Lord of hosts! my King and my God.' The Psalmist pleads\nwith God, and lays hold for his own confidence upon the fact that\ncreatures which do not understand what the altar means, may build beside\nit, and those which have no notion of who the God is to whom the house\nis sacred, are yet cared for by Him. And he thinks to himself, 'If I can\nsay \"_My_ King and _my_ God,\" surely He that takes care of them will not\nleave me uncared for.' The unrest of the soul that is capable of\nappropriating God is an unrest which has in it, if we understand it\naright, the assurance that it shall be stilled and satisfied. He that is\ncapable of entering into the close personal relationship with God which\nis expressed by that eloquent little pronoun and its reduplication with\nthe two words, 'King' and 'God'--such a creature cannot cry for rest in\nvain, nor in vain grope, as a homeless wanderer, for the door of the\nFather's house.\n\n'Doth God care for oxen; or saith He it altogether for our sakes?'\n'Consider the fowls of the air; your heavenly Father feedeth them.' And\nthe same argument which the Apostle used in the one of these sayings,\nand our Lord in the other, is valid and full of encouragement when\napplied to this matter. He that 'satisfies the desires of every living\nthing,' and fills full the maw of the lowest creature; and puts the\nworms into the gaping beak of the young ravens when they cry, is not the\nKing to turn a deaf ear, or the back of His hand, to the man who can\nappeal to Him with this word on his lips, 'My King and my God!' We grasp\nGod when we say that; and all that we see of provident recognition and\nsupply of wants in dealings with these lower creatures should encourage\nus to cherish calm unshakable confidence that every true desire of our\nsouls after Him is as certain to be satisfied.\n\nAnd so the glancing swallows around the eaves of the Temple and the\ntwittering sparrows on its pinnacles may proclaim to us, not only a\ncontrast which is bitter, but a confidence which is sweet. We may be\nsure that we shall not be left uncared for amongst the many pensioners\nat His table, and that the deeper our wants the surer we are of their\nsupply. Our bodies may hunger in vain--bodily hunger has no tendency to\nbring meat; but our spirits cannot hunger in vain if they hunger after\nGod; for that hunger is the sure precursor and infallible prophet of the\ncoming satisfaction.\n\nThese words not only may hearten us with confidence that our desires\nwill be satisfied if they are set upon Him, but they point us to the one\nway by which they are so. Say 'My King and my God!' in the deepest\nrecesses of a spirit conscious of His presence, of a will submitting to\nHis authority, of emptiness expectant of His fulness; say that, and you\nare in the house of the Lord. For it is not a question of place, it is a\nquestion of disposition and desire. This Psalmist, though, when he began\nhis song, he was far away from the Temple, and though he finished it\nsitting on the same hillside on which he began it, when he had ended it\nwas within the curtains of the sanctuary and wrapt about with the\npresence of his God. He had regained as he sang what for a moment he had\nlost the consciousness of when he began--viz. the presence of God with\nhim on the lone, dreary expanse of alien soil as truly as amidst the\nsanctities of what was called His House.\n\nSo, brethren! if we want rest, let us clasp God as ours; if we desire a\nhome warm, safe, sheltered from every wind that blows, and inaccessible\nto enemies, let us, like the swallows, nestle under the eaves of the\nTemple. Let us take God for our Hope. They that hold communion with\nHim--and we can all do that wherever we are and whatever we may be\ndoing--these, and only these, 'dwell in the house of the Lord all the\ndays of their lives.' Therefore, with deepest simplicity of expression,\nour psalm goes on to describe, as equally recipients of blessedness,\n'those that dwell in the house of the Lord,' and those in 'whose heart\nare the ways' that lead to it, and to explain at last, as I have already\npointed out, that both the dwellers in, and the pilgrims towards, that\nintimacy of abiding with God are included in the benediction showered on\nthose who cling to Him, 'Blessed is the man that trusteth in Thee!'\n\nIII. Lastly, we may take this picture of the Psalmist's as a warning.\n\nSparrows and swallows have very small brains. They build their nests,\nand they do not know whose altars they are flitting around. They pursue\nthe insects on the wing, and they twitter their little songs; and they\ndo not understand how all their busy, glancing, brief, trivial life is\nbeing lived beneath the shadow of the cherubim, and all but in the\npresence of the veiled God of the Shekinah.\n\nThere are too many people who live like that. We are all tempted to\nbuild our nests where we may lay our young, or dispose of ourselves or\nour treasures in the very sanctuary of God, with blind, crass\nindifference to the Presence in which we move. The Father's house has\nmany mansions, and wherever we go we are in God's Temple. Alas! some of\nus have no more sense of the sanctities around us, and no more\nconsciousness of the divine Eye that looks down upon us, than if we were\nso many feathered sparrows flitting about the altar.\n\nLet us take care, brethren! that we give our hearts to be influenced,\nand awed, and ennobled, and tranquillised by the sense of ever more\nbeing in the house of the Lord. Let us see to it that we keep in that\nhouse by continual aspiration, cherishing in our hearts the ways that\nlead to it; and so making all life worship, and every place what the\npilgrim found the stone of Bethel to be, a house of God and a gate of\nheaven. For everywhere, to the eye that sees the things that are, and\nnot only the things that seem--and to the heart that feels the unseen\npresence of the One Reality, God Himself--all places are temples, and\nall work may be beholding His beauty and inquiring in His sanctuary; and\neverywhere, though our heads rest upon a stone, and there be night and\nsolitude around us, and doubt and darkness in front of us, and danger\nand terror behind us, and weakness within us, as was the case with\nJacob, there will be the ladder with its foot at our side and its top in\nthe heavens; and above the top of it His face, which when we see it look\ndown upon us, makes all places and circumstances good and sweet.\n\n\n\n\nHAPPY PILGRIMS\n\n\n    'Blessed is the man whose strength is in Thee; in whose heart are\n    the highways to Zion. 6. Passing through the valley of Weeping they\n    make it a place of springs; yea, the early rain covereth it with\n    blessings. 7. They go from strength to strength, every one of them\n    appeareth before God in Zion.'--PSALM lxxxiv. 5-7.\n\nRightly rendered, the first words of these verses are not a calm,\nprosaic statement, but an emotional exclamation. The Psalmist's tone\nwould be more truly represented if we read, 'How blessed is the man,' or\n'Oh, the blessednesses!' for that is the literal rendering of the Hebrew\nwords, 'of the man whose strength is Thee.'\n\nThere are three such exclamations in this psalm, the consideration of\nwhich leads us far into the understanding of its deepest meaning. The\nfirst of them is this, 'How blessed are they that dwell in Thy house!'\nOf course the direct allusion is to actual presence in the actual Temple\nat Jerusalem. But these old psalmists, though they attached more\nimportance to external forms than we do, were not so bound by them, even\nat their stage of development of the religious life, as that they\nconceived that no communion with God was possible apart from the form,\nor that the form itself was communion with God. We can see gleaming\nthrough all their words, though only gleaming through them, the same\ntruth which Jesus Christ couched in the immortal phrase--the charter of\nthe Church's emancipation from all externalisms--'neither in this\nmountain, nor yet in Jerusalem, shall men worship the Father.' To 'dwell\nin the house of the Lord' is not only to be present in bodily form in\nthe Temple--the Psalmist did not think that it was _only_ that--but to\npossess communion with Him, of which the external presence is but the\nsymbol, the shadow, and the means.\n\nBut there is another blessing. To be there is blessing, to wish to be\nthere is no less so.--'Blessed are the men in whose heart are the ways.'\nThe joyous company that went up from every corner of the land to the\nfeasts in Jerusalem made the paths ring with their songs as they\ntravelled, and as the prophet says about another matter, 'they went up\nto Zion with songs and joy upon their heads,' and so the search after is\nonly a shade less blessed--if it be even that--than the possession of\ncommunion with God.\n\nBut there is a third blessedness in our psalm. 'Oh! the blessedness of\nthe man that trusteth in Thee.' That includes and explains both the\nothers. It confirms what I have said, that we do great injustice to the\nbeauty and the spirituality of the Old Testament religion, if we\nconceive of it as slavishly tied to external forms. And it suggests the\nthought that in trust there lie both the previous elements, for he that\ntrusts possesses, and he that trustingly possesses is thereby impelled\nas trustingly to seek for, larger gifts.\n\nSo, then, I turn to this outline sketch of the happy pilgrims on the\nroad, and desire to gather from it, as simply as may be, the stimulating\nthoughts which it suggests to us.\n\nI. Let me ask you, then, following the words which I have read to you,\nto look with me, first at the blessedness of the pilgrims' spirit.\n\n'Blessed are the men in whose heart are the ways.' A singular\nexpression, and yet a very eloquent and significant one! 'The ways' are,\nof course, the various roads which, from every corner of the land, lead\nto the Temple, and the thought suggested is that the men whom the\nPsalmist pronounces blessed, and in whose blessednesses his longing\nheart desires to share, are the men who are restless till they are on\nthe path, whose eyes are ever travelling to the goal, who have a 'divine\ndiscontent' with distance from God, and who know the impulse and the\nsting that sends them ever travelling on the path that leads to Him.\n\nOn any lower level it is perfectly true that the very salt of life is\naspiration after an unattained ideal; that there is nothing that so\nkeeps a man young, strong, buoyant, and fits him for nobilities of\naction, as that there shall be gleaming for ever before him in the\nbeckoning distance a horizon that moves ever as he moves. When we cease\nto be the slaves of unattained ideals in any department, it is time for\nus to die; indeed, we are dead already. There are men in every civilised\ncountry, with the gipsy strain in their blood, who never can be at rest\nuntil they are in motion, to whom a settled abode is irksome, and to\nwhom the notion of blessedness is that they shall be out in the free\nplains. '_Amplius_,' the dying Xavier's word, '_further afield_,' is the\nmotto of all noble life--scientist, scholar, artist, man of letters, man\nof affairs; all come under the same law, that unless there is something\nbefore them which has dominated their hearts, and draws their whole\nbeing towards it, their lives want salt, want nobility, want freshness,\nand a green scum comes over the pool. We all know that. To live is to\naspire; to cease to aspire is to die.\n\nWell then, looking all round our horizon there stands out one path for\naspiration which is clearly blessed to tread--one path, and one path\nalone. For, oh brethren! there are needs in all our hearts, deep\nlongings, terrible wounds, dreary solitudes, which can only be appeased\nand healed and companioned when we are pressing nearer and nearer God,\nthat infinite and divine Source of all blessedness, of all peace and\ngood. To possess God is life; to feel after God is life, too. For that\naim is sure, as we shall see, to be satisfied. That aim gives, and it is\nthe only one which does give, adequate occupation for every power of a\nman's soul; that aim brings, simultaneously with its being entertained,\nits being satisfied; for, as I have already said, in the one act of\nfaith there lie both these elements of blessedness--the possession of,\nand the seeking after, God. The religious life is distinguished from all\nothers in two respects; one is the contemporaneousness and co-existence\nof desire and fruition, and the other is the impossibility that fruition\nshall ever be so complete and perfect as that desire shall die. And\nbecause thus all my nature may reach out its yearnings to Him, and in\nreaching out may find that after which it feels, and yet, finding it,\nmust feel after it all the more; therefore, high above all other\ndelights of search, high above all other blessednesses of pilgrimage,\nhigh above all the buoyancy and concentration of aim and contempt of\nhindrances which pour into a soul, before which the unattained ideal\nburns beckoning and inviting, there stands the blessedness of the man\n'in whose heart are the ways' which lead to God in Zion.\n\nII. And now notice the blessedness of the pilgrims' experience.\n\nIf you use the Revised Version you will see the changes upon the\nAuthorised which it makes, following the stream of modern critics and\ncommentators, and which may thus be reproduced: 'Passing through the\nValley of Weeping, they make it a _place of springs_, the rain also\n_covereth it with blessings_.' No doubt the poet is referring here to\nthe actual facts of the pilgrimage to Zion, No doubt, on some one of the\nroads, there lay a gloomy gorge, the name of which was the Valley of\nWeeping; either because it dimly commemorated some half-forgotten\ntragedy long ago, or, more probably, because it was arid and frowning\nand full of difficulty for the travellers on the march. The Psalmist\nuses that name with a lofty imaginative freedom, which itself confirms\nthe view that I have taken, that there is something deeper in the psalm\nthan the mere external circumstances of the pilgrimages to the Holy\nCity. For, he says, 'passing through the Valley of Weeping, they make it\na place of springs.' They, as it were, pour their tears into the wells,\nand they become sources of refreshment and fertility.\n\nBut there are other kinds of moisture than tears and fountains. And so\nhe goes on: 'the rain also' from above 'covereth it with blessings'; the\nblessings being, I suppose, the waving crops which the poet's\nimagination conceives of as springing up all over the else arid ground.\nIrrigated thus by the pilgrims' labour, and rained upon thus by God's\ngift from heaven, 'the wilderness rejoices and blossoms as the rose.'\n\nNow, translate that--it scarcely needs translation, I suppose, to\nanybody who will read the psalm with the least touch of a poetic\nimagination--translate that, and it just comes to this. If we have in\nour hearts, as our chief aim, the desire to get closer to God, then our\nsorrows and our tears will become sources of refreshment and fertility.\nAh! how different all our troubles, large and little, look when we take\nas our great aim in life what is God's great purpose in giving us\nlife--viz. that we should be moulded into His likeness and enriched by\nthe possession of Himself. That takes the sting out of sorrow, and\nalthough it leaves us in no morbid condition of insensibility, it yet\nmakes it possible for us to gather our tears into reservoirs which shall\nbe to us the sources of many a blessing, and many a thankfulness. _He_\nputs them into His bottle; we have to put them into our wells. And be\nsure of this, that if we understood better the meaning of life, that it\nwas all intended to be our road to God, and if we judged of things more\nfrom that point of view, we should less frequently be brought to stand\nby what we call the mysteries of Providence and more able to wring out\nof them all the rich honey which is stored in them all for us. Not the\nleast of the blessednesses of the pilgrim heart is its power of\ntransmitting the pilgrim's tears into the pilgrim's wells. Brothers! do\nyou bring such thoughts to bear on the disappointments, anxieties,\nsorrows, losses that befall you, be they great or small? If you do, you\nwill have learned, better than I can say it, how strangely grief changes\nits aspect when it is looked upon as the helper and servant to our\nprogress towards God.\n\nBut that is not all. If, with the pilgrims' hearts, we rightly use our\nsorrows, we shall not be left to find refreshment and fertilising power\nonly in ourselves, but the benediction of the rain from heaven will come\ndown, and the great Spirit of God will fall upon our hearts, not in a\nflood that drowns, but broken up into a beneficent mist that falls\nquietly upon us, and brings with itself the assurance of fertility. And\nso the secret of turning the desert into abundance, and tears into\nblessings, lies in having the pilgrim's heart.\n\nIII. Notice the blessedness of the pilgrims' advance.\n\n'They go from strength to strength.' I do not know whether the Psalmist\nmeans to use that word 'strength' in the significance which it also has\nin old English, of a fortified place, so that the metaphor would be that\nfrom one camp of security, one fortress to another, they journey safe\nalways, because of their protection; or whether he means to use it\nrather in its plain and simple sense, according to which the\nsignificance would be that these happy pilgrims do not get worn out on\nthe journey, as is the wont of men that set out, for instance, from some\nfar corner of India to Mecca, and come in battered and travel-stained,\nand half dead with their privations, but that the further they go the\nstronger they become; and on the road gain more vigour than they could\never have gained by ease and indulgence in their homes. But, whichever\nof these two meanings we may be disposed to adopt, the great thought\nthat comes out of both of them is identical--viz. that this is one of\nthe distinguishing joys of a Christian career of pressing forward to\ncloser communion and conformity with our Lord and Master, in whom God is\nmanifested--viz. that we grow day by day in strength, and that effort\ndoes not weaken, but invigorates.\n\nAnd now I have to put a very plain question. Is that growing strength\nanything like the general characteristic of us professing Christians? I\nwonder how many people there are listening to me now that have been\nmembers of Christian churches for half a century almost, but are not a\nbit better than they were away back in the years that they have almost\nforgotten? I wonder in how many of our cases there has been an arrested\ndevelopment, like that which you will sometimes see in deformed people,\nthe lower limbs all but atrophied? I wonder how many of us are babes of\nforty years old, and from how many of our minds the very conception of\ncontinual growth, as an essential of Christian life, has altogether\nvanished? Brother! are you any further than you were ten years ago?\n\nI remember once, long ago, when I was on board a sailing ship, that we\nhad baffling winds as we tried to run up the coast; and morning after\nmorning for a week we used to come up on deck, and _there_ were the same\nwindmill, and the same church-tower that we had seen last night, and the\nnight before and the night before that. That is the sort of voyage that\na great many of you Christian people are making. There may be motion;\nthere is no progress. Round and round and round you go. That is not the\nway to get to Zion. 'They go from strength to strength,' and unless you\nare doing that, you know little about the blessedness of the pilgrim\nheart.\n\nIV. Lastly, note the blessedness of the pilgrims' arrival.\n\n'Every one of them in Zion appeareth before God.' Then there is one road\non which whosoever travels is sure to reach his goal. On all others\ncaravans get lost, overwhelmed in a sandstorm, or slain by robbers; and\nthe bleached bones of men and camels lie there on the sand for\ncenturies. This caravan always arrives. For no man ever wanted God who\ndid not possess Him, and the measure of our desire is the prophecy of\nour possession. Surely it is worth while, even from the point of view of\nself-interest, to forsake all these lower aims in which success is\nabsolutely problematical, or, while pursuing them as far as duty and\nnecessity require, in and through them, as well as above and beyond\nthem, to press towards the one aim in which failure is impossible. You\ncannot say about say other course--'Blessed is the man that enters on\nit, for he is sure to reach what he desires.' Other goals are elusive;\nthe golden circlet may never drop upon your locks. But there is one path\non which all that you seek you shall have, and you are on it if 'in your\nhearts are the _ways_.'\n\nI need not say a word about the ultimate fulfilment of this great\npromise of our text; how that there is not only in our psalm, gleaming\nthrough it, a reference to the communion of earth rather than to the\nexternal Presence in the sanctuary, but there is also hinted, though\nless consciously, to the Psalmist himself, yet necessarily from the\nnature of the case the perfecting of that earthly communion in the\nhigher house of the Lord in the heavenly Zion. Are all these desires,\nthese longings, these efforts after God which make the nobleness and the\nblessedness of a life on earth, and which are always satisfied, and yet\nnever satiated, to be crushed into nothingness by the accident of bodily\ndissolution? Then, then, the darkest of all clouds is drawn over the\nface of God, and we are brought into a state of absolute intellectual\nbewilderment as to what life, futile and frail, has been for at all. No,\nbrother! God never gives mouths but He sends meat to fill them; and He\nhas not suffered His children to long after Him, to press after Him,\nonly in order that the partial fulfilment of their desires and yearnings\nwhich is possible upon earth should be all their experience.\n\n  'He thinks he was not made to die,\n   And Thou hast made him; Thou art just.'\n\nBe sure that 'every one of them in Zion appeareth before God.'\n\nSo, brethren! let us take the pilgrim scrip and staff; and be sure of\nthis, that the old blessed word will be fulfilled, that we shall not\nbe lost in the wilderness, where there is no way, nor grope and\nsearch after elusive and fleeting good; but that 'the ransomed of the\nLord shall return and come to Zion with songs, and everlasting joy\nshall be upon their heads.'\n\n\n\n\nBLESSED TRUST\n\n\n    'O Lord of Hosts, blessed is the man that trusteth in Thee.'\n    --PSALM lxxxiv. 12.\n\nIn my last sermon from the central portion of this psalm I pointed out\nthat the Psalmist thrice celebrates the blessedness of certain types of\ncharacter, and that these threefold benedictions constitute, as it were,\nthe keynotes of the portions of the psalm in which they respectively\noccur. They are these: 'Blessed are they that dwell in Thy house';\n'Blessed is the man in whose heart are the ways'; and this final one,\n'Blessed is the man that trusteth in Thee.'\n\nNow, this last benediction includes, as I then remarked, both of the\nothers; both the blessedness belonging to dwelling in, and that realised\nby journeying towards, the House of the Lord. For trust is both fruition\nand longing; both aspiration and possession. But it not only includes\nthe other two: it explains and surpasses them. For they bear, deeply\nstamped upon them, the impression of the imperfect stage of revelation\nto which the psalm belongs, and are tied to form in a manner which we\nought not to be. But here the Psalmist gets behind all the externals of\nceremonial worship, and goes straight to the heart of spiritual religion\nwhen, for dwelling in, and journeying towards, any house of the Lord, he\nsubstitutes that plain expression, 'the man that trusteth in Thee.'\n\nNow, the other two benedictions of which I have spoken do respectively\nform the centre of the first and second portions of this psalm; in each\ncase the remainder of the section being an explanation of that central\nutterance. And here the case is the same; for the verses which precede\nthis final exclamation are various phases of the experience of a man who\ntrusts in God, and are the ground upon which his faith is pronounced\n'blessed.'\n\nSo I desire now to view these three preceding verses together, as being\nillustrations of the various blessednesses of the life of trust in God.\nThey are not exhaustive. There are other tints and flashes of glory\nsleeping in the jewel which need the rays of light to impinge upon it at\nother angles, in order to wake them into scintillation and lustre. But\nthere is enough in the context to warrant the Psalmist's outburst into\nthis final rapturous exclamation, and ought to be enough to make us seek\nto possess that life as our own.\n\nI. First, then, note here how the heart of religion always has been, and\nis, trust in God.\n\nThis Psalmist, nourished amidst the externalisms of an elaborate\nceremonial, and compelled, by the stage of revelation at which he stood,\nto localise worship in an external Temple, in a fashion that we need not\ndo, had yet attained to the conviction that, in the desert or in the\nTemple, God was near; that no weary pilgrimage was needed to reach His\nhouse, but that with one movement of a trusting heart the man clasped\nGod wherever he was. And that is the living centre of all religion. I do\nnot mean merely that our way to be sure of God is not through the\nunderstanding only, but through the outgoing of confidence in Him--but I\nmean that the kernel of a devout life is trust in God. The bond that\nunderlies all the blessedness of human society, the thing that makes the\nsweetness of the sweetest ties that can knit men together, the secret of\nall the happy loves of husband and wife, friend and friend, parent and\nchild, is simple confidence. And the more utter the confidence the more\ntranquilly blessed is the union and the life that flow from it. Transfer\nthis, then--which is the bond of perfectness between man and man--to our\nrelation to God, and you get to the very heart of the mystery. Not by\nexternalisms of any kind, not by the clear dry light of the\nunderstanding, but by the outgoing of the heart's confidence to God, do\nwe come within the clasp of His arms and become recipients of His grace.\nTrust knits to the unseen, and trust alone.\n\nThat has always been the way. This Psalmist is no exception to the\ndevout souls of his time. For though, as I have said, externalisms and\nritualisms filled a place then, that it is an anachronism and a\nretrogression that they should be supposed to fill now, still beneath\nall these there lay this one ancient, permanent relation, the relation\nof trust. From the day in which the 'father of the faithful' as he is\nsignificantly called Abraham, 'believed God, and it was counted to him\nfor righteousness,' down all through the ages of that ancient Church,\nevery man who laid a real hold upon God clasped Him by the outstretched\nhand of faith. So the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews was fully\nwarranted in claiming all these ancient heroes, sages, and saints, as\nhaving lived by faith, and as being the foremost files in the same army\nin which the Christians of his day marched. The prophets who cried,\n'Trust ye in the Lord for ever, for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting\nstrength,' were saying the very same thing as the Apostles who preached\n'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.' The\ncontents of the faith were expanded; the faith itself was identical.\nLike some of those old Roman roads, where to-day the wains of commerce\nand the chariots of ease and the toiling pedestrians pass over the lava\nblocks that have been worn by the tramp of legions and rutted by the\nwheels of their chariots, the way to God that we travel is the way on\nwhich all the saints from the beginning of time have passed in their\npilgrimage. Trust is, always has been, always will be, the bond that\nknits men with God.\n\nAnd trust is blessed, because the very attitude of confident dependence\ntakes the strain off a man. To feel that I am leaning hard upon a firm\nprop, to devolve responsibility, to put the reins into another's hand,\nto give the helm into another steersman's grasp, whilst I may lie down\nand rest, that is blessedness, though there be a storm. In the story of\nfrontier warfare we read how, day by day, the battalion that had been in\nthe post of danger, and therefore of honour, was withdrawn into the\ncentre; and another one was placed in the position that it had occupied.\nSo, when we trust we put Him in the front, and we march more quietly,\nmore blessedly, when we are in the centre, and He has to bear the brunt\nof the assailing foe.\n\nChristian people! have you got as far past the outsides of religion as\nthis Psalmist had? Do you recognise as clearly as he did that all this\noutward worship, and a great deal of our theology, is but the\nscaffolding; and that the real building lies inside of that; and that it\nis of value only as being a means to an end? Church membership is all\nvery well; coming to church and chapel is all right; the outsides of\nworship will be necessary as long as our souls have outsides--their\nbodies. But you do not get into the house of the Lord unless you go in\nthrough 'the door of faith,' which is opened to us all. The heart of the\nreligious life, which makes it blessed, is trust in God.\n\nII. And now, secondly, a life of faith is a blessed life, because it\ntalks with God.\n\nI have already said that my text is expanded in the preceding verses.\nAnd I now turn to them to catch the various flashes of the diversely\ncoloured blessedness of this life. The first of them is that which I\nhave just mentioned. The Psalmist has described for us the happy\npilgrims passing from strength to strength, and in imagination has\nlanded them in the Temple. And then he goes on to tell us what they did\nand found there.\n\nThe first thing that they did was to speak to Him who was in the Temple.\n'Behold! O God our Shield! and look upon the face of Thine anointed.'\nThey had, as he has just said, 'Every one of them appeared before God in\nZion.' As they looked up to Him they asked Him to look down upon them.\n'Behold! O God our Shield!' 'Shield' here is the designation of God\nHimself, and is an exclamation addressed to Him--'Thou who art our God\nand Shield, look down upon us!' And then comes a singular clause, about\nwhich much might be said if time permitted: 'Look upon the face of Thine\nanointed.' The use of that word 'anointed' seems to suggest that the\npsalm is either the outpouring of a king, or that it is spoken by some\none in the train of a king, who feels that the favour bestowed upon the\nking will be participated in by his followers. But whilst that, if it be\nthe explanation, might carry with it a hint as to the great truth of the\nmediation of Jesus Christ, our true King, I pass that by altogether, and\nfix upon the thought that here one element of the blessedness of the\nlife of faith lies in the desire that God should look upon us. For that\nlook means love, and that look secures protection and wise distribution\nof gifts. And it is life to have His eye fixed upon me, and to be\nconscious that He is looking at me. Dear brethren! if we want a lustre\nto be diffused through all our days, depend upon it, the surest and the\nonly way to secure it is that that Face shall be felt to be turned\ntoward us, 'as the sun shineth in his strength'; and then all the\nlandscape will rejoice, and the birds will sing and the waters will\nflash. 'Look upon me, and let me sun myself beneath Thine eye'--to have\nthat desire is blessed; and to feel that the desire is accomplished is\nmore blessed still.\n\nDear friends! it seems to me that the ordinary Christian life of this\nday is terribly wanting in this experience of frank, free talk with God,\nand that that is one reason why so many of us professing Christians know\nso little of the blessedness of the man that trusts in God. You have\nreligion enough to keep you from doing certain gross acts of sin; you\nhave religion enough to make you uncomfortable in neglected duty. You\nhave religion enough to impel you to certain acts that you suppose to be\nobligatory upon you. But do you know anything about the elasticity and\nspring of spirit in getting near God, and pouring out all your hearts to\nHim? The life of faith is not blessed unless it is a life of frank\nspeaking with God.\n\nIII. The life of faith is blessed, because it has fixed its desires on\nthe true good.\n\nThe Psalmist goes on--'A day in Thy courts is better than a thousand; I\nhad rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the\ntents of wickedness.' 'A day in Thy courts is better than a thousand.'\nWe all know how strangely elastic time is, and have sometimes been\namazed when we remembered what an infinity of joy or sorrow we had lived\nthrough in one tick of the pendulum. When men are dreaming, they pass\nthrough a long series of events in a moment's space. When we are truly\nawake, we live long in a short time, for life is measured, not by the\nlength of its moments, but by the depth of its experiences. And when\nsome new truth is flashed upon us, or some new emotion has shaken us as\nwith an earthquake, or when some new blessing has burst into our lives,\nthen we know how 'one day' with men may be as it is with God, in a\ndeeper sense, 'as a thousand years,' so great is the change that it\nworks upon us. There is nothing that will so fill life to the utmost\nbounds of its elastic capacity as strong trust in Him. There is nothing\nthat will make our lives so blessed. This Psalmist, speaking with the\nvoice of all them that trust in the Lord, here declares his clear\nconsciousness that the true good for the human soul is fellowship with\nGod.\n\nBut the clearest knowledge of that fact is not enough to bring the\nblessedness. There must be the next step--'I had rather be a doorkeeper\nin the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness'--the\ndefinite resolve that I, for my part, will act according to my\nconviction, and believing that the best thing in life is to have God in\nlife, and that that will make life, as it were, an eternity of\nblessedness even while it is made up of fleeting days, will put my foot\ndown and make my choice, and having made it, will stick to it. It is all\nvery well to say that 'A day in Thy courts is better than a thousand':\nhave I _chosen_ to dwell in the courts; and do I, not only in estimate\nbut in feeling and practice, set communion with God high above\neverything besides?\n\nThis psalm, according to the superscription attached to it, is one 'for\nthe sons of Korah.' These sons of Korah were a branch of the Levitical\npriesthood, to whose charge was committed the keeping of the gates of\nthe Temple, and hence this phrase is especially appropriate on their\nlips. But passing that, let me just ask you to lay to heart, dear\nfriends! this one plain thought, that the effect of a real life of faith\nwill be to make us perfectly sure that the true good is in God, and\nfixedly determined to pursue that. And you have no right to claim the\nname of a believing Christian, unless your faith has purged your eyes,\nso that you can see the hollowness of all besides, and has stiffened\nyour will so that you can determine that, for your part, 'the Lord is\nthe Strength of your heart, and your Portion for ever.' The secret of\nblessedness lies here. 'Seek ye the Kingdom of God and all these things\nshall be added unto you.'\n\nIV. Lastly, a life of faith is a life of blessedness, because it draws\nfrom God all necessary good.\n\nI must not dwell, as I had hoped to do, upon the last words preceding my\ntext, 'The Lord God is a Sun and Shield'--brightness and defence--'the\nLord will give grace and glory': 'grace,' the loving gifts which will\nmake a man gracious and graceful; 'glory,' not any future lustre of the\ntransfigured soul and glorified body, but the glory which belongs to the\nlife of faith here on earth. Link that thought with the preceding one.\n'The Lord is a Sun ... the Lord will give glory'; like a little bit of\nbroken glass lying in the furrows of a ploughed field, when the sun\nsmites down upon it, it flashes, outshining many a diamond. If a man is\nwalking upon a road with the sun behind him, his face is dark. He wheels\nhimself round, and it is suffused with light, as Moses' face shone. 'We\nall, with unveiled faces beholding, are changed from glory to glory.' If\nwe walk in the sunshine we shall shine too. If we 'walk in the light' we\nshall be 'light in the Lord.'\n\n'No good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly.' Trust is\ninward, and the outside of trust is an upright walk; and if a man has\nthese two, which, inasmuch as one is the root and the other is the\nfruit, are but one in reality, nothing that is good will be withheld\nfrom Him. For how can the sun but pour its rays upon everything that\nlives? 'Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh\ndown from the Father of lights.' So the life is blessed that talks with\nGod; that has fixed its desires on Him as its Supreme Good; that is\nirradiated by His light, glorified by the reflection of His brightness,\nand ministered to with all necessary appliances by His loving\nself-communication.\n\nWe come back to the old word, dear friends! 'Trust in the Lord, and do\ngood, and verily thou shalt be fed.' We come back to the old message\nthat nothing knits a man to God but faith with its child, righteousness.\nIf trusting we love, and loving we obey, then in converse with Him, in\nfixed desires after Him, in daily and hourly reception from Him of\nHimself and His gifts, the life of earth will be full of a blessedness\nmore real, more deep, more satisfying, more permanent, than can be found\nanywhere besides.\n\nWho was it that said, 'I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no man\ncometh to the Father but by Me'? Tread that path, and you will come into\nthe house of the Lord, and will dwell there all the days of your life.\n'Believe in God, believe also in Me.'\n\n\n\n\n'THE BRIDAL OF THE EARTH AND SKY'\n\n\n    'Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have\n    kissed each other. 11. Truth shall spring out of the earth; and\n    righteousness shall look down from heaven. 12. Yea, the Lord shall\n    give that which is good; and our land shall yield her increase. 13.\n    Righteousness shall go before Him, and shall set us in the way of\n    His steps.'--PSALM lxxxv. 10-13.\n\nThis is a lovely and highly imaginative picture of the reconciliation\nand reunion of God and man, 'the bridal of the earth and sky.'\n\nThe Poet-Psalmist, who seems to have belonged to the times immediately\nafter the return from the Exile, in strong faith sees before him a\nvision of a perfectly harmonious co-operation and relation between God\nand man. He is not prophesying directly of Messianic times. The vision\nhangs before him, with no definite note of time upon it. He hopes it may\nbe fulfilled in his own day; he is sure it will, if only, as he says,\nhis countrymen 'turn not again to folly.' At all events, it will be\nfulfilled in that far-off time to which the heart of every prophet\nturned with longing. But, more than that, there is no reason why it\nshould not be fulfilled with every man, at any moment. It is the ideal,\nto use modern language, of the relations between heaven and earth. Only\nthat the Psalmist believed that, as sure as there was a God in heaven,\nwho is likewise a God working in the midst of the earth, the ideal might\nbecome, and would become, a reality.\n\nSo, then, I take it, these four verses all set forth substantially the\nsame thought, but with slightly different modifications and\napplications. They are a four-fold picture of how heaven and earth ought\nto blend and harmonise. This four-fold representation of the one thought\nis what I purpose to consider now.\n\nI. To begin with, then, take the first verse:--'Mercy and Truth are met\ntogether, Righteousness and Peace have kissed each other.' We have here\n_the heavenly twin-sisters, and the earthly pair that correspond_.\n\n'Mercy and Truth are met together'--that is one personification;\n'Righteousness and Peace have kissed each other' is another. It is\ndifficult to say whether these four great qualities are here regarded as\nall belonging to God, or as all belonging to man, or as all common both\nto God and man. The first explanation is the most familiar one, but I\nconfess that, looking at the context, where we find throughout an\ninterpenetration and play of reciprocal action as between earth and\nheaven, I am disposed to think of the first pair as sisters from the\nheavens, and the second pair as the earthly sisters that correspond to\nthem. Mercy and Truth--two radiant angels, like virgins in some solemn\nchoric dance, linked hand in hand, issue from the sanctuary and move\namongst the dim haunts of men making 'a sunshine in a shady place,' and\nto them there come forth, linked in a sweet embrace, another pair,\nRighteousness and Peace, whose lives depend on the lives of their elder\nand heavenly sisters. And so these four, the pair of heavenly origin,\nand the answering pair that have sprung into being at their coming upon\nearth;--these four, banded in perfect accord, move together, blessing\nand light-giving, amongst the sons of men. Mercy and Truth are the\ndivine--Righteousness and Peace the earthly.\n\nLet me dwell upon these two couples briefly. 'Mercy and Truth are met\ntogether' means this, that these two qualities are found braided and\nlinked inseparably in all that God does with mankind; that these two\nsprings are the double fountains from which the great stream of the\n'river of the water of life,' the forthcoming and the manifestation of\nGod, takes its rise.\n\n'Mercy and Truth.' What are the meanings of the two words? Mercy is love\nthat stoops, love that departs from the strict lines of desert and\nretribution. Mercy is Love that is kind when Justice might make it\notherwise. Mercy is Love that condescends to that which is far beneath.\nThus the 'Mercy' of the Old Testament covers almost the same ground as\nthe 'Grace' of the New Testament. And Truth blends with Mercy; that is\nto say--Truth in a somewhat narrower than its widest sense, meaning\nmainly God's fidelity to every obligation under which He has come, God's\nfaithfulness to promise, God's fidelity to His past, God's fidelity, in\nHis actions, to His own character, which is meant by that great word,\n'He sware by _Himself_!'\n\nThus the sentiment of mercy, the tender grace and gentleness of that\ncondescending love, has impressed upon it the seal of permanence when we\nsay: 'Grace and Truth, Mercy and Faithfulness, are met together.' No\nlonger is love mere sentiment, which may be capricious and may be\ntransient. We can reckon on it, we know the law of its being. The love\nis lifted up above the suspicion of being arbitrary, or of ever changing\nor fluctuating. We do not know all the limits of the orbit, but we know\nenough to calculate it for all practical purposes. God has committed\nHimself to us, He has limited Himself by the obligations of His own\npast. We have a right to turn to Him, and say; 'Be what Thou art, and\ncontinue to be to us what Thou hast been unto past ages,' and He\nresponds to the appeal. For Mercy and Truth, tender, gracious, stooping,\nforgiving love, and inviolable faithfulness that can never be otherwise,\nthese blend in all His works, 'that by two immutable things, wherein it\nwas impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation.'\n\nAgain, dear brethren! let me remind you that these two are the ideal\ntwo, which as far as God's will and wish are concerned, are the only two\nthat would mark any of His dealings with men. When He is, if I may so\nsay, left free to do as He would, and is not forced to His 'strange act'\nof punishment by my sin and yours, these, and these only, are the\ncharacteristics of His dealings. Nor let us forget--'We beheld His\nglory, the glory as of the Only Begotten of the Father, _full of grace\nand truth_.' The Psalmist's vision was fulfilled in Jesus Christ, in\nwhom these sweet twin characteristics, that are linked inseparably in\nall the works of God, are welded together into one in the living\npersonality of Him who is all the Father's grace embodied; and is 'the\nWay and the Truth and the Life.'\n\nTurn now to the other side of the first aspect of the union of God and\nman, 'Mercy and Truth are met together'; these are the heavenly twins.\n'Righteousness and Peace have kissed each other'--these are the earthly\nsisters who sprang into being to meet them.\n\nOf course I know that these words are very often applied, by way of\nillustration, to the great work of Jesus Christ upon the Cross, which is\nsupposed to have reconciled, if not contradictory, at least divergently\nworking sides of the divine character and government. And we all know\nhow beautifully the phrase has often been employed by eloquent\npreachers, and how beautifully it has been often illustrated by devout\npainters.\n\nBut beautiful as the adaptation is, I think it is an adaptation, and not\nthe real meaning of the words, for this reason, if for no other, that\nRighteousness and Peace are not in the Old Testament regarded as\nopposites, but as harmonious and inseparable. And so I take it that here\nwe have distinctly the picture of what happens upon earth when Mercy and\nTruth that come down from Heaven are accepted and recognised--then\nRighteousness and Peace kiss each other.\n\nOr, to put away the metaphor, here are two thoughts, first that in men's\nexperience and life Righteousness and Peace cannot be rent apart. The\nonly secret of tranquillity is to be good. He who is, first of all,\n'King of Righteousness' is 'after that also King of Salem, which is King\nof Peace.' 'The effect of righteousness shall be peace,' as Isaiah, the\nbrother in spirit of this Psalmist, says; and on the other hand, as the\nsame prophet says, 'The wicked is like a troubled sea that cannot rest,\nwhose waters cast up mire and dirt; there is no peace, saith my God, to\nthe wicked,' but where affections are pure, and the life is worthy,\nwhere goodness is loved in the heart, and followed even imperfectly in\nthe daily practice, there the ocean is quiet, and 'birds of peace sit\nbrooding on the charmed wave.' The one secret of tranquillity is first\nto trust in the Lord and then to do good. Righteousness and Peace kiss\neach other.\n\nThe other thought here is that Righteousness and her twin sister, Peace,\nonly come in the measure in which the mercy and the truth of God are\nreceived into thankful hearts. My brother! have you taken that Mercy and\nthat Truth into your soul, and are you trying to reach peace in the only\nway by which any human being can ever reach it--through the path of\nrighteousness, self-suppression, and consecration to Him?\n\nII. Now, take the next phase of this union and cooperation of earth and\nheaven, which is given here in the 11th verse--'Truth shall spring out\nof the earth, and Righteousness shall look down from heaven.' That is,\nto put it into other words--God responding to man's truth.\n\nNotice that in this verse one member from each of the two pairs that\nhave been spoken about in the previous verse is detached from its\ncompanion, and they are joined so as to form for a moment a new pair.\nTruth is taken from the first couple; Righteousness from the second, and\na third couple is thus formed.\n\nAnd notice, further, that each takes the place that had belonged to the\nother. The heavenly Truth becomes a child of earth; and the earthly\nRighteousness ascends 'to look down from heaven.' The process of the\nprevious verse in effect is reversed. 'Truth shall spring out of the\nearth, Righteousness shall look down from heaven'; that is to say--man's\nTruth shall begin to grow and blossom in answer, as it were, to God's\nTruth that came down upon it. Which being translated into other words is\nthis: where a man's heart has welcomed the Mercy and the Truth of God\nthere will spring up in that heart, not only the Righteousness and\nPeace, of which the previous verse is speaking, but specifically a\nfaithfulness not all unlike the faithfulness which it grasps. If we have\na God immutable and unchangeable to build upon, let us build upon Him\nimmutability and unchangeableness. If we have a Rock on which to build\nour confidence, let us see that the confidence which we build upon it is\nrocklike too. If we have a God that cannot lie, let us grasp His\nfaithful word with an affiance that cannot falter. If we have a Truth in\nthe heavens, absolute and immutable, on which to anchor our hopes, let\nus see to it that our hopes, anchored thereon, are sure and steadfast.\nWhat a shame it would be that we should bring the vacillations and\nfluctuations of our own insincerities and changeableness to the solemn,\nfixed unalterableness of that divine Word! We ought to be faithful, for\nwe build upon a faithful God.\n\nAnd then the other side of this second picture is 'Righteousness shall\nlook down from heaven,' not in its judicial aspect merely, but as the\nperfect moral purity that belongs to the divine Nature, which shall bend\ndown a loving eye upon the men beneath, and mark the springings of any\nimperfect good and thankfulness in our hearts; joyous as the husbandman\nbeholds the springing of his crops in the fields that he has sown.\n\nGod delights when He sees the first faint flush of green which marks the\nspringing of the good seed in the else barren hearts of men. No good, no\nbeauty of character, no meek rapture of faith, no aspiration Godwards is\never wasted and lost, for His eye rests upon it. As heaven, with its\nmyriad stars, bends over the lowly earth, and in the midnight when no\nhuman eye beholds, sees all, so God sees the hidden confidence, the\nunseen 'Truth' that springs to meet His faithful Word. The flowers that\ngrow in the pastures of the wilderness, or away upon the wild prairies,\nor that hide in the clefts of the inaccessible mountains, do not 'waste\ntheir sweetness on the desert air,' for God sees them.\n\nIt may be an encouragement and quickening to us to remember that\nwherever the tiniest little bit of Truth springs upon the earth, the\nloving eye--not the eye of a great Taskmaster--but the eye of the\nBrother, Christ, which is the eye of God, looks down. 'Wherefore we\nlabour, that whether present or absent, we may be well-pleasing unto\nHim.'\n\nIII. And then the third aspect of this ideal relation between earth and\nheaven, the converse of the one we have just now been speaking of, is\nset forth in the next verse: 'Yea, the Lord shall give that which is\ngood and our land shall yield her increase.' That is to say, Man is here\nresponding to God's gift.\n\nYou see that the order of things is reversed in this verse, and that it\nrecurs to the order with which we originally started. 'The Lord shall\ngive that which is good.' In the figure that refers to all the skyey\ninfluence of dew, rain, sunshine, passing breezes, and still ripening\nautumn days; in the reality it refers to all the motives, powers,\nimpulses, helps, furtherances by which He makes it possible for us to\nserve Him and love Him, and bring forth fruits of righteousness.\n\nAnd so the thought which has already been hinted at is here more fully\ndeveloped and dwelt upon, this great truth that earthly fruitfulness is\npossible only by the reception of heavenly gifts. As sure as every leaf\nthat grows is mainly water that the plant has got from the clouds, and\ncarbon that it has got out of the atmosphere, so surely will all our\ngood be mainly drawn from heaven and heaven's gifts. As certainly as\nevery lump of coal that you put upon your fire contains in itself\nsunbeams that have been locked up for all these millenniums that have\npassed since it waved green in the forest, so certainly does every good\ndeed embody in itself gifts from above. No man is pure except by\nimpartation; and every good gift and every perfect gift cometh from the\nFather of Lights.\n\nSo let us learn the lesson of absolute dependence for all purity,\nvirtue, and righteousness on His bestowment, and come to Him and ask Him\never more to fill our emptiness with His own gracious fulness and to\nlead us to be what He commands and would have us to be.\n\nAnd then there is the other lesson out of this phase of the ideal\nrelation between earth and heaven, the lesson of what we ought to do\nwith our gifts. 'The earth yields her increase,' by laying hold of the\ngood which the Lord gives, and by means of that received good quickening\nall the germs. Ah, dear brethren! wasted opportunities, neglected\nmoments, uncultivated talents, gifts that are not stirred up, rain and\ndew and sunshine, all poured upon us and no increase--is not that the\nstory of much of all our lives, and of the whole of some lives? Are we\nlike Eastern lands where the trees have been felled, and the great\nirrigation works and tanks have been allowed to fall into disrepair, and\nso when the bountiful treasure of the rains comes, all that it does is\nto swell for half a day the discoloured stream that carries away some\nmore of the arable land; and when the sunshine comes, with its swift,\nwarm powers, all that it does is to bleach the stones and scorch the\nbarren sand? 'The earth which _drinketh in the rain_ that cometh oft\nupon it, and yieldeth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed,\nreceiveth the blessing of God.' Is it true about you that the earth\nyieldeth her increase, as it is certainly true that 'the Lord giveth\nthat which is good'?\n\nIV. And now the last thing which is here, the last phase of the fourfold\nrepresentation of the ideal relation between earth and heaven is,\n'Righteousness shall go before Him and shall set us in the way of His\nsteps.' That is to say, God teaches man to walk in His footsteps.\n\nThere is some difficulty about the meaning of the last clause of this\nverse, but I think that having regard to the whole context and to that\nidea of the interpenetration of the heavenly with the human which we\nhave seen running through it, the reading in our English Bible gives\nsubstantially, though somewhat freely, the meaning. The clause might\nliterally be rendered 'make His footsteps for a way,' which comes to\nsubstantially the same thing as is expressed in our English Bible.\nRighteousness, God's moral perfectness, is set forth here in a twofold\nphase. First it is a herald going before Him and preparing His path. The\nPsalmist in these words draws tighter than ever the bond between God and\nman. It is not only that God sends His messengers to the world, nor only\nthat His loving eye looks down upon it, nor only 'that He gives that\nwhich is good'; but it is that the whole heaven, as it were, lowers\nitself to touch earth, that God comes down to dwell and walk among men.\nThe Psalmist's mind is filled with the thought of a present God who\nmoves amongst mankind, and has His 'footsteps' on earth. This herald\nRighteousness prepares God's path, which is just to say that all His\ndealings with mankind--which, as we have seen, have Mercy and\nFaithfulness for their signature and stamp--are rooted and based in\nperfect Rectitude.\n\nThe second phase of the operation of Righteousness is that that majestic\nherald, the divine purity which moves before Him, and 'prepares in the\ndesert a highway for the Lord,'--that that very same Righteousness comes\nand takes my feeble hand, and will lead my tottering footsteps into\nGod's path, and teach me to walk, planting my little foot where He\nplanted His. The highest of all thoughts of the ideal relation between\nearth and heaven, that of likeness between God and man, is trembling on\nthe Psalmist's lips. Men may walk in God's ways--not only in ways that\nplease Him, but in ways that are like His. 'Be ye therefore perfect,\neven as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.'\n\nAnd the likeness can only be a likeness in moral qualities--a likeness\nin goodness, a likeness in purity, a likeness in aversion from evil, for\nHis other attributes and characteristics are His peculiar property; and\nno human brow can wear the crown that He wears. But though His mercy can\nbut, from afar off, be copied by us, the righteousness that moves before\nHim, and engineers God's path through the wilderness of the world, will\ncome behind Him and nurselike lay hold of our feeble arms and teach us\nto go in the way God would have us to walk.\n\nAh, brethren! that is the crown and climax of the harmony between God\nand man, that His mercy and His truth, His gifts and His grace have all\nled us up to this: that we take His righteousness as our pattern, and\ntry in our poor lives to reproduce its wondrous beauty. Do not forget\nthat a great deal more than the Psalmist dreamed of, you Christian men\nand women possess, in the Christ 'who of God is made unto us\nRighteousness,' in whom heaven and earth are joined for ever, in whom\nman and God are knit in strictest bonds of indissoluble friendship; and\nwho, having prepared a path for God in His mighty mission and by His\nsacrifice on the Cross, comes to us, and as the Incarnate Righteousness,\nwill lead us in the paths of God, leaving us an Example, that 'we should\nfollow in His steps.'\n\n\n\n\nA SHEAF OF PRAYER ARROWS\n\n\n    'Bow down Thine ear, O Lord, hear me; for I am poor and needy. 2.\n    Preserve my soul, for I am holy: O Thou my God, save Thy servant\n    that trusteth in Thee. 3. Be merciful unto me, O Lord: for I cry\n    unto Thee daily. 4. Rejoice the soul of Thy servant: for unto Thee,\n    O Lord, do I lift up my soul. 5. For Thou, Lord, art good, and ready\n    to forgive; and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon\n    Thee.'--PSALM lxxxvi. 1-5.\n\nWe have here a sheaf of arrows out of a good man's quiver, shot into\nheaven. This series of supplications is remarkable in more than one\nrespect. They all mean substantially the same thing, but the Psalmist\nturns the one blessing round in all sorts of ways, so great does it seem\nto him, and so earnest is his desire to possess it. They are almost all\nquotations from earlier psalms, just as our prayers are often words of\nScripture, hallowed by many associations, and uniting us with the men of\nold who cried unto God and were answered.\n\nThe structure of the petitions is remarkably uniform. In each there are\na prayer and a plea, and in most of them a direct invocation of God. So\nI have thought that, if we put them all together now, we may get some\nlessons as to the invocations, the petitions, and the pleas of true\nprayer; or, in other words, we may be taught how to lay hold of God,\nwhat to ask from Him, and how to be sure of an answer.\n\nI. First, the lesson as to how to lay hold upon God.\n\nThe divine names in this psalm are very frequent and significant, and\nthe order in which they are used is evidently intentional. We have the\ngreat covenant name of Jehovah set in the very first verse, and in the\nlast verse; as if to bind the whole together with a golden circlet. And\nthen, in addition, it appears once in each of the other two sections of\nthe psalm, with which we have nothing to do at present. Then we have,\nfurther, the name of _God_ employed in each of the sections; and\nfurther, the name of _Lord_, which is not the same as _Jehovah_, but\nimplies the simple idea of superiority and authority. In each portion of\nthe psalm, then, we see the writer laying his hand, as it were, upon\nthese three names--'Jehovah,' 'my God,' 'Lord'--and in all of them\nfinding grounds for his confidence and reasons for his cry.\n\nNothing in our prayers is often more hollow and unreal than the formal\nrepetitions of the syllables of that divine name, often but to fill a\npause in our thoughts. But to 'call upon the Name of the Lord' means,\nfirst and foremost, to bring before our minds the aspects of His great\nand infinite character, which are gathered together into the Name by\nwhich we address Him. So when we say 'Jehovah!' 'Lord!' what we ought to\nmean is this, that we are gazing upon that majestic, glorious thought of\nBeing, self-derived, self-motived, self-ruled, the being of Him whose\nName can only be, 'I am that I am.' Of all other creatures the name is,\n'I am that I have been made,' or 'I am that I became,' but of Him the\nName is, 'I am that I am.' Nowhere outside of Himself is the reason for\nHis being, nor the law that shapes it, nor the aim to which it tends.\nAnd this infinite, changeless Rock is laid for our confidence, Jehovah\nthe Eternal, the Self-subsisting, Self-sufficing One.\n\nThere is more than that thought in this wondrous Name, for it not only\nexpresses the timeless, unlimited, and changeless being of God, but also\nthe truth that He has entered into what He deigns to call a Covenant\nwith us men. The name Jehovah is the seal of that ancient Covenant, of\nwhich, though the form has vanished, the essence abides for ever, and\nGod has thereby bound Himself to us by promises that cannot be\nabrogated. So that when we say, 'O Lord!' we summon up before ourselves,\nand grasp as the grounds of our confidence, and we humbly present before\nHim as the motives, if we may so call them, for His action, His own\ninfinite being and His covenanted grace.\n\nThen, further, our psalm invokes '_my_ God.' That names implies in\nitself, simply, the notion of power to be reverenced. But when we add to\nit that little word '_my_,' we rise to the wonderful thought that the\ncreature can claim an individual relation to Him, and in some profound\nsense a possession there. The tiny mica flake claims kindred with the\nAlpine peak from which it fell. The poor, puny hand, that can grasp so\nlittle of the material and temporal, can grasp all of God that it needs.\n\nThen, there is the other name, 'Lord,' which simply expresses\nillimitable sovereignty, power over all circumstances, creatures, orders\nof being, worlds, and cycles of ages. Wherever He is He rules, and\ntherefore my prayer can be answered by Him. When a child cries 'Mother!'\nit is more than all other petitions. A dear name may be a caress when it\ncomes from loving lips. If we are the kind of Christians that we ought\nto be, there will be nothing sweeter to us than to whisper to ourselves,\nand to say to Him, 'Abba! Father!' See to it that your calling on the\nName of the Lord is not formal, but the true apprehension, by a\nbelieving mind and a loving heart, of the ineffable and manifold\nsweetnesses which are hived in His manifold names.\n\nII. Now, secondly, we have here a lesson as to what we should ask.\n\nThe petitions of our text, of course, only cover a part of the whole\nfield of prayer. The Psalmist is praying in the midst of some unknown\ntrouble, and his petitions are manifold in form, though in substance, as\nI have said, they may all be reduced to one. Let me run over them very\nbriefly. 'Bow down Thine ear and hear me.' That is not simply the\ninvocation of the omniscience of a God, but an appeal for loving,\nattentive regard to the desires of His poor servant. The hearing is not\nmerely the perception in the divine mind of what the creature desires,\nbut it is the answer in fact, or the granting of the petition. The best\nillustration of what the Psalmist desires here may be found in another\npsalm, where another Psalmist tells us his experience and says, 'My cry\ncame unto His ears, and the earth shook and trembled.' You put a\nspoonful of water into a hydraulic press at the one end, and you get a\nforce that squeezes tons together at the other. Here there is a poor,\nthin stream of the voice of a sorrowful man at the one end, and there is\nan earthquake at the other. That is what 'hearing' and 'bowing down the\near' means.\n\nThen the prayers go on to three petitions, which may be all regarded as\ndiverse acts of deliverance or of help. 'Preserve my soul.' The word\nexpresses the guardianship with which a garrison keeps a fortress. It is\nthe Hebrew equivalent of the word employed by Paul--'The peace of God\nshall _keep_ your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.' The thought is that\nof a defenceless man or thing round which some strong protection is\ncast. And the desire expressed by it is that in the midst of sorrow,\nwhatever it is, the soul may be guarded from evil. Then, the next\npetition--'Save Thy servant'--goes a step further, and not only asks to\nbe kept safe in the midst of sorrows, but to be delivered out of them.\nAnd then the next petition--'Be merciful unto me, O Lord!'--craves that\nthe favour which comes down to inferiors, and is bestowed upon those who\nmight deserve something far otherwise, may manifest itself, in such acts\nof strengthening, or help, or deliverance, as divine wisdom may see fit.\nAnd then the last petition is--'Rejoice the soul of Thy servant.' The\nseries begins with 'hearing,' passes through 'preserving,' 'saving,'\nshowing 'mercy,' and comes at last to 'rejoice the soul' that has been\nso harassed and troubled. Gladness is God's purpose for us all; joy we\nall have a right to claim from Him. It is the intended issue of every\nsorrow, and it can only be had when we cleave to Him, and pass through\nthe troubles of life with continual dependence on and aspiration towards\nHimself.\n\nSo these are the petitions massed together, and out of them let me take\ntwo or three lessons. First, then, let us learn to make all wishes and\nannoyances material of prayer. This man was harassed by some trouble,\nthe nature of which we do not know; and although the latter portion of\nhis psalm rises into loftier regions of spiritual desire, here, in the\nfirst part of it, he is wrestling with his afflicting circumstances,\nwhatever they were, and he has no hesitation in spreading them all out\nbefore God and asking for His delivering help. Wishes that are not\nturned into prayers irritate, disturb, unsettle. Wishes that are turned\ninto prayers are calmed and made blessed. Stanley and his men lived for\nweeks upon a poisonous root, which, if eaten crude, brought all manner\nof diseases, but, steeped in running water, had all the acrid juices\nwashed out of it, and became wholesome food. If you steep your wishes in\nthe stream of prayer the poison will pass out of them. Some of them will\nbe suppressed, all of them will be hallowed, and all of them will be\ncalmed. Troubles, great or small, should be turned into prayers. Breath\nspent in sighs is wasted; turned into prayers it will swell our sails.\nIf a man does not pray 'without ceasing,' there is room for doubt\nwhether he ever prays at all. What would you think of a traveller who\nhad a valuable cordial of which he only tasted a drop in the morning and\nanother in the evening; or who had a sure staff on which to lean which\nhe only employed at distant intervals on the weary march, and that only\nfor a short time? Let us turn all that we want into petitions, and all\nthat annoys us let us spread before God.\n\nLearn, further, that earnest reiteration is not vain repetition. 'Use\nnot vain repetitions as the heathen do, for they think they shall be\nheard for their much speaking,' said the Master. But the same Master\n'went away from them and prayed the third time, using the same words.'\nAs long as we have not consciously received the blessing, it is no vain\nreiteration if we renew our prayers that it may come upon our heads. The\nman who asks for a thing once, and then gets up from his knees and goes\naway, and does not notice whether he gets the answer or not, does not\npray. The man who truly desires anything from God cannot be satisfied\nwith one languid request for it. But as the heart contracts with a sense\nof need, and expands with a faith in God's sufficiency, it will drive\nthe same blood of prayer over and over again through the same veins; and\nlife will be wholesome and strong.\n\nThen learn, further, to limit wishes and petitions within the bounds of\nGod's promises. The most of these supplications of our text may be found\nin other parts of Scripture, as promises from God. Only so far as an\narticulate divine word carries my faith has my faith the right to go. In\nthe crooked alleys of Venice there is a thin thread of red stone, inlaid\nin the pavement or wall, which guides through all the devious turnings\nto the Piazza, in the centre, where the great church stands. As long as\nwe have the red line of promise on our path, faith may follow it and\nwill come to the Temple. Where the line stops it is presumption, and not\nfaith, that takes up the running. God's promises are sunbeams flung down\nupon us. True prayer catches them on its mirror, and signals them back\nto God. We are emboldened to say, 'Bow down Thine ear!' because He has\nsaid, 'I will hear.' We are encouraged to cry, 'Be merciful!' because we\nhave our foot upon the promise that He will be; and all that we can ask\nof Him is, 'Do for us what Thou hast said; be to us what Thou art.'\n\nThe final lesson is, Leave God to settle how He answers your prayer. The\nPsalmist prayed for preservation, for safety, for joy; but he did not\nventure to prescribe to God _how_ these blessings were to be ministered\nto him. He does not ask that the trouble may be taken away. That is as\nit may be; it may be better that it shall be left. But he asks that in\nit he shall not be allowed to sink, and that, however the waves may run\nhigh, they shall not be allowed to swamp his poor little cockle-shell of\na boat. This is the true inmost essence of prayer--not that we should\nprescribe to Him how to answer our desires, but that we should leave all\nthat in His hands. The Apostle Paul said, in his last letter, with\ntriumphant confidence, that he knew that God would 'deliver him and save\nhim into His everlasting kingdom.' And he knew, at the same time, that\nhis course was ended, and that there was nothing for him now but the\ncrown. How was he 'saved into the kingdom' and 'delivered from the mouth\nof the lion'? The sword that struck off the wearied head that had\nthought so long for God's Church was the instrument of the deliverance\nand the means of the salvation. For us it may be that a sharper sorrow\nmay be the answer to the prayer, 'Preserve Thy servant.' It may be that\nGod's 'bowing down His ear' and answering us when we cry shall be to\npass us through a mill that has finer rollers, to crush still more the\nbruised corn. But the end and the meaning of it all will be to 'rejoice\nthe soul of the servant' with a deeper joy at last.\n\nIII. Finally, mark the lesson which we have here as to the pleas that\nare to be urged, or the conditions on which prayer is answered.\n\n'I am poor and needy,' or, as perhaps the words more accurately mean,\n'afflicted and poor.' The first condition is the sense of need. God's\nhighest blessings cannot be given except to the men who know they want\nthem. The self-righteous man cannot receive the righteousness of Christ.\nThe man who has little or no consciousness of sin is not capable of\nreceiving pardon. God cannot put His fulness into our emptiness if we\nconceit ourselves to be filled and in need of nothing. We must know\nourselves to be 'poor and naked and blind and miserable' ere He can make\nus rich, and clothe us, and enlighten our eyes, and flood our souls with\nHis own gladness. Our needs are dumb appeals to Him; and in regard to\nall outward and lower things, they bind Him to supply us, because they\nthemselves have been created by Him. He that hears the raven's croak\nsatisfies the necessities that He has ordained in man and beast. But,\nfor all the best blessings of His providence and of His love, the first\nsteps towards receiving them are the knowledge that we need them and the\ndesire that we should possess them.\n\nThen the Psalmist goes on to put another class of pleas derived from his\nrelation to God. These are mainly two--'I am holy,' and 'Thy servant\nthat trusteth in Thee.' Now, with regard to that first word 'holy,'\naccording to our modern understanding of the expression it by no means\nsets forth the Psalmist's idea. It has an unpleasant smack of\nself-righteousness, too, which is by no means to be found in the\noriginal. But the word employed is a very remarkable and pregnant one.\nIt really carries with it, in germ, the great teaching of the Apostle\nJohn. 'We love Him because He first loved us.' It means one who, being\nloved and favoured by God, answers the divine love with his own love.\nAnd the Psalmist is not pleading any righteousness of his own, but\ndeclaring that he, touched by the divine love, answers that love, and\nlooks up; not as if thereby he deserved the response that he seeks, but\nas knowing that it is impossible but that the waiting heart should thus\nbe blessed. They who love God are sure that the answer to their desires\nwill come fluttering down upon their heads, and fold its white wings and\nnestle in their hearts. Christian people are a great deal too much\nafraid of saying, 'I love God.' They rob themselves of much peace and\npower thereby. We should be less chary of so saying if we thought more\nabout God's love to us, and poked less into our own conduct.\n\nAgain, the Psalmist brings this plea--'Thy servant that trusteth in\nThee.' He does not say, 'I deserve to be answered because I trust,' but\n'because I trust I am sure that I shall be answered'; for it is absurd\nto suppose that God will look down from heaven on a soul that is\ndepending upon Him, and will let that soul's confidence be put to shame.\nDear friend! if your heart is resting upon God, be sure of this, that\nanything is possible rather than that you should not get from Him the\nblessings that you need.\n\nThe Psalmist gathers together all his pleas which refer to himself into\ntwo final clauses--'I cry unto Thee daily,' 'I lift up my soul unto\nThee'--which, taken together, express the constant effort of a devout\nheart after communion with God. To withdraw my heart from the low levels\nof earth, and to bear it up into communion with God, is the sure way to\nget what I desire, because then God Himself will be my chief desire, and\n'they who seek the Lord shall not want any good.'\n\nBut the true and prevailing plea is not in our needs, desires, or\ndispositions, but in God's own character, as revealed by His words and\nacts, and grasped by our faith. Therefore the Psalmist ends by passing\nfrom thoughts of self to thoughts of God, and builds at last on the sure\nfoundation which underlies all his other 'fors' and gives them all their\nforce--'For Thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive, and plenteous in\nmercy unto all them that call upon Thee.'\n\nBrethren! turn all your wishes and all your annoyances into prayers. If\na wish is not fit to be prayed about, it is not fit to be cherished. If\na care is too small to be made a prayer, it is too small to be made a\nburden. Be frank with God as God is frank with you, and go to His\nthrone, keeping back nothing of your desires or of your troubles. To\ncarry them there will take the poison and the pain out of wasps' stings,\nand out of else fatal wounds. We have a Name to trust to, tenderer and\ndeeper than those which evoked the Psalmist's triumphant confidence. Let\nus see to it that, as the basis of our faith is firmer, our faith be\nstronger than his. We have a plea to urge, more persuasive and mighty\nthan those which he pressed on God and gathered to his own heart. 'For\nChrist's sake' includes all that he pled, and stretches beyond it. If we\ncome to God through Him who declares His name to us, we shall not draw\nnear to the Throne with self-willed desires, nor leave it with empty\nhands. 'If ye ask anything in My Name, I will do it.'\n\n\n\n\nCONTINUAL SUNSHINE\n\n\n    'Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound: they shall walk,\n    O Lord, in the light of Thy countenance.'--PSALM lxxxix. 15.\n\nThe Psalmist has just been setting forth, in sublime language, the\nglories of the divine character--God's strength, His universal sway, the\njustice and judgment which are the foundation of His Throne, the mercy\nand truth which go as heralds before His face. A heathen singing of any\nof his gods would have gone on to describe the form and features of the\ngod or goddess who came behind the heralds, but the Psalmist remembers\n'Thou shalt not make unto thyself any ... likeness of God.' A sacred\nreverence checks his song. He veils his face in his mantle while He whom\nno man can see and live passes by. Then he breaks into rapturous\nexclamations which are very prosaically and poorly represented by our\nversion. For the text is not a mere statement, as it is made to be by\nreading 'Blessed is the people,' but it is a burst of adoring wonder,\nand should be read, 'Oh! the blessedness of the people that know the\njoyful sound.'\n\nNow, the force of this exclamation is increased if we observe that the\nword that is rendered 'joyful sound' is the technical word for the\ntrumpet blast at Jewish feasts. The purpose of these blasts, like those\nof the heralds at the coronation of a king, was to proclaim the presence\nof God, the King of Israel, in the festival, as well as to express the\ngladness of the worshippers. Thus the Psalmist, when he says, 'Blessed\nis the people that know the joyful sound,' has no reference, as we\nordinarily take him to have, to the preaching of the Gospel, but to the\ntrumpet-blasts that proclaimed the present God and throbbed with the\ngladness of the waiting worshippers. So that this exclamation is\nequivalent to 'Oh! how blessed are the people who are sure that they\nhave God with them!' and who, being sure, bow before Him in loving\nworship. It is to be further noticed that the subsequent words of the\ntext state the first element which it indicates of that blessedness of a\ndevout life, 'They shall walk, O Lord! in the light of Thy countenance.'\n\nI. We deal first with the meaning of this phrase.\n\nOf course, 'the light of Thy countenance' is a very obvious and natural\nsymbol for favour, complacency, goodwill on the part of Him that is\nconceived of as looking on any one. We read, for instance, in reference\nto a much lower subject in the Book of Proverbs, 'In the light of the\nking's countenance is life, and his favour is as a cloud of the latter\nrain.' Again we have, in the Levitical benediction, the phrase\naccompanied in the parallel clauses by what is really an explanation of\nit, 'The Lord cause His face to shine upon thee and be gracious unto\nthee.' So that the simple and obvious meaning of the words, 'the light\nof Thy countenance,' is the favour and lovingkindness of God manifested\nin that gracious Face which He turns to His servants. As for the other\nchief word in the clause, 'to walk' is the equivalent throughout\nScripture for the conduct of the active life and daily conversation of a\nman, and to walk in the light is simply to have the consciousness of the\ndivine Presence and the experience of the divine lovingkindness and\nfriendship as a road on which we travel our life's journey, or an\natmosphere round us in which all our activities are done and in which we\never remain, as a diver in his bell, to keep evil and sin from us.\n\nThere is only one more remark in the nature of explanation which I make,\nand that is that the expression here for walking is cast in the original\ninto a form which grammarians call intensive, strengthening the simple\nidea expressed by the word. We may express its force if we read, 'They\nwalk continually in the light of Thy countenance.'\n\nIs not that just a definition of the Christian life as an unbroken\nrealisation of the divine Presence, and an unbroken experience of the\nlovingkindness and favour of God? Is not that religion in its truest,\nsimplest essence, in its purest expression? The people who are sure that\nthey have their King in their midst, and who feel that He is looking\ndown upon them with tender pity, with loving care, with nothing but\nfriendship and sweetness in His heart, these people, says the Psalmist,\nare blessed. So much, then, for the meaning of the word.\n\nII. Consider the possibility of such a condition being ours.\n\nCan such a thing be? Is it possible for a man to go through life\ncarrying this atmosphere constantly with him? Can the continuity which,\nas I remarked, is expressed by the original accurately rendered, be kept\nup through an ordinary life that has all manner of work to do, or are we\nonly to 'hear the joyful sound,' now and then, at rare intervals, on set\noccasions, answering to these ancient feasts? Which of the two is it to\nbe, dear brethren? There is no need whatever why any amount of hard\nwork, or outward occupations of the most secular character, or any\namount of distractions, should break for us the continuity of that\nconsciousness and of that experience. We may carry God with us wherever\nwe go, if only we remember that where we cannot carry Him with us we\nought not to go. We may carry Him with us into all the dusty roads of\nlife; we may always walk on the sunny side of the street if we like. We\nmay always bear our own sunshine with us. And although we are bound to\nbe diligent in business, and some of us have had to take a heavy lift of\na great deal of hard work, and much of it apparently standing in no sort\nof relation to our religious life, yet for all that it is possible to\nbend all to this one direction, and to make everything a means of\nbringing us nearer to God and fuller of the conscious enjoyment of His\npresence. And if we have not learned to do that with our daily work,\nthen our daily work is a curse to us. If we have allowed it to become so\nabsorbing or distracting as that it dims and darkens our sense of the\ndivine Presence, then it is time for us to see what is wrong in the\nmethod or in the amount of work which is thus darkening our consciences.\nI know it is hard, I know that an absolute attainment of such an ideal\nis perhaps beyond us, but I know that we can approach--I was going to\nsay infinitely, but a better word is indefinitely--nearer it than any of\nus have ever yet done. As the psalm goes on to say in the next clause,\nit is possible for us to 'rejoice in His Name all the day.' Ay, even at\nyour tasks, and at your counters, and in your kitchens, and in my study,\nit is possible for us; and if our hearts are what and where they ought\nto be, the possibility will be realised. Earthly duty has no necessary\neffect of veiling the consciousness of God.\n\nNor is there any reason why our troubles, sorrows, losses, solitude\nshould darken that sunshine. I know that that is hard, too, perhaps\nharder than the other. It is more difficult to have a sense of the\nsunshine of the divine Presence shining through the clouds of disaster\nand sorrow than even it is to have it shining through the dust that is\nraised by traffic and secular occupation. But it _is_ possible. There is\nnothing in all the sky so grand as clouds smitten by sunshine, and the\nlight is never so glorious as when it is flashed back from them and dyes\ntheir piled bosoms with all celestial colours. There is no experience of\nGod's Presence so blessed as that of a man who, in the midst of sorrow,\nhas yet with him the assurance of the Father's friendship and favour and\nlove, and so can say 'as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.' This sunshine\nshines in the foulest corners, and the most thunder-laden clouds only\nflash back its glories in new forms.\n\nThere is only one thing that breaks the continuity of that blessedness,\nand that is our own sin. We carry our own weather with us, whether we\nwill or no, and we can bring winter into the middle of summer by\nflinging God away from us, and summer into the midst of winter by\ngrappling Him to our hearts. There is only one thing that necessarily\nbreaks our sense of His Presence, and that is that our hearts should\nturn away from His face. A man can work hard and yet feel that God is\nwith him. A man can be weighed upon by many distresses and yet feel that\nGod is with him and loves him; but a man cannot commit the least tiny\nsin and love it, and feel at the same time that God is with him. The\nheart is like a sensitive photographic plate, it registers the\nvariations in the sunshine; and the one hindrance that makes it\nimpossible for God's light to fall upon my soul with the assurance of\nfriendship and the sense of sweetness, is that I should be hugging some\nevil to my heart. It is not the dusty highway of life nor the dark vales\nof weeping and of the shadow of death through which we sometimes have to\npass that make it impossible for this sunlight to pour down upon us, but\nit is our gathering round ourselves of the poisonous mists of sin\nthrough which that light cannot pierce; or if it pierce, pierces\ntransformed and robbed of all its beauty.\n\nIII. Let me note next the blessedness which draws out the Psalmist's\nrapturous exclamation.\n\nThe same phrase is employed in one of the other psalms, which, I think,\nbears in its contents the confirmation of the attribution of it to\nDavid. When he was fleeing before his rebellious son, at the very lowest\nebb of his fortunes, away on the uplands of Moab, a discrowned king, a\nfugitive in danger of death at every moment, he sang a psalm in which\nthese words occur: 'There be many that say, Who will show us any good?'\n'Lord, lift up the light of Thy countenance upon us'; and then follows,\n'Thou hast put gladness into my heart more than when their corn and wine\nabound.' The speech of the many, 'Who will show us any good?' is\ncontrasted with the prayer of the one, 'Lord, lift Thou up the light of\nThy countenance upon us.' That is blessedness. It is the only thing that\nmakes the heart to be at rest. It is the only thing that makes life\ntruly worth living, the only thing that brings sweetness which has no\nafter taint of bitterness and breeds no fear of its passing away. To\nhave that unsetting sunshine streaming down upon my open heart, and to\ncarry about with me whithersoever I go, like some melody from hidden\nsingers sounding in my ears, the Name and the Love of my Father\nGod--that and that only, brother, is true rest and abiding blessedness.\nThere are many other joys far more turbulent, more poignant, but they\nall pass. Many of them leave a nauseous taste in the mouth when they are\nswallowed; all of them leave us the poorer for having had them and\nhaving them no more. For one who is not a Christian I do not know that\nit _is_\n\n  'Better to have loved and lost\n   Than never to have loved at all.'\n\nBut for those to whom God's Face is as a Sun, life in all its\npossibilities is blessed; and there is no blessedness besides. So let us\nkeep near Him, 'walking in the light,' in our changeful days, 'as He is\nin the light' in His essential and unalterable being; and that light\nwill be to us all which it is taken in Scripture to symbolise--knowledge\nand joy and purity; and in us, too, there will be 'no darkness at all.'\n\nBut there is one last word that I must say, and that is that a possible\nterror is intertwined with this blessedness. The next psalm to this\nsays, with a kind of tremulous awe in the Psalmist's voice: 'Thou hast\nset our iniquities before Thee, our secret sins in the light of Thy\ncountenance.' In that sense all of us, good and bad, lovers of God and\nthose that are careless about Him, walk all the day long in the light of\nHis face, and He sees and marks all our else hidden evil. It needs\nsomething more than any of us can do to make the thought that we do\nstand in the full glaring of that great searchlight, not turned\noccasionally but focussed steadily on us individually, a joy and a\nblessing to us. And what we need is offered us when we read, 'His\ncountenance was as the sun shineth in his strength, and I fell at His\nfeet as dead. And He laid His hand upon me and said, Fear not! I am He\nthat liveth and was dead; and behold! I am alive for ever more.' If we\nput our poor trust in the Eternal Light that was manifest in Christ,\nthen we shall walk in the sunshine of His face on earth, and that lamp\nwill burn for us in the darkness of the grave and lead us at last into\nthe ever-blazing centre of the Sun itself.\n\n\n\n\nTHE CRY OF THE MORTAL TO THE UNDYING\n\n\n    'Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us: and establish Thou\n    the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands establish\n    Thou it.--PSALM xc. 17.\n\nIf any reliance is to be placed upon the superscription of this psalm,\nit is one of the oldest, as it certainly is of the grandest, pieces of\nreligious poetry in the world. It is said to be 'A prayer of Moses, the\nman of God,' and whether that be historically true or no, the tone of\nthe psalm naturally suggests the great lawgiver, whose special task it\nwas to write deep upon the conscience of the Jewish people the thought\nof the wages of sin as being death.\n\nHence the sombre magnificence and sad music of the psalm, which\ncontemplates a thousand generations in succession as sliding away into\nthe dreadful past, and sinking as beneath a flood. This thought of the\nfleeting years, dashed and troubled by many a sin, and by the righteous\nretribution of God, sent the Psalmist to his knees, and he found the\nonly refuge from it in these prayers. These two petitions of our text,\nthe closing words of the psalm, are the cry forced from a heart that has\ndared to look Death in the eyes, and has discovered that the world after\nall is a place of graves.\n\n'Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish Thou the\nwork of our hands upon us.' There are two thoughts there--the cry of the\nmortal for the beauty of the Eternal; and the cry of the worker in a\nperishable world for the perpetuity of his work. Look at these two\nthoughts briefly.\n\nI. We have here, first, the yearning and longing cry of the mortal for\nthe beauty of the Eternal.\n\nThe word translated 'beauty' in my text is, like the Greek equivalent in\nthe New Testament, and like the English word 'grace,' which corresponds\nto them both susceptible of a double meaning. 'Grace' means both\n_kindness_ and _loveliness_, or, as we might distinguish both\ngraciousness and gracefulness. And that double idea is inherent in the\nword, as it is inherent in the attribute of God to which it refers. For\nthat twofold meaning of the one word suggests the truth that God's\nlovingkindness and communicating mercy _is_ His beauty, and that the\nfairest thing about Him, notwithstanding the splendours that surround\nHis character, and the flashing lights that come from His many-sided\nglory, is that He loves and pities and gives Himself. God is all fair,\nbut the central and substantial beauty of the divine nature is that it\nis a stooping nature, which bows to weak and unworthy souls, and on them\npours out the full abundance of its manifold gifts. So the 'beauty of\nthe Lord' means, by no quibble or quirk, but by reason of the essential\nloveliness of His lovingkindness, both God's loveliness and God's\ngoodness; God's graciousness and God's gracefulness (if I may use such a\nword).\n\nThe prayer of the Psalmist that this beauty may be _upon_ us conceives\nof it as given to us from above and as coming floating down from heaven,\nlike that white Dove that fell upon Christ's head, fair and meek, gentle\nand lovely, and resting on our anointed heads, like a diadem and an\naureole of glory.\n\nNow that communicating graciousness, with its large gifts and its\nresulting beauty, is the one thing that we need in view of mortality and\nsorrow and change and trouble. The psalm speaks about 'all our years'\nbeing 'passed away in Thy wrath,' about the very inmost recesses of our\nsecret unworthiness being turned inside out, and made to look blacker\nthan ever when the bright sunshine of His face falls upon them. From\nthat thought of God's wrath and omniscience the poet turns, as we must\nturn, to the other thought of His gentle longsuffering, of His\nforbearing love, of His infinite pity, of His communicating mercy. As a\nsupport in view both of our dreary and yet short years, and our certain\nmortality, and in the contemplation of the evils within and suffering\nfrom without, that harass us all, there is but one thing for us to\ndo--namely, to fling ourselves into the arms of God, and in the spirit\nof this great petition, to ask that upon us there may fall the dewy\nbenediction of His gentle beauty.\n\nThat longing is meant to be kindled in our hearts by all the discipline\nof life. Life is not worth living unless it does that for us; and there\nis no value nor meaning either in our joys or in our sorrows, unless\nboth the one and the other send us to Him. Our gladness and our\ndisappointments, our hopes fulfilled and our hopes dissipated and\nunanswered are but, as it were, the two wings by which, on either side,\nour spirits are to be lifted to God. The solemn pathos of the earlier\nportion of this psalm--the funeral march of generations--leads up to the\nprayerful confidence of these closing petitions, in which the sadness of\nthe minor key in which it began has passed into a brighter strain. The\nthought of the fleeting years swept away as with a flood, and of the\ngenerations that blossom for a day and are mown down and wither when\ntheir swift night falls, is saddening and paralysing unless it suggests\nby contrast the thought of Him who, Himself unmoved, moves the rolling\nyears, and is the dwelling-place of each succeeding generation. Such\ncontemplations are wholesome and religious only when they drive us to\nthe eternal God, that in Him we may find the stable foundation which\nimparts its own perpetuity to every life built upon it. We have\nexperienced so many things in vain, and we are of the 'fools' that,\nbeing 'brayed in a mortar,' are only brayed fools after all, unless\nlife, with its sorrows and its changes, has blown us, as with a\nhurricane, right into the centre of rest, and unless its sorrows and\nchanges have taught us this as the one aspiration of our souls: 'Let the\nbeauty of the Lord our God be upon us,' and then, let what may come,\ncome, let what can pass, pass, we shall have all that we need for life\nand peace.\n\nAnd then, note further, that this gracious gentleness and\nlong-suffering, giving mercy of God, when it comes down upon a man,\nmakes him, too, beautiful with a reflected beauty. If the beauty of the\nLord our God be upon us, it will cover over our foulness and deformity.\nFor whosoever possesses in any real fashion God's great mercy will have\nhis spirit moulded into the likeness of that mercy. We cannot have it\nwithout reflecting it, we cannot possess it without being assimilated to\nit. Therefore, to have the grace of God makes us both gracious and\ngraceful. And the true refining influence for a character is that into\nit there shall come the gift of that endless pity and patient love,\nwhich will transfigure us into some faint likeness of itself, so that we\nshall walk among men, able, in some poor measure, after the manner of\nour Master, to say, 'He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father.' He said\nit in a sense and in a measure which we cannot reach, but the\nassimilation to and reflection of the divine character is our aim, or\nought to be, if we are Christians. 'Let the beauty of the Lord our God\nbe upon us,' and 'change us into the same image from glory to glory.'\n\nII. We have here the cry of the worker in a fleeting world for the\nperpetuity of his work.\n\n'Establish,' or make firm, 'the work of our hands upon us, yea the work\nof our hands establish Thou it.' The thought that everything is passing\naway so swiftly and inevitably, as the earlier part of the psalm\nsuggests, might lead a man to say, 'What is the use of my doing\nanything? I may just as well sit down here, and let things slide, if\nthey are all going to be swallowed up in the black bottomless gulf of\nforgetfulness.' The contemplation has actually produced two opposite\neffects, 'Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die,' is quite as fair\nan inference from the fact as is 'Awake to righteousness and sin not,'\nif the fact itself only be taken into account. There is nothing\nreligious in the clearest conviction of mortality, if it stands alone.\nIt may be the ally of profligate and cynical sensuality quite as easily\nas it may be the preacher of asceticism. It may make men inactive, from\ntheir sense of the insignificant and fleeting nature of all human works,\nor it may stimulate to intensest effort, from the thought, 'I must work\nthe works of Him that sent me while it is day. The night cometh.' All\ndepends on whether we link the conviction of mortality with that of\neternity, and think of our perishable selves as in relationship with the\nunchanging God.\n\nThis prayer expresses a deep longing, natural to all men, and which yet\nseems incompatible with the stern facts of mortality and decay. We\nshould all like to have our work exempted from the common lot. What\npathetically futile attempts to secure this are pyramids, and\nrock-inscriptions, and storied tombs, and posthumous memoirs, and rich\nmen's wills! Why should any of us expect that the laws of nature should\nbe suspended for our benefit, and our work made lasting while everything\nbeside changes like the shadows of the clouds? Is there any way by which\nsuch exceptional permanence can be secured for our poor deeds? Yes,\ncertainly. Let us commit them to God, praying this prayer, 'Establish\nThou the work of our hands upon us.'\n\nOur work will be established if it is His work. This prayer in our text\nfollows another prayer (verse 16)--namely, 'Let _Thy_ work appear unto\nThy servants.' That is to say, My work will be perpetual when the work\nof my hands is God's work done through me. When you bring your wills\ninto harmony with God's will, and so all your effort, even about the\nlittle things of daily life, is in consonance with His will, and in the\nline of His purpose, then your work will stand. If otherwise, it will be\nlike some slow-moving and frail carriage going in the one direction and\nmeeting an express train thundering in the other. When the crash comes,\nthe opposing motion of the weaker will be stopped, reversed, and the\nfrail thing will be smashed to atoms. So, all work which is man's and\nnot God's will sooner or later be reduced to impotence and either\nannihilated or reversed, and made to run in the opposite direction. But\nif our work runs parallel with God's, then the rushing impetus of His\nwork will catch up our little deeds into the swiftness of its own\nmotion, and will carry them along with itself, as a railway train will\nlift straws and bits of paper that are lying by the rails, and give them\nmotion for a while. If my will runs in the line of His, and if the work\nof my hands is 'Thy work,' it is not in vain that we shall cry\n'Establish it upon us,' for it will last as long as He does.\n\nIn like manner, all work will be perpetual that is done with 'the beauty\nof the Lord our God' upon the doers of it. Whosoever has that grace in\nhis heart, whosoever is in contact with the communicating mercy of God,\nand has had his character in some measure refined and ennobled and\nbeautified by possession thereof, will do work that has in it the\nelement of perpetuity.\n\nAnd our work will stand if we quietly leave it in His hands. Quietly do\nit to Him, never mind about results, but look after motives. You cannot\ninfluence results, let God look after them; you can influence motives.\nBe sure that they are right, and if they are, the work will be eternal.\n\n'Eternal? What do you mean by eternal? how can a man's work be that?'\nPart of the answer is that it may be made permanent in its issues by\nbeing taken up into the great whole of God's working through His\nservants, which results at last in the establishment of His eternal\nkingdom. Just as a drop of water that falls upon the moor finds its way\ninto the brook, and goes down the glen and on into the river, and then\ninto the sea, and is there, though undistinguishable, so in the great\nsumming up of everything at the end, the tiniest deed that was done for\nGod, though it was done far away up amongst the mountain solitudes where\nno eye saw, shall live and be represented, in its effects on others and\nin its glad issues to the doer.\n\nIn the highest fashion the Psalmist's cry for the perpetuity of the\nfleeting deeds of dying generations will be answered in that region in\nwhich his dimmer eye saw little but the sullen flood that swept away\nyouth and strength and wisdom, but in which we can see the solid land\nbeyond the river, and the happy company who rejoice with the joy of\nharvest, and bear with them the sheaves, whereof the seed was sown on\nthis bank, in tears and fears. 'Blessed are the dead that die in the\nLord. Their works do follow them.' 'The world passeth away, and the\nfashion thereof, but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE SHELTERING WING\n\n\n    'He shall cover thee with His feathers, and under His wings shalt\n    thou trust: His truth shall be thy shield and buckler.'\n    --PSALM xci. 4.\n\nWe remember the magnificent image in Moses' song, of God's protection\nand guidance as that of the eagle who stirred up his nest, and hovered\nover the young with his wings, and bore them on his pinions. That\npassage may possibly have touched the imagination of this psalmist, when\nhe here employs the same general metaphor, but with a distinct and\nsignificant difference in its application. In the former image the main\nidea is that of training and sustaining. Here the main idea is that of\nprotection and fostering. _On_ the wing and _under_ the wing suggest\nentirely different notions, and both need to be taken into account in\norder to get the many-sided beauties and promises of these great\nsayings. Now there seems to me here to be a very distinct triad of\nthoughts. There is the covering wing; there is the flight to its\nprotection; and there is the warrant for that flight. 'He shall cover\nthee with His pinions'; that is the divine act. 'Under His wings shalt\nthou trust'; that is the human condition. 'His truth shall be thy shield\nand buckler'; that is the divine manifestation which makes the human\ncondition possible.\n\nI. A word then, first, about the covering wing.\n\nNow, the main idea in this image is, as I have suggested, that of the\nexpanded pinion, beneath the shelter of which the callow young lie, and\nare guarded. Whatever kites may be in the sky, whatever stoats and\nweasels may be in the hedges, the brood are safe there. The image\nsuggests not only the thought of protection but those of fostering,\ndowny warmth, peaceful proximity to a heart that throbs with parental\nlove, and a multitude of other happy privileges realised by those who\nnestle beneath that wing. But while these subsidiary ideas are not to be\nlost sight of, the promise of protection is to be kept prominent, as\nthat chiefly intended by the Psalmist.\n\nThis psalm rings throughout with the truth that a man who dwells 'in the\nsecret place of the Most High' has absolute immunity from all sorts of\nevil; and there are two regions in which that immunity, secured by being\nunder the shadow of the Almighty, is exemplified here. The one is that\nof outward dangers, the other is that of temptation to sin and of what\nwe may call spiritual foes. Now, these two regions and departments in\nwhich the Christian man does realise, in the measure of his faith, the\ndivine protection, exhibit that protection as secured in two entirely\ndifferent ways.\n\nThe triumphant assurances of this psalm, 'There shall no evil befall\nthee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling,'--'the pestilence\nshall smite thousands and ten thousands beside thee, but not come nigh\nthee,'--seem to be entirely contradicted by experience which testifies\nthat 'there is one event to the evil and the good,' and that, in\nepidemics or other widespread disasters, we all, the good and the bad,\nGod-fearers and God-blasphemers, do fare alike, and that the conditions\nof exemption from physical evil are physical and not spiritual. It is of\nno use trying to persuade ourselves that that is not so. We shall\nunderstand God's dealings with us, and get to the very throbbing heart\nof such promises as these in this psalm far better, if we start from the\ncertainty that whatever it means it does _not_ mean that, with regard to\nexternal calamities and disasters, we are going to be God's petted\nchildren, or to be saved from the things that fall upon other people.\nNo! no! we have to go a great deal deeper than that. If we have felt a\ndifficulty, as I suppose we all have sometimes, and are ready to say\nwith the half-despondent Psalmist, 'My feet were almost gone, and my\nsteps had well-nigh slipped,' when we see what we think the complicated\nmysteries of divine providence in this world, we have to come to the\nbelief that the evil that is in the evil will never come near a man\nsheltered beneath God's wing. The physical external event may be\nentirely the same to him as to another who is not covered with His\nfeathers. Here are two partners in a business, the one a Christian man,\nand the other is not. A common disaster overwhelms them. They become\nbankrupts. Is insolvency the same to the one as it is to the other? Here\nare two men on board a ship, the one putting his trust in God, the other\nthinking it all nonsense to trust anything but himself. They are both\ndrowned. Is drowning the same to the two? As their corpses lie side by\nside among the ooze, with the weeds over them, and the shell-fish at\nthem, you may say of the one, but only of the one, 'There shall no evil\nbefall thee, neither any plague come nigh thy dwelling.'\n\nFor the protection that is granted to faith is only to be understood by\nfaith. It is deliverance from the evil in the evil which vindicates as\nno exaggeration, nor as merely an experience and a promise peculiar to\nthe old theocracy of Israel, but not now realised, the grand sayings of\nthis text. The poison is all wiped off the arrow by that divine\nprotection. It may still wound but it does not putrefy the flesh. The\nsewage water comes down, but it passes into the filtering bed, and is\ndisinfected and cleansed before it is permitted to flow over our fields.\n\nAnd so, brethren! if any of you are finding that the psalm is not\noutwardly true, and that through the covering wing the storm of hail has\ncome and beaten you down, do not suppose that that in the slightest\ndegree impinges upon the reality and truthfulness of this great promise,\n'He shall cover thee with His feathers.' Anything that has come through\n_them_ is manifestly not an 'evil.' 'Who is he that will harm you if ye\nbe followers of that which is good?' 'If God be for us who can be\nagainst us?' Not what the world calls, and our wrung hearts feel that it\nrightly calls, 'sorrows' and 'afflictions,'--these all work for our\ngood, and protection consists, not in averting the blows, but in\nchanging their character.\n\nThen, there is another region far higher, in which this promise of my\ntext is absolutely true--that is, in the region of spiritual defence.\nFor no man who lies under the shadow of God, and has his heart filled\nwith the continual consciousness of that Presence, is likely to fall\nbefore the assaults of evil that tempt him away from God; and the\ndefence which He gives in that region is yet more magnificently\nimpregnable than the defence which He gives against external evils. For,\nas the New Testament teaches us, we are kept from sin, not by any\noutward breastplate or armour, nor even by the divine wing lying above\nus to cover us, but by the indwelling Christ in our hearts. His Spirit\nwithin us makes us 'free from the law of sin and death,' and conquerors\nover all temptations.\n\nI say not a word about all the other beautiful and pathetic associations\nwhich are connected with this emblem of the covering wing, sweet and\ninexhaustible as it is, but I simply leave with you the two thoughts\nthat I have dwelt upon, of the twofold manner of that divine protection.\n\nII. And now a word, in the second place, about the flight of the\nshelterless to the shelter.\n\nThe word which is rendered in our Authorised Version, 'shalt thou\ntrust,' is, like all Hebrew words for mental and spiritual emotions and\nactions, strongly metaphorical. It might have been better to retain its\nliteral meaning here instead of substituting the abstract word 'trust.'\nThat is to say, it would have been an improvement if we had read with\nthe Revised Version, not, 'under His wings shalt thou trust,' but 'under\nHis wings shalt thou take refuge.' For that is the idea which is really\nconveyed; and in many of the psalms, if you will remember, the same\nmetaphor is employed. 'Hide me beneath the shadow of Thy wings';\n'Beneath Thy wings will I take refuge until calamities are overpast';\nand the like. Many such passages will, no doubt, occur to your memories.\n\nBut what I wish to signalise is just this, that in this emblem of flying\ninto a refuge from impending perils we get a far more vivid conception,\nand a far more useful one, as it seems to me, of what Christian faith\nreally is than we derive from many learned volumes and much theological\nhair-splitting. 'Under His wings shalt thou flee for refuge.' Is not\nthat a vivid, intense, picturesque, but most illuminative way of telling\nus what is the very essence, and what is the urgency, and what is the\nworth, of what we call faith? The Old Testament is full of the\nteaching--which is masked to ordinary readers, but is the same teaching\nas the New Testament is confessedly full of--of the necessity of faith\nas the one bond that binds men to God. If only our translators had\nwisely determined upon a uniform rendering in Old and New Testament of\nwords that are synonymous, the reader would have seen what is often now\nreserved for the student, that all these sayings in the Old Testament\nabout 'trusting in God' run on all fours with 'Believe on the Lord Jesus\nChrist and thou shalt be saved.'\n\nBut just mark what comes out of that metaphor; that 'trust,' the faith\nwhich unites with God, and brings a man beneath the shadow of His wings,\nis nothing more or less than the flying into the refuge that is provided\nfor us. Does that not speak to us of the urgency of the case? Does that\nnot speak to us eloquently of the perils which environ us? Does it not\nspeak to us of the necessity of swift flight, with all the powers of our\nwill? Is the faith which is a flying into a refuge fairly described as\nan intellectual act of believing in a testimony? Surely it is something\na great deal more than that. A man out in the plain, with the avenger of\nblood, hot-breathed and bloody-minded, behind him might believe, as much\nas he liked, that there would be safety within the walls of the City of\nRefuge, but unless he took to his heels without loss of time, the spear\nwould be in his back before he knew where he was. There are many men who\nknow all about the security of the refuge, and believe it utterly, but\nnever run for it; and so never get into it. Faith is the gathering up of\nthe whole powers of my nature to fling myself into the asylum, to cast\nmyself into God's arms, to take shelter beneath the shadow of His wings.\nAnd unless a man does that, and swiftly, he is exposed to every bird of\nprey in the sky, and to every beast of prey lurking in wait for him.\n\nThe metaphor tells us, too, what are the limits and the worth of faith.\nA man is not saved because he believes that he is saved, but because by\nbelieving he lays hold of the salvation. It is not the flight that is\nimpregnable, and makes those behind its strong bulwarks secure. Not my\noutstretched hand, but the Hand that my hand grasps, is what holds me\nup. The power of faith is but that it brings me into contact with God,\nand sets me behind the seven-fold bastions of the Almighty protection.\n\nSo, brethren! another consideration comes out of this clause: 'Under His\nwings shalt thou trust.' If you do not flee for refuge to that wing, it\nis of no use to you, however expanded it is, however soft and downy its\nunderside, however sure its protection. You remember the passage where\nour Lord uses the same venerable figure with modifications, and says:\n'How often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen\ndoth gather her brood under her wings, _and ye would not_.' So our\n'would not' thwarts Christ's 'would.' Flight to the refuge is the\ncondition of being saved. How can a man get shelter by any other way\nthan by running to the shelter? The wing is expanded; it is for us to\nsay whether we will 'flee for refuge to the hope set before us.'\n\nIII. Now, lastly, the warrant for this flight.\n\n'His truth shall be thy shield.' Now, 'truth' here does not mean the\nbody of revealed words, which are often called God's truth, but it\ndescribes a certain characteristic of the divine nature. And if, instead\nof  'truth,' we read the good old English word 'troth,' we should be a\ngreat deal nearer understanding what the Psalmist meant. Or if 'troth'\nis archaic, and conveys little meaning to us; suppose we substitute a\nsomewhat longer word, of the same meaning, and say, 'His faithfulness\nshall be thy shield.' You cannot trust a God that has not given you an\ninkling of His character or disposition, but if He has spoken, then you\n'know where to have him.' That is just what the Psalmist means. How can\na man be encouraged to fly into a refuge, unless he is absolutely sure\nthat there is an entrance for him into it, and that, entering, he is\nsafe? And that security is provided in the great thought of God's troth.\n'Thy faithfulness is like the great mountains.' 'Who is like unto Thee,\nO Lord! or to Thy faithfulness round about Thee?' That faithfulness\nshall be our 'shield,' not a tiny targe that a man could bear upon his\nleft arm; but the word means the large shield, planted in the ground in\nfront of the soldier, covering him, however hot the fight, and circling\nhim around, like a wall of iron.\n\nGod is 'faithful' to all the obligations under which He has come by\nmaking us. That is what one of the New Testament writers tells us, when\nhe speaks of Him as 'a faithful Creator.' Then, if He has put desires\ninto our hearts, be sure that somewhere there is their satisfaction; and\nif He has given us needs, be sure that in Him there is the supply; and\nif He has lodged in us aspirations which make us restless, be sure that\nif we will turn them to Him, they will be satisfied and we shall be at\nrest. 'God never sends mouths but He sends meat to fill them.' 'He\nremembers our frame,' and measures His dealings accordingly. When He\nmade me, He bound Himself to make it possible that I should be blessed\nfor ever; and He has done it.\n\nGod is faithful to His word, according to that great saying in the\nEpistle to the Hebrews, where the writer tells us that by 'God's\ncounsel,' and 'God's oath,' 'two immutable things,' we might have\n'strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope\nset before us.' God is faithful to His own past. The more He has done\nthe more He will do. 'Thou hast been my Help; leave me not, neither\nforsake me.' Therein we present a plea which God Himself will honour.\nAnd He is faithful to His own past in a yet wider sense. For all the\nrevelations of His love and of His grace in times that are gone, though\nthey might be miraculous in their form, are permanent in their essence.\nSo one of the Psalmists, hundreds of years after the time that Israel\nwas led through the wilderness, sang: 'There did _we_'--of this present\ngeneration--'rejoice in Him.' What has been, is, and will be, for Thou\nart 'the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever.' We have not a God\nthat lurks in darkness, but one that has come into the light. We have to\nrun, not into a Refuge that is built upon a 'perhaps,' but upon 'Verily,\nverily! I say unto thee.' Let us build rock upon Rock, and let our faith\ncorrespond to the faithfulness of Him that has promised.\n\n\n\n\nTHE HABITATION OF THE SOUL\n\n\n    'Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most\n    High, thy habitation; there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall\n    any plague come nigh thy dwelling.'--PSALM xci. 9, 10.\n\nIt requires a good deal of piecing to make out from the Hebrew the\ntranslation of our Authorised Version here. The simple, literal\nrendering of the first words of these verses is, 'Surely, Thou, O Lord!\nart my Refuge'; and I do not suppose that any of the expedients which\nhave been adopted to modify that translation would have been adopted,\nbut that these words seem to cut in two the long series of rich promises\nand blessings which occupy the rest of the psalm. But it is precisely\nthis interruption of the flow of the promises which puts us on the right\ntrack for understanding the words in question, because it leads us to\ntake them as the voice of the devout man, to whom the promises are\naddressed, responding to them by the expression of his own faith.\n\nThe Revised Version is much better here than our Authorised Version, for\nit has recognised this breach of continuity of sequence in the promises,\nand translated as I have suggested; making the first words of my text,\n'Thou, O Lord! art my Refuge,' the voice of one singer, and 'Because\nthou hast made the Most High thy habitation, there shall no evil befall\nthee, neither shall any evil come nigh thy dwelling,' the voice of\nanother.\n\nWhether or no it be that in the Liturgical service of the Temple this\npsalm was sung by two choirs which answered one another, does not matter\nfor our purpose. Whether or no we regard the first clause as the voice\nof the Psalmist speaking to God, and the other as the same man speaking\nto himself, does not matter. The point is that, first, there is an\nexclamation of personal faith, and that then that is followed and\nanswered, as it were, by the further promise of continual blessings. One\nvoice says, 'Thou, Lord! art my Refuge,' and then another voice--not\nGod's, because that speaks in majesty at the end of the psalm--replies\nto that burst of confidence, 'Thou hast made the Lord thy habitation'\n(as thou hast done by this confession of faith), 'there shall no evil\ncome nigh thy dwelling.'\n\nI. We have here the cry of the devout soul.\n\nI observed that it seems to cut in two the stream of promised blessings,\nand that fact is significant. The psalm begins with the deep truth that\n'He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under\nthe shadow of the Almighty.' Then a single voice speaks, 'I will say of\nthe Lord, He is my Refuge and my Fortress, my God, in Him will I trust.'\nThen that voice, which thus responds to the general statement of the\nfirst verse, is answered by a stream of promises. The first part of our\ntext comes in as the second speech of the same voice, repeating\nsubstantially the same thing as it said at first.\n\nNow, notice that this cry of the soul, recognising God as its Asylum and\nHome, comes in response to a revelation of God's blessing, and to large\nwords of promise. There is no true refuge nor any peace and rest for a\nman unless in grasping the articulate word of God, and building his\nassurance upon that. Anything else is not confidence, but folly;\nanything else is building upon sand, and not upon the Rock. If I trust\nmy own or my brother's conception of the divine nature, if I build upon\nany thoughts of my own, I am building upon what will yield and give. For\nall peaceful casting of my soul into the arms of God there must be,\nfirst, a plain stretching out of the hands of God to catch me when I\ndrop. So the words of my text, 'Thou art my Refuge,' are the best answer\nof the devout soul to the plain words of divine promise. How abundant\nthese are we all know, how full of manifold insight and adaptation to\nour circumstances and our nature we may all experience, if we care to\nprove them.\n\nBut let us be sure that we _are_ hearkening to the voice with which He\nspeaks through our daily circumstances as well as by the unmistakable\nrevelation of His will and heart in Jesus Christ. And then let us be\nsure that no word of His, that comes fluttering down from the heavens,\nmeaning a benediction and enclosing a promise, falls at our feet\nungathered and unregarded, or is trodden into the dust by our careless\nheels. The manna lies all about us; let us see that we gather it. 'When\nThou saidst, Seek ye My Face, my heart said unto Thee, Thy Face, Lord,\nwill I seek.' When Thou saidst, 'I will be thy Strength and thy\nRighteousness,' have I said, 'Surely, O Jehovah! Thou art my Refuge'?\nTurn His promises into your creed, and whatever He has declared in the\nsweet thunder of His voice, loud as the voice of many waters, and\nmelodious as 'harpers harping with their harps,' do you take for your\nprofession of faith in the faithful promises of your God.\n\nStill further, this cry of the devout soul suggests to me that our\nresponse ought to be the establishment of a close personal relation\nbetween us and God. 'Thou, O Lord! art my Refuge.' The Psalmist did not\ncontent himself with saying 'Lord! Thou hast been _our_ Dwelling-place\nin all generations,' or as one of the other psalmists has it, 'God is\n_our_ Refuge and _our_ Strength.' That thought was blessed, but it was\nnot enough for the Psalmist's present need, and it is never enough for\nthe deepest necessities of any soul. We must isolate ourselves and\nstand, God and we, alone together--at heart-grips--we grasping His hand,\nand He giving Himself to us--if the promises which are sent down into\nthe world for all who will make them theirs can become ours. They are\nmade payable to your order; you must put your name on the back before\nyou get the proceeds. There must be what our good old Puritan\nforefathers used to call, in somewhat hard language, 'the appropriating\nact of faith,' in order that God's richest blessings may be of any use\nto us. Put out your hand to grasp them, and say, 'Mine,' not 'Ours.' The\nthought of others as sharing in them will come afterwards, for he who\nhas once realised the absolute isolation of the soul and has been alone\nwith God, and in solitude has taken God's gifts as his very own, is he\nwho will feel fellowship and brotherhood with all who are partakers of\nlike precious faith and blessings. The 'ours' will come; but you must\nbegin with the 'mine'--'_my_ Lord and _my_ God.' 'He loved _me_, and\ngave Himself for _me_.'\n\nJust as when the Israelites gathered on the banks of the Red Sea, and\nMiriam and the maidens came out with songs and timbrels, though their\nhearts throbbed with joy, and music rang from their lips for national\ndeliverance, their hymn made the whole deliverance the property of each,\nand each of the chorus sang, 'The Lord is my Strength and my Song, He\nalso is become my Salvation,' so we must individualise the common\nblessing. Every poor soul has a right to the whole of God, and unless a\nman claims all the divine nature as his, he has little chance of\npossessing the promised blessings. The response of the individual to the\nworldwide promises and revelations of the Father is, 'Thou, O Lord! art\nmy Refuge.'\n\nFurther, note how this cry of the devout soul recognises God as He to\nwhom we must go because we need a refuge. The word 'refuge' here gives\nthe picture of some stronghold, or fortified place, in which men may\nfind security from all sorts of dangers, invasions by surrounding foes,\nstorm and tempest, rising flood, or anything else that threatens. Only\nhe who knows himself to be in danger bethinks himself of a refuge. It is\nonly when we know our danger and defencelessness that God, as the Refuge\nof our souls, becomes precious to us. So, underlying, and an essential\npart of, all our confidence in God, is the clear recognition of our own\nnecessity. The sense of our own emptiness must precede our grasp of His\nfulness. The conviction of our own insufficiency and sinfulness must\nprecede our casting ourselves on His mercy and righteousness. In all\nregions the consciousness of human want must go before the recognition\nof the divine supply.\n\nII. Now, note the still more abundant answer which that cry evokes.\n\nI said that the words on which I have been commenting thus far, seem to\nbreak in two the continuity of the stream of blessings and promises. But\nthere may be observed a certain distinction of tone between those\npromises which precede and those which follow the cry. Those that follow\nhave a certain elevation and depth, completeness and fulness, beyond\nthose that precede. This enhancing of the promises, following on the\nfaithful grasp of previous promises, suggests the thought that, when God\nis giving, and His servant thankfully accepts and garners up His gifts,\nHe opens His hand wider and gives more. When He pours His rain upon the\nunthankful and the evil, and they let the precious, fertilising drops\nrun to waste, there comes after a while a diminution of the blessing;\nbut they who store in patient and thankful hearts the faithful promises\nof God, have taken a sure way to make His gifts still larger and His\npromises still sweeter, and their fulfilment more faithful and precious.\n\nBut now notice the remarkable language in which this answer is couched.\n'Thou hast made the Most High thy Habitation, there shall no evil befall\nthee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.'\n\nDid you ever notice that there are two dwelling-places spoken of in this\nverse? 'Thou hast made the Most High thy Habitation'; 'There shall no\nplague come nigh thy dwelling.' The reference of the latter word to the\nformer one is even more striking if you observe that, literally\ntranslated, as in the Revised Version, it means a particular kind of\nabode--namely, a tent. 'Thou hast made the Most High thy habitation.'\nThe same word is employed in the 90th Psalm: 'Lord, Thou hast been our\nDwelling-place in all generations.' Beside that venerable and ancient\nabode, that has stood fresh, strong, incorruptible, and unaffected by\nthe lapse of millenniums, there stands the little transitory canvas tent\nin which our earthly lives are spent. We have two dwelling-places. By\nthe body we are brought into connection with this frail, evanescent,\nillusory outer world, and we try to make our homes out of shifting\ncloud-wrack, and dream that we can compel mutability to become\nimmutable, that we may dwell secure. But fate is too strong for us, and\nalthough we say that we will make our nest in the rocks, and shall never\nbe moved, the home that is visible and linked with the material passes\nand melts as a cloud. We need a better dwelling-place than earth and\nthat which holds to earth. We have God Himself for our true Home. Never\nmind what becomes of the tent, as long as the mansion stands firm. Do\nnot let us be saddened, though we know that it is canvas, and that the\nwalls will soon rot and must some day be folded up and borne away, if we\nhave the Rock of Ages for our dwelling-place.\n\nLet us abide in the Eternal God by the devotion of our hearts, by the\naffiance of our faith, by the submission of our wills, by the aspiration\nof our yearnings, by the conformity of our conduct to His will. Let us\nabide in the Eternal God, that 'when the earthly house of this\ntabernacle is dissolved,' we may enter into two buildings 'eternal in\nthe heavens'--the one the spiritual body which knows no corruption, and\nthe other the bosom of the Eternal God Himself. 'Because thou hast made\nHim thy Habitation,' that Dwelling shall suffer no evil to come near it\nor its tenant.\n\nStill further, notice the scope of this great promise. I suppose there\nis some reference in the form of it to the old story of Israel's\nexemption from the Egyptian plagues, and a hint that that might be taken\nas a parable and prophetic picture of what will be true about every man\nwho puts his trust in God. But the wide scope and the paradoxical\ncompleteness of the promise itself, instead of being a difficulty, point\nthe way to its true interpretation. 'There shall no plague come nigh thy\ndwelling'--and yet we are smitten down by all the woes that afflict\nhumanity. 'No evil shall befall thee'--and yet 'all the ills that flesh\nis heir to' are dealt out sometimes with a more liberal hand to them who\nabide in God than to them who dwell only in the tent upon earth. What\nthen? Is God true, or is He not? Did this psalmist mean to promise the\nvery questionable blessing of escape from all the good of the discipline\nof sorrow? Is it true, in the unconditional sense in which it is often\nasserted, that 'prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament, and\nadversity of the New'? I think not, and I am sure that this psalmist,\nwhen he said, 'there shall no evil befall thee, nor any plague come nigh\nthy dwelling,' was thinking exactly the same thing which Paul had in his\nmind when he said, 'All things work together for good to them that love\nGod, to them that are called according to His purpose.' If I make God my\nRefuge, I shall get something a great deal better than escape from\noutward sorrow--namely, an amulet which will turn the outward sorrow\ninto joy. The bitter water will still be given me to drink, but it will\nbe filtered water, out of which God will strain all the poison, though\nHe leaves plenty of the bitterness in it; for bitterness is a tonic. The\nevil that is in the evil will be taken out of it, in the measure in\nwhich we make God our Refuge, and 'all will be right that seems most\nwrong' when we recognise it to be 'His sweet will.'\n\nDear brother! the secret of exemption from every evil lies in no\npeculiar Providence, ordering in some special manner our outward\ncircumstances, but in the submission of our wills to that which the good\nhand of the Lord our God sends us for our good; and in cleaving close to\nHim as our Refuge. Nothing can be 'evil' which knits me more closely to\nGod; and whatever tempest drives me to His breast, though all the four\nwinds of the heavens strive on the surface of the sea, it will be better\nfor me than calm weather that entices me to stray farther away from Him.\n\nWe shall know that some day. Let us be sure of it now, and explain by it\nour earthly experience, even as we shall know it when we get up yonder\nand 'see all the way by which the Lord our God has led us.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE ANSWER TO TRUST\n\n\n    'Because he hath set his love upon Me, therefore will I deliver him:\n    I will set him on high, because he hath known My name.'\n    --PSALM xci. 14.\n\nThere are two voices speaking in the earlier part of this psalm: one\nthat of a saint who professes his reliance upon the Lord, his Fortress;\nand another which answers the former speaker, and declares that he shall\nbe preserved by God. In this verse, which is the first of the final\nportion of the psalm, we have a third voice--the voice of God Himself,\nwhich comes in to seal and confirm, to heighten and transcend, all the\npromises that have been made in His name. The first voice said of\nhimself, '_I_ will trust'; the second voice addresses that speaker, and\nsays, '_Thou_ shalt not be afraid'; the third voice speaks of him, and\nnot to him, and says, 'Because _he_ hath set his love upon Me, therefore\nwill I deliver him.'\n\nWhy does this divine voice speak thus indirectly of this blessing of His\nservant? I think partly because it heightens the majesty of the\nutterance, as if God spake to the whole universe about what He meant to\ndo for His friend who trusts Him; and partly because, in that general\nform of speech, there is really couched an 'whosoever'; and it applies\nto us all. If God had said, 'Because thou hast set thy love upon Me, I\nwill deliver thee,' it had not been so easy for us to put ourselves in\nthe place of the man concerning whom this great divine voice spoke; but\nwhen He says, 'Because _he_ hath set _his_ love upon Me,' in the 'he'\nthere lies 'everybody'; and the promise spoken before the universe as to\nHis servants is spoken universally to His servants.\n\nSo, then, these words seem to me to carry two thoughts: the first, what\nGod delights to find in a man; and the second, what God delights to give\nto the man in whom He finds it.\n\nI. Note, first, what God delights to find in man.\n\nThere is, if we may reverently say so, a tone of satisfaction in the\nwords, 'Because he hath set his love upon Me,' and 'because he hath\nknown My name.' Thus, then, there are two things that the great Father's\nheart seeks, and wheresoever it finds them, in however imperfect a\ndegree, He is glad, and lavishes upon such a one the most precious\nthings in His possession.\n\nWhat are these two things? Let us look at each of them. Now the word\nrendered 'set his love' includes more than is suggested by that\nrendering, beautiful as it is. It implies the binding or knitting\noneself to anything. Now, though love be the true cement by which men\nare bound to God, as it is the only real bond which binds men to one\nanother, yet the word itself covers a somewhat wider area than is\ncovered by the notion of love. It is not my love only that I am to\nfasten upon God, but my whole self that I am to bind to Him. God\ndelights in us when we cling to Him. There is a threefold kind of\nclinging, which I would urge upon you and upon myself.\n\nLet us cling to Him in our thoughts, hour by hour, moment by moment,\namidst all the distractions of daily life. Whilst there are other things\nthat must legitimately occupy our minds, let us see to it that, ever and\nanon, we turn ourselves away from these, and betake ourselves, with a\nconscious gathering in of our souls, to Him, and calm and occupy our\nhearts and minds with the bright and peaceful thoughts of a present God\never near us, and ever gracious to us. Life is but a dreary stretch of\nwilderness, unless all through it there be dotted, like a chain of ponds\nin a desert, these moments in which the mind fixes itself upon God, and\nloses sorrows and sins and weakness and all other sadnesses in the calm\nand blessed contemplation of His sweetness and sufficiency. The very\nheavens are bare and lacking in highest beauty, unless there stretch\nacross them the long lines of rosy-tinted clouds. And so across our\nskies let us cast a continuous chain of thoughts of God, and as we go\nabout our daily work, let us try to have our minds ever recurring to\nHim, like the linked pools that mirror heaven in the midst of the barren\ndesert, and bring a reflection of life into the midst of its death.\nCleave and cling to God, brother! by frequent thoughts of Him, diffused\nthroughout the whole continuity of the busy day.\n\nThen again, we might say, let us cleave to Him by our love, which is the\none bond of union, as I said, between man and God, as it is the one bond\nof union between man and man. 'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all\nthy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all\nthy strength,' was from the beginning the Alpha, and until the end will\nbe the Omega, of all true religion; and within the sphere of that\ncommandment lie all duty, all Christianity, all blessedness, and all\nlife. The heart that is divided is wretched; the heart that is\nconsecrated is at rest. The love that is partial is nought; the love\nthat is worth calling so is total and continuous. Let us cling to Him\nwith our thoughts; let us cling to Him with the tendrils of our hearts.\n\nLet us cleave to Him, still further, by the obedient contact of our\nwills with His, taking no commandments from men, and no overpowering\nimpressions from circumstances, and no orders from our own fancies and\ninclinations and tastes and lusts, but receiving all our instructions\nfrom our Father in heaven. There is no real contact between us and God,\nno real cleaving to Him, howsoever the thought of God may be in our\nminds, and some kind of imperfect love to Him may be supposed to be in\nour hearts, unless there be the absolute submission of our wills to His\nauthority; and only in the measure in which we are able to say, What He\ncommands I do, and what He sends I accept, and my will is in His hands\nto be moulded, do we really get close and keep close to our Father in\nthe heavens. He that hath brought himself into loving touch with God,\nand clings to Him in that threefold fashion, by thought, love, and\nsubmission, he, and only he, is so joined to the Lord as to be one\nSpirit.\n\nNow that is not a state to be won and kept without much vigorous,\nconscious effort. The nuts in a machine work loose; the knots in a rope\n'come untied,' as the children say. The hand that clasps anything, by\nslow and imperceptible degrees, loses muscular contraction, and the grip\nof the fingers becomes slacker. Our minds and affections and wills have\nthat same tendency to slacken their hold of what they grasp. Unless we\ntighten up the machine it will work loose; and unless we make conscious\nefforts to keep ourselves in touch with God, His hand will slip out of\nours before we know that it is gone, and we shall fancy that we feel the\nimpression of the fingers long after they have been taken away from our\nnegligent palms.\n\nBesides our own vagrancies, and the waywardness and wanderings of our\npoor, unreliable natures, there come in, of course, as hindrances, all\nthe interruptions and distractions of outside things, which work in the\nsame direction of loosening our hold on God. If the shipwrecked sailor\nis not to be washed off the raft he must tie himself on to it, and must\nsee that the lashings are reliable and the knots tight; and if we do not\nmean to be drifted away from God without knowing it, we must make very\nsure work of anchor and cable, and of our own hold on both. Effort is\nneeded, continuous and conscious, lest at any time we should slide away\nfrom Him. And this is what God delights to find: a mind and will that\nbind themselves to Him.\n\nThere is another thing in the text which, as I take it, is a consequence\nof that close union between man in his whole nature and God: 'I will set\nhim on high because he hath known My name.' Notice that the knowledge of\nthe name comes after, and not before, the setting of the love or the\nfixing of the nature upon God. God's 'name' is the same thing as His\nself-revelation or His manifested character. Then, does not every one to\nwhom that revelation is made know His name? Certainly not. The word\n'know' is here used in the same deep sense in which it is employed all\nbut uniformly in the New Testament--the same sense in which it is used\nin the writings of the Apostle John. It describes a knowledge which is a\ngreat deal more than a mere intellectual acquaintance with the facts of\ndivine revelation. Or, to put the thought into other words, this is a\nknowledge which comes after we have set our love upon God, a knowledge\nwhich is the child of love. We forget sometimes that it is a Person, and\nnot a system of truth, whom the Bible tells us we are to know. And how\ndo you know people? Only by familiar acquaintance with them. You might\nread a description of a man, perfectly accurate, sufficiently full, but\nyou would not therefore say you knew him. You might know about him, or\nfancy you did, but if you knew him, it would be because you had summered\nand wintered with him, and lived beside him, and were on terms of\nfamiliar acquaintance with him. As long as it is God and not theology,\nthe knowledge of whom makes religion, so long it will not be the head,\nbut the heart or spirit, that is the medium or organ by which we know\nHim. You have to become acquainted with Him and be very familiar with\nHim--that is to say, to fix your whole self upon Him--before you 'know'\nHim; and it is only the knowledge which is born of love and familiarity\nthat is worth calling knowledge at all. Just as with our earthly\nrelationships and acquaintances, only they who love a man or a woman\nknow such a one right down to the very depth of their being, so the one\nway to know God's name is to bind myself to Him with mind and heart and\nwill, as friends cleave to one another. Then I shall know Him and be\nknown of Him.\n\nStill further, this knowledge which God delights to find in us men, is a\nknowledge which is experience. There is all the difference between\nreading about a foreign country and going to see it with your own eyes.\nThe man that has been there knows it; the man that has not knows about\nit. And only he knows God to whom the commonplaces of religion have\nturned into facts which he verifies by his own experiences.\n\nIt is a knowledge, too, which influences life. Obviously the words of my\ntext look back to what the saint was represented as saying in an earlier\nportion of the psalm. Why does God declare that the man has set his love\nupon Him, and knows His name? Because the saint professed this, 'I will\nsay of the Lord, He is my Refuge and my Fortress.' These are His name.\nThe man knows it; he has it not only upon his lips, but in his heart,\nand feels that it is true, and acts accordingly. 'He is my Refuge and my\nFortress; my God, in Him will I trust.' The knowledge which God regards\nas knowledge of Him is one based upon experience and upon familiar\nacquaintance, and issuing in joyful recognition of my possession of Him\nas mine, and the outgoing of my confidence to Him. These are the things\nthat God desires and delights to find in men.\n\nII. Note, secondly, what God gives to the man in whom He finds such\nthings.\n\n'I will deliver him'; 'I will set him on high.' These two clauses are\nsubstantially parallel, and yet there is a difference between them, as\nis the nature of the parallelism of Hebrew poetry, where the same ideas\nare repeated with a shade of modification, and the second of them\nsomewhat surpassing the first. 'I will deliver him,' says the promise.\nThat confirms the view that the promise in the previous verse, 'There\nshall no plague come nigh thy dwelling,' does not mean exemption from\nsorrow and trial because, if so, there would be no relevancy or\nblessedness in the promise of deliverance. He who needs 'deliverance' is\nthe man who is surrounded by evils, and God's promise is not that no\nevil shall come to the man who trusts Him, but that he shall be\ndelivered out of the evil that does come, and that it will not be truly\nevil.\n\nAnd why is he to be delivered? 'Because he has bound himself to Me,'\nsays God, 'therefore will I deliver him.' Of course, if I am fastened to\nGod, nothing that does not hurt Him can hurt me. If I am knit to Him as\nclosely as this psalm contemplates, it is impossible but that out of His\nfulness my emptiness shall be filled, and with His rejoicing strength my\nweakness will be made strong. It is just the same idea as is given to us\nin the picture of Peter upon the water, when the cold waves are up to\nhis knees, and the coward heart says, 'I am ready to sink,' but yet,\nwith the faith that comes with the fear, he puts out his hand and grasps\nChrist's hand, and as soon as he does, and the two are united, he is\nbuoyant, and rises again, and the water is beneath the soles of his\nfeet. 'He sent from above, He took me; He drew me out of many waters.'\nWhoever is joined to God is lifted above all evil, and the evil that\ncontinues to eddy about him will change its character, and bear him\nonwards to his haven. For he who is thus knit to God in the living,\npulsating bond of thought and affection and submission, will be\ndelivered from sin.\n\nWhen a boy first learns to skate, he needs some one to go behind him and\nhold him up whilst he uses his unaccustomed limbs; and so, when we are\nupon the smooth, treacherous ice of this wicked world, it is by leaning\non God that we are kept upright. 'He hath set himself close to Me, I\nwill deliver him,' says God. 'Yea! he shall not fall, for the Lord is\nable to make him stand.'\n\nStill further, we have another great promise, which is the explanation\nand extension of the former, 'I will set him on high, because he hath\nknown My name.' That is more than lifting a man up above the reach of\nthe storms of life by means of any external deliverance. There is a\nbetter thing than that--namely, that our whole inward life be lived\nloftily. If it is true of us that we know His name, then our lives are\n'hid with Christ in God,' and far below our feet will be all the riot of\nearth and its noise and tumult and change. We shall live serene and\nuplifted lives on the mount, if we know His name and have bound\nourselves to Him, and the troubles and cares and changes and duties and\njoys of this present will be away down below us, like the lowly cottages\nin some poor village, seen from the mountain top, the squalor out of\nsight, the magnitude diminished, the noise and tumult dimmed to a mere\nmurmur that interrupts not the sacred silence of the lofty peak where we\ndwell with God. 'I will set him on high because he knows My name.'\n\nThen, perhaps, there is a hint in the words, as there is in subsequent\nwords of the verse, of an elevation even higher than that, when, life\nended and earth done, He shall receive into His glory those whom He hath\nguided by His counsel. 'I will set him on high, because he hath known My\nname,' says the Jehovah of the Old Covenant. 'To him that overcometh\nwill I grant to sit with Me on My throne,' says the Jesus of the New,\nwho is the Jehovah of the Old.\n\n\n\n\nWHAT GOD WILL DO FOR US\n\n\n    'He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in\n    trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him. 16. With long life will\n    I satisfy him, and show him My salvation.'--PSALM xci. 15, 16.\n\nWhen considering the previous verses of this psalm, I pointed out that\nat its close we have God's own voice coming in to confirm and expand the\npromises which, in the earlier portion of it, have been made in His name\nto the devout heart. The words which we have now to consider cover the\nwhole range of human life and need, and may be regarded as being a\npicture of the sure and blessed consequences of keeping our hearts fixed\nupon our Father, God. He Himself speaks them, and His word is true.\n\nThe verses of the text fall into three portions. There are promises for\nthe suppliant, promises for the troubled, promises for mortals. 'He\nshall call upon Me and I will answer him'; that is for the suppliant. 'I\nwill be with him in trouble; I will deliver him and honour him'; that is\nfor the distressed. 'With long life will I satisfy him, and show him My\nsalvation'; that is for the mortal. Now let us look at these three.\n\nI. The promise to the suppliant.\n\n'He will call upon Me and I will answer.' We may almost regard the first\nof these two clauses as part of the promise. It is not merely a Hebrew\nway of putting a supposition, 'If he calls upon Me, then I will answer\nhim,' nor merely a virtual commandment, 'Call, if you expect an answer,'\nbut itself is a part of the blessing and privilege of the devout and\nfaithful heart. 'He shall call upon Me'; the King opens the door of His\nchamber and beckons us within.\n\nIn these great words we may see set forth both the instinct, as I may\ncall it, of prayer, and the privilege of access to God. If a man's heart\nis set upon God, his very life-breath will be a cry to His Father. He\nwill experience a need which is not degraded by being likened to an\ninstinct, for it acts as certainly as do the instincts of the lower\ncreatures, which guide them by the straightest possible road to the\nsurest supply of their need. Any man who has learned in any measure to\nlove God and trust Him will, in the measure in which he has so learned,\nlive in the exercise and habit  of prayer; and it will be as much his\ninstinct to cry to God in all changing circumstances as it is for the\nswallows to seek the sunny south when the winter comes, or the cold\nnorth when the sunny south becomes torrid and barren. So, then, 'He\nshall call upon Me' is the characteristic of the truly God-knowing and\nGod-loving heart, which was described in the previous verse. 'Because he\nhas clung to Me in love, therefore will I deliver him; because he has\nknown My name, therefore will I set him on high,' and because he has\nclung and known therefore it is certain that He will 'call upon Me.'\n\nMy friend! do you know anything of that instinctive appeal to God? Does\nit come to your heart and to your lips without your setting yourself to\npray, just as the thought of dear ones on earth comes stealing into our\nminds a hundred times a day, when we do not intend it nor know exactly\nhow it has come? Does God suggest Himself to you in that fashion, and is\nthe instinct of your hearts to call upon Him?\n\nAgain, we see here not only the unveiling of the very deepest and most\ncharacteristic attribute of the devout soul, but also the assurance of\nthe privilege of access. God lets us speak to Him. And there is,\nfurther, a wonderful glimpse into the very essence of true prayer. 'He\nshall call upon Me.' What for? No particular object is specified as\nsought. It is God whom we want, and not merely any things that even He\ncan give. If asking for these only or mainly is our conception of what\nprayer is, we know little about it. True prayer is the cry of the soul\nfor the living God, in whom is all that it needs, and out of whom is\nnothing that will do it good. 'He shall call upon Me,' that is prayer.\n\n'I will answer him.' Yes! Of course the instinct is not all on one side.\nIf the devout heart yearns for God, God longs for the devout heart. If I\nmight use such a metaphor, just as the ewe on one side of the hedge\nhears and answers the bleating of its lamb on the other, so, if my heart\ncries out for the living God, anything is more credible than that such a\ncry should not be answered. You may not get this, that, or the other\nblessing which you ask, for perhaps they are not blessings. You may not\nget what you fancy you need. We are not always good at translating our\nneeds into words, and it is a mercy that there is Some One that\nunderstands what we do want a great deal better than we do ourselves.\nBut if below the specific petition there lies the cry of a heart that\ncalls for the living God, then whether the specific petition be answered\nor dispersed into empty air will matter comparatively little. 'He shall\ncall upon Me,' and that part of his prayer 'I will answer' and come to\nhim and be in him. Is that our experience of what it is to pray, and our\nnotion of what it is to be answered?\n\nII. Further, here we have a promise for suppliants.\n\nI take the next three clauses of the text as being all closely\nconnected. 'I will be with him in trouble. I will deliver him and honour\nhim'--in trouble, His presence; from trouble, His deliverance; after\ntrouble, glorifying and refining. There are the whole theory and process\nof the discipline of the devout man's life.\n\n'I will be with him in trouble.' The promise is not only that, when\ntrials of any kind, larger or smaller, more grave or more slight, fall\nupon us, we shall become more conscious, if we take them rightly, of\nGod's presence, but that all which is meant by God's presence shall\nreally be more fully ours, and that He is, if I may say so, actually\nnearer us. Though, of course, all words about being near or far have\nonly a very imperfect application to our relation to Him, still the\ngifts that are meant by His presence--that is to say, His sympathy, His\nhelp, His love--are more fully given to a man who in the darkness is\ngroping for his Father's hand, and yet not so much groping for as\ngrasping it. He _is_ nearer us as well as _felt_ to be nearer us, if we\ntake our sorrows rightly. The effect of sorrow devoutly borne, in\nbringing God closer to us, belongs to it, whether it be great or small;\nwhether it be, according to the metaphor of an earlier portion of this\npsalm, 'a lion or an adder'; or whether it be a buzzing wasp or a\nmosquito. As long as anything troubles me, I may make it a means of\nbringing God closer to myself.\n\nTherefore, there is no need for any sorrowful heart ever to say, 'I am\nsolitary as well as sad.' He will always come and sit down by us, and if\nit be that, like poor Job upon his dunghill, we are not able to bear the\nword of consolation, yet He will wait there till we are ready to take\nit. He is there all the same, though silent, and will be near all of us,\nif only we do not drive Him away. 'He will call upon Me and I will\nanswer him'; and the beginning of the answer is the real presence of God\nwith every troubled heart.\n\nThen there follows the next stage, deliverance from trouble; 'I will\n_deliver_ him.' That is not the same word as is employed in the previous\nverse, though it is translated in the same way in our Bibles. The word\nhere means lifting up out of a pit, or dragging up out of the midst of\nanything that surrounds a man, and so setting him in some place of\nsafety. Is this promise always true, about people who in sorrow of any\nkind cast themselves upon God? Do they always get deliverance from Him?\nThere are some sorrows from the pressure of which we shall never escape.\nSome of us have to carry such. Has this promise no application to the\npeople for whom outward life can never bring an end of the sorrows and\nburdens that they carry? Not so. He will deliver us not only by taking\nthe burden off our backs, but by making us strong to carry it, and the\nsorrow, which has changed from wild and passionate weeping into calm\nsubmission, is sorrow from which we have been delivered. The serpent may\nstill wound our heel, but if God be with us He will give us strength to\npress the wounded heel on the malignant head, and we can squeeze all the\npoison out of it. The bitterness remains; be it so, but let us be quite\nsure of this, that though sorrow be lifelong, that does not in the least\ncontradict the great and faithful promise, 'I will be with him in\ntrouble and deliver him,' for where He is _there_ is deliverance.\n\nLastly, there is the third of these promises for the troubled. 'I will\nhonour him.' The word translated 'honour' is more correctly rendered\n'glorify.' Is not that the end of a trouble which has been borne in\ncompany with Him; and from which, because it has been so borne, a devout\nheart is delivered even whilst it lasts? Does not all such sorrow\nhallow, ennoble, refine, purify the sufferer, and make him liker his\nGod? 'He for our profit, that we should be partakers of His holiness.'\nIs not that God's way of glorifying us before heaven's glory? When a\nblunt knife is ground upon a wheel, the sparks fly fast from the edge\nheld down upon the swiftly-revolving emery disc, but that is the only\nway to sharpen the dull blade. Friction, often very severe friction, and\nheat are indispensable to polish the shaft and turn the steel into a\nmirror that will flash back the sunshine. So when God holds us to His\ngrindstone, it is to get a polish on the surface. 'I will deliver him\nand I will glorify him.'\n\nIII. Last of all, we have the promise for mortals.\n\n'With long life will I satisfy him, and show him My salvation.' I do not\nknow whether by that first clause the Psalmist meant, as people who\nsometimes like to make the Psalmist mean as little as possible tell us\nthat he did mean, simply 'length of days.' For my own part I do not\nbelieve that he did. He meant that, no doubt, for longevity was part of\nthe Old Testament promises for this life. But 'length of days' does not\n'satisfy' all old people who attain to it, and that 'satisfaction'\nnecessarily implies something more than the prolongation of the physical\nlife to old age. The idea contained in this promise may be illustrated\nby the expression which is used in reference to a select few of the Old\nTestament saints, of whom it is recorded that they died 'full of days.'\nThat does not merely mean that they had many days, but that, whatever\nthe number, they had as many as they wished, and departed unreluctantly,\nhaving had enough of life. They looked back, and saw that all the past\nhad been very good, and that goodness and mercy had determined and\naccompanied all their days, and so they did not wish to linger longer\nhere, but closed their eyes in peace, with no hungry, vain cravings for\nprolonged life. They had got all out of the world which it could give,\nand were contented to have done with it all.\n\nSo this promise assures us that, if we are of those who, in the midst of\nfleeting days, lay hold on the 'Ancient of Days' and live by Him, we\nshall find a table spread in the wilderness, and like travellers in an\ninn, having eaten enough, shall willingly obey the call to leave the\nmeal provided on the road, and pass into the Father's house, and sit at\nthe bountiful feast there.\n\nThe heart that lives near God, whether its years be few or many, will\nfind in life all that life is capable of giving, and when the end comes\nwill not be unwilling that it should come, nor hold on desperately to\nthe last fag-end and fragment of life that it can keep within its\nclutches, but will be satisfied to have lived and be contented to die.\n\nNor is this all, for says the Psalmist, 'I will show him My salvation.'\nThat sight comes after he is satisfied with length of days here. And so\nI think the fair interpretation of the words, in their place in this\npsalm, is, that however dimly, yet certainly, here the Psalmist saw\nsomething beyond. It was not a black curtain which dropped at death. He\nbelieved that, yonder, the man who here had been living near God,\ncalling to Him, realising His presence, and satisfied with the fatness\nof His house upon earth, would see something that would satisfy him\nmore. 'I shall be satisfied when I awake in Thy likeness.' That is\nsatisfaction indeed, and the vision, which is possession, of that\nperfected salvation is the vision that makes the blessedness of heaven.\n\nSo, dear friends! we, if we will, may have access to God's chamber at\nevery moment, and may have His presence, which will make it impossible\nthat we should ever be alone. We may have Him to deliver us from all the\nevil that is in evil, and to turn it into good. We may have Him to\npurge, and cleanse, and uplift, and change us into His likeness, even by\nthe ministry of our trials. We may get out of life the last drop of the\nsweetness that He has put in it; and when it comes to a close, may say,\n'It is enough! Let Thy servant depart in peace; for mine eyes have seen\nThy salvation,' and then we may go to see it better in that world where\nwe shall all, if we attain thither, be 'satisfied' when we 'awake in His\nlikeness.'\n\n\n\n\nFORGIVENESS AND RETRIBUTION\n\n\n    'Thou wast a God that forgavest them, though Thou tookest vengeance\n    of their inventions.'--PSALM xcix. 8.\n\nWhen the prophet Isaiah saw the great vision which called him to\nservice, he heard from the lips of the seraphim around the Throne the\nthreefold ascription of praise: 'Holy! holy! holy! Lord God of hosts.'\nThis psalm seems to be an echo of that heavenly chorus, for it is\ndivided into three sections, each of which closes with the refrain, 'He\nis holy,' and each of which sets forth some one aspect or outcome of\nthat divine holiness. In the first part the holiness of His universal\ndominion is celebrated; in the second, the holiness of His revelations\nand providences to Israel, His inheritance; in the third, the holiness\nof His dealings with them that call upon His name, both when He forgives\ntheir sins and when He scourges for the sins that He has forgiven.\n\nTwo remarks of an expository character will prepare the way for what I\nhave further to say. The first is that the word 'though' in my text,\nwhich holds together the two statements that it contains, is commentary\nrather than translation. For the original has the simple 'and,' and the\ndifference between the two renderings is this, that 'though' implies\nsome real or apparent contrariety between forgiveness and taking\nvengeance, which makes their co-existence remarkable, whereas 'and' lays\nthe two things down side by side. The Psalmist simply declares that they\nare both there, and puts in no such fine distinction as is represented\nby the words 'though,' or 'but,' or 'yet.' To me it seems a great deal\nmore eloquent in its simplicity and reticence that he should say, 'Thou\nforgavest them and tookest vengeance,' than that he should say 'Thou\nforgavest them though Thou tookest vengeance.'\n\nThen there is another point to be noted, viz. we must not import into\nthat word 'vengeance,' when it is applied to divine actions, the notions\nwhich cluster round it when it is applied to ours. For in its ordinary\nuse it means retaliation, inflicted at the bidding of personal enmity or\npassion. But there are no turbid elements of that sort in God. His\nretribution is a great deal more analogous to the unimpassioned,\nimpersonal action of public law than it is to the 'wild justice of\nrevenge.' When we speak of His 'vengeance' we simply mean--unless we\nhave dropped into a degrading superstition--the just recompense of\nreward which divinely dogs all sin. There is one saying in Scripture\nwhich puts the whole matter in its true light, 'Vengeance is Mine; I\nwill repay,' saith the Lord; the last clause of which interprets the\nfirst. So, then, with these elucidations, we may perhaps see a little\nmore clearly the sequence of the Psalmist's thought here--God's\nforgiveness, and co-existing with that, God's scourging of the sin which\nHe forgives; and both His forgiveness and the scourging, the efflux and\nthe manifestation of the divine holiness. Now just let us look at these\nthoughts. Here we have--\n\nI. The adoring contemplation of the divine forgiveness.\n\nI suppose that is almost exclusively a thought due to the historical\nrevelation, through the ages, to Israel, crowned, as well as deepened,\nby the culmination and perfecting of the eternal revelation of God in\nJesus Christ our Lord. I suppose the conception of a forgiving God is\nthe product of the Old and of the New Testament. But familiar as the\nword is to us, and although the thing that it means is embodied in the\ncreed of Christendom, 'I believe ... in the forgiveness of sins,' I\nthink that a great many of us would be somewhat put to it, if we were\ncalled upon to tell definitely and clearly what we mean when we speak of\nthe forgiveness of sins. Many of us, prior to thinking about the matter,\nwould answer 'the non-infliction or remission of penalty.' And I am far\nfrom denying that that is an element in forgiveness, although it is the\nlowest and the most external, in both the Old Testament and the New\nTestament conception of it. But we must rise a great deal higher than\nthat. We are entitled, by our Lord's teaching, to parallel God's\nforgiveness and man's forgiveness; and so perhaps the best way to\nunderstand the perfect type of forgiveness is to look at the imperfect\ntypes which we see round us. What, then, do we mean by human\nforgiveness? It is seen in multitudes of cases where there is no\nquestion at all of penalty. Two men get alienated from one another. One\nof them does something which the other thinks is a sin against\nfriendship or loyalty, and he who is sinned against says, 'I forgive\nyou.' That does not mean that he does not inflict a penalty, because\nthere is no penalty in question. Forgiveness is not a matter of conduct,\nthen, primarily, but it is a matter of disposition, of attitude, or, to\nput it into a shorter word, it is a matter of the heart; and even on the\nlower level of the human type, we see that remission of penalty may be a\npart, sometimes is and sometimes is not, but is always the smallest part\nof it, and a derivative and secondary result of something that went\nbefore. An unconscious recognition of this attitude of mind and heart,\nas being the essential thing in forgiveness, brings about an instance of\nthe process by which two words that originally mean substantially the\nsame thing come to acquire each its special shade of meaning. What I\nrefer to is this--when a judicial sentence on a criminal is remitted, we\nnever hear any one speak about the criminal being 'forgiven.' We keep\nthe word 'pardon,' in our daily conventional intercourse, for slight\noffences or for the judicial remission of a sentence. The king pardons a\ncriminal; you never hear about the king 'forgiving' a criminal. And\nthat, as I take it, is just because people have been groping after the\nthought that I am trying to bring out, viz. that the remission of\npenalty is one thing, and purging the heart of all alienation and hatred\nis another; and that the latter is forgiveness, whilst the former has to\nbe content with being pardon.\n\nThe highest type of forgiveness is the paternal. Every one of us who\nremembers our childhood, and every one of us who has had children of his\nown, knows what paternal forgiveness is. It is not when you put away the\nrod that the little face brightens again and the tears cease to flow,\nbut it is when _your_ face clears, and the child knows that there is no\ncloud between it and the father, or still more the mother, that\nforgiveness is realised. The immediate effect of our transgressions is\nthat we, as it were, thereby drop a great, black rock into the stream of\nthe divine love, and the channel is barred by our action; and God's\nforgiveness is when, as was the case in another fashion in the Deluge,\nthe floods rise above the tops of the highest hills; and as the good old\nhymn that has gone out of fashion nowadays, says, over sins:\n\n  'Like the mountains for their size,\n   The seas of sovereign grace arise.'\n\nWhen the love of God flows over the black rock, as the incoming tide\ndoes over some jagged reef, then, and not merely when the rod is put on\nthe shelf, is forgiveness bestowed and received.\n\nBut, as I have said, the remission of penalty _is_ an element in\nforgiveness. Some people say: 'It is a very dangerous thing, in the\ninterests of Christian truth, to treat that relation of a loving Father\nas if it expressed all that God is to men.' Quite so; God is King as\nwell as Father. There are analogies, both in paternal and regal\ngovernment, which help us to understand the divine dealings with us;\nthough, of course, in regard to both we must always remember that the\nanalogies are remote and not to be pressed too far. But even in\nrecognising the fact that an integral part of forgiveness is remission\nof penalty, we come back, by another path, to the same point, that the\nessence of forgiveness is the uninterrupted flow of love. Remission of\npenalty;--yes, by all means. But then the question comes, what _is_ the\npenalty of sin? And I suppose that the deepest answer to that is,\nseparation from God. But if the true New Testament conception of the\npenalty of sin is the eternal death which is the result of the rending\nof a man away from the Source of life, then the remission of the penalty\nis precisely identical with the uninterrupted flow of the divine love.\nThe mists of autumnal mornings drape the sky in gloom, and turn the\nblessed sun itself into a lurid ball of fire. Sweep away the mists, and\nits rays again pour out beneficence. The man who sins, piles up, as it\nwere, a cloud-bank between himself and God, and forgiveness, which is\nthe remission of the penalty, is the sweeping away of the cloud-bank,\nand the pouring out of sunshine upon a darkened heart. So, brethren! the\nessence of forgiveness is that God shall love me all the same, though I\nsin against Him.\n\nBut now turn, in the next place, to\n\nII. God's scourging of the sin which He forgives.\n\nLook at the instances in our psalm, 'Moses and Aaron among His\npriests.... They called upon the Lord and He answered them. Thou wast a\nGod that forgavest them, and Thou tookest vengeance of their doings.'\nMoses dies on Pisgah, Aaron is stripped of his priestly robes by his\nbrother's hand and left alone amongst the clouds and the eagles, on the\nsolitary summit of the mountain, and yet Moses and Aaron knew themselves\nforgiven the sins for which they died those lonely deaths. And these are\nbut instances of what is universally true, that the sin which is\npardoned is also 'avenged' in the sense of having retribution dealt out\nto it.\n\nI need not dwell upon this at any length, but let me just remind you how\nthere are two provinces of human experience in which this is abundantly\ntrue: one, that of outward consequences, and another that of inward\nconsequences. Take, for instance, two men, boon companions, who together\nhave wasted their substance in riotous living. One of them is converted,\nas we call it, becomes a Christian, knows himself forgiven. The other\none is not. Is the one less certain to have a corrugated liver than the\nother? Will the disease, the pauperism, the ruined position in life, the\nloss of reputation be any different in the cases of him who is pardoned\nand of him who is not? No; the two will suffer in a similar fashion, and\nthe different attitude that the one has to the divine love from that\nwhich the other has, will not make a hair of difference as to the\nresults that follow. The consequences are none the less divine\nretribution because they are the result of natural laws, and none the\nless penal because they are automatically inflicted.\n\nThere is another department in which we see the same law working, and\nthat is the inward consequences. A man does change his attitude to his\nformer sins, when he knows that he is pardoned; but the results of these\nsins will follow all the same, whether he is forgiven or not. Memory\nwill be tarnished, habits will be formed and chain a man, capacities\nwill be forfeited, weaknesses will ensue. The wounds may be healed, but\nthe scars will remain, and when we consider how certainly, and as I\nsaid, divinely, such issues dog all manner of transgression, we can\nunderstand what the Psalmist meant when, not thinking about a future\nretribution, but about the present life's experiences, he said, 'Thou\nwast a God that forgavest them, and Thou tookest vengeance of their\ninventions.' 'The sluggard will not plough by reason of the cold,\ntherefore shall he beg in harvest, and have nothing,' and that will be\nhis case whether he is forgiven, or not forgiven, by the divine love.\n\nSo, dear friends! do not let us confound the two things which are so\nwidely separated, the flow of the divine love to us irrespective of our\nsins, which is the true forgiveness, and the remission of the penalty,\nthe infliction of which may itself be a part of forgiveness. 'Whatsoever\na man soweth that shall he also reap,' and he will reap it whether he\nhas sown darnel and tares and poisonous seeds, of which he is now\nashamed, and for which he has received forgiveness, or whether he has\nnot asked nor received it.\n\nOnly remember that if we humbly realise the great fact that God has\nforgiven us, we can, as they say, 'take our punishment' in an altogether\ndifferent spirit and temper, and it comes to be, not judicial penalty,\nbut paternal chastisement, the token of love, and of which we can say\nthat 'We are judged of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with\nthe world.'\n\nLastly, my text leads us to think of--\n\nIII. Forgiveness and scourging as both issues of holy love.\n\nSome people, in their narrow and altogether superficial view of\nChristianity, would divide between the two, and say forgiveness comes\nfrom God's love, and scourging comes from His holiness. But this psalm\nputs the two together, just as we must put together as inseparable from\neach other the two conceptions of holiness and of love. Now our modern\nnotions of what is meant by the love of God are a great deal too\nsentimental and gushing and limp. Love is degraded unless there be\nholiness in it. It becomes immoral good nature, much more than anything\nthat deserves the name of love. A God who is all love, so much so that\nit makes no difference to Him whether a man is a saint or a sinner, is\nnot a God to be worshipped, and scarcely a God to be admired. He is\nlower than we, not higher. But His holy love is like a sea of glass\nmingled with fire; the love being shot all through, as it were, with\nstreams of flame.\n\nThis holy love underlies the forgiveness of sins. To forgive may\nsometimes be profoundly right; it may sometimes be profoundly immoral. A\ngeneral gaol delivery simply sets the scoundrels free; a universal\namnesty is a failure of justice, and a very doubtful benefit. But the\nforgiveness, which is the issue of holy love, is a means to an end, and\nthe end which it has in view is that, drawn by answering love to a\npardoning God, we may be drawn from the sins which alienate us from Him.\nThere is no such sure way of making a man forsake his sins as to give\nhim the assurance that God has forgiven them. 'Thou shalt be ashamed and\nconfounded, and never open thy mouth any more, because of thy sins,\nwhen'--I smite? no--'I am pacified towards thee for all that thou hast\ndone.' 'Thou wast a God that forgavest them,' and in the very act of\nforgiving, didst draw them from their sins.\n\nThat holy love, in like manner, underlies retribution. I have been\nspeaking of retribution mainly as it is seen in the working of natural\nlaw. It is none the less God's act, because it is the operation of the\nlaws which He impressed upon His creation at the beginning. You have\nweaving machines in your mills that whenever a thread breaks, stop dead.\nIs it the machine or the maker that is to get the credit of that? God\nhas set us in an order of things wherein, and has given us a nature\nwhereby, automatically, every sin, as it were, stops the loom, and\n'every transgression and disobedience receives its just recompense of\nreward.' But men sometimes say 'that is Nature; that is not God.' God\nlies at the back of Nature, and works through Nature. Although Nature is\nnot God, God is Nature. Therefore it is 'Thou' that 'takest vengeance of\ntheir inventions.' Let us, then, remember that retribution is a token of\nlove, meant to drive us from our sins, just as forgiveness is meant to\ndraw us from them. Our Psalmist had come the length of putting these two\nthings together, forgiveness and retribution. We have reached further,\nand here is the New Testament enlargement and deepening and explanation\nof the Old Testament thought: 'If we confess our sins, He is faithful\nand just to forgive us our sins,' and in the very act, 'to cleanse us\nfrom all unrighteousness.' 'If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the\nFather, Jesus Christ the Righteous.'\n\n\n\n\nINVIOLABLE MESSIAHS AND PROPHETS\n\n\n    'He reproved kings for their sakes; 15. Saying, Touch not Mine\n    anointed, and do My prophets no harm.'--PSALM cv. 14, 15.\n\nThe original reference of these words is to the fathers of the Jewish\npeople--the three wandering shepherds, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The\nPsalmist transfers to them the great titles which properly belong to a\nlater period of Jewish history. None of the three were ever in the\nliteral sense of the word 'anointed,' but all the three had what\nanointing symbolised. None of them were in the literal or narrow sense\nof the word 'prophets'--that is to say, predicters of future events--but\none of them was called a 'prophet' even in his lifetime. And they all\npossessed that intimacy of communion with God which imparted the power\nof _forth-speaking for_ Him. Insignificant as they were, they were\nbigger than the Pharaohs and Abimelechs and the other kinglets that\nstrutted their little day beside them. Astonished as the monarch of\nEgypt would have been, or the king of the Philistines either, if he had\nbeen told that the wandering shepherd was of far more importance for the\nworld than he was, it was true. 'He suffered no man to do them wrong:\nyea, He reproved kings for their sakes, saying, Touch not Mine anointed,\nand do My prophets no harm.'\n\nFurther, as Judaism, with its anointings and prophecies was a narrower\nsystem following upon a wider one, so a wider one has succeeded it; and\nwe step into the position occupied by these patriarchs--on whose heads\nno anointing oil had been poured, and into whose lips no supernatural\ngifts of prediction had been infused. It is no arrogance, but the\nsimplest recognition of the essential facts of the case, if we take\nthese words of the Psalmist's and transfer them bodily to the whole mass\nof Christian people, and to each individual atom that makes up the mass.\nAll are anointed; all are prophets; of all it is true that God suffers\nno man nor thing to do them wrong. And kings and dynasties and the\npolitics of the world are all in the hands of One whose supreme purpose\nis that through men there may be made known to all mankind the\nsignificant tidings of His love. Therefore, His Church is founded upon a\nrock, and earth is the servant of the servants of God.\n\nI. Every Christian is a 'messiah.'\n\nYou know that the word 'anointed' is a translation of the Hebrew word\n'Messiah,' or of the Greek word 'Christ.' The meaning of the symbolic\n'anointing' was simply consecration to office by the divine will, and\nendowment with the capacity for that office by the divine gift. In the\nancient system it was mainly employed--though not, perhaps,\nexclusively--as a means of designating, and when received in humble\ndependence on God, of fitting, a man for the two great offices of king\nand priest.\n\nOil was an appropriate symbol. Its gentle flow, its soothing, suppling\neffect, and in another aspect, its value as a means of invigoration and\nsustenance, and in yet another, as a source of light, peculiarly adapted\nit to be an emblem of the bestowment on a patient and trustful and\nsubmissive heart that was saying, 'Lord, take me, and use me as Thou\nwilt,' of that divine Spirit by whose silent, sweet, soft-flowing,\nstrong influences men were prepared for God's service.\n\nJesus was the Christ, the Messias, because that Divine Spirit dwelt in\nHim without measure. If we are Christians in the real sense of the word,\nthen, however imperfectly, yet really, and by God's grace increasingly,\nthere is such a union between us and our Saviour as that into us there\ndoes flow the anointing of His Spirit. There being a community of life\nderived from the Source of Life, it is no presumption to say that every\nChristian man is a Christ.\n\nThe word has been used of late with unwise significations, but the truth\nthat has been inadequately expressed by such uses is the great truth of\nScripture; 'He that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit,' and there does\nflow the anointing oil from the head of the High Priest to the skirts of\nthe garments. Every man and woman who has any hold of Jesus Christ at\nall, in the measure of his or her hold, is drawing from Him this\n'unction of the Holy One.' So, brethren, rise to the solemnity, the\nawfulness, the joyfulness of your true position, and understand that\nyou, too, are anointed, though not for the same purposes (and in humbler\nand derived fashion), for which the Spirit dwelt without measure upon\n'the First-born among many brethren.'\n\nKings were anointed; and when that divine gift comes into a man's heart,\nit, and as I believe, only it, makes him lord of himself, of\ncircumstances, of time, and of the world. 'All things are yours, and ye\nare Christ's.' There is one real royalty--the royalty of the man who\nrules because he submits. Every Christian soul may be described as\nGideon's brethren were described, 'As thou art, so were they: each one\nresembled the children of a king,' for if Christ's Spirit is in the\nChristian's spirit, the disciple will grow like his Master, and it will\nbe growingly true of us, that 'as He is, so are we in this world.'\n\nPriests were anointed. And we, if we are Christian people, have the\nprerogative of direct access to the Divine Presence, and need neither\nChurch nor sacraments to intervene or mediate between us and Him. The\ntrue democracy of Christianity lies in that word 'Mine anointed.'\n\nII. Further, every Christian man is a prophet.\n\nI have already said that there is no historical warrant for supposing\nthat the gift of prophecy, in its narrower sense, was ever bestowed upon\nany of these patriarchs. But prediction is only one corner of the\nprophetic office. The word is connected with a root which means 'to\nboil, or bubble like a fountain,' and it expresses, not so much the\ntheme of the utterance as its nature. The welling up, from a full heart,\nof God's thoughts and God's truth, that is prophecy. The patriarchs were\nprophets, not in the sense that they had the gift of beholding and\nforetelling visions of the future, and all the wonder that should be,\nbut in the higher sense--for it is the higher as well as broader--of\nbeing bearers of a divine word, breathed into them by that anointing\nSpirit, that it might be uttered forth by them. That sort of prophetic\ninspiration belongs to all Christians. It is the result of the\nrelationship between Christ and Christians of which we have been\nspeaking. Every one who has been anointed will be thus gifted.\n\nGod's 'messiahs' will be God's prophets. If we are in touch with God,\nand have our hearts and whole spiritual natures drawn and kept so near\nHim as that we are ever receiving from Him of His transcendent and\nmysterious life, then silence will be impossible. The lips will not be\nable to contain themselves, but will speak forth that of which the heart\nis full. And thus every Christian man, in the measure of his true\nChristianity, will be a prophet of the most High.\n\nI do not need to point the lesson. A silent Christian is an anomaly, a\ncontradiction in terms, as much as black light, or dark stars. If Christ\nis in you He will come out of you. If your hearts are full the crystal\ntreasure will flow over the brim. It is easy to be dumb when you have\nnothing to say, and that is the condition of hundreds of people who\nfancy themselves to be, and are called by others, 'Christians.' 'Mine\nanointed' cannot help being 'My prophets.' If you are not prophets, if\nthere never is any bubbling up of the fountain demanding utterance, ask\nyourselves whether there is any fountain there at all.\n\nIII. And so, lastly, every Christian man, in his double  capacity of\nanointed and prophet, is watched over by God.\n\nOne is tempted to diverge into wider considerations, and speak of the\nrelative importance of things secular and sacred (to adopt a doubtful\ndistinction) in the history of the world, and how the former are for the\nsake of the latter. But I do not yield to the temptation. Let me rather\ntake the thought here as it applies to our own little lives.\n\nAbraham more than once in his lifetime, though sometimes by his own\nfault, was brought into very perilous places. There are one or two\nincidents which are familiar to most of us, I dare say, in his life\nwhich are evidently referred to in the phrase 'He reproved kings for\ntheir sakes.' The principle remains in full force to-day, and God says\nto every thing and person, Death included, 'Do My prophets no harm.'\nThey may slay; they cannot harm. If I might use a very homely metaphor,\nsportsmen train retriever dogs to bring their game without ruffling a\nfeather. God trains evils and sorrows to lay hold of us, and bring us\nto, and lay us down at, His feet untouched.\n\nThere is no real harm in so-called evil. That is the interpretation that\nChristianity gives to such words as this of my text, not because it is\nforced to weaken them by the obstinate facts of life, but because it has\nlearned to strengthen them by the understanding of what is harm and what\nis good; what is gain and what is loss. Peter shall be delivered out of\nprison by the skin of his teeth when they are hammering at the scaffold\non the other side of the wall, and the dawn is just beginning to show\nitself in the sky; whilst James shall have his head cut off. Was that\nbecause God loved Peter better than James? Was one harmed and the other\nnot? Ah! Peter's turn came all in good time. Peter and his brother Paul\nhad both to bow their necks to the headsman's sword one day, although\none of them said, 'Who shall harm you if ye be followers of that which\nis good?' and the other said, when within sight of his death, 'He shall\ndeliver me from every evil work.' Were they disappointed? Let us hear\nhow Paul ends the same verse: 'and shall save me into His heavenly\nkingdom.' Ay! and he _was_ 'saved into the heavenly kingdom' when\noutside the walls of Rome; where a gaudy church stands now, he died for\nhis Master. No harm came to him. God said to Death, 'Do My prophet no\nharm!' and Death docilely did him good, and brought him to his Lord.\n\nOnly, dear friends! let us remember that the inviolableness of the\nambassador depends on his function, and not on his person; and that if\nwe want to be kept from all evil, we must do the work for which we have\nbeen sent here. So let us understand the meaning of our difficulties and\nsorrows. Let us set ourselves to our tasks, live up to the level of the\nhigh names which we have a right to claim, and be sure that there is no\nharm in the harm that befalls us; and that all evil things 'work\ntogether for good to them that love God.'\n\n\n\n\nGOD'S PROMISES TESTS\n\n\n    'Until the time that his word came, the word of the Lord tried him.'\n    --PSALM cv. 19.\n\nI do not think I shall be mistaken if I affirm that these words do not\nconvey any very clear idea to most readers. They were spoken with\nreference to Joseph, during the period of his imprisonment. For the\nunderstanding of them I think we must observe that there is a contrast\ndrawn between two 'words,' 'his' (_i.e._ Joseph's) and God's. If we lay\nfirm hold of that clue, I think it will lead us into clear daylight, and\nit will be obvious that Joseph's word, which delayed its coming, or\nfulfilment, was either his boyish narrative of the dreams that\nforeshadowed his exaltation, or less probably, his words to his\nfellow-prisoners in the interpretation of their dreams. In either case,\nthe _terminus ad quem_, the point to which our attention is directed, is\nthe period when that word came to be fulfilled, and what my text says is\nthat during that long season of unfulfilled hope, the 'word of God,'\nwhich was revealed in Joseph's dream, and was the ground on which his\nown 'word' rested--did what? Encouraged, heartened, strengthened him?\nNo, that unfulfilled promise might encourage or discourage him; but the\nPsalmist fixes our thoughts on another effect which, whether it\nencouraged or discouraged, it certainly had, namely, that it tested him,\nand found out what stuff he was made of, and whether there was staying\npower enough in him to hold on, in unconquerable faith, to a promise\nmade long since, communicated by no more reliable method than a dream,\nand of the fulfilment of which not the faintest sign had, for all these\nweary years, appeared. His circumstances, judged by appearances,\nshattered his early visions, and bade him believe them to be no more\nthan the boyish aspirations which grown men dismiss or find melt away of\nthemselves when life's realities wake the dreamer. We might either say\nthat the non-fulfilment of the promise tested Joseph, or that the\npromise, by its non-fulfilment, tested him. The Psalmist chooses the\nlatter more forcible and half paradoxical mode of speech. It proved the\ndepth and vitality of his faith, and his ability to see things that are\nnot as though they were. Will this man be able continually through years\nof poverty and imprisonment to keep his eye on the light beyond, to see\nhis star through clouds? Will he despise the 'light affliction,' in the\npotent and immovable belief that it is 'but for a moment?'\n\nThus, for all these years the great blessed word, or the hope that was\nbuilt upon it, tested Joseph in the very depths of his soul. And is not\nthat just what our anticipations, built upon God's assurances, whether\nthey are in regard to earthly matters that seem long in coming, or\nwhether they, as they ought to do, travel beyond the bounds of the\nmaterial, to grasp _the_ hope which is _the_ promise, 'the hope of\neternal life,' ought to do for us, test us and find out what sort of\npeople we are? And they do!\n\nLet us go back to the man in our text. According to some commentators,\nhe was imprisoned for something like ten years. We do not know how long\nhis Egyptian bondage had lasted, nor how long before that his endurance\nof the active ill-will of his surly brothers had gone on. But at all\nevents his chrysalis stage was very long, and one would not have\nwondered if he had said to himself, down in that desert pit or in that\nEgyptian dungeon, 'Ah, yes! they _were_ dreams, and _only_ dreams,' or\nif he had, as so many of us do, turned his back on his youthful visions,\nand gained the sad power of being able to smile at his old hopes and\nambitions. Brethren! especially you young men and women, cherish your\nyouthful dreams. They are often the prophecies of capacities and\npossibilities, signs of what God means you to make yourselves. But that\nis apart from my subject. Suppose we had clear before us, with\nunwavering confidence in its reality, the great promise which God has\ngiven us, do you not think that its presence would purify our souls, and\ngive power and dignity to our lives?\n\nThe promise was a test, says my text. The word which it employs to\ndesignate the manner of testing or trying, is one drawn from the\nsmelting operations of the goldsmith, by which, heat being applied, the\nmass is made fluid and the dross is run off, and as the result of the\ntrial, there flows out gold refined by fire.\n\n'Having these promises, dearly beloved! let us cleanse ourselves from\nall filthiness of the flesh and spirit.' 'Every man who hath this hope\nin Him purifieth himself, even as He is pure.' The result of the great\npromise of eternal life and of the hope that it kindles is meant to be\nthat it shall purge our spirits from meanness, from sense, from undue\ndependence upon the miserable trivialities of to-day, that it shall\nemancipate us from slavery to the moment, and lead us into the liberty\nof the eternities, 'while we look not at the things that are seen, but\nat the things which are not seen.' Oh! if we would only see clearly and\nhabitually before us--for we could if we would--what God's heart\ninclines Him to do for us, and what He certainly will do for us, in the\nfar-off future, if we will only let Him, do you not think that these\ntrifles that put us off our equanimity this morning would have been\nborne with a little more composure? Do you not think that the things\nthat looked so huge when we were down abreast of them would, by the laws\nof perspective, diminish in their proportions as we rose steadily above\nthem, until all the hubbub in the valley was unheard on the mountain\npeak, and the great trees that waved their giant branches below and shut\nout the sky from our eyes while we were among them would dwindle to a\ngreen smear on the plain, and all the foes 'show scarce so gross as\nbeetles,' from the height from which we look down upon them? Get up\nbeside God's promise, if you would take the true dimensions of cares and\ntasks, and burdens and sorrows. Then, brother! you will learn the truth\nof the paradox, 'light ... but for a moment'; though often they all but\ncrush the burden-bearing shoulder and seem to last through slow years.\n\n'The word of the Lord tried him,' and because it tried him, it purified\nhim. If we give credence, as we ought to, to that word, it will purify\n_us_, and it will test of what contexture our faith is. The further away\nthe object of any hope is, the more noble the cherishing of it makes a\nlife. The trivial, short-lived anticipations which do not look beyond\nthe end of next week are far less operative in making strong and noble\ncharacters than are those, of whatever kind they may be otherwise, which\nlook far ahead and need years for their realisation. It is a blessing to\nhave the mark far, far away, because that means that the arm that pulls\nthe bow must draw more strongly, and the eye that sees the goal must\ngaze more intently. Be thankful for the promise that cannot be fulfilled\nin this world because it lifts us above the low levels, and already\nmakes us feel as if we were endowed with immortality.\n\nThe word will test our patience, and it will test our willingness,\nthough we be heirs of the kingdom, to do humble tasks. Christian men in\nthis world are sons of a King, and look forward to a royal inheritance,\nbut in the meantime they have, as it were, to keep a little huckster's\nshop in a back alley. But if we adequately realised the promise of our\ninheritance, the meanness of our surroundings and the triviality of our\noccupations would not make us mean or trivial, but our souls would be\n'like stars' and 'dwell apart' while we travelled 'on life's common way\nin cheerful godliness,' and did small duties in such a manner as to make\nthem great.\n\nBecause Joseph was sure that God's long-lingering word would be\nfulfilled, he did not mind though he had to be the lackey of his\nbrothers, the Midianites' chattel, Potiphar's slave, Pharaoh's prisoner,\nand a servant of servants in his dungeon. So with us, the measure of our\nwilling acceptance of our present tasks, burdens, humiliations, and\nlimitations is the measure of our firm faith in the promise that\ntarries.\n\n'If we hope for what we see not, then do we with patience wait for it,'\nsays the Apostle, though most of us would have said exactly the\nopposite. We generally suppose that the more ardent the hope, the more\nis it impatient of delay. Paul had learned better. The more certain the\nassurance, the better we can tolerate the procrastination of its\nfulfilment.\n\nSo, brethren! God's greatest gift to us, like all His other gifts, has\nin it the quality of testing us; and we can come to a pretty fair\napproximation to an estimate of what sort of Christian people we are, by\nobserving how we deal with God's promises of help according to our need\nhere and of heaven hereafter. How do we deal with them? Why, a sadly\nlarge number of us never think about them at all; and a large proportion\nof the others would a great deal rather stay working in the huckster's\nshop in the back alley, than go home to the King. I am quite sure that\nif the inmost sentiments of the bulk of professing Christians about a\nfuture life were dragged into light, these would be a revelation of a\nfaith all honeycombed with insincerity. God tests us, and it is a sharp\ntest if we submit ourselves to it; He tests us by His promises. 'Child,\nwilt thou believe?' is the first testing question put to us by these.\n'Wilt thou keep them hid in thy heart?' is the next. 'Wilt thou go out\ntowards them in desire?' is the next. 'Wilt thou live worthy of them?'\nis the last. 'The word of the Lord tried him.'\n\nSo let us be thankful for the delays of love, for the wide gap between\npromise and realisation. It was for Joseph's sake that the slow years\nwere multiplied between the first gleam of his future and the full\nsunshine of his exaltation. And it is for our sakes that God in like\nmanner protracts the period of anticipation and non-fulfilment. 'If the\nvision tarry, wait for it.' 'Jesus loved Mary and Martha and Lazarus\ntheir brother' very dearly. 'When He heard, therefore, that he was sick,\nHe abode still two days'--to give time for Lazarus to die--'in the same\nplace where He was.' Ay, and when each sister came to Him with her most\nnatural and yet most faithless 'Lord! if Thou hadst been here my brother\nhad not died,' He only said, 'If thou wouldst believe thou shouldst see\nthe glory of God.' Was not Lazarus dearer, restored from the grave, than\nhe would have been, raised from his sickbed? Is not the delaying of the\nblessing a means of increase of the blessing? And shall not we be sure\nthat however long 'He that shall come' may seem to tarry ere He comes,\nwhen He _has_ come they who have waited for His coming more than they\nthat watch for the morning and have sometimes been ready to cry out:\n'Hath the Lord forgotten? Doth His promise fail for ever more?' will be\nashamed of their impatient moments and will humbly and thankfully\nexclaim: 'He came at the very right time and did _not_ tarry.' 'Until\nthe time that his word came, the word of the Lord tried him,' and the\ncoming of that word was all the more blessed for every heavy-laden hour\nof hope deferred, which, by God's grace, did not make the heart sick,\nbut prepared it for fuller possession of the blessings enhanced by the\ndelays of love.\n\n\n\n\nSOLDIER PRIESTS\n\n\n    'Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the\n    beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew\n    of thy youth.'--PSALM cx. 3.\n\nIt is no part of my present purpose to establish the reference of this\npsalm to our Lord. We have Christ's own authority for that.\n\nIt does not seem to be typical--that is to say, it does not appear to\nhave had a lower application to a king of Israel who was a shadow of the\ntrue monarch, but rather to refer only to the coming Sovereign, whom\nDavid was helped to discern, indeed, by his own regal office, but whose\noffice and character, as here set forth, far surpass anything belonging\nto him or to his dynasty. The attributes of the King, the union in His\ncase of the royal and priestly dignities, His seat at the right hand of\nGod, His acknowledged supremacy over the greatest Jewish ruler, who here\ncalls him 'my Lord,' His eternal dominion, His conquest of many nations,\nand His lifting up of His head in triumphant rule that knows no end--all\nthese characteristics seem to forbid the possibility of a double\nreference, and to demand the acknowledgment of a distinct and exclusive\nprophecy of Christ.\n\nTaking that for granted without more words, it strikes one as remarkable\nthat this description of the subjects of the Priest-King should be thus\nimbedded in the very heart of the grand portraiture of the monarch\nHimself. It is the anticipation of the profound New Testament thought of\nthe unity of Christ and His Church. By simple faith a union is brought\nabout so close and intimate that all His is theirs, and the picture of\nHis glory is incomplete without the vision of 'the Church, which is His\nbody, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all.' Therefore, between\nthe word of God which elevates Him to His right hand, and the oath of\nGod which consecrates Him a priest for ever, is this description of the\narmy of the King.\n\nThe full force of the words will, I hope, appear as we advance. For the\npresent it will be enough to say that there are really in our text three\nco-ordinate clauses, all descriptive of the subjects of the monarch,\nregarded as a band of warriors--and that the main ideas are these:--the\nsubjects are willing soldiers; the soldiers are priests; the\npriest-soldiers are as dew upon the earth. Or, in other words, we have\nhere the very heart of the Christian character set forth as being\nwilling consecration; then we have the work which Christian men have to\ndo, and the spirit in which they are to do it, expressed in that\nmetaphor of their priestly attire; and then we have their refreshing and\nquickening influence upon the world.\n\nI. The subjects of the Priest-King are willing soldiers.\n\nIn accordance with the warlike tone of the whole psalm, our text\ndescribes the subjects as an army. That military metaphor comes out more\nclearly when we attach the true meaning to the words, 'in the day of Thy\npower.' The word rendered, and rightly rendered, 'power,' has the same\nambiguity which that word has in the English of the date of our\ntranslation, and for a century later, as you may find in Shakespeare and\nMilton, who both used it in the sense of 'army.' Singularly enough we do\nnot employ 'powers' in that meaning, but we do another word which means\nthe same thing--and talk of 'forces,' meaning thereby 'troops.' By the\nway, what a melancholy sign it is of the predominance of that infernal\nmilitary spirit, that it should have so leavened language, that the\n'forces' of a nation means its soldiers, its embattled energies turned\nto the work of destruction. But the phrase is so used here. 'The day of\nThy power' is not a mere synonym for 'the time of Thy might,' but means\nspecifically 'the day of Thine army,' that is, 'the day when Thou dost\nmuster Thy forces and set them in array for the war.'\n\nThe King is going forth to conquest. But He goes not alone. Behind Him\ncome His faithful followers, all pressing on with willing hearts and\nhigh courage. Then, to begin with, the warfare which He wages is one not\nconfined to Him. Alone He offers the sacrifice by which He atones; but,\nas we shall see, we too are priests. He rules, and His servants rule\nwith Him. But ere that time comes, they are to be joined with Him in the\ngreat warfare by which He wins the earth for Himself. 'As Captain of the\nLord's host am I now come.' He wins no conquests for Himself; and now\nthat He is exalted at God's right hand, He wins none by Himself. We have\nto do His work, we have to fight His battles as good soldiers of Jesus\nChrist. By power derived from Him, but wielded by ourselves; with\ncourage inspired by Him, but filling our hearts; not as though He needed\nus, but inasmuch as He is pleased to use us, we have to wage warfare for\nand to please Him who hath chosen us to be soldiers. The Captain of our\nsalvation sits at the right hand of God, expecting till His enemies be\nmade His footstool. He has bidden us to keep the field and fight the\nfight. From His height He watches the conflict--nay, He is with us while\nwe wage it. So long as we strike for Him, so long is it His power that\nteaches our hands to war. Our King's flag is committed to our care; but\nwe are not left to defend it alone. In indissoluble unity, the King and\nthe subjects, the Chief and His vassals, the Captain and His soldiers,\nare knit together--and wheresoever His people are, in all the danger and\nhardships of the long struggle, there is He, to keep their heads in the\nday of battle, and make them more than conquerors.\n\nThen, again, that warfare is shared in by all the subjects. It is a levy\n_en masse_--an armed nation. The whole of the people are embodied for\nthe battle. It is not the work of a select few, but of every one who\ncalls Christ 'Lord,' to be His faithful servant and soldier. Whatever\nvarieties of occupation may be set us by Him, one purpose is to be kept\nin view and one end to be effected by them all. Every Christian man is\nbound to strive for the reduction of all human hearts under Christ's\ndominion. The tasks may be different, but the result should be one. Some\nof us have to toil in the trenches, some of us to guard the camp, some\nto lead the assault, some to stay by the stuff and keep the\ncommunications open. Be it so. We are all soldiers, and He alone has to\ndetermine our work. We are responsible for the spirit of it, He for its\nsuccess.\n\nAgain, there are no _mercenaries_ in these ranks, no pressed men. The\nsoldiers are all volunteers. 'Thy people shall be willing.' Pause for a\nmoment upon that thought.\n\nDear brethren! there are two kinds of submission and service. There is\nsubmission because you cannot help it, and there is submission because\nyou like it. There is a sullen bowing down beneath the weight of a hand\nwhich you are too feeble to resist, and there is a glad surrender to a\nlove which it would be a pain not to obey. Some of us feel that we are\nshut in by immense and sovereign power which we cannot oppose. And yet,\nlike some raging rebel in a dungeon, or some fluttering bird in a cage,\nwe beat ourselves, all bruised and bloody, against the bars in vain\nattempts at liberty, alternating with fits of cowed apathy as we slink\ninto a corner of our cell. Some of us, thank God! feel that we are\nenclosed on every side by that mighty Hand which none can resist, and\nfrom which we would not stray if we could, and we joyfully hide beneath\nits shelter, and gladly obey when it points. Constrained obedience is no\nobedience. Unless there be the glad surrender of the will and heart,\nthere is no surrender at all. God does not want compulsory submission.\nHe does not care to rule over people who are only crushed down by\ngreater power. He does not count that those serve who sullenly acquiesce\nbecause they dare not oppose. Christ seeks for no pressed men in His\nranks. Whosoever does not enlist joyfully is not reckoned as His. And\nthe question comes to us, brethren!--What is my relation to that loving\nLord, to that Redeemer King? Do I submit because His love has won my\nheart, and it would be a pang not to serve Him; or do I submit because I\nknow Him strong, and am afraid to refuse? If the former, all is well; He\ncalls us 'not servants but friends.' If the latter, all is wrong; we are\nnot subjects, but enemies.\n\nThere is another idea involved in this description. The soldiers are not\nonly marked by glad obedience, but that obedience rests upon the\nsacrifice of themselves. The word here rendered 'willing' is employed\nthroughout the Levitical law for 'freewill offerings.' And if we may\nventure to bring that reference in here, it carries us a step farther in\nthis characterisation of the army. This glad submission comes from\nself-consecration and surrender. It is in that host as it was in the\narmy whose heroic self-devotion was chaunted by Deborah under her\npalm-tree, 'The people willingly offered themselves.' Hence came\ncourage, devotion, victory. With their lives in their hands they flung\nthemselves on the foe, and nothing could stand against the onset of men\nwho recked not of themselves. There is one grand thing even about the\ndevilry of war--the transcendent self-abnegation with which, however\npoor and unworthy may be the cause, a man casts himself away, 'what time\nthe foeman's line is broke.' The poorest, vulgarest, most animal natures\nrise for a moment into something like nobility, as the surge of the\nstrong emotion lifts them to that height of heroism. Life is then most\nglorious when it is given away for a great cause. That sacrifice is the\none noble and chivalrous element which gives interest to war--the one\nthing that can be disentangled from its hideous associations, and can be\ntransferred to higher regions of life. That spirit of lofty consecration\nand utter self-forgetfulness must be ours, if we would be Christ's\nsoldiers. Our obedience will then be glad when we feel the force of, and\nyield to, that gentle, persuasive entreaty, 'I beseech you, brethren! by\nthe mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice.'\nThere is 'one Sacrifice for sin for ever'--which never can be repeated,\nnor exhausted, nor copied. And the loving, faithful acceptance of that\nsacrifice of propitiation leads our hearts to the response of\nthank-offering, the sacrifice and surrender of ourselves to Him who has\ngiven Himself not only to, but for us. It cannot be recompensed, but it\nmay be acknowledged. Let us give ourselves to Christ, for He has died\nfor us. Let us give ourselves to Christ, for only in such surrender do\nwe truly find ourselves. Let us give ourselves to Christ, for such a\nsacrifice makes all life fair and noble, and that altar sanctifies the\ngift. Let us give ourselves to Christ, for without such sacrifice we\nhave no place in the host whom He leads to victory. 'Thy people shall be\nwilling offerings in the day of Thy power.'\n\nStill further, another remarkable idea may be connected with this word.\nBy a natural transition, of which illustrations may be found in other\nlanguages, it comes to mean '_free_,' and also '_noble_.' As, for\ninstance, it is used in the fifty-first Psalm, 'Uphold me with Thy\n_free_ Spirit'--and in the forty-seventh, 'The _princes_ of the people\nare gathered together.' And does not this shading of\nsignifications--willing sacrifices, free, princely--remind us of another\ndistinctly evangelical principle, that the willing service which rests\nupon glad consecration raises him who renders it to true freedom and\ndominion? Every man enlisted in His body-guard is noble. The Prince's\nservants are every other person's master. The King's livery exempts\nfrom all other submission. As in the old Saxon monarchies, the monarch's\ndomestics were nobles, the men of Christ's household are ennobled\nby their service. They who obey Him are free from every yoke of\nbondage--'free indeed.' All things serve the soul that serves Christ.\n'He hath made us kings unto God.'\n\nII. The soldiers are priests.\n\nThat expression, 'in the beauties of holiness,' is usually read as if it\nbelonged either to the words immediately preceding, or to those\nimmediately following. But in either case the connection is somewhat\ndifficult and obscure. It seems better regarded as a distinct and\nseparate clause, adding a fresh trait to the description of the army,\nand what that is we need not find any difficulty in ascertaining. 'The\nbeauties of holiness' is a frequent phrase for the sacerdotal garments,\nthe holy festal attire of the priests of the Lord. So considered, how\nbeautifully it comes in here! The conquering King whom the psalm hymns\nis a Priest for ever; and He is followed by an army of priests. The\nsoldiers are gathered in the day of the muster, with high courage and\nwilling devotion, ready to fling away their lives; but they are clad not\nin mail, but in priestly robes--like those who wait before the altar\nrather than like those who plunge into the fight--like those who\ncompassed Jericho with the ark for their standard, and the trumpets for\nall their weapons. We can scarcely fail to remember the words which echo\nthese and interpret them: 'The armies which were in heaven followed Him\non white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean'--a strange\narmour against sword-cut and spear-thrust.\n\nThe main purpose, then, of this part of our text seems to be to bring\nout the priestly character of the Christian soldier--a thought which\ncarries with it many important considerations, on which I can barely\ntouch.\n\nMark, then, how the warfare which we have to wage is the same as the\npriestly service which we have to render. The conflict is with our own\nsin and evil; the sacrifice we have to offer is ourselves. As soldiers,\nwe have to fight against our selfish desires and manifold imperfections;\nas priests, we have to lay our whole selves on His altar. The task is\nthe same under either emblem. We have a conflict to wage in the world,\nand in the world we have a priestly work to do, and these are the same.\nWe have to be God's representatives in the world, bringing Him nearer to\nmen's apprehensions and hearts by word and work. We have to bring men to\nGod by entreaty, and by showing the path which leads to Him. That\npriestly service for men is in effect identical with the merciful\nwarfare which we have to wage in the world. The Church militant is an\narmy of priests. Its warfare is its sacerdotal function. It fights for\nChrist when it opposes the message of His grace and the power of His\nblood to its own and the world's sins--and when it intercedes in the\nsecret place for the coming of His kingdom.\n\nDoes not this metaphor teach us also, what is to be our defence and our\nweapon in this warfare? Not with garments rolled in blood, nor with\nbrazen armour do they go forth, who follow Him that conquered by dying.\nTheir uniform is the beauties of holiness, 'the fine linen clean and\nwhite, which is the righteousness of saints.' Many great thoughts lie in\nsuch words, which I must pass over. But this one thing is obvious--that\nthe great power which we Christian men are to wield in our loving\nwarfare is--_character_. Purity of heart and life, transparent simple\ngoodness, manifest in men's sight--these will arm us against dangers,\nand these will bring our brethren glad captives to our Lord. We serve\nHim best, and advance His kingdom most, when the habit of our souls is\nthat righteousness with which He invests our nakedness. Be like your\nLord, and as His soldiers you will conquer, and as His priests you will\nwin some to His love and fear. Nothing else will avail without that.\nWithout that dress no man finds a place in the ranks.\n\nThe image suggests, too, the spirit in which our priestly warfare is to\nbe waged. The one metaphor brings with it thoughts of strenuous effort,\nof discipline, of sworn consecration to a cause. The other brings with\nit thoughts of gentleness and sympathy and tenderness, of still waiting\nat the shrine, of communion with Him who dwells between the Cherubim.\nWhilst our work demands all the courage and tension of every power which\nthe one image presents, it is to be sedulously guarded from any tinge of\nwrath or heat of passion, such as mingles with conflict, and is to be\nprosecuted with all the pity and patience, the brotherly meekness of a\ntrue priest. 'The wrath of men worketh not the righteousness of God.' If\nwe forget the one character in the other, we shall bring weakness into\nour warfare, and pollution into our sacrifice. 'The servant of the Lord\nmust not strive.' We must not be animated by mere pugnacious desire to\nadvance our principles, nor let the heat of human eagerness give a false\nfervour to our words and work. We cannot scold nor dragoon men to love\nJesus Christ. We cannot drive them into the fold with dogs and sticks.\nWe are to be gentle, long-suffering, not doing our work with passion and\nself-will, but remembering that gentleness is mightiest, and that we\nshall best 'adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour' when we go among men\nwith the light caught in the inner sanctuary still irradiating our\nfaces, and our hands full of blessings to bestow on our brethren. We are\nto be soldier-priests, strong and gentle, like the ideal of those\nknights of old who were both, and bore the cross on shield and helmet\nand sword-hilt.\n\nHe, our Lord, is our pattern for both; and from Him we derive the\nstrength for each. He is the Captain of our salvation, and we fight\nbeneath His banner, and by His strength. He is a merciful and faithful\nHigh Priest, and He consecrates His brethren to the service of the\nsanctuary. To Him look for your example of heroism, of fortitude, of\nself-forgetfulness. To Him look for your example of gentle patience and\ndewy pity. Learn in Christ how possible it is to be strong and mild, to\nblend in fullest harmony the perfection of all that is noble, lofty,\ngenerous in the soldier's ardour of heroic devotion; and of all that is\ncalm, still, compassionate, tender in the priest's waiting before God\nand mediation among men. And remember, that by faith only do we gain the\npower of copying that blessed example, to be like which is to be\nperfect--not to be like which is to fail wholly, and to prove that we\nhave no part in His sacrifice, nor any share in His victory.\n\nIII. The final point in this description must now engage us for a few\nmoments. The soldier-priests are as dew upon the earth.\n\n'From the womb of the morning thou hast the dew of thy youth.' These\nwords are often misunderstood, and taken to be a description of the\nfresh, youthful energy attributed by the psalm to the Priest-King of\nthis nation of soldier-priests. The misunderstanding, I suppose, has led\nto the common phrase, 'The dew of one's youth.' But the reference of the\nexpression is to the army, not to its leader. 'Youth' here is a\ncollective noun, equivalent to 'young men.' The host of His\nsoldier-subjects is described as a band of young warriors whom He leads,\nin their fresh strength and countless numbers and gleaming beauty, like\nthe dew of the morning.\n\nThere are two points in this last clause which may occupy us for a few\nmoments--that picture of the army as a band of youthful warriors; and\nthat lovely emblem of the dew as applied to Christ's servants.\n\nAs to the former--there are many other words of Scripture which carry\nthe same thought, that he who has fellowship with God, and lives in the\nconstant reception of the supernatural life and grace which come from\nJesus Christ, possesses the secret of perpetual youth. The world ages\nus, time and physical changes tell on us all, and the strength which\nbelongs to the life of nature ebbs away, but the life eternal is subject\nto no laws of decay and owes nothing to the external world. So we may be\never young in heart and spirit. It is possible for a man to carry the\nfreshness, the buoyancy, the elastic cheerfulness, the joyful hope of\nhis earliest days, right on through the monotony of middle-aged\nmaturity, and even into old age, unshadowed by the lonely reflection of\nthe tombs which the setting sun casts over the path. It is possible for\nus to get younger as we get older, because we drink more full draughts\nof the fountain of life: and so to have to say at the last, 'Thou hast\nkept the good wine until now.' 'Even the youths shall faint and be\nweary, and the young men shall utterly fall. But they that wait upon the\nLord shall renew their strength.' If we live near Christ, and draw our\nlife from Him, then we may blend the hopes of youth with the experience\nand memory of age; be at once calm and  joyous, wise and strong,\npreserving the blessedness of each stage of life into that which\nfollows, and thus at last possessing the sweetness and the good of all\nat once. We may not only bear fruit in old age, but have blossoms,\nfruit, and flowers--the varying product and adornment of every stage of\nlife, united in our characters.\n\nThen, with regard to the other point in this final clause--that emblem\nof the dew leads to many considerations upon which I can but\ninadequately touch.\n\nIt comes into view here, I suppose, mainly for the sake of its effect\nupon the earth. It is as a symbol of the refreshing which a weary world\nwill receive from the conquests and presence of the King and His host,\nthat the latter are likened to the glittering morning dew. Another\nprophetic Scripture gives us the same emblem when it speaks of Israel\nbeing 'in the midst of many people as a dew from the Lord.' Such ought\nto be the effect of our presence. We are meant to gladden, to adorn, to\nrefresh, this parched, prosaic world, with a freshness brought from the\nchambers of the sunrise.\n\nIt is worth while to notice how we may discern a sequence of thought in\nthese successive features of description in our text. It began with that\ninmost spirit and motive of the Christian life, the submission of will\nand consecration of self to Christ. It advanced to the function and\ncharacter of His servants in the world. And now it deals finally with\nthe influence which they are to exert by this their soldier-like\nobedience and priestly ministration.\n\nThere is progress of thought, too, in another way. We began with a\nsymbol that had in it something almost harsh and stern. We advanced to\none in which there was a predominance of gentle and gracious thoughts\nand images. And now all that was severe, and all that reminded either of\nopposition or of effort, has melted away into this sweet emblem. Instead\nof the 'confused noise' of the battle of the warrior, we have the\nsilence of the dawn, and the noiseless falling of the dew amid the\nsolitudes of the wildernesses, or the recesses of the mountains. So the\nhighest thought of our Christian influence, is that it comes with silent\nfootfall and refreshes men's souls, like His, who will come down as\n'rain upon the mown grass,' who will not strive nor cry, but in gentle\nomnipotence and meek persistence of love, 'will not fail nor be\ndiscouraged till He have set judgment in the earth.'\n\nRemember other symbols by which the same general thought of Christian\ninfluence upon the world is set forth with very remarkable variation.\n'Ye are the light of the world.'--'Ye are the salt of the earth.' The\nlight guides and gladdens; the salt preserves and purifies; the dew\nfreshens and fertilises; the light, conspicuous; the salt, working\nconcealed; and the dew, visible like the former, but yet unobtrusive and\noperating silently like the latter. Some of us had rather be light than\nsalt; prefer to be conspicuous rather than to diffuse a wholesome silent\ninfluence around us. But these three types must all be blended, both in\nregard to the manner of working, and in regard to the effects produced.\nWe shall refresh and beautify the world only in proportion as we save it\nfrom its rottenness and corruption, and we shall do either only in\nproportion as we bear abroad the name of Christ, in whom is 'life; and\nthe life is the light of men.'\n\nNor need we omit allusions to other associations connected with this\nfigure. The dew, formed in the silence of the darkness while men sleep,\nfalling as willingly on a bit of dead wood as anywhere, hanging its\npearls on every poor spike of grass, and dressing everything on which it\nlies with strange beauty, each separate globule tiny and evanescent, but\neach flashing back the light, and each a perfect sphere, feeble one by\none, but united, mighty to make the pastures of the wilderness\nrejoice--so, created in silence by an unseen influence, weak when taken\nsingly, but strong in their myriads, glad to occupy the lowliest place,\nand each 'bright with something of celestial light,' Christian men and\nwomen are to be in the midst of many people as a dew from the Lord.\n\nBrethren! that characteristic, like all else which is good, belongs to\nus in proportion as we keep near to Christ Jesus, and are filled with\nHis fulness. All these emblems which have been occupying us now,\noriginally belonged to Him, and we receive from Him the grace that makes\nus as He is in the world. He Himself is the Warrior King, the Captain of\nthe Lord's host, the true Joshua, whose last word ere His Cross was a\nshout of victory, 'I have overcome the world'--whose promises from the\nthrone seven times crown the conqueror who overcomes as He overcame. He\nmakes us His soldiers and strengthens us for the war, if we live by\nfaith in Him. He Himself is the Priest--the only Eternal Priest of the\nworld--who wears on His head the mitre and the diadem, and bears in His\nhand the sceptre and the censer; and He makes us priests, if faith in\nHis only sacrifice and all-prevalent intercession be in our souls. He is\nthe dew unto Israel--and only by intercourse with Him shall we be made\ngentle and refreshing, silent blessings to all the weary and the parched\nsouls in the wilderness of the world.\n\nEverything worth being or doing comes from Jesus Christ. Heroic courage;\nthen hold His hand, and He will strengthen your heart. Glad surrender;\nthen think of His sacrifice for us until ours to Him be our answering\ngift. Priestly power; then let Him bring us nigh by His blood, that we\ntoo may be able to have compassion on the ignorant and to draw them to\nGod. Dewy purity and freshness; then open your hearts for the reception\nof His grace, for all the invigoration that we can impart to the world\nis but the communication of that refreshing wherewith we ourselves are\nrefreshed of Christ. In every aspect of our relations to the world, we\ndraw all our fitness for all our offices from that Lord, who is and\ngives everything that we can be or do. Then let us seek by humble faith\nand habitual contact with Him and His truth, to have our emptiness\nfilled by His fulness, and our unfitness made ready for all service by\nHis all-sufficiency.\n\nAnd let me close by reiterating what I have said already. There is a\ntwofold manner of subjection--the spurious and the real. The involuntary\nis nought; the glad and cheerful surrender alone is counted submission.\nThis psalm shows us Christ surrounded by His friends who are glad to\nobey. But it also shows us Christ ruling in the midst of His enemies.\nThey cannot help obeying; His dominion is established over them, but\nthey do not wish to have Him to reign over them, and therefore they are\nenemies--even though they be subjects. Which is it with you, my brother?\nDo you serve because you love--and love because He died for you? or do\nyou serve because you must? Then, remember, constrained service is no\nservice; and subjects without loyalty are rebel traitors. Our psalm\nshows us Christ gathering His army in array. He is calling each of us to\na place there, in this day of His power, and day of His grace. Take heed\nlest the day of His power should for you darken into that other day of\nwhich this psalm speaks--the day of His wrath, when He strikes through\nkings, and bruises the head over many countries. Put your trust in that\nSaviour, my friend! cleave to that Sacrifice, then you will not be\namongst those whom He treads down in His march to victory, but one of\nthat happy band of priestly warriors who follow Him as He goes forth\n'conquering and to conquer.'\n\n\n\n\nGOD AND THE GODLY\n\n\n    'His righteousness endureth for ever.'--PSALMS cxi. 3; cxii. 3.\n\nThese two psalms are obviously intended as a pair. They are identical in\nnumber of verses and in structure, both being acrostic, that is to say,\nthe first clause of each commences with the first letter of the Hebrew\nalphabet, the second clause with the second, and so on. The general idea\nthat runs through them is the likeness of the godly man to God. That\nresemblance comes very markedly to the surface at several points in the\npsalms, and pervades them traceably even where it is less conspicuous.\nThe two corresponding clauses which I have read as my text are the first\nsalient instances of it. But I propose to deal not only with them, but\nwith a couple of others which occur in the course of the psalms, and\nwill appear as I proceed.\n\nThe general underlying thought is a noteworthy one. The worshipper is to\nbe like his God. So it is in idolatry; so it should be with us. Worship\nis, or should be, adoration of and yearning after the highest\nconceivable good. Such an attitude must necessarily lead to imitation,\nand be crowned by resemblance. Love makes like, and they who worship God\nare bound to, and certainly will, in proportion to the ardour and\nsincerity of their devotion, grow like Him whom they adore. So I desire\nto look with you at the instances of this resemblance or parallelism\nwhich the Psalmist emphasises.\n\nI. The first of them is that in the clauses which I have read as our\nstarting-point, viz. God and the godly are alike in enduring\nrighteousness.\n\nThat seems a bold thing to say, especially when we remember how lofty\nand transcendent were the Old Testament conceptions of the righteousness\nof God. But, lofty as these were, this Psalmist lifts an unpresumptuous\neye to the heavens, and having said of Him who dwells there, 'His\nrighteousness endureth for ever,' is not afraid to turn to the humble\nworshipper on this low earth, and declare the same thing of him. Our\nfinite, frail, feeble lives may be really conformed to the image of the\nheavenly. The dewdrop with its little rainbow has a miniature of the\ngreat arch that spans the earth and rises into the high heavens. And so,\nthough there are differences, deep and impassable, between anything that\ncan be called creatural righteousness, and that which bears the same\nname in the heavens, the fact that it does bear the same name is a\nguarantee to us that there is an essential resemblance between the\nrighteousness of God in its lustrous perfectness, and the righteousness\nof His child in its imperfect effort.\n\nBut how can we venture to run any kind of parallelism between the\neternity of the one and that of the other? God's righteousness we can\nunderstand as enduring for ever, because it is inseparable from His very\nbeing; because it is manifested unbrokenly in all the works that for\never pour out from that central Source, and because it and its doings\nstand fast and unshaken amidst the passage of ages, and the 'wreck of\nmatter and the crash of worlds.' But may there not be, if not an\neternity, yet a perpetuity, in our reflection of the divine\nrighteousness which shall serve to vindicate the application of the same\nmighty word to both? Is it not possible that, unbroken amidst the stress\nof temptation, and running on without interruptions, there may be in our\nhearts and in our lives conformity to the divine will? And is it not\npossible that the transiencies of our earthly doings may be sublimed\ninto perpetuity if there is in them the preserving salt of\nrighteousness?\n\n    'The actions of the just\n  Smell sweet, and blossom in the dust.'\n\nAnd may it not be, too, that though this Psalmist may have had no clear\narticulate doctrine of eternal life beyond, he may have felt, and\nrightly felt, that there were things that were too fair to die, and that\nit was inconceivable that a soul which had been, in some measure, tinged\nwith the righteousness of God could ever be altogether a prey to the law\nof transiency and decay which seizes upon things material and corporeal?\nThat which is righteous is eternal, be it manifested in the acts of the\nunchanging God or in the acts of a dying man, and when all else has\npassed away, and the elements have melted with fervent heat, 'he that\ndoeth the will of God,' and the deeds which did it, 'shall abide for\never.' 'His righteousness endureth for ever.'\n\nNow, brethren! there are two ways in which we may look at this\nparallelism of our text: the one is as containing a stringent\nrequirement; the other as holding forth a mighty hope. It contains a\nstringent requirement. Our religion does not consist in assenting to any\ncreed. Our religion is not wholly to consist of devout emotions and\nloving and joyous acts of communion and friendship with God. There must\nbe more than these; these things there must be. For if a man is to be\nguided mainly by reason, there must, first of all, be creed; then there\nmust be corresponding emotions. But creed and emotions are both meant to\nbe forces which shall drive the wheels of life, and conduct is, after\nall, the crown of religion and the test of godliness. They that hold\ncommunion with God are bound to mould their lives into the likeness of\nHis. 'Little children, let no man deceive you,' and let not your own\nhearts deceive you. You are not a Christian because you believe the\ntruths of the Gospel. You are not such a Christian as you ought to be,\nif your religion is more manifest in loving trust than in practical\nobedience which comes from trust. 'He that doeth righteousness is\nrighteous,' and he is to be righteous 'even as He is righteous.' If you\nare God's, you will be like God. Apply the touchstone to your lives, and\ntest your Christianity by this simple and most stringent test.\n\nBut again, we may look at the thought as holding forth a great hope. I\ndo not wish to force upon Old Testament writers New Testament truth. It\nwould be an anachronism and an absurdity to make this Psalmist\nresponsible for anything like a clear evangelistic statement of the way\nby which a man may be made righteous. That waited for coming days, and\neminently for Jesus Christ. But it would be quite as great a mistake to\neviscerate the words of their plain implications. And when they put side\nby side the light and the reflection, God and the godly, it seems to me\nto be doing violence to their meaning for the sake of trying to make\nthem mean less than they do, if we refuse to recognise that they have at\nany rate an inkling of the thought that the Original and Pattern of\nhuman righteousness was likewise the Source of it. This at least is\nplain, that the Psalmist thought that 'the fear of the Lord' was not\nonly, as he calls it at the close of the former of the two psalms, 'the\nbeginning of wisdom,' but also the basis of goodness, for he begins his\ndescription of the godly with it.\n\nI believe that he felt, what is assuredly true, that no man, by his own\nunaided effort, can ever work out for himself a righteousness which will\nsatisfy his own conscience, and that he must, first of all, be in touch\nwith God, in order to receive from Him that which he cannot create. Ah,\nbrethren! the 'fine linen, clean and white, which is the righteousness\nof saints,' is woven in no earthly looms; and the lustrous light with\nwhich it glistens is such as 'no fuller on earth can white' men's\ncharacters into. Another Psalmist has sung of the man who can stand in\nthe holy place, 'He shall _receive_ the blessing from the Lord, even\nrighteousness from the God of his salvation,' and our psalms hint, if\nthey do not articulately declare, how that reception is possible for us,\nwhen they set forth waiting upon God as the condition of being made like\nHim. We translate the Psalmist's feeling after the higher truth which we\nknow, when we desire 'that we may be found in Him, not having our own\nrighteousness which is of the law, but that which is of God by faith.'\nSo much, then, for the first point of correspondence in these two\npsalms.\n\nII. God and the godly are alike in gracious compassion.\n\nIf you will turn to the two psalms for a moment, and look at the last\nclauses of the two fourth verses, you will see how that thought is\nbrought out. In the former psalm we read, 'The Lord is gracious and full\nof compassion': in the latter we find, 'he' (the upright man) 'is\ngracious and full of compassion, and righteous.'\n\nI need not trouble you with any remarks about certain difficulties that\nlie in the rendering of that latter verse. Suffice it to say that they\nare such as to make more emphatic the intentional resemblance between\nthe godly as there described, and God as described in the previous one.\nOf both it is said 'gracious and full of compassion.'\n\nNow that great truth of which I have been speaking, the divine\nrighteousness, is like white Alpine snow, sublime, but cold, awful and\nrepellent, when taken by itself. Our hearts need something more than a\nrighteous God if we are ever to worship and draw near. Just as the white\nsnow on the high peak needs to be flushed with the roseate hue of the\nmorning before it can become tender, and create longings, so the\nrighteousness of the great white Throne has to be tinged with the ruddy\nheart-hue of gracious compassion if men are to be moved to adore and to\nlove. Each enhances the other. 'What God hath joined together,' in\nHimself, 'let not man put asunder'; nor talk about the stern Deity of\nthe Old Testament, and pit Him against the compassionate Father of the\nNew. He is righteous, but the proclaimers of His righteousness in old\ndays never forgot to blend with the righteousness the mercy; and the\ncombination heightens the lustre of both attributes.\n\nThe same combination is absolutely needful in the copy, as is\nemphatically set forth in our text by the addition of 'and righteous,'\nin the case of the man. For whilst with God the tyro attributes do lie,\nside by side, in perfect harmony, in us men there is always danger that\nthe one shall trench upon the territory of the other, and that he who\nhas cultivated the habit of looking upon sorrows and sins with\ncompassion and tenderness shall somewhat lose the power of looking at\nthem with righteousness. So our text, in regard to man, proclaims more\nemphatically than it needs to do in regard to the perfect God, that ever\nhis highest beauty of compassion must be wedded to righteousness, and\never his truest strength of righteousness must be softened with\ncompassion.\n\nBut beyond that, note how, wherever there is the loving and childlike\ncontemplation of God, there will be an analogy in our compassion, to His\nperfectness. We are transformed by beholding. The sun strikes a poor\nlittle pane of glass in a cottage miles away, and it flashes with some\nlikeness of the sun and casts a light across the plain. The man whose\nface is turned Godwards will have beauty pass into his face, and all\nthat look upon him will see 'as it had been the countenance of an\nangel.'\n\nIf we have, in any real and deep measure, received mercy we shall\nreflect mercy. Remember the parable of the unmerciful debtor. The\nservant that cast himself at his lord's feet, and got the acquittal of\nhis debt, and went out and gripped his fellow-servant by the throat,\nleaving the marks of his fingernails on his windpipe, with his 'Pay me\nthat thou owest!' had all the pardon cancelled, and all the debt laid\nupon his shoulders again. If we owe all our hope and peace to a\nforgiving God, how can we make anything else the law of our lives than\nthat, having received mercy, we should show mercy? The test of your\nbeing a forgiven man is your forgivingness. There is no getting away\nfrom that plain principle, which modifies the declaration of the freedom\nof God's full pardon.\n\nBut I would have you notice, further, as a very remarkable illustration\nof this correspondence between the gracious and compassionate Lord and\nHis servant, that in the verses which follow respectively the two about\nwhich I am now speaking, the same idea is wrought out in another shape.\nIn the psalm dealing with the divine character and works we read,\nimmediately after the declaration that He is 'gracious and full of\ncompassion,' this--'He hath given meat to them that fear Him'; and the\ncorresponding clause in the second of our psalms is followed by this--to\ntranslate accurately--'It is well with the man who showeth favour and\nlendeth.' So man's open-handedness in regard to money is put down side\nby side with God's open-handedness in regard to giving meat unto them\nthat fear Him. And again, in the ninth verse of each psalm, we have the\nsame thought set forth in another fashion. 'He sent redemption unto His\npeople,' says the one; 'He hath dispersed, He hath given to the poor,'\nsays the other. That is to say, our paltry giving may be paralleled with\nthe unspeakable gifts which God has bestowed, if they come from a love\nwhich is like His. It does not matter though they are so small and His\nare so great; there is a resemblance. The tiniest crystal may be like\nthe hugest. God gives to us the possession of things in order that we\nmay enjoy the luxury, which is one of the elements in the blessedness of\nthe blessed God, who is blessed because He is the giving God, the luxury\nof giving. Poor though our bestowments must be, they are not unlike His.\nThe little burn amongst the heather carves its tiny bed, and impels its\nbaby ripples by the same laws which roll the waters of the Amazon, and\nevery fall that it makes over a shelf of rock a foot high is a miniature\nNiagara.\n\nIII. So, lastly, we have still another point, not so much of resemblance\nas of correspondence, in the firmness of God's utterances and of the\ngodly heart.\n\nIn the first of our two psalms we read, in the seventh verse, 'All His\ncommandments are _sure_.' In the second we read, in the corresponding\nverse, 'his heart is _fixed_, trusting in the Lord.' The former psalm\ngoes on, 'His commandments _stand fast_ for ever and ever; and the next\npsalm, in the corresponding verse, says 'his heart is _established_,'\nthe original employing the same word in both cases, which in our version\nis rendered, in the one place, 'stand fast,' and in the other\n'established.' So that the Psalmist is thinking of a correspondence\nbetween the stability of God's utterances and the stability of the heart\nthat clasps them in faith.\n\nHis commandments are not only precepts which enjoin duty. All which God\nsays is law, whether it be directly in the nature of guiding precept, or\nwhether it be in the nature of revealing truth, or whether it be in the\nnature of promise. It is sure, reliable, utterly trustworthy. We may be\ncertain that it will direct us aright, that it will reveal to us\nabsolute truth, that it will hold forth no flattering and false\npromises. And it is 'established.' The one fixed point amidst the whirl\nof things is the uttered will of God.\n\nTherefore, the heart that builds there builds safely. And there should\nbe a correspondence, whether there is or no, between the faithfulness of\nthe Speaker and the faith of the hearer. A man who is doubtful about the\nsolidity of the parapet which keeps him from toppling over into the\nabyss will lean gingerly upon it, until he has found out that it is\nfirm. The man that knows how strong is the stay on which he rests ought\nto lean hard upon it. Lean hard upon God, put all your weight upon Him.\nYou cannot put too much, you cannot lean too hard. The harder the\nbetter; the better He is pleased, and the more He breathes support and\nstrength into us. And, brethren! if thus we build an established faith\non that sure foundation, and match the unchangeableness of God in Christ\nwith the constancy of our faith in Him, then, 'He that believeth shall\nnever make haste,' and as my psalm says, 'He shall not be afraid of evil\ntidings; his heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord.'\n\nThe upshot of the whole matter is--we cannot work out for ourselves a\nrighteousness that will satisfy our own consciences, nor secure for\nourselves a strength that will give peace to our hearts, and stability\nto our lives, by any other means than by cleaving fast to God revealed\nin Jesus Christ.\n\nWe have borne the image of the earthly long enough; let us open our\nhearts to God in Christ. Let us yield ourselves to Him; let us gaze upon\nHim with fixed eyes of love, and labour to make our own what He bestows\nupon us. Thus living near Him, we shall be bathed in His light, and show\nforth something of His beauty. Godliness is God-likeness. It is of no\nuse to say that we are God's children if we have none of the family\nlikeness. 'If ye were Abraham's sons ye would do the works of Abraham,'\nsaid Christ to the Jews. If we are God's sons we shall do the works of\nGod. 'Be ye therefore perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect;' be\nye merciful as your Father is merciful. And if thus we here, dwelling\nwith Christ, are being conformed to the image of His Son, we shall one\nday 'be satisfied' when we 'awake in His likeness.'\n\n\n\n\nEXPERIENCE, RESOLVE, AND HOPE\n\n\n    'Thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and\n    my feet from falling. 9. I will walk before the Lord in the land of\n    the living.'--PSALM cxvi. 8, 9.\n\nThis is a quotation from an earlier psalm, with variations which are\ninteresting, whether we suppose that the Psalmist was quoting from\nmemory and made them unconsciously, or whether, as is more probable, he\ndid so, deliberately and for a purpose. The variations are these. The\nwords in the original psalm (lvi.) according to the Revised Version,\nread, 'Thou hast delivered my soul from death; hast Thou not delivered\nmy feet from falling?' The writer of this psalm felt that that did not\nsay all, so he put in another clause: 'Thou hast delivered my soul from\ndeath, _mine eyes from tears_, and my feet from falling.' It is not\nenough to keep a man alive and upright. God will wipe away his tears;\nand will often keep him from shedding them.\n\nThen the original psalm goes on: 'Thou hast delivered ... my feet from\nfalling, that I may walk before God,' but the later Psalmist goes a step\nfurther than his original. The first singer had seen what it is always a\nblessing to see--what God meant by all the varieties of His providences,\nviz. that the recipient might walk as in His presence; but the later\npoet not only discerns, but accords with, God's purpose, yields himself\nto the divine intention, and instead of simply saying 'That was what God\nmeant,' he says, 'That is what I am going to do--I will walk before the\nLord.' There is still another variation which, however, does not alter\nthe sense. The original psalm says, 'in the light of the living'; the\nother uses another word, a little more intelligible, perhaps, to an\nordinary reader, and says, 'in the land of the living.'\n\nNow, noting these significant variations, I would draw attention to this\nexpression of the Psalmist's acceptance of the divine purpose, and the\nvision that it gave him of his future. It is hard to say whether he\nmeans 'I will walk' or 'I shall walk'; whether he is expressing a hope\nor giving utterance to a fixed resolve. I think there is an element of\nboth in the words. At all events, I find in them three things: a sure\nanticipation, a firm resolve, and a far-reaching hope.\n\nI. A sure anticipation.\n\n'Thou hast'--'I will.' The past is for this Psalmist a mirror in which\nhe sees reflected the approaching form of the veiled future. God's past\nis the guarantee of God's future. Godless people, who get wearied of the\nmonotony of life, begin to say before they have gone far in it, 'Oh!\nthere is nothing new. That which is to be hath already been. It is just\none continual repetition of the same sort of thing.' But that is only\npartially true. There is only one man in the world who can truly and\ncertainly say, 'To-morrow shall be as this day, and much more abundant';\nand that is the man who says; 'He delivered my soul from death, mine\neyes from tears, and my feet from falling.' For the continuance of\nthings here is not guaranteed to us by the fact that they have lasted\nfor so long. Why, nobody knows whether the sun will rise to-morrow or\nnot--whether there will be a to-morrow or not. There will come one day\nwhen the sun sets for the last time. What people call the 'uniformity of\nnature' affords no ground on which to build certainty as to the future.\nWe all do it, but we have no right to do it. But when we bring God into\nthe future, that makes all the difference. His past is the guarantee and\nthe revelation of His future, and every person that grasps Him in faith\nhas the right to pray with assurance, 'Thou hast been my Helper; leave\nme not, neither forsake me,' and to declare triumphantly, 'The Lord will\nperfect that which concerneth me.'\n\nSo, brethren! all the past, as it is recorded for us in Scripture, lives\nand throbs with faithful promises for us to-day. Though the methods of\nthe manifestation may alter, the essence of it remains the same. As one\nof the Apostles says, 'Whatsoever things were written aforetime were\nwritten for our advantage, that we, through the encouragement ministered\nby the Scriptures, might have hope'; and looking forward into all the\nfuture, might discern its wastes unknown, all lighted up by the one glad\ncertainty that He that is 'the same yesterday and to-day and for ever'\nwill be there, and we shall be beside Him. What God has done, He will\nkeep on doing. 'The Lord hath delivered mine eyes from tears, and my\nfeet from falling,' and therefore 'I shall walk before the Lord in the\nland of the living.'\n\nOur experience yields fuel for our faith. We have been near death many a\ntime; we have never fallen into it. Our eyes have been wet many a time;\nGod has dried them. Our feet have been ready to fall many a time, and if\nat the moment when we were tottering on the edge of the precipice, we\nhave cried to Him and said, 'My feet have well-nigh slipped,' a strong\nHand has been held out to us. 'The Lord upholdeth them that are in the\nact of falling,' as the old psalm, rightly rendered, has it, and if we\nhave pushed aside His hand, and gone down, then the next clause of the\nsame verse applies, for He 'raiseth up those that have fallen,' and are\nlying prostrate.\n\nAs it has been, so it will be. 'Thou hast been with me in six troubles,'\ntherefore 'in the seventh Thou wilt not forsake me.' We can wear out\nmen; and we cannot argue that because a man has had long patience with\nsome unworthy recipient of his goodness, his patience will never give\nout. But it is safe to argue thus about God. 'I say not unto thee, until\nseven times, but until seventy times seven'--the two perfect numbers\nmultiplied into each other, and the product again multiplied by one of\nthem, to give the measureless measure of the exhaustless divine love,\nand the sure guarantee that to His servant 'to-morrow shall be as this\nday, and much more abundant.'\n\nThen, again, if we put a little different meaning into the Psalmist's\nwords (and as I said, I think both meanings lie in them), they suggest\nthat he did not look forward into the future only with expectation, but\nthat along with expectation there was resolve. So we have here\n\nII. A firm resolve.\n\n'I will walk before the Lord.' What does 'walking before the Lord' mean?\nThere are two or three expressions very like each other, yet entirely\ndifferent from each other, in the Old and in the New Testament, about\nthis matter. We read of 'walking with God,' and of 'walking before God,'\nand of 'walking after God.' And whilst there is much that is common to\nall the expressions, they look at the same idea from different angles.\n'Walking with God,' communion, fellowship, and companionship are implied\nthere. 'Walking after God,' guidance, direction, and example, and our\npoor imitation and obedience, are most conspicuous there. And 'walking\nbefore God' means, I suppose, mainly, feeling always that we are in His\npresence, and have the light of His face, and the glance of His\nall-seeing eye, falling upon us. 'If I take the wings of the morning,\nand fly into the uttermost parts of the sea, Thou art there.' 'Thou art\nacquainted with all my ways, search me, O God!' That is walking before\nGod. To put it into colder words, it means the habitual--I do not say\nunbroken, but habitual--effort to feel in our conscious hearts that we\nare in His sight; not only that we are with Him, but that we are 'naked\nand open to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.' And that is to be\nthe result, says our psalm, as it is the intention, of all that God has\nbeen doing with us in His merciful providence, in His quickening,\nsustaining, and comforting influences in the past. He sent all these\nvarying conditions, kept the psalmist alive, kept him from weeping, or\ndried his tears, kept him from falling, with the intention that he\nshould be continually blessed in the continuous sunshine of God's\npresence, and should open out his heart in it and for it, like a flower\nwhen the sunbeams strike it. Oh! how different life would look if we\nhabitually took hold of all its incidents by that handle, and thought\nabout them, not as we are accustomed to do, according to whether they\ntended to make us glad or sorry, to disappoint or fulfil our hopes and\npurposes, but looked upon them all as stages in our education, and as\nintended, if I might so say, to force us, when the tempests blow, close\nup against God; and when the sunshine came, to woo us to His side. Would\nnot all life change its aspect if we carried that thought right into it,\nand did not only keep it for Sundays, or for the crises of our lives,\nbut looked at all the trifles as so many magnets brought into action by\nHim to attract us to Himself? Dear brother, it is not enough to\nrecognise God's purpose, we must fall in with it, accept the intention,\nand co-operate with God in fulfilling it. It is a matter of purity and\nof piety, to say, 'Thou hast delivered my soul from death, that I may\nwalk before Thee.'\n\nBut there has to be something more. There have to be a firm resolve, and\neffort without which the firmest resolve will all come to nothing, and\nbe one more paving-stone for the road that is 'paved with good\nintentions.' That firm resolve finds utterance in the not vain vow, 'I\nwill'--in spite of all opposition and difficulties--'I will walk before\nthe Lord,' and keep ever bright in my mind the thought, 'Thou God seest\nme.'\n\nAy! and just in the measure in which we do so shall we have joy. In some\nof those inhuman prisons where they go in for solitary confinement,\nthere is a little hole somewhere in the wall--the prisoner does not know\nwhere--at which at any moment in the four-and-twenty hours the eye of\nthe gaoler may be, and they say that the thought of that unseen eye,\nglaring in upon the felons, drives some of them half mad. The thought\nthat poor Hagar found to be her only comfort in the wilderness--and so\nchristened the well after it--'Thou God seest me,' must be the source of\nour purest joy; or it must be a ghastly dread.  When He comes at last,\nsome men will lift up their faces to the sunshine and have their faces\nirradiated by the light; and some will call on the rocks and the hills\nto cover them from His face, and prefer rather to be crushed than to be\nblasted by the brightness of His countenance. If we are right with God,\nthen the gladdest of thoughts is, 'Thou knowest me altogether, and Thou\nhast beset me behind and before.' If we are right with God, 'Thou hast\nlaid Thine hand upon me' will mean for us support and blessing. If we\nare wrong, it will mean a weight that crushes to the earth.\n\nAnd if we are right with Him, that same thought brings with it security\nand companionship. Ah! we do not need ever to say 'I am alone' if we are\nwalking before God. It brings with it, of course, an armour against\ntemptation. What mean, lustful, worldly seduction has any power when a\nman falls back on the thought, 'God sees me, and God is with me'? Do you\nremember the very first instance in Scripture of the use of this phrase?\nThe Lord said unto Abraham, 'Walk before Me, and be thou perfect.' That\nwas not only a commandment, but it was a promise, and we might as truly,\nfor the sense of the passage, read, 'Walk before Me, and thou shalt be\nperfect.' That thought of the present God draws the teeth of all raging\nlions, and takes the stings out of all serpents, and paralyses and\nreduces to absolute nothingness every temptation. Clasp God's hand, and\nyou will not fall.\n\nIII. There is lastly here, a far-reaching hope.\n\nI do not know whether the Psalmist had any notion of any land of the\nliving except the land of Earth, where men pass their natural lives. I\nalmost think that both he and his brother, whose words he was imitating,\nhad some glimpse of a future life of closer union, when eyes should no\nmore weep nor feet fall. At any rate, you and I cannot help reading that\nhope into his words. When we read, 'I will walk before the Lord in the\nland of the living,' we cannot but think of the true and perfect\ndeliverance, when it shall be said, with a depth and a fulness of\nmeaning with which it is never said here, 'Thou hast delivered my soul\nfrom death,' and the black dread that towered so high, and closed the\nvista of all human expectation of the future, is now away back in the\npast, hull-down on the horizon as they say about ships scarcely visible,\nand no more to be feared. We cannot but think of the perfect deliverance\nof 'mine eyes from tears,' when 'God shall wipe away the tears from off\nall faces, and the rebuke of His people from off all the earth.' We\ncannot but think of the perfect deliverance of 'my feet from falling'\nwhen the redeemed of the Lord shall stand firm, and walk at liberty on\nthe golden pavements, and no more dread the stumbling-blocks of earth.\nWe cannot but think of the perfect presence of God, the perfect\nconsciousness that we are near Him, when He shall 'present us faultless\nbefore the presence of His glory with exceeding joy.' We cannot but\nthink of the perfect activity of that future state when we 'shall walk\nwith Him in white,' and 'follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth.' And\none guarantee for all that far-reaching hope is in the tiny experiences\nof the present; for He who hath delivered our souls from death, our eyes\nfrom tears, and our feet from falling, is not going to expose Himself to\nthe scoff, 'This \"God\" began to build, and was not able to finish.' But\nHe will complete that which He has begun, and will not stay His hand\nuntil all His children are perfectly redeemed and perfectly conscious of\nHis perfect Presence.\n\n\n\n\nREQUITING GOD\n\n\n    'What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits toward me?\n    13. I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the\n    Lord.'--PSALM cxvi. 12, 13.\n\nThere may possibly be a reference here to a part of the Passover ritual.\nIt seems to have become the custom in later times to lift high the wine\ncup at that feast and drink it with solemn invocation and glad\nthanksgiving. So we find our Lord taking the cup--the 'cup of blessing'\nas Paul calls it--and giving thanks. But as there is no record of the\nintroduction of that addition to the original Paschal celebration, we do\nnot know but that it was later than the date of this psalm. Nor is there\nany need to suppose such an allusion in order either to explain or to\ngive picturesque force to the words. It is a most natural thing, as all\nlanguages show, to talk of a man's lot, either of sorrow or joy, as the\ncup which he has to drink; and there are numerous instances of the\nmetaphor in the Psalms, such as 'Thou art the Portion of mine\ninheritance and of my cup, Thou maintainest my lot.' 'My cup runneth\nover.' That familiar emblem is all that is wanted here.\n\nThen one other point in reference to the mere words of the text may be\nnoticed. 'Salvation' can scarcely be taken in its highest meaning here,\nboth because the whole tone of the psalm fixes its reference to lower\nblessings, and because it is in the plural in the Hebrew. 'The cup of\nsalvation' expresses, by that plural form, the fulness and variety of\nthe manifold and multiform deliverances which God had wrought and was\nworking for the Psalmist. His whole lot in life appears to him as a cup\nfull of tender goodness, loving faithfulness, delivering grace. It runs\nover with divine acts of help and sustenance. As his grateful heart\nthinks of all God's benefits to him, he feels at once the impulse to\nrequite and the impossibility of doing so. With a kind of glad despair\nhe asks the question that ever springs to thankful lips, and having\nnothing to give, recognises the only possible return to God to be the\nacceptance of the brimming chalice which His goodness commends to his\nthirst.\n\nThe great thought, then, which lies here is that we best requite God by\nthankfully taking what He gives.\n\nNow I note to begin with--how deep that thought goes into the heart of\nGod.\n\nWhy is it that we honour God most by taking, not by giving? The first\nanswer that occurs to you, no doubt, is--because of His all-sufficiency\nand our emptiness. Man receives all. God needs nothing. We have all to\nsay, after all our service, 'Of Thine own have we given Thee.' No doubt\nthat is quite true; and rightly understood that is a strengthening and a\nglad truth. But is that all which can be said in explanation of this\nprinciple? Surely not. 'If I were hungry I would not tell thee; for the\nworld is mine and the fulness thereof,' is a grand word, but it does not\ngive all the truth. When Paul stood on Mars Hill, and, within sight of\nthe fair images of the Parthenon, shattered the intellectual basis of\nidolatry, by proclaiming a God 'not worshipped with men's hands as\nthough He needed anything, seeing He giveth to all men all things,' that\ntruth, mighty as it is, is not all. We requite God by taking rather than\nby giving, not merely because He needs nothing, and we have nothing\nwhich is not His. If that were all, it might be as true of an almighty\ntyrant, and might be so used as to forbid all worship before the gloomy\npresence, to give reverence and love to whom were as impertinent as the\ngrossest offerings of savage idolaters. But the motive of His giving to\nus is the deepest reason why our best recompense to Him is our thankful\nreception of His mercies. The principle of our text reposes at last on\n'God is love and wishes our hearts,' and not merely on 'God has all and\ndoes not need our gifts.'\n\nTake the illustration from our own love and gifts. Do we not feel that\nall the beauty and bloom of a gift is gone if the giver hopes to receive\nas much again? Do we not feel that it is all gone if the receiver thinks\nof repaying it in any coin but that of the heart? Love gives because it\ndelights in giving. It gives that it may express itself and may bless\nthe recipient. If there be any thought of return it is only the return\nof love. And that is how God gives. As James puts it, He is 'the giving\nGod,--who gives,' not as our version inadequately renders, 'liberally,'\nbut 'simply'--that is, I suppose, with a single eye, without any\nulterior view to personal advantage, from the impulse of love alone, and\nhaving no end but our good. Therefore it is, because of that pure,\nperfect love, that He delights in no recompense, but only in the payment\nof a heart won to His love and melted by His mercies. Therefore it is\nthat His hand is outstretched, 'hoping for nothing again.' His Almighty\nall-sufficiency needs nought from us, and to all heathen notions of\nworship and tribute puts the question: 'Do ye requite the Lord, O\nfoolish people and unwise?' But His deep heart of love desires and\ndelights in the echo of its own tones that is evoked among the rocky\nhardnesses of our hearts, and is glad when we take the full cup of His\nblessings and, as we raise it to our lips, call on the name of the Lord.\nIs not that a great and a gracious thought of our God and of His great\npurpose in His mercies?\n\nBut now let us look for a moment at the elements which make up this\nrequital of God in which He delights. And, first I put a very simple and\nobvious one, let us be sure that we recognise the real contents of our\ncup. It _is_ a cup of salvations, however hard it is sometimes to\nbelieve it. Of how much blessing and happiness we all rob ourselves by\nour slowness to feel that! Some of us by reason of natural temperament;\nsome of us by reason of the pressure of anxieties, and the aching of\nsorrows, and the bleeding of wounds; some of us by reason of mere\nblindness to the true character of our present, have little joyous sense\nof the real brightness of our days. It seems as if joys must have passed\nand be seen in the transfiguring light of memory, before we can discern\ntheir fairness; and then, when their place is empty, we know that we\nwere entertaining angels unawares. Many men and women live in the gloom\nof a lifelong regret for the loss of some gift which, when they had it,\nseemed nothing very extraordinary, and could not keep them from\nannoyance with trifles. Common sense and reasonable regard for our own\nhappiness and religious duty unite, as they always do, in bidding us\ntake care that we know our blessings. Do not let custom blind you to\nthem. Do not let tears so fill your eyes that you cannot see the\ngoodness of the Lord. Do not let thunderclouds, however heavy their\nlurid piles, shut out from you the blue that is in your sky. Do not let\nthe empty cup be your first teacher of the blessings you had when it was\nfull. Do not let a hard place here and there in the bed destroy your\nrest. Seek, as a plain duty, to cultivate a buoyant, joyous sense of the\ncrowded kindnesses of God in your daily life. Take full account of all\nthe pains, all the bitter ingredients, remembering that for us weak and\nsinful men the bitter is needful. If still the cup seem charged with\ndistasteful draught, remember whose lip has touched its rim, leaving its\nsacred kiss there, and whose hand holds it out to you while He says, 'Do\nthis in remembrance of Me.' The cup which my Saviour giveth me, can it\nbe anything but a cup of salvations?\n\nThen, again, another of the elements of this requital of God is--be sure\nthat you take what God gives.\n\nThere can be no greater slight and dishonour to a giver than to have his\ngifts neglected. You give something that has, perhaps, cost you much, or\nwhich at any rate has your heart in it, to your child, or other dear\none; would it not wound you if a day or two after you found it tossing\nabout among a heap of unregarded trifles? Suppose that some of those\nRajahs who received presents on a royal visit to India had gone out from\nthe durbar and flung them into the kennel, that would have been insult\nand disaffection, would it not? But these illustrations are trivial by\nthe side of our treatment of the 'giving God.' Surely of all the follies\nand crimes of our foolish and criminal race, there is none to match\nthis--that we will not take and make our own the things that are freely\ngiven to us of God. This is the height of all madness; this is the\nlowest depth of all sin. He spares not His own Son, the Son spares not\nHimself, the Father gives up His Son for us all because He loves, the\nSon loves us, and gives Himself to us and for us, and we stand with our\nhands folded on our breasts, will not condescend so much as to stretch\nthem out, or hold our blessings with so slack a grasp that at any time\nwe may let them slip through our careless fingers. He prays us with much\nentreaty to receive the gift, and neglect and stolid indifference are\nHis requital. Is there anything worse than that? Surely Scripture is\nright when it makes the sin of sins that unbelief, which is at bottom\nnothing else than a refusal to take the cup of salvation. Surely no\nsharper grief can be inflicted on the Spirit of God than when we leave\nHis gifts neglected and unappropriated.\n\nIn the highest region of all, how many of these there are which we treat\nso! A Saviour and His pardoning blood; a Spirit and His quickening\nenergies; that eternal life which might spring in our souls a fountain\nof living waters--all these are ours. Are we as strong as we might be if\nwe used the strength which we have? How comes it that with the fulness\nof God at our sides we are empty; that with the word of God in our hands\nwe know so little; that with the Spirit of God in our hearts we are so\nfleshly; that with the joy of our God for our portion we are so\ntroubled; that with the heart of God for our hiding-place we are so\ndefenceless? 'We have all and abound,' and yet we are poor and needy,\nlike some infatuated beggar, in rags and wretchedness, to whom wealth\nhad been given which he would not use.\n\nIn the lower region of daily life and common mercies the same strange\nslowness to take what we have is found. There are very few men who\nreally make the best of their circumstances. Most of us are far less\nhappy than we might be, if we had learned the divine art of wringing the\nlast drop of good out of everything. After our rude attempts at smelting\nthere is a great deal of valuable metal left in the dross, which a wiser\nsystem would extract. One wonders when one gets a glimpse of how much of\nthe raw material of happiness goes to waste in the manufacture in all\nour lives. There is so little to spare, and yet so much is flung away.\nIt needs a great deal of practical wisdom, and a great deal of strong,\nmanly Christian principle, to make the most of what God gives us.\nWatchfulness, self-restraint, the power of suppressing anxieties and\ntaking no thought for the morrow, and most of all, the habitual temper\nof fellowship with God, which is the most potent agent in the chemistry\nthat extracts its healing virtue from everything--all these are wanted.\nThe lesson is worth learning, lest we should wound that most tender\nLove, and lest we should impoverish and hurt ourselves. Do not complain\nof your thirsty lips till you are sure that you have emptied the cup of\nsalvation which God gives.\n\nOne more element of this requital of God has still to be named, the\nthankful recognition of Him in all our feasting--'call on the name of\nthe Lord.' Without this the preceding precept would be a piece of pure\nselfish Epicureanism--and without this it would be impossible. Only he\nwho enjoys life in God enjoys it worthily. Only he who enjoys life in\nGod enjoys it at all. This is the true infusion which gives sweetness to\nwhatever of bitter, and more of sweetness to whatever of sweet, the cup\nmay contain, when the name of the Lord is pronounced above it. The\nJewish father at the Passover feast solemnly lifted the wine cup above\nhis head, and drank with thanksgiving. The meal became a sacrament. So\nhere the word rendered 'take' might be translated 'raise,' and we may be\nintended to have the picture as emblematical of our consecration to all\nour blessings by a like offering of them before God and a like invoking\nof the Giver.\n\nChrist gave us not only the ritual of an ordinance, but the pattern for\nour lives, when He 'took the cup and gave thanks.' So common joys become\nsacraments, enjoyment becomes worship, and the cup which holds the\nbitter or the sweet skilfully mingled for our lives becomes the cup of\nblessing and salvation drank in remembrance of Him. If we carried that\nspirit with us into all our small duties, sorrows, and gladnesses, how\ndifferent they would all seem! We should then drink for strength, not\nfor drunkenness. We should not then find that God's gifts hid Him from\nus. We should neither leave any of them unused nor so greedily grasp\nthem that we let His hand go. Nothing would be too great for us to\nattempt, nothing too small for us to put our strength into. There would\nbe no discord between earthly gladness and heavenly desires, nor any\nrepugnance at what He held to our lips. We should drink of the cup of\nHis benefits, and all would be sweet--until we drew nearer and slaked\nour thirst at the river of His pleasures and the Fountain-head itself.\n\nOne more word. There is an old legend of an enchanted cup filled with\npoison, and put treacherously into a king's hand. He signed the sign of\nthe Cross and named the name of God over it, and it shivered in his\ngrasp. Do you take that name of the Lord as a test. Name Him over many a\ncup of which you are eager to drink, and the glittering fragments will\nlie at your feet, and the poison be spilled on the ground. What you\ncannot lift before His pure eyes and think of Him while you enjoy is not\nfor you. Friendships, schemes, plans, ambitions, amusements,\nspeculations, studies, loves, businesses--can you call on the name of\nthe Lord while you put these cups to your lips? If not, fling them\nbehind you--for they are full of poison which, for all its sugared\nsweetness, at the last will 'bite like a serpent and sting like an\nadder.'\n\n\n\n\nA CLEANSED WAY\n\n\n    'Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed\n    thereto according to Thy word.'--PSALM cxix. 9.\n\nThere are many questions about the future with which it is natural for\nyou young people to occupy yourselves; but I am afraid that the most of\nyou ask more anxiously 'How shall I _make_ my way?' than 'How shall I\n_cleanse_ it?' It is needful carefully to ponder the questions: 'How\nshall I get on in the world--be happy, fortunate?' and the like, and I\nsuppose that that is the consideration which presses with special force\nupon a great many of you. Now I want you to think of another question:\n'How shall I _cleanse_ my way?' For purity is the best thing; and to be\ngood is a wiser as well as a nobler object of ambition than any other.\nSo my object is just to try and urge upon my dear young friends before\nme the serious consideration for a while of this grave question of my\ntext, and the answers which are given to it.\n\nIf I can get you once to be smitten with a passion for purity, all but\neverything is gained. But I shall not be content if even that is the\nissue of my pleading with you now, for I want to have you all\nChristians. And that is why I have asked you to listen to what I have to\nsay to you on this occasion.\n\nI. So, first, we have here the great practical problem for life:\n'Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way?' Or, in other words,\n'How may I live a pure and a noble life?'\n\nIt is a question, of course, for everybody: it is _the_ question for\neverybody, but it is more especially one for you young people. And I\nwish to urge it upon you for two or three reasons, which I very briefly\nspecify.\n\nFirst, I desire to press upon you this question, because, as I have\nsaid, you are under special temptations not to ask it. There are so many\nother points in your future unresolved, that you are only too apt to put\naside the consideration of this one in favour of those which seem to be\nof more pressing and immediate importance. And you have the other\ntemptation, common to us all, but especially attending you as young\npeople, of living without any plan of life at all. The sin and the\nmisery of half the world are that they live from hand to mouth, knowing\nwhy they do each single action at the moment, but never looking a dozen\ninches beyond their noses to see where all the actions taken together\ntend; and so being just like weathercocks, whirled round by every wind\nof temptation that comes to them. If they are good or pure they are so\nby accident, by impulse, or because they have never been tempted. They\nhave no definite plan or theory of life which they could put into words\nif anybody asked them on what principles, and for what end, and towards\nwhat objects they were living. And as everybody is tempted into such an\nunreflecting way of life, so you especially are tempted to it, because\nat your age judgment and experience are not so strong as inclination and\npassion; and everything has got the fresh gloss of novelty upon it, and\nit seems to be sometimes sufficient delight to live and get hold of the\nnew joys that are flooding in upon you. And therefore I want you to stop\nand for a moment think whether you have any plan of life that bears\nbeing put into words, whether you can tell God and your own consciences\nwhat you are living for.\n\nAnd I urge this question upon you for another reason--because it is\nworth while for _you_ to ask it. For you have still the prerogative that\nsome of us have lost, of determining the shape that your life's course\nis to take. The path that you are going to tread lies all unmarked out\nacross the plain of life. You may be pretty nearly what you like. Life\nis before you, with great blessed possibilities; it is behind some of\nus. All the long years which you may probably have are all plastic in\nyour hands yet; they are moulded into a rigid shape for men like me. We\nhave made our beds, and we must lie on them. You have your life in your\nown hands; therefore, I beseech you, while you have not to ask this\nquestion with the bitter meaning with which old men that have made their\npaths, and made them filthy, have to ask it--'How shall an _old_ man\ncleanse his way, and get rid of the filth?'--consider how you may secure\nthat your way in the untrodden future shall be clean, and do not rest\ntill you get an answer.\n\nAnd I press it upon you for another reason, because you have special\ntemptations to make your ways unclean. It is a fearful ordeal that every\nyoung man and woman has to face, as he or she steps across the dividing\nboundary between childhood and youth, when parental authority is\nweakened, and the leading-strings are loosened, and the young swimmer is\nas it were cut away from the buoys, and has to battle with the waves\nalone. There are hundreds of young men in Manchester, there are many of\nthem here now, who have come up into this great city from quiet country\nhomes where they were shielded by the safeguards of a father's and a\nmother's love and care, and have been flung into this place, with its\nevery street swarming with temptation, and companions on the benches of\nthe university, at the desks, in the warehouses, and the workshops,\nleading them away into evil and teaching them the devil's\nalphabet--young men with their evenings vacant and with no home. Am I\nspeaking to any such standing in slippery places? Oh, my young friend!\nthere is nothing in all these temptations, the fascinations of which you\nare beginning to find out, there is nothing in them all worth soiling\nyour fingers for; there is nothing in them all that will pay you for the\nloss of your innocence. There is nothing in them all except a fair\noutside with poison at the core. You see the 'primrose path'; you do not\nsee, to use Shakespeare's solemn words, 'the everlasting burnings' to\nwhich it leads. And so I plead with you all, young men and women, to lay\nthis question to heart; and I beseech you to credit me when I say to you\nthat you have not yet touched the gravest and the most pressing problem\nof life unless you have asked yourselves in a serious mood of deep\nreflection, 'Wherewithal shall I cleanse my way?'\n\nII. So much for the first point to which I ask your attention. Now,\nsecondly, look at this answer, which tells us that we can only make our\nway clean on condition of constant watchfulness. 'By taking heed\nthereto.'\n\nThat seems a very plain, simple, common-sense answer. The best made road\nwants looking after if it is to be kept in repair. What would become of\na railway that had no surfacemen and platelayers going along the line\nand noticing whether anything was amiss? I remember once seeing a bit of\nan old Roman road; the lava blocks were there, but for want of care,\nhere a young sapling had grown up between two of them and had driven\nthem apart; there they were split by the frost, here was a great ugly\ngap full of mud; and the whole thing ended in a jungle. How shall a man\nkeep his road in repair? 'By taking heed thereto.' Things that are left\nto go anyhow in this world have a strange knack of going one how. You do\nnot need anything else than negligence to ensure that things will come\nto grief.\n\nAnd so, at first sight, my text simply seems to preach the plain truth:\nif you want to keep your road right, look after it. But if you look at\nyour Bibles, you will see that the word 'thereto' is a supplement, and\nthat all that the Psalmist really says is 'by taking heed.' And perhaps\nit is to himself rather than to his 'way' that a man is exhorted to\n'take heed.' 'Take heed to thyself' is the only condition of a pure and\nnoble life.\n\nThat such a condition is necessary, will appear very plain from two\nconsiderations. First, it is clear that there must be constant\nwatchfulness, if we consider what sort of a world this is that we have\ngot into And it is also plain, if we consider what sort of creatures we\nare that have got into it.\n\nFirst, it is plain if we consider what sort of a world this is that we\nhave got into. It is a world a great deal fuller of inducements to do\nwrong than of inducements to do right; a world in which there are a\ngreat many bad things that have a deceptive appearance of pleasure; a\ngreat many circumstances in which it seems far easier to follow the\nworse than to follow the better course. And so, unless a man has learned\nthe great art of saying 'No!' 'So did not I because of the fear of the\nLord'; he will come to rack and ruin without a doubt. There are more\nthings round about you that will tempt you downwards than will draw you\nupwards, and your only security is constant watchfulness. As George\nHerbert says:--\n\n  'Who keeps no guard upon himself is slack,\n   And rots to nothing at the next great thaw.'\n\nAnd that is what will happen to you, as sure as you are living, in spite\nof all your good resolutions, unless you back up those resolutions with\nperpetual jealous watchfulness over yourselves. 'Keep thy heart with all\ndiligence.'\n\nAnd the same lesson is pealed out to us if we consider what sort of\ncreatures we are that have got into this world all full of wickedness.\nWe are creatures evidently made for self-government. Our whole nature is\nlike a monarchy. There are things in each of us that are never meant to\nrule, but to be kept well down under control, such as strong passions,\ndesires rooted in the flesh which are not meant to get the mastery of a\nman, and there are parts of our nature which are as obviously intended\nto be supreme and sovereign: the reason, the conscience, the will.\n\nThere is a deal of pestilent talk which one sometimes hears, amongst\nyoung men especially, about 'following nature.' Yes! I say, 'Follow\nnature!' and nature says, 'Let the man govern the animal!' and 'Do not\nset beggars on horseback,' nor allow your passions to guide you, but\nkeep a tight hand on them, suppress them, scourge them, rule them by\nyour reason, by your conscience, and by your will.\n\nSuppose a man were to say about a steamship, 'The structure of this\nvessel shows that it is meant that we should get a roaring fire up in\nthe furnaces, and set the engines going at full speed, and let her go as\nshe will.' Would he not have left out of account that there was a\nsteering apparatus, which was as plainly meant to guide as are the\nengines to drive? What are the rudder and the wheel for?--do they not\nimply a pilot? and is not the make of our souls as plainly suggestive of\nsubordination and control? Doth not nature itself teach you that you do\nnot follow, but outrage, nature, when you let your passions rule, and\nthat you only then follow nature when you bow the whole man under the\ndominion of the conscience, and when conscience stands waiting for the\nvoice of God?\n\n  'Unless above himself he can erect\n   Himself, how mean a thing is man!'\n\nYou are called upon by the very world that you have come into, and by\nthe very sort of person that you yourself are, to exercise that\nperpetual watchfulness which is the only condition of cleansing your\nway. There must be a strong guard on the frontier, which shall examine\nall the thoughts and purposes and desires that would pass out, and all\nthe temptations and seductions that would pass in; and take care that\nnone shall pass which cannot bring the King's warrant, 'Keep thy heart\nwith diligence.' 'Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? By\ntaking heed thereto.'\n\nIII. This constant watchfulness, to be of any use, must be regulated by\nGod's Word. 'Taking heed thereto, according to Thy word.'\n\nThe guard on the frontier who is to keep the path must have instructions\nfrom headquarters, and not choose and decide according to their own\nphantasy, but according to the King's orders. Or to use another\nmetaphor, it is no use having a guard unless the guard has a lantern,\nand the lantern and light is the Word of God.\n\nThat brings me to say, and only in a word or two, how inadequate for the\ntask of regulating our own lives our own watchfulness is. Conscience is\nthe captain of the guard, and there is only one judgment in which\nconscience is always and infallibly right, and that is when it says, 'It\nis right to do right; and it is wrong to do wrong.' But when you begin\nto ask conscience, 'And, pray, what _is_ right and what _is_ wrong?' it\nis by no means invariably to be trusted; for you can educate conscience\nup or down to almost anything; and you can warp conscience, and you can\nbribe conscience, and you can stifle conscience. And so it is not enough\nthat we should exercise the most watchful care over our course, and\ndecide upon the right and the wrong of it by our own judgments; we may\nbe fearfully wrong notwithstanding it all. It is not enough for a man to\nhave a good watch in his pocket unless now and then he can get Greenwich\ntime by which he can set it, and unless that has been secured by taking\nan observation of the sun. And so you cannot trust to anything in\nyourselves for the guidance of your own way or for the determination of\nyour duty, but you must look to that higher Wisdom that has condescended\nto speak to us, and give us in this Book the revelation of its will. Men\nrebel against the moral law of the Bible, and speak of it as if it were\na restraint and a sharp taskmaster. Ah, no! It is one of the greatest\ntokens of God's infinite love to us that He has not left us to grope our\nway amidst the illusions of our own judgments, and the questionable\nshapes of human conceptions of right and wrong, but that He has declared\nto us His own character for the standard of all perfection, and given us\nin the human life of the Son of His love the all-sufficient pattern for\nevery life.\n\nSo I need not dwell at any length upon the thought that in that word of\nGod, in its whole sweep, and eminently and especially in Christ, who is\nthe Incarnate Word, we have an all-sufficient Guide. A guide of conduct\nmust be plain--and whatever doubts and difficulties there may be about\nthe doctrines of Christianity there is none about its morality. A guide\nof conduct must be decisive--and there is no faltering in the utterance\nof the Book as to right and wrong. A guide of conduct must be capable of\napplication to the wide diversities of character, age, circumstance--and\nthe morality of the New Testament especially, and of the Old in a\nmeasure, secures that, because it does not trouble itself about minute\ndetails, but deals with large principles. The morality of the Gospel, if\nI may so say, is a morality of centres, not of circumferences; of\ngerminal principles, not of special prescriptions. A guide for morals\nmust be far in advance of the followers, and it has taken generations\nand centuries to work into men's consciences, and to work out in men's\npractice, _a portion_ of the morality of that Book. People tell us that\nChristianity is worn out. Ah! it will not be worn out until all its\nmoral teaching has become part of the practice of the world, and that\nwill not be for a year or two! The men that care least about Christian\ndoctrines are foremost to admit that the Sermon on the Mount is the\nnoblest code of morality that has ever been promulgated. If the world\nkept the commandments of the New Testament, the world would be in the\nMillennium; and all the sin and crime, and ninety-nine-hundredths of all\nthe sorrow, of earth would have vanished like an ugly dream. Here is the\nguide for you, and if you take it you will not err.\n\nMy dear young friend! did you ever try to measure one day's actions by\nthe standard of this Book? Let me press upon you this: Cultivate the\nhabit--the habit of bringing all that you do side by side with this\nlight; as a scholar in some school of art will take his feeble copy, and\nhold it by the side of the masterpiece, and compare line for line, and\ntint for tint. Take your life, and put it by the side of the Great Life,\nand you will begin to find out how 'according to Thy word' is the only\nstandard by which to set your lives.\n\nIV. And now I have one last thing to say. All this can only be done\neffectually if you are a Christian. My psalm does not go to the bottom;\nit goes as far as the measure of revelation granted to its author\nadmitted; but if a person had no more to say than that, it would be a\nweary business. It is no use to tell a man, 'Guard yourself, guard\nyourself,' nor even to tell him, 'Guard yourself according to God's\nword,' if God's word is only a _law_.\n\nThe fatal defect of all attempts at keeping my heart  by my own\nwatchfulness is that keeper and kept are one and the same, and so there\nmay be mutiny in the garrison, and the very forces that ought to subdue\nthe rebellion may have gone over to the rebels. You want a power outside\nof you to steady you. The only way to haul a boat up the rapids is to\nhave some fixed point on the shore to which a man may fasten a rope and\npull at that. You get that eternal guard and fixed point by which to\nhold in Jesus Christ, the dear Son of God's love, who has died for you.\n\nYou want another motive to be brought to bear upon your conduct, and\nupon your convictions and your will mightier than any that now influence\nthem; and you get that if you will yield yourself to the love that has\ncome down from heaven to save you, and says to you, 'If you love Me,\nkeep My commandments.' You want for keeping yourself and cleansing your\nway reinforcements to your own inward vigour, and you will get these if\nyou will trust to Jesus Christ, who will breathe into you the Spirit of\nHis own life, which will make you 'free from the law of sin and death.'\n\nYou want, if your path is to be cleansed--the youngest of you, the most\ntenderly nurtured, the purest, the most innocent wants--forgiveness for\na past path, which is in some measure stained and foul, as well as\nstrength for the future, to deliver you from the dreadful influence of\nthe habit of evil. And you get all these, dear friends! in the blood of\nJesus Christ that cleanses from all sin.\n\nSo, standing as you do in the place where two ways meet, and with your\nchoice yet in your power, I beseech you, turn away from the broad, easy\nroad that slopes pleasantly downwards, and choose the narrow, steep path\nthat climbs. Better rocks than mud, better the painful life of\nself-restraint and self-denial than the life of pleasing self.\n\nOh! choose the better portion, choose Christ for your Leader, your Law,\nyour Lord! Trust yourselves to that great sacrifice which He made on the\nCross, that all the past for you may be cleansed, and the future may be\nswept clear; and, so trusting, be sure He will be with you, to keep you\nand to guide you into the path which His own hand has raised above the\nfilth of the world; the path of holiness, along which you may walk with\nfeet and garments unstained till you come to Zion, 'with songs and\neverlasting joy upon your heads,' and bless Him there for all the way by\nwhich He led you home.\n\n\n\n\nLIFE HID AND NOT HID\n\n\n    'Thy word have I hid in my heart.'--PSALM cxix. 11.\n\n    'I have not hid Thy righteousness in my heart.'--PSALM xl. 10.\n\nThen there are two kinds of hiding--one right and one wrong: one\nessential to the life of the Christian, one inconsistent with it. He is\na shallow Christian who has no secret depths in his religion. He is a\ncowardly or a lazy one, at all events an unworthy one, who does not\nexhibit, to the utmost of his power, his religion. It is bad to have all\nthe goods in the shop window; it is just as bad to have them all in the\ncellar. There are two aspects of the Christian life--one between God and\nmyself, with which no stranger intermeddles; one patent to all the\nworld. My two texts touch these two.\n\nI. 'I have hid Thy word within my heart.' There we have the word hidden,\nor the secret religion of the heart.\n\nNow, I have often had occasion to remind you that the Old Testament use\nof the word 'heart' is much wider than our modern one, which limits it\nto being the seat and organ of love, affection, or emotion; whereas in\nthe Old Testament the 'heart' is the very vital centre of the personal\nself. As the Book of Proverbs has it, 'out of it are the issues of\nlife,' all the outgoings of activity of every kind, both that which we\nascribe to the head, and that which we ascribe to the heart. These come,\naccording to the Old Testament idea, from this central self. And so,\nwhen the Psalmist says, 'I have hid Thy word within my heart,' he means\n'I have buried it deep in the very midst of my being, and put it down at\nthe very roots of myself, and there incorporated it with the very\nsubstance of my soul.'\n\nNow, I venture to take that expression, 'Thy word,' in a somewhat wider\nsense than the Psalmist employed it. There are three ideas conveyed by\nthat expression in Scripture; and two of them are distinctly found in\nthis psalm.\n\nFirst, there is the plain, obvious one, which means by 'the word,'\nwritten revelation. The Bible of the Psalmist was a very small volume\ncompared with ours. The Pentateuch, and perhaps some of the historical\nbooks, possibly also one or two of the prophets--and these were about\nall. Yet this fragmentary word he 'hid in his heart.' Now, dear\nbrethren! I wish to say a very practical thing or two, and I begin with\nthis. If you want to be strong Christian people, hide the Bible in your\nheart. When I was a boy the practice of good Christian folk was to read\na daily chapter. I wonder if that is kept up. I gravely suspect it is\nnot. There are, no doubt, a great many causes contributing to the\ncomparative decay amongst professing Christians, of Bible reading and\nBible study. There is modern 'higher criticism,' which has a great deal\nto say about how and when the books were made, especially the books that\ncomposed this Psalmist's Bible. But I want to insist that no theories,\nwere they ever so well established--as I take leave to say they are\nnot--no theories about these secondary questions touch the value of\nScripture as a factor in the development of the Christian life. Whatever\na man may think about these, he will be none the less alive, if he is\nwise, to the importance of the daily devotional study of Scripture.\n\nThen there is another set of reasons for the neglect of Scripture, in\nthe multiplication of other forms of literature. People have so many\nother books to read now, that they have not much time for reading their\nBibles, or if they have, they think they have not. No literature will\never take the place of the old Book. Why, even looked at as a mere\nliterary product there is nothing in the world like it! And no religious\nliterature, sermons, treatises, still less magazines and periodicals,\nwill do for Christian men what the Bible will do for them. You make a\ntremendous mistake, for your own souls' sake, if your religious reading\nconsists in what people have said and thought about Scripture, more than\nin the Scripture itself. Why should you dip your pitchers into the\nreservoir, when you can take them up to where the spring comes gushing\nout of the hillside, pure and limpid and living?\n\nThen there is the drive of our modern life which crowds out the word.\nGet up a quarter of an hour earlier and you will have time to read your\nBible. It will be well worth the sacrifice, if it is a sacrifice. I do\nnot mean by reading the Bible what, I am afraid, is far too common,\nreading a scrap of Scripture as if it were a kind of charm. But I would\nmost earnestly press upon you that muscle and fibre will distinctly\natrophy and become enfeebled, if Christian people neglect the first\nplain way of hiding the word in their heart, which is to make the\nutterances of Scripture as if incorporated with their very being, and\npart of their very selves.\n\nBut there is another use of the expression, 'Thy word,' which is not\nwithout example in this great psalm of praise of the word. In one place\nin it we read, 'For ever, O Lord! Thy word is settled in heaven'; that\nis not the Bible. 'Thy faithfulness is unto all generations. They\ncontinue this day according to Thy ordinances'; these are not the\nBible--'for all are Thy servants.' 'Unless Thy law had been my delight,\nI should have perished in my afflictions'; I think that is not the Bible\neither, but it is the utterance of God's will, as expressed in the\nPsalmist's affliction. God's word comes to us in His providences and in\nmany other ways. It is the declaration of His character and purposes,\nhowever they are declared, and the expression of His will and command,\nhowever expressed. In that wider sense of the phrase, I would say, 'Hide\nthat manifested will of God in your hearts.' Let us cultivate the habit\nof bringing all 'the issues of life'--the streams that bubble up from\nthat fountain in the centre of our being--into close relation to what we\nknow to be God's will concerning us. Let the thought of the will of God\nsit sovereign arbiter, enthroned in the very centre of our personality,\nruling our will, bending it and making it yielding and conformed to His,\ngoverning our affections, regulating our passions, restraining our\ndesires, stimulating our slothfulness, quickening our aspirations,\nlifting heavenwards our hopes, and bringing the whole of the activities\nthat well up from our hearts into touch with the will of God. Cast the\nhealing branch into the very eye of the fountain, and then all the\nstreams will partake of the cleansing. Let that known will of God be as\nthe leaven hid in three measures of meal till the whole was leavened. A\nfanciful interpretation of that emblem makes the three measures to mean\nthe triple constituents of humanity, body, soul, and spirit. We may\nsmile at the fantastic exposition, but let us take heed to obey the\nexhortation. When God's will is deeply planted within, it will work\nquickening change on the heavy dough of our sluggish natures. It is when\nwe bring the springs of our actions--namely, our motives, which are our\ntrue selves--into touch with His uttered will, that our deeds become\nconformed to it. Look after the motives, and the deeds will look after\nthemselves. 'I have hid Thy word within my heart.'\n\nAnd now I venture upon a further application of this phrase, of which\nthe Psalmist had no notion, but which, in God's great mercy, in the\nprogress of revelation, we can make. There is a better word of God than\nthe Bible; there is a better word of God than any will uttered in His\nprovidences and the like. There is the Incarnate Word of God, who 'was\nfrom the beginning with God, and was God,' and is manifested in these\nlast times unto us. I am keeping well within the analogy of Scripture\nteaching when I see the perfecting of revelation by the spoken Word as\nreached in the revelation by the personal word; and when, in addition to\nthe exhortation, to hide the Scripture in your hearts, and to hide the\nuttered will of God, however uttered, in your hearts, I add, let us hide\nChrist in our hearts. For He will 'dwell in our hearts by faith,' and if\nHe is shrined within the curtains of the secret place within us, which\nis 'the secret place of the Most High,' then, in the courts of the\nsanctuary, there will be a pure sacrifice and a priest clad 'in the\nbeauties of holiness.'\n\nII. The word not hidden, or the religion of the outward life.\n\nOur second text brings into view the outer side of the devout life, that\nwhich is turned to the world. The word is to be hidden in the heart, for\nthis very end of being then revealed in the life. For what other purpose\nis it to be set in the centre of our being and applied to the springs of\naction, than to mould action, and so to be displayed in conduct? It is\nnot to be hid like some forgotten and unused treasure in a castle vault,\nbut to be buried deep in a living person, that it may affect all that\nperson's character and acts. 'There is nothing hidden, but that it\nshould come abroad.' The deepest, sacredest, most secret Christian\nexperiences are to be operative on the outward life. A man may be caught\nup into the third heavens and there hear words which mortal speech\ncannot utter, but the incommunicable vision should tell on his patience\nand fortitude, and influence his Christian work. Nor is our\nmanifestation of the springs of our action to be confined to conduct.\nHowever eloquent it is, it will be all the more intelligible for the\ncommentary supplied by confession with the mouth. Speech for Christ is a\nChristian obligation. 'What ye hear in the ear, that proclaim ye on the\nhousetops.' True, there is a legitimate reticence as to the depths of\npersonal religion, which needs very strong reasons to warrant its being\nbroken through. Peter told Mark nothing of the interview which he had\nwith Christ on the Resurrection morning, but he must have told the fact.\nWe shall do well to be silent as to what passes between Jesus and us in\nsecret; but we shall not do well if, coming from our private communion\nwith Him, we do not 'find' some to whom we can say, 'We have found the\nMessiah,' and so bring them to Jesus.\n\nThe word, if hid in the heart, will certainly be manifest in the life.\nFor not only is it impossible for a man who deeply and continually\nrealises God's will, and lives in touch with Jesus Christ, to prevent\nthese experiences from visibly affecting His life and conduct, but also\nin the measure in which we have that conscious inward possession of the\ndivine word and the divine Christ we shall be impelled to manifest them\nto our fellows by every means in our power. What, then, is the inference\nto be drawn from the fact that there are thousands of professing\nChristian people in Manchester, who never felt the slightest touch of a\nnecessity to make known the Master whom they say they serve? They must\nbe very shallow Christians, having no depth of experience, or that\nexperience would insist on coming out. True Christian emotion is like a\nfire smouldering within some substance, that never rests till it burns\nits way to the outside. As one of the prophets puts it, 'I said I will\nspeak no more in Thy name'; he goes on to tell how his resolve of\nsilence gave way under the pressure of the unuttered speech--'Thy word\nshut up in my bones was like a fire, and I was weary of forbearing and I\ncould not stay.' So it will always be. Every genuine conviction demands\nutterance. A full heart needs the relief of speech. If you feel no need\nto show your allegiance and love to Christ by speech as well as by life,\nI shrewdly suspect you have little love or allegiance to hide.\n\nFurther, the more we show it, the more need there is for us to cultivate\nthe hidden element in our religion. If I were talking to ministers I\nshould have a great deal to say about that. There are preachers who\npreach away their own religion. The two attitudes of mind in imparting\nand in receiving are wholly different; and if one is allowed to encroach\nupon the other, nothing but harm can come. 'As thy servant was busy here\nand there, he was gone,'--that is the short account of the decay of\npersonal religion in many a life outwardly diligent in Christian work.\nIf there is a proportionate cultivation of the hidden self, then the act\nof manifesting will tend to strengthen it. It is meant that our\nChristian convictions and affections should grow in strength and in\ntransforming power upon ourselves, by reason of utterance; just as when\nyou let air in, the fire burns brighter. But it is quite possible that\nwe may dissipate and scatter our feeble religion by talking about it;\nand some of us may be in danger of that. The loftier you mean to build\nyour tower, the deeper must be the foundation that you dig. The more any\nof us are trying to do for Jesus Christ, the more need there is that we\nincrease our secret communion with Jesus Christ.\n\nWe may wrongly hide our religion so that it evaporates. Too many\nprofessing Christians put away their religion as careless housewives\nmight do some precious perfume, and when they go to take it out, they\nfind nothing but a rotten cork, a faint odour, and an empty flask. Take\ncare of burying your religion so deep, as dogs do bones, that you cannot\nfind it again, or if you do discover, when you open the coffin, that it\nholds only a handful of dry dust. The heart has two actions. In one it\nopens its portals and expands to receive the inflowing blood which is\nthe life. In the other it contracts to drive the life through the veins.\nFor health there must be both motions; the receptiveness, in the secret\n'hiding of the word in the heart'; the expulsive energy in the 'not\nhiding Thy righteousness in my heart.'\n\n\n\n\nA STRANGER IN THE EARTH\n\n\n    'I am a stranger in the earth: hide not Thy commandments from me....\n    64. The earth, O Lord, is full of Thy mercy: teach me Thy statutes.'\n    --PSALM cxix. 19, 64.\n\nThere is something very remarkable in the variety-in-monotony of this,\nthe longest of the psalms. Though it be the longest it is in one sense\nthe simplest, inasmuch as there is but one thought in it, beaten out\ninto all manner of forms and based upon all various considerations. It\nreminds one of the great violinist who out of one string managed to\nbring such music and melody.\n\nThe one thought is the infinite preciousness of God's law, by which, of\ncourse, is not meant the written record of that law which lies in\nScripture, but the utterances of God's law in any form, by which men may\nreceive it. You will find that that wider signification of the word\n'law,' 'commandment,' 'statute,' is essential to the understanding of\nevery portion of this psalm.\n\nAnd now these two petitions which I have put together base the prayer,\nwhich they both offer, in slightly varied form ('Teach me Thy statutes,'\nor 'Hide not Thy commandments from me,') upon two diverse\nconsiderations, which, taken in conjunction, are extremely interesting.\n\nThe two facts on which the one petition rests, are like two great piers\non two opposite sides of a river, each of which holds one end of the\narch. 'The earth is full of Thy mercy'; ay! but 'I am a stranger upon\nthe earth.' These two things are both true, and from each of them, and\nstill more from both of them taken together, rises up this petition. Let\nus look then at the facts, and then at the prayer that is built upon\nthem.\n\nTake first that thought of the rejoicing earth, full of God's mercy as\nsome cup is full of rich wine, or as the flowers in the morning are\nfilled with dew. The Bible does not look at the external world, the\nmaterial universe, from a scientific point of view, nor does it look at\nit from a poetical point of view, but from a simply religious one.\nNothing that modern science has taught us to say about the world in the\nleast affects this principle which the Psalmist lays down, that it is\nall full of God's mercy. The thought is intended to exclude man and\nman's ways and all connected with him, as we shall see presently, but\nthe Psalmist looks out upon the earth and all the rest of its\ninhabitants, and he is sure of two things: one, that God's direct act is\nat work in it all, so as that every creature that lives, and everything\nthat is, lives and is because God is there, and working there; and next,\nthat everything about us is the object of loving thoughts of God's; and\nhas, as it were, some reflection of God's smile cast across it like the\nlight of flowers upon the grass. Spring days with life 're-orient out of\ndust,' and the annual miracle beginning again all round, with the birds\nin the trees, that even dwellers in towns can hear singing as if their\nhearts would burst for very mirth and hopefulness, the blossoms\nbeginning to push above the frosty ground, and the life breaking out of\nthe branches that were stiff and dry all through the winter, proclaim\nthe same truth as the Psalmist was contemplating when he spoke thus. He\nlooks all round, and everywhere sees the signature of a loving divine\nHand.\n\nThe earth is full to brimming of Thy mercy. It takes faith to see that;\nit takes a deeper and a firmer hold of the thought of a present God than\nmost men have, to feel that. For the most of us, the world has got to be\nvery empty of God now. We hear rather the creaking of the wheels of a\ngreat machine, or see the workings of a blind, impersonal force. But I\nbelieve that all that is precious and good in the growth of knowledge\nsince the old days when this Psalmist wrote may be joyfully accepted by\nus, and deep down below all we may see the deeper, larger truth of the\nliving purpose and will of God Himself. And I know no reason why\ntwentieth-century men, full to the fingertips of modern scientific\nthought, may not say as heartily as the old Psalmist said, 'The earth, O\nLord! is full of Thy mercy.'\n\nBut then there is another side to all this. Amidst all this sunny play\nof gladness, and apocalypse of blessing, there stands one exception.\nHearken to the other word of my texts, 'I am a stranger upon the earth.'\nMan is out of joint with the great whole, out of harmony with the music,\nthe only hungry one at the feast. All other creatures are admirably\nadapted for the place they fill, and the place they fill is sufficient\nfor them. But I stand here, knowing that I do not belong to this goodly\nfellowship, feeling that I am an exception to the rule. As Colonel\nGardiner said, 'I looked at the dog, and I wished that _I_ was a dog.'\nAh! many another man has felt, Why is it that whilst every creature, the\nmotes that dance in the sunbeam, and the minutest living things, however\ninsignificant, are all filled to the very brim of their capacity--why is\nit that I, the roof and crown of things, stand here, a sad and solitary\nstranger, having made acquaintance with grief; having learned what they\nknow not, the burden of toil and care, cursed with forecast and\nanticipation, saddened by memory, torn by desires? 'We look before and\nafter, and pine for what is not.' All other beings fit their place, and\ntheir place fits them like a glove upon a fair hand, but I stand here 'a\nstranger upon the earth.' And the more I feel, or at least the more I am\nconvinced that it is full of God's mercy, the more I feel that there is\nsomething else which I need to make me, in my fashion, as really and as\ncompletely blessed as the lowest of His creatures.\n\nThe Psalmist tells us what that something more is: 'I am a stranger upon\nthe earth; hide not Thy commandments from me.' That is my food, that is\nwhat I need; that is the one thing that will make our souls feel at\nrest, that we shall have not merely a Bible in our hands, but the will\nof God, the knowledge and the love of the will of God, in our hearts.\nWhen we can say 'I delight to do Thy will, and my whole being seeks to\nlay itself beneath the mould of Thine impressing purpose, and to be\nshaped accordingly'; Oh! then, then the care and the toil and the sorrow\nand the restlessness and the sense of transiency, all change. Some of\nthem pass away altogether; those of them that survive are transfigured\nfrom darkness to glory. Just as some gloomy cliff, impending over the\nplain, when the rising sun smites upon it, is changed into a rosy and\ngolden glory, so the frowning peaks that look down upon us, are all\ntransmuted and glorified, when once the light of God's recognised will\nfalls upon them.\n\n  'All is right that seems most wrong,\n     If it be His sweet will.'\n\nAnd when He has not hidden His commandments from us, but we have them in\nour hearts, for the joy and the strength of our lives, then, then it\ndoes not matter, though we have to say, 'foxes have holes, and birds of\nthe air have their roosting-places,' and I only, in creation, have 'not\nwhere to lay my head.' If we have His will in our hearts, and are humbly\nand yet lovingly trying to do it, then toil becomes easy, and work\nbecomes blessedness. If we have His will in our hearts, and are seeking\nto cleave to it, then and only then, do we cease to feel that it is sad\nthat we should be strangers upon the earth, because then and then only\ncan we say 'we seek for a better country, that is, a heavenly.'\n\nOh, dear friends! we shall be cursed with restlessness and 'weighed upon\nwith sore distress'; and a fleeting world will, by its very\nfleetingness, be a misery to us, until we have learned to yield our\nwills to God, and to drink in His law as the joy and the rejoicing of\nour hearts. A stranger upon the earth needs the statutes of the Lord, he\nneeds no more, and then they will be as the Psalmist says in another\nplace, 'his song in the house of his pilgrimage.'\n\nBut the first of our two texts suggests further to us the certainty that\nthis petition shall not be in vain. If the thought, 'I am a stranger in\nthe earth,' teaches us our need of God's commandments, the thought, 'the\nearth is full of Thy mercies,' assures us that we shall get what we\nneed.\n\nSurely it is not going to be the case that we only are to be left hungry\nwhen all other creatures sit at His table and feast there. Surely He who\nknows what each living thing requires, and opens His hand, and satisfies\ntheir desires, is not going to leave the nobler famishing of an immortal\nsoul uncared for.\n\nSurely if all through the universe besides, we see that the measure of a\ncreature's capacity is the measure of God's gift to it, there is not\ngoing to be, there need not be, any disproportion between what we\nrequire and what we possess. Surely if His ear can hear and translate,\nand His loving hand can open to satisfy, the croaking of the young raven\nwhen it cries, He will neither mistake nor neglect the voice of a man's\nheart, when it is asking what is so in accordance with His will as that\nHe should let him know and love His statutes.\n\nIt is not meant to be the case that we lie in the middle of His\ncreation, the one exception to the universal law, like Gideon's fleece,\ndry and dusty, while every poor bit of bush and grass round about is\nsoaked with His dew. If 'the earth is full of Thy mercy,' Thou thereby\nhast pledged Thyself that my heart shall be full of Thy law and Thy\ngrace, if I desire it.\n\nAnd so, dear brethren! whilst the one of these twin considerations\nshould send us to our knees, the other should hearten and wing our\nprayers. And if, on the one hand, we feel that to bring us up to the\nlevel of the poorest of His creatures, we need a firm grasp and a hearty\nlove of His law deep in our spirits, on the other hand, the fact that\nthe feeblest and the poorest of His creatures is saturated and soaked\nwith as much of God's goodness as it can suck in, may make us quite sure\nthat our souls will not vainly pant after Him in a 'dry and thirsty land\nwhere no water is.' 'The earth, O Lord! is full of Thy mercy.' Am I to\nbe empty of the highest mercy, the knowledge of Thy will? Never! never!\n\nAnd so, 'Say not, Who shall ascend up into the heavens? say not, Who\nshall pass over the sea to bring Thy law near, that we may hear and do\nit? Behold! the word is very nigh thee.' The law, the will of God, and\nthe power to perform it are braided together, in inextricable union, in\nJesus Christ Himself; and the prayer of my psalm most deeply understood,\nturns itself all into this:--Give me Christ, more of the knowledge of\nHim who is my law and Thine uttered will; more of the love of Him whom\nto love is to be at home everywhere, and to be filled with Thy mercy;\nmore of the likeness to Him whom to imitate is holiness; whom to\nresemble is perfection. 'The earth is full of Thy mercy.' 'The Word was\nmade flesh, and dwelt among us; and we beheld His glory, full of grace\nand truth.' And of that fulness can all we receive. Then will we be\nstrangers here no longer; and our hearts will be replenished with a\nbetter mercy than all the universe beside is capable of containing.\n\n\n\n\n'TIME FOR THEE TO WORK'\n\n\n    'It is time for Thee, Lord, to work; for they have made void Thy\n    Law. 127. Therefore I love Thy commandments above gold, yea, above\n    fine gold. 128. Therefore I esteem all Thy precepts concerning all\n    things to be right; and I hate every false way.'\n    --PSALM cxix. 126-128.\n\nIf much that we hear be true, a society to circulate Bibles is a most\nirrational and wasteful expenditure of energy and money. We cannot\nignore the extent and severity of the opposition to the very idea of\nrevelation, even if we would; we should not if we could. We are told\nwith some exaggeration--the wish being father to the thought--that the\neducated mind of the country has broken with Christianity, a statement\nwhich is equally remarkable for its accuracy and for its modesty. But it\nhas a basis of truth in the widespread disbelief diffused through the\nliterary and so-called cultivated classes. There is no need to spend\ntime in referring at length to facts which are only too familiar to most\nof us. Every sphere of knowledge, every form of literature, is enlisted\nin the crusade. Periodicals that lie on all our tables, works of\nimagination that your daughters read, newspapers that go everywhere, are\nfull of it. Poetry, forgetting her lineage and her sweetness, strains\n_her_ voice in rhapsodies of hostility. Science, leaping the hedge\nbeyond which _she_ at all events is a trespasser,--or in finer language,\n'prolonging its gaze backwards beyond the boundary of experimental\nevidence,' or in still plainer terms, _guessing_, affirms that she\ndiscerns in matter the promise and potency of every form of life; or\npresently, in a devouter mood, looking on the budding glories of the\nspring, declines to _profess_ the creed of Atheism. Learned criticism\ndemonstrates the impossibility of supernatural religion. The leader of\nan influential school leaves behind him a voice hollow and sad, as from\nthe great darkness, in which we seem to hear the echoes of a life\nbaffled in the attempt to harmonise the logical and the spiritual\nelements of a large soul: 'There may be a God. The evidence is\ninsufficient for proof. It only amounts to one of the lower degrees of\nprobability. He may have given a revelation of His will. There are\ngrounds sufficient to remove all antecedent improbability. The question\nis wholly one of evidence; but the evidence required has not been, and\ncannot be, forthcoming. There is room to hope for a future life, but\nthere is no assurance whatever. Therefore cultivate in the region of the\nimagination merely those hopes which can never become certainties, for\nthey are infinitely precious to mankind.'\n\nAh, brethren! do we not hear in these dreary words the cry of the\nimmortal hunger of the soul for God, for the living God? The concessions\nthey make to Christian apologists are noteworthy, but that unconscious\nconfession of need is the most noteworthy. Surely, as the eye prophesies\nlight, so the longing of the soul and the capacity for forming such\nideals are the token that He is for whom heart and flesh do thus yearn.\nAnd how blessed is it to set over against these dreary ghosts that call\nthemselves hopes, and that pathetic vain attempt to find refuge in the\ngreen fields of the imagination from the choking dust of the logical\narena, the old faithful words: 'This is the record, that God hath given\nto us eternal life, and that this life is in His Son'!\n\nBut my object in referring to these forms of opinion was merely to\nprepare the way for my subsequent observations; I have no intention of\ndealing with any of them by way of criticism or refutation. This is not\nthe place nor the audience, nor am I the person, for that task. But I\nhave thought that it might not be inappropriate to this occasion if I\nwere to ask you to consider with me, from these words, the attitude of\nmind and heart to God's word which becomes the Christian in times of\nopposition.\n\nThe Psalmist was surrounded, as would appear, by widespread defection\nfrom God's law. But instead of trembling as if the sun were about to\nexpire, he turns himself to God, and in fellowship with Him sees in all\nthe antagonism but the premonition that He is about to act for the\nvindication of His own work. That confidence finds expression in the\nsublime invocation of our text. Then with another movement of thought,\nthe contemplation of the departures makes him tighten his own hold on\nthe law of the Lord, and the contempt of the gainsayers quickens his\nlove: '_Therefore_ I love,' etc. And as must needs be the case, that\nlove is the measure of his abhorrence of the opposite; and because God's\ncommandments are so dear to him, therefore he recoils with healthy\nhatred from false ways. So, I think, we have a fourfold representation\nhere of our true attitude in the face of existing antagonism--calm\nconfidence in God's work for His law; earnest prayer, which secures the\nforthputting of the divine energy; an increased intensity of cleaving to\nthe word; and a decisive opposition to the ways which make it void.\n\nI ask your attention to some remarks on each of these in their order.\nSo, then, we have--\n\nI. Calm confidence that times of antagonism evoke God's work for His\nword.\n\nNow I dare say that some of you feel that is not the first thought that\nshould be excited by the opposition around us. 'We have no sort of\ndoubt,' you may say, 'that God will take care of His own word, if there\nbe such a thing; but the question that presses is, Have we it in this\nbook? Answer that for us, and we will thank you; but platitudes about\nGod watching over His truth are naught. The first thing to do is to meet\nthese arguments and establish the origin of Scripture. Then it will\nfollow of itself that it will not perish.'\n\nBut I take leave to think we, as Christians, arc not bound to revise the\nfoundation belief of our lives at the call of every new antagonist. Life\nis too short for that. There is too much work waiting, to suspend our\nactivity till we have answered each denier. We do not hold our faith in\nthe word of God, as the winners at a match do their cups and belts, on\ncondition of wrestling for them with any challenger. It is a perfectly\nlegitimate position to say, We hold a ground of certitude, from which\nnone of this strife of tongues is able to dislodge us. 'We have heard\nHim ourselves, and know that this is the Christ.' The Scriptures which\nwe have received, not without knowledge of the grounds on which\ncontroversialists defend them, have proved themselves to us by their own\nwitness. The light is its own proof. We have the experience of Christ\nand His law. He has saved our souls, He has changed our lives. We know\nin whom we have believed, and we are neither irrational nor obstinate\nwhen we avow that we will not pretend to suspend these convictions on\nthe issue of any debate. We decline to dig up the piles of the bridge\nthat carries us over the abyss because voices tell us that it is rotten.\nIt is shorter and perfectly reasonable to answer, 'Rotten, did you say?\nWell, we have tried it, and it bears'; which, being translated into less\nsimple language, is just the assertion of certitude built on facts and\nexperience which leaves no place for doubt. All the opposition will be\nbroken into spray against that rock bulwark: 'Thy words were found, and\nI did eat them, and they are the joy and rejoicing of my heart.'\n\nSo I venture to think that, speaking to Christian men and women, I have\na right to speak on the basis of our common belief, and to encourage\nthem to cherish it notwithstanding gainsayers. I am not counselling\nstolid indifference to the course of modern thought, nor desertion of\nthe duty of defence. We are not to say, 'God will interfere; I need do\nnothing.' But the task of controversy is not for all Christians, nor the\nduty of following the flow of opinion. There is plenty of more\nprofitable work than that for most of us. The temper which our text\nenjoins _is_ for us all; and this calm confidence, that at the right\ntime God will work for His word, is its first element.\n\nThis confidence rests upon our belief in a divine providence that\ngoverns the world, and on the observed laws of its working. It is ever\nHis method to send His succour _after_ the evil has been developed, and\n_before_ it has triumphed. Had it come sooner, the priceless benefits of\nstruggle, the new perceptions won in controversy of the many-sided\nmeaning and value of His truth, the vigour from conflict, the wholesome\nsense of our weakness, had all been lost. Had it come later, it had come\ntoo late. So He times His help, in order that we may derive the greatest\npossible benefit from both the trial and the aid. We have all been dealt\nwith so in our personal histories, whereof the very motto might be,\n'When I said my foot slippeth, Thy mercy, O Lord! held me up.' The same\nlaw works on the wider platform. The enemy shall be allowed to pass\nthrough the breadth of the land, to spread dread and sorrow through\nvillage and hamlet, to draw his ranks round Jerusalem, as a man closes\nhis hand on some insect he would crush. _To-morrow_, and the assault\nwill be made; but _to-night_ 'the angel of the Lord went forth and smote\nthe camp; and when they arose in the morning,' expecting to hear the\nwild war-cry of the conquerors as they stormed across the undefended\nwalls, 'they were all dead corpses.' Then, as it would appear, a\npsalmist, moved by that mighty victory, cast it into words, which remain\nfor all generations the law of the divine aid, and imply all that I am\nurging now: 'The Lord is in the midst of her, she shall not be moved;\nthe Lord shall help her at the dawning of the morning.' True, we are no\njudges of the time. Our impatience is ever outrunning His calm\ndeliberation. An illusion besets us all that _our_ conflicts with\nunbelief are the severest the world has ever seen; and there is a great\ndeal of exaggeration on both sides at present as to the real extent and\nimportance of existing antagonism to God's revelation. A widespread\nliterature provides so many--I would not say empty--spaces for any voice\nto reverberate in, that both the shouters and the listeners are apt to\nfancy the assailants are an army, when they are only a handful, armed\nmainly with trumpets and pitchers. There have been darker days of\nantagonism than these. 'He that believeth shall not make haste.' This\nconfidence in the punctual wisdom of His working involves the other\nbelief, that if He does not 'work,' it is because the time is not yet\nripe; the negations and contradictions have still an office to fulfil,\nand no hurt that cannot be repaired has been done to the faith of the\nChurch or the power of the word.\n\nNor can we forecast the manner of His working. He can call forth from\nthe solitary sheepfolds the defenders of His word, as has ever been His\nwont, raising the man when the hour had come, even as He sent His son in\nthe fulness of time. He can lead science on to deeper truth; He can\nquicken His Church into new life; He can guide the spirit of the age. We\nbelieve that the history of the world is the unfolding of His will, and\nthe course of opinion guided in its channel by the Voice which the\ndepths have obeyed from of old. Therefore we wait for His working,\nexpecting no miracle, prescribing no time, hurried by no impatience,\navoiding no task of defence or confession; but knowing that, unhasting\nand unresting He will arise when the storm is loudest, and somehow will\nsay, 'Peace! be still.' Then they who had not cast away their confidence\nfor any fashion of unbelief that passeth away will rejoice as they sing,\n'Lo! this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us.'\n\nThis confidence is confirmed by the history of all the past assaults on\nScripture.\n\nThe whole history of the origin, collection, preservation, transmission,\ndiffusion, and present influence of the Bible involves so much that is\nsurprising and unique, as to amount to at least a strong presumption of\na divine care. Among all the remarkable things about the Book, nothing\nis more remarkable than that there it is, after all that has happened.\nWhen we think of the gaps and losses in ancient literature, and the long\nstormy centuries that lie between us and its earlier pages, we can\nfaintly estimate the chances against their preservation. It is strange\nthat the Jewish race should have so jealously preserved books which\ncertainly did not flatter national pride, which put a mortifying\nexplanation on national disasters, which painted them and their fathers\nin dark colours, which proclaimed truths they never loved, and breathed\na spirit they never caught. It is stranger still, that in the long years\nof dispersion the very vices and limitations of the people subserved the\nsame end, and that stiff pedantry and laborious trifling--the poorest\nform of intellectual activity--should have guarded the letter of the\nword, as the coral insects painfully build up their walls round some\nfair island of the Southern Sea. When one thinks of the great gulf of\nlanguage between the Old and New Testaments, of the variety of authors,\nperiods, subjects, literary form, the animosities of Christian and Jew,\nit _is_ strange that we have the Book here _one_, and that all these\nparts should blend into unity, unless the source and theme were one, and\none Hand had shaped each, and cared for the gathering together of all.\n\nIt has been demonstrated over and over again to have no pretensions to\nbe a divine revelation; and yet here it is, believed by millions, and\nrooted so firmly in European language and thought, that no revolution\nshort of a return to barbarism can abolish it. It has been proved to be\na careless, unauthenticated collection of works of different periods,\nstyles, and schools of thought, having no unity but what is given by the\nbookbinder: and lo! here it is still, not disintegrated, much less\ndissolved. Each age brings its own destructive criticism to play on it,\nconfessing thereby that its predecessors have effected nothing; for as\nthe Bible says about sacrifices, so we may say about assaults on\nScripture, 'If they had done their work, would they not have ceased to\nbe offered?' And the effect of the heaviest artillery that can be\nbrought into position is as transient as the boom of their report and\nthe puff of their smoke. Why, who knows anything about the world's\nwonders of books that a hundred years ago made good men's hearts tremble\nfor the ark of God? You may find them in dusty rows on the top shelves\nof great libraries. But if their names had not occurred in the pages of\nChristian apologists, flies in amber, nobody in this generation would\never have heard of them. And still more conspicuously is it so with\nearlier examples of the same kind. Their work is as hopelessly dead as\nthey. And the Book seems none the worse for all the shot--like the rock\nthat a ship fired at all night, taking it for an enemy, and could not\nprovoke to answer nor succeed in sinking. Surely some dim suspicion of\nthe hopelessness of the attempt might creep into the hearts of men who\nknow what _has_ been. Surely the signal failure and swift fading away of\nall former efforts to dethrone the Bible might lead to the question,\n'Does it not lay its deep foundations in the heart of man and the\npurpose of God, too deep to be reached by the short tools of mere\ncriticism, too massive to be overthrown by all the weight of\nmaterialistic science?' It is with the Bible as it was with the Apostle,\non whose hand, as he crouched over the newly-lit flame, the viper\nfastened, 'and he shook off the beast into the fire, and felt no harm.'\nThe barbarous people, who changed their minds after they had looked a\ngreat while and saw no harm come to him, were not altogether wrong, and\nmight teach a lesson to some modern wise men, that, among the other\nfacts which they deal with, they should try to estimate this fact of the\ncontinued existence and influence of Scripture, and the failure thus far\nof all attempts to shake its throne or break the sweet influences of its\nbands.\n\nBrethren! we, at all events, should learn the lesson of historical\nexperience. The Gospel and the Book which is its record, have met with\neager, eloquent, learned antagonists before to-day, and they have\npassed. Little more than a generation has sufficed to sweep them to\noblivion. So it will be again. The forms of opinion, the tendencies of\nthought, which now seem to some of its enemies so certain to conquer,\nwill follow these forgotten precursors into the dim land. May we not see\nthem--these ancient discrowned kings that ruled over men and rebelled\nagainst Christ, these beliefs that no man now believes--rising from\ntheir shadowy thrones in the underworld to meet the now living and\nruling unbelief, when it, too, shall have gone down to them; 'All they\nshall speak and say unto thee, Art thou also become weak as we? art thou\nbecome like unto us?' Yes, each in its turn 'becomes but a noise' when\nhe 'passes the time appointed'--the time when God arises to do His act\nand vindicate His word.\n\nII. We have here, secondly, earnest prayer which brings that divine\nenergy.\n\nThe confidence that God _will_ work underlies and gives energy to the\nprayer that God _would_ work. The belief that a given thing is in the\nline of the divine purpose is not a reason for saying, 'We need not\npray; God means to do it,' but is a reason for saying on the contrary,\n'God means to do it; let us pray for it.' And this prayer, based upon\nthe confidence that it is His will, is the best service that any of us\ncan render to the Gospel in troublous times.\n\nI shall have a word to say presently on the _sort_ of outflow of the\ndivine energy which we should principally expect and desire; but let me\nfirst remind you, very briefly, how the prayers of Christian men do\ncondition--I had almost said regulate--that outflow.\n\nI need not put this matter on its abstract and metaphysical side. Two\nfacts are enough for my present purpose--one, a truth of faith, that the\nactual power wherewith God works for His word remains ever the same;\none, a truth of observation and experience, that there are variations in\nthe intensity of its operations and effects in the world. Wherefore?\nSurely because of the variations in the human recipients and organs of\nthe power. Here at one end is the great fountain, ever brimming. Draw\nfrom it ever so much, it sinks not one hair's-breadth in its pure basin.\nHere, on the other side, is an intermittent flow, sometimes in scanty\ndriblets, sometimes in painful drops, sometimes more full and free on\nthe pastures of the wilderness. Wherefore these jerks and spasms? It\nmust be something stopping the pipe. Yes, of course. God's might is ever\nthe same, but our capacity of receiving and transmitting that might\nvaries, and with it varies the energy with which that unchanging power\nis exerted in the world. Our faith, our earnestness of desire, our\nardour and confidence of prayer, our faithfulness of stewardship and\nstrenuousness of use, measure the amount of the unmeasured grace which\nwe can receive. So long as our vessels are brought, the golden oil does\nnot cease to flow. When they are full, it stays. The principle of the\nvariation in actual manifestation of the unvarying might of God is found\nin the Lord's words: 'According to your faith be it unto you.' So, then,\nwe may expect periods of quickened energy in the forth-putting of the\ndivine power. And these will correspond to, and be consequent on, the\nfaithful prayers of Christian men. See to it, brethren! that you keep\nthe channels clear, that the flow may continue full and increase. Let no\nmud and ooze of the world, no big blocks of sin nor subtler\naccumulations of small negligences, choke them again. Above all, by\nsimple, earnest prayer keep your hearts, as it were, wide open to the\nSun, and His light will shine on you, and His grace fructify through\nyou, and His Spirit will work in you mightily.\n\nThe tenor of these remarks presupposes a point on which I wish to make\none or two observations now, viz. that the manner of the divine working\nwhich we should most earnestly desire in a time of diffused unbelief is\nthe elevation of Christian souls to a higher spiritual life.\n\nI do not wish to exclude other things, but I believe that the true\nantidote to a widespread scepticism is a quickened Church. We may indeed\ndesire that in other ways the enemy should be met. We ought to pray that\nGod would work by sending forth defenders of the truth, by establishing\nHis Church in the firm faith of disputed verities, and by all the\nmultitude of ways in which He can sway the thoughts and tendencies of\nmen. But I honestly confess that I, for my part, attach but secondary\nimportance to controversial defences of the faith. No doubt they have\ntheir office; they may confirm a waverer, they may establish a believer,\nthey may show onlookers that the Christian position is tenable; they\nmay, in some rare cases of transcendent power, prevent a heresy from\nspreading and from descending to another generation. But oftenest they\nare barren of result, and where they do their work, it is not to be\nforgotten that there may remain as true a making void of God's law by an\nevil heart of unbelief as by an understanding cased in the mail of\ndenial. You may hammer ice on an anvil, or bray it in a mortar. What\nthen? It is pounded ice still, except for the little portion melted by\nheat of percussion, and it will soon all congeal again. Melt it in the\nsun, and it flows down in sweet water, which mirrors that light which\nloosed its bonds of cold. So hammer away at unbelief with your logical\nsledge-hammers, and you will change its shape, perhaps; but it is none\nthe less unbelief because you have ground it to powder. It is a mightier\nagent that must melt it--the fire of God's affection, of all lower,\nhowsoever tender, loves that once filled the whole heart. Such surrender\nis not pain but gladness, inasmuch as the deeper well that has been sunk\ndries the surface springs, and gathers all their waters into itself. The\nnew treasure that has filled the heart compels, by glad compulsion, the\nsurrender or, at least, the subordination, of all former affections to\nthe constraint of all-mastering love.\n\nThe same thing is true in regard to the union of the soul with Christ.\nThe description of the bride's abandonment of former duties and ties may\nbe transferred, without the change of a word, to our relations to Him.\nIf love to Him has really come into our hearts, it will master all our\nyearnings and tendencies and affections, and we shall feel that we\ncannot but yield up everything besides, by reason of the sovereign power\nof this new affection. Christ demands from us (if I may use the word\n'demand' for the beseeching of love), for His sake, and for our sakes,\nthe entire surrender of ourselves to Him. And that new affection will\ndeal with the old loves, just as the new buds upon the beech-trees in\nthe spring deal with the old leaves that still hang withered on some of\nthe branches. It will push them from their hold, and they will drop. If\na river should be turned into some dark cave where unclean beasts have\nherded and littered for years, the bright waters would sweep out on\ntheir bosom all the filth and rottenness. So, when the love of Christ\ncomes surging and flashing into a heart, it will bear out on its broad\nsurface all conflicting and subordinate inclinations, with the passions\nand lusts that used to rule and befoul the spirit. Christ demands\ncomplete surrender, and, if we are Christians, that absolute abandonment\nwill not be a pain nor unwelcome. We epidemic. That is a doctrine which\none influential school of modern disbelievers, at all events, cannot but\nadmit.\n\nWhat then? Why this--that to change the opinions you must change the\natmosphere; or, in other words, the true antagonist of a diffused\nscepticism is a quickened Christian life. Brethren! if we had been what\nwe ought, would such an environment have ever been possible as that\nwhich produces this modern unbelief? Even now, depend upon it, we shall\ndo more for Christ by catching and exhibiting more of His Spirit than by\nmany arguments--more by words of prayer to God than by words of\nreasoning to men. A higher tone of spiritual life would prove that the\nGospel was mighty to mould and ennoble character. If our own souls were\ngleaming with the glory of God, men would believe that we had met more\nthan the shadow of our own personality in the secret place. If the fire\nof faith were bright in us, it would communicate itself to others, for\nnothing is so contagious as earnestness. If we believed, and therefore\nspoke, the accent of conviction in our tones would carry them deep into\nsome hearts. If we would trust Christ's Cross to stand firm without our\nstays, and arguing less about it, would seldomer try to _prop_ it, and\noftener to _point_ to it, it would draw men to itself. When the power\nand reality of Scripture as the revelation of God are questioned, the\nbest answer in the long-run will be a Church which can adduce itself as\nthe witness, and can say to the gainsayers, 'Why, herein is a marvellous\nthing, that ye know not from whence He is, and yet He hath opened mine\neyes!' Brethren! do you see to it that your life be thus a witness that\nyou have heard His voice; and make it your contribution to the warfare\nof this day, if you do not bear a weapon, that you lift your hands and\nheart to God. Moses on the mount helped the struggling ranks below in\ntheir hand-to-hand combat with Amalek. Hezekiah's prayer, when he spread\nthe letter of the invader before the Lord, was more to the purpose than\nall his munitions of war. Let your voice rise to heaven like a fountain,\nand blessings will fall on earth. 'Arise, O Lord! plead Thine own cause.\nThe tumult of those that rise up against Thee increaseth continually.'\n\nIII. We have here, thirdly, as the fitting attitude in times of\nwidespread unbelief, a love to God's word made more fervid by\nantagonism.\n\nThere may be a question what reason for the Psalmist's love is pointed\nat in this 'therefore.' We shall hardly be satisfied with the slovenly\nand not very reverent explanation, that the word is introduced, without\nany particular meaning, because it begins with the initial letter proper\nto this section; nor does it seem enough to suppose a mere general\nreference to the excellences of the law of the Lord, which are the theme\nof the whole psalm. Such an interpretation blunts the sharp edge of the\nthought, and has nothing in its favour but the general want of\nconnection between the separate verses. There are, however, one or two\nother instances where a thought is pursued through more than one verse,\nand the usual mere juxtaposition gives place to an interlocking, so that\nthe construction is not unexampled. It is most natural to take the plain\nmeaning of the words, and to suppose that when the Psalmist said, 'They\nhave made void Thy law, therefore I love Thy commandments,' he meant,\n'The prevailing opposition is the reason why I, for my part, grasp Thy\nlaw more strongly.' The hostility of others evokes my warmer love. The\nthought, so understood, is definite, true, and important, and so I\nventure to construe it, and enforce it as containing a lesson for the\nday.\n\nAnd here I would first observe that I desire not to be understood as\nurging the substitution of feeling for reason, nor as trying to enlist\npassion in a crusade against the opponent's logic. Still less do I\ndesire to counsel the exaggeration of opinions because they are\ndenied--that besetting danger of all controversy.\n\nBut surely the emotions have a place and an office, if not indeed in the\nsearch for, and the submission to, the truth of God, yet in the defence\nand adherence to that truth when found. The heart may not be the organ\nfor the investigation and apprehension of truth, though it has a part to\nplay even there; but the tenacity with which I cleave to truth, when\napprehended, is far more an affair of the will than of the\nunderstanding--it is the heart's love steadying the mind, and holding it\nfixed to the rock. And love has also a place in the defence of the\ntruth. It gives weight to blows, and wings to the arrows. It makes\narguments to be wrought in fire rather than in frost. It lights the\nenthusiasm which cannot despair, the diligence that will not weary, the\nfervour that often goes farther to sway other minds than the sharpest\ndialectics of a passionless understanding. There _are_ causes in which\nan unimpassioned advocacy is worse than silence; and this is one of\nthem. The word of the living God which has saved our souls and brought\nto us all that makes our natures rich and strong, and all that peoples\nthe great darkness with fair hopes solid as certainties, demands and\ndeserves fervour in its soldiers, and loyal love in its subjects.\n\nAnd while it is weakness to over-emphasise our beliefs _merely_ because\nthey are denied, and one of the saddest issues of controversy, that both\nsides are apt to be hurried into exaggerated statements which calmer\nthoughts would repudiate; on the other hand, there _is_ a legitimate\nprominence which ought to be given to a truth _precisely_ because it is\ndenied. The time to underline and accentuate strongly our convictions\nis, when society is slipping away from them, provided it be done without\npetulance, passion, or the falsehood of extremes.\n\nIf ever there was a period when such general considerations as these had\na practical application, this is the time. Would that all such as my\nvoice now reaches would take these grand words for theirs: 'They make\nvoid Thy law, therefore I love Thy commandments above gold; yea, above\nfine gold!'\n\nSuch increase of affection because of gainsayers is the natural instinct\nof loyal and chivalrous love. If your mother's name were defiled, would\nnot your heart bound to her defence? When a prince is a dethroned exile,\nhis throne is fixed deeper in the hearts of his adherents 'though his\nback be at the wall' and common souls become heroes because their\ndevotion has been heightened to sublimity of self-sacrifice by a\nnation's rebellion. And when so many voices are proclaiming that God has\nnever spoken to men, that our thoughts of His Book are dreams, and its\nlong empire over men's spirits a waning tyranny, does cool indifference\nbecome us? Will not fervour be sobriety, and the glowing emotion of our\nwhole nature our reasonable service?\n\nSuch increase of affection because of gainsayers is the fitting end and\nmain blessing of the controversy which is being waged. We never fully\nhold our treasures till we have grasped them hard, lest they should be\nplucked from us. No truth is established till it has been denied and has\nsurvived. Antagonism to the word of God should have, and will have, to\nthose who use it rightly, a blessing in its train, in bringing out yet\nmore of the preciousness and manifoldness, the all-sufficiency and the\nuniversality of the Book. 'The more 'tis shook, the more it shines.' The\nfiercer the blast, the firmer our confidence in the inexpugnable\nsolidity of that tower of strength that stands four square to every wind\nthat blows. 'The word of the Lord is tried, therefore Thy servant loveth\nit.'\n\nSuch increase of attachment to the word of God because of gainsayers, is\nthe instinct of self-preservation. The sight of so many making void the\nlaw makes a man bethink himself of what his own standing is. We, as\nthey, are the children of the age. The tendencies to which they have\nyielded operate on us too, and our only strength is, 'Hold Thou me up,\nand I shall be safe!' The present condition of opinion remands us all to\nour foundations, and should teach us that nothing but firm adherence to\nGod revealed in His word, and to the word which reveals God, will\nprevent us, too, from drifting away to shoreless, solitary seas of\ndoubt, barren as the foam, and changeful as the crumbling, restless\nwave.\n\nSuch strength of affection in the presence of diffused doubt is not to\nbe won without an effort. All our churches afford us but too many\nexamples of men and women who have lost the warmth of their first love,\nif not their love itself, for no better reason than because so many\nothers have lost it. The effect of popular unbelief stretches far beyond\nthose who are directly affected by its arguments, or avowedly adopt its\nconclusions. It is hard to hold by a creed which so many influential\nvoices tell you it is a sign of folly and of being behind the age to\nbelieve. The consciousness that Christian truth is denied, makes some of\nyou falter in its profession, and fancy that it is less certain simply\nbecause it is gainsaid. The mist wraps you in its folds, and it is\ndifficult to keep warm in it, or to believe that love and sunshine are\nabove it all the same. 'Because iniquity shall abound, the love of many\nshall wax cold.'\n\nTherefore, brethren! do you consciously endeavour that the tempest shall\nmake you tighten your hold on Christ and His word. He appeals to us,\ntoo, with that most pathetic question, in which yearning for our love\nand sorrow over the departed disciples blend so wondrously, as if He\ncast Himself on our loyalty: 'Will ye also go away?' Let us answer, not\nwith the self-confidence that was so signally put to shame, 'Though all\nshould forsake Thee, yet will not I'; but with the resolve that draws\nits firmness from His fulness and from our knowledge of the power of His\ntruth, 'Lord! to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life.'\n\nIV. And lastly, we have here, as the final trait in the temper which\nbecomes such times, healthy opposition to the ways which make void the\nword of the Lord.\n\nThat is the Psalmist's last movement of feeling, and you see that it\ncomes second, not first, in the order of his emotions. It is the\nconsequence of his love, the recoil of his heart from the practices and\ntheories which contradicted God's law.\n\nNow, far be it from me to say a word which should fan the embers of the\n_odium theologicum_ into a blaze against either men or opinions. But\nthere is a truth involved which seems to be in danger of being forgotten\nat present, and that to the detriment of large interests as well as of\nthe forgetters. The correlative of a hearty love for any principle or\nbelief is--we may as well use the obnoxious word--a healthy hatred for\nits denial and contradiction. They are but two aspects of one thing,\nlike that pillar of old which, in its single substance, was a cloud and\ndarkness to the foes, and gave light by night to the friends of Him who\ndwelt in it. Nay, they are but two names for the very same thing viewed\nin the very same motion, which is love as it yearns towards and cleaves\nto its treasure; and hatred, as by the identical same act it recoils and\nwithdraws from the opposite: 'He will hold to the one, and therefore and\ntherein despise the other.'\n\nMuch popular teaching as to Christian truth seems to me to ignore this\nplain principle, and to be working harm, especially among our younger\ncultivated men and women, whom it charms by an appearance of liberality,\nwhich in their view, contrasts very favourably with the narrowness of us\nsectarians. I am free to admit that in our zeal about small matters (and\nin a certain 'provincialism,' so to speak, which characterised the type\nof English Christianity till within a recent period) we needed, and\nstill need, the lesson, and I will thankfully accept the rebuke that\nreminds me of what I ever tend to forget, that the golden rod, wherewith\nthe divine Builder measures from jewel to jewel in the walls of the New\nJerusalem, takes in wider spaces than we have meted with our lines. But\nthat is a very different matter from the tone which vitiates and weakens\nso much modern adherence to Christ's Gospel and Christ's Church. The old\nprinciple, 'in essentials unity, in non-essentials liberty,' made no\nattempt to determine what belonged to these two classes, and in practice\ntheir bounds may often have been wrongly set, so as to include many of\nthe latter among the former; but it at all events recognised the\ndistinction as the basis of its next clause, 'in all things, charity.'\nBut nowadays, to listen to some liberal teachers, one would think that\nnothing was necessary, except the great sacred principle, that nothing\nis necessary; and that charity could not exist, unless that distinction\nwere effaced.\n\nI pray you, and if I may venture so far, I would especially pray my\nyounger hearers, to take note, that however fair this way of looking at\nvarying forms of Christian opinion may be, it really reposes on a basis\nwhich they will surely think twice before accepting, the denial that\nthere is such a thing as intellectual certitude in religion which can be\ncast into definite propositions. If there be any truth at all, to\nconfess _it_ is to deny its opposite, to cleave to _this_ is to reject\nthat, to love the one is to hate the other. I fear--I know--that there\nare many minds among us who began with simply catching this tone of\ntolerance, and who have been insensibly borne along to an enfeebled\nbelief that there is such a thing as religious truth at all, and that\nthe truth lies in the word of God. Dear friends! let me beseech you to\ntake heed lest, while you are only conscious of your hearts expanding\nwith the genial glow of liberality, by little and little you lose your\npower of discerning between things that differ, your sense of the worth\nof the Scripture as the depository of divine truth, and from your slack\nhand the hem of the vesture in which its healing should fall away.\n\nAs broad a liberality as you please within the limits that are laid down\nby the very nature of the case. 'These things are written that ye might\nbelieve that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing, ye\nmight have life through His name.' Wheresoever that record is accepted,\nthat divine Name confessed, that faith exercised, and that life\npossessed, there, with all diversities, own a brother. Wheresover these\nthings are not, loyalty to your Lord demands that the strength of your\nlove for His word should be manifested in the strength of your recoil\nfrom that which makes it void. 'I love Thy commandments, and I hate\nevery false way.'\n\nI am much mistaken if times are not rapidly coming on us when a decisive\nelection of his side will be forced on every man. The old antagonists\nwill be face to face once more. Compromises and hesitations will not\nserve. The country between the opposing forces will be stripped of every\nspot that might serve as cover for neutrals. On the one side a mighty\nhost, its right the Pharisees of ecclesiasticism and ritual, with their\nbanner of authority, making void the law of God by their tradition; its\nleft, and never far away from their opposites on the right with whom\nthey are strangely leagued, working into each other's hands, the\nSadducees denying angel and spirit, with their war-cry of unfettered\nfreedom and scientific evidence; and in the centre, far rolling,\ninnumerable, the dusky hosts of mere animalism, and worldliness, and\nself, making void the law by their sheer godlessness. And on the other\nside, 'He was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood, and His name is\ncalled the Word of God, and they that were with Him were called, and\nchosen, and faithful.' The issue is certain from of old. Do you see to\nit that you are of those who were valiant for the truth upon the earth.\n\nLet not the contradiction of many move you from your faith; let it lift\nyour eyes to the hills from whence cometh our help. Let it open your\ndesires in prayer to Him who keeps His own word, that it may keep His\nChurch and bless the world. Let it kindle into fervent enthusiasm, which\nis calm sobriety, your love for that word. Let it make decisive your\nrejection of all that opposes. Driftwood may float with the stream; the\nship that holds to her anchor swings the other way. Send that word far\nand wide. It is its own best evidence. It will correct all the\nmisrepresentation of its foes, and supplement the inadequate defences of\nits friends. Amid all the changes of attacks that have their day and\ncease to be, amid all the changes of our representations of its endless\nfulness, it will live. Schools of thought that assail and defend it\npass, but it abides. Of both enemy and friend it is true, 'The grass\nwithereth, and the flower thereof passeth away.' How antique and\nineffectual the pages of the past generations of either are, compared\nwith the ever-fresh youth of the Bible, which, like the angels, is the\nyoungest and is the oldest of books. The world can never lose it; and\nnotwithstanding all assaults, we may rest upon _His_ assurance, whose\ncommand is prophecy, when He says, 'Write it before them in a table, and\nnote it in a book, that it may be for the time to come for ever and\never.'\n\n\n\n\nSUBMISSION AND PEACE\n\n\n    'Great peace have they which love Thy law; and nothing shall offend\n    them.'\n        PSALM cxix. 165.\n\nThe marginal note says 'they shall have no stumbling block.'\n\nWe do great injustice to this psalm--so exuberant in its praises of 'the\nlaw of the Lord'--if we suppose that that expression means nothing more\nthan the Mosaic or Jewish revelation. It does mean that, of course, but\nthe psalm itself shows that the writer uses the expression and its\nvarious synonyms as including a great deal more than any one method by\nwhich God's will is made known to man. For he speaks, for instance, in\none part of the psalm of God's 'word,' as being settled for ever in the\nheavens, and of the heavens and earth as continuing to this day,\n'according to Thine ordinances.'\n\nSo we are warranted in giving to the thought of our text the wider\nextension of taking the divine 'law' to include not only that directory\nof conduct contained in Scripture, but the expressed will of God,\ninvolving duties for us, in whatever way it is made known. The love of\nthat uttered will, the Psalmist declares, will always bring peace. Such\nan understanding of the text does not exclude the narrower reference,\nwhich is often taken to be the only thought in the Psalmist's mind, nor\ndoes it obliterate the distinction between the written law of God and\nthe disclosures of His will which we collect by the exercise of our\nfaculties on events around and facts within us. But it widens the\nhorizon of our contemplations, and bases the promised peace on its true\nfoundation, the submission of the human to the divine will.\n\nLet us then consider how true love to the will of God, however it is\nmade known to us, either in the Book or in our consciousness, or in\ndaily providences, or by other people's hints, is the talisman that\nbrings to us, in all circumstances, and in every part of our nature, a\ntranquillity which nothing can disturb.\n\nOf course, by 'love' here is meant, not only delight in the\nexpression of, but the submission of the whole being to, God's will;\nand we love the law only when, and because, we love the Lawgiver.\n\nI. Thus loving the law of God, not only with delight in the vehicle of\nits expression, but with inward submission to its behests, we shall\nhave, first of all, the peacefulness of a restful heart.\n\nSuch a heart has found an adequate and worthy object for the outgoings\nof its affections. Base things loved always disturb. Noble things loved\nalways tranquillise. And he to whom his judgment declares that the best\nof all things is God's manifested will, and whose affections and\nemotions and actions follow the dictate of his judgment, has a love\nwhich grasps whatsoever things are noble and fair and of good report,\nand is lifted to a level corresponding with the loftiness of its\nobjects. For our hearts are like the creatures in some river, of which\nthey tell us that they change their colour according to the hue of the\nbed of the stream in which they float and of the food of which they\npartake. The heart that lives on the will of God will be calm and\nsteadfast, and ennobled into reposeful tranquillity like that which it\ngrasps and grapples.\n\nLittle boats which are made fast to the sides of a ship rise and fall\nwith the tide, as does that to which they are attached. And our hearts,\nif they be roped to the fleeting, the visible, the creatural, the\nfinite, partake of the fluctuations, and finally are involved in the\ndestruction, of that which they have made their supreme good. And\ncontrariwise, they who love that which is eternal shine with a light\nthrown by reflection from the object of their love, and 'he that doeth\nthe will of God abideth for ever,' like the will which he doeth. 'Great\npeace'--the peace of a restful heart--'have they that love Thy law.'\n\nII. Then again, such love brings the calm of a submitted will.\n\nBrethren! it is not sorrow that troubles us so much as resistance to\nsorrow. It is not pain that lacerates; it cuts, and cuts clean when we\nkeep ourselves still and let it do its merciful ministry upon us. But it\nis the plunging and struggling under the knife that makes the wounds\njagged and hard to heal. The man who bows his will to the Supreme, in\nquiet acceptance of that which He sends, is never disturbed. Resistance\ndistracts and agitates; acquiescence brings a great calm. Submission is\npeace. And when we have learned to bend our wills, and let God break\nthem, if that be His will, in order to bend them, then 'nothing shall by\nany means hurt us'; and nothing shall by any means trouble us.\n\nIf you were ever on board a sailing-ship you know the difference between\nits motion when it is beating up against the wind and when it is running\nbefore it. In the one case all is agitation and uneasiness, in the other\nall is smooth and frictionless and delicious. So, when we go with the\ngreat stream, in not ignoble surrender, then we go quietly. It is God's\ngreat intention, in all that befalls us in this life, to bring our wills\ninto conformity with His. Blessed is the ministry of sorrow and of pain\nand of loss, if it does that for us, and disastrous and accursed is the\nministry of joy and success if it does not. There is no joy but calm,\nand there is no calm but in--not the annihilation, but--the intensest\nactivity of will, in the act of submitting to that higher will, which is\ndiscerned to be 'good,' and is gratefully taken as 'acceptable,' and\nwill one day be seen to have been 'perfect.' The joy and peace of a\nsubmitted will are the secret of all true tranquillity.\n\nIII. Then again, there comes by such a love the peace of an obedient\nlife.\n\nWhen once we have taken it (and faithfully adhere to the choice) as our\nsupreme desire to do God's will, we are delivered from almost all the\nthings that distract and disturb us. Away go all the storms of passion,\nand we are no more at the mercy of vagrant inclinations. We are no\nlonger agitated by having to consult our own desires, and seeking to\nfind in them compass and guide for our lives--a hopeless attempt! All\nthese sources of agitation are dried up, and the man who has only this\ndesire, to do his duty because God has made it such, has an ever\npowerful charm, which makes him tranquil whatever befalls.\n\nAnd as thus we may be delivered from all the agitations and\ncross-currents of conflicting wishes, inclinations, aims, which\notherwise would make a jumble and a chaos of our lives, so, on the other\nhand, if for us the supreme desire is to obey God, then we are delivered\nfrom the other great enemy to tranquillity--namely, anxious forecasting\nof possible consequences of our actions, which robs so many of us of so\nmany quiet days. 'I do the little I can do,' said Faber, 'and leave the\nrest with Thee,' and that will bring peace. Instead of wondering what is\nto come of this step and that, whether our plans will turn out as we\nhope, and so being at the mercy of contingencies impossible to be\nforecasted, we cast all upon Him and say, 'I have nothing to do with the\nfar end of my actions. Thou givest them a body as it has pleased Thee. I\nhave to do with this end of my actions--their motive; and I will make\nthat right, and then it is Thy business to make the rest right.' And so,\n'great peace have they which love Thy law.'\n\nAn obedient life not only delivers us from the distractions of\nmiscellaneous desires, and from the anxiety of unforeseen results, but\nit contributes to tranquillity in another way. The thing that makes us\nmost uneasy is either sin done or duty neglected. Either of these,\nhowever small it may appear, is like a horse-hair upon the sheets of a\nbed, or a little wrinkle in that on which a man lies, disturbing all his\nrepose. No man is really at rest unless his conscience is clear. 'The\nwicked is like the troubled sea, which cannot rest, whose waters cast up\nmire and dirt.' But if the uttered will of the Lord is our supreme\nobject, then in this direction, too, tranquillity is ours.\n\nIV. Lastly, such a love gives the peace of freedom from temptations.\n\n'Nothing shall offend them.' 'There shall be no stumbling-block to\nthem.' The higher love casts out the lower. It is well, when, by\nreinforcing conscience by considerations of duty, or even sometimes by\nthe lower thoughts of consequences, a man is able to pass by a\ntemptation which appeals to him, and conquers the inclination to go\nwrong. But it is far better--and it is possible--to be lifted up into\nsuch a region as that the temptation does not appeal to him any more.\n\nTo take a very homely illustration, whether is it better for a man to\nsteel himself, and walk past the door of a public-house, though the\nfumes appeal to his sense, and stir his inclinations; or to go past, and\nnever know any attraction to enter? Which is best, to overcome our\ntemptations, or to live away up in the high regions to which the malaria\nof the swamps never climbs, and where no disease-germs can ever reach?\n\nThat elevation is possible for us, if only we keep in close touch with\nGod, and love the law because our hearts are knit to the Law-giver.\n'There shall be no occasion of stumbling in him,' as the Apostle John\nvaries the expression of my text. Within, there will be no traitors to\nsurrender the camp to the enemy without. So Paul in the letter to the\nPhilippians attributes to 'the peace of God which passeth understanding'\na military function, and says that it will 'garrison the heart and\nmind,' and keep them 'in Christ Jesus,' which is but the Christian way\nof saying, 'Great peace have they which love Thy law; and there is no\noccasion of stumbling in them.'\n\n\n\n\nLOOKING TO THE HILLS\n\n\n    'I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my\n    help. 2. My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.'\n    --PSALM cxxi. 1, 2.\n\nThe so-called 'Songs of Degrees,' of which this psalm is one, are\nusually, and with great probability, attributed to the times of the\nExile. If that be so, we get an appropriate background and setting for\nthe expressions and emotions of this psalm. We see the exile, wearied\nwith the monotony of the long-stretching, flat plains of Babylonia,\nsummoning up before his mind the distant hills where his home was. We\nsee him wondering how he will be able ever to reach that place where his\ndesires are set; and we see him settling down, in hopeful assurance that\nhis effort is not in vain, since his help comes from the Lord. 'I will\nlift up my eyes unto the hills'; away out yonder westwards, across the\nsands, lie the lofty summits of my fatherland that draws me to itself.\nThen comes a turn of thought, most natural to a mind passionately\nyearning after a great hope, the very greatness of which makes it hard\nto keep constant. For the second clause of my text cannot possibly be,\nas it is translated in our Authorised Version, an affirmation, but must\nbe taken as the Revised Version correctly gives it, a question: 'I will\nlift up mine eyes unto the hills. From whence cometh my help?' How am I\nto get there? And then comes the final turn of thought: 'My help cometh\nfrom the Lord, which made heaven and earth.'\n\nSo then, there are three things here--the look of longing, the question\nof weakness, the assurance of faith.\n\nI. The look of longing.\n\n'I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills'--a resolution, and a\nresolution born of intense longing. Now the hills that the Psalmist is\nthinking about were visible from no part of that long-extended plain\nwhere he dwelt; and he might have looked till he wore his eyes out, ere\nhe could have seen them on the horizon of sense. But although they were\nunseen, they were visible to the heart that longed for them. He directs\nhis desires further than the vision of his eyeballs can go. Just as his\npossible contemporary, Daniel, when he prayed, opened his window towards\nthe Jerusalem that was so far away; and just as Mohammedans still, in\nevery part of the world, when they pray, turn their faces to the\n_Kaabah_ at Mecca, the sacred place to which their prayers are directed;\nand just as many Jews still, north, east, south or west though they be,\nface Jerusalem when they offer their supplications--so this psalmist in\nBabylon, wearied and sick of the low levels that stretched endlessly and\nmonotonously round about him, says, 'I will look at the things that I\ncannot see, and lift up my eyes above these lownesses about me, to the\nloftinesses that sense cannot behold, but which I know to be lying\nserene and solid beyond the narrowing horizon before me.'\n\nThere was the look of longing, and the longing which made non-vision\ninto a look; and there was the effort to divert his attention from the\nthings around him to the things afar off; and there was the realisation,\nby reason of the effort, of these distant but most certain realities.\n\nNow this Psalmist's home-sickness, if I may so call it, had nothing at\nall religious about it. It was simply that he wanted to get to his own\ncountry--his own, though he had been born in exile; and there was\nnothing more devout or spiritual or refining about his longing than\nthere is about the wish to return to his native country that any\nforeigner in a distant land feels. But when we take these words, as we\nall ought to do, as the motto of our lives, we must necessarily attach\nthe loftiest religious meaning to them. And here start up the plain,\nsimple, but tight-gripping and stimulating questions, 'Do I see the\nUnseen? Does that far-off, dim land assume substance and reality to me?\nDo I walk in the light of it raying out to me through earth's darkness?\nDo I dwell contented with never a glimpse of it?' It comes to be a very\nsharp question with us professing Christians, whether the horizon of our\ninward being is limited by, and coterminous with, the horizon of our\nsenses, or whether, far beyond the narrow limits to which these can\nreach, our spirits' desire stretches boundless. Are, to us, the things\nunseen the solid things, and the things visible the shadows and the\nphantoms? The Apocalyptic seer, in his rocky Patmos, was told that he\nwas to be shown 'the things which _are_'; and what was it that he saw? A\nset of what people call unreal and symbolic visions. 'The things which\nare,' the world would have said, 'are the rocks that you are standing\non, and the sea that is dashing upon them, and all the solid-seeming\nRoman world, and the power that has got you in its grip. These are the\nrealities, and these things that you think you see, these are the\ndreams.' But it is exactly the other way. The world and all that is\nabout us, Manchester and its hubbub, warehouses crammed with cloth, and\nmills full of jennies and throstles--these are the shadows; and the\nthings that only the believing eye beholds, that are wrapped in the\ninvisibility of their own greatness, these, and these only, are the\nrealities. We see with the bodily eyes the shadows on the wall, as it\nwere, but we have to turn round and see with the eyes of our minds the\nlight that flings the shadows. 'I will lift up my eyes' from the\nmud-flats where I live to the hills that I cannot see, and, seeing them,\nI shall be blessed.\n\nFurther, do we know anything of that longing that the Psalmist had? He\nwas perfectly comfortable in Babylon. There was abundance of everything\nthat he wanted for his life. The Jews there were materially quite as\nwell off, and many of them a great deal better off, than ever they had\nbeen in their narrow little strip of mountain land, shut in between the\ndesert and the sea. But for all that, fat, wealthy Babylon was not\nPalestine. So amidst the lush vegetation, the wealth of water and the\nfertile plains, the Psalmist longed for the mountains, though the\nmountains are often bare of green things. It was that longing that led\nto his looking to the hills. Do we know anything of that longing which\nmakes us 'that are in this tabernacle to groan, being burdened'? 'Absent\nfrom the Lord,' and 'present in the body,' we should not be at ease, nor\nat home. Unless our Christianity throws us out of harmony and\ncontentment with the present, it is worth very little. And unless we\nknow something of that immortal longing to be nearer to God, and fuller\nof Christ, and emancipated from sense, and from the burdens and\ntrivialities of life, we have yet to learn what the meaning of 'walking\nnot after the flesh but after the Spirit' really is.\n\nFurther, do we make any effort like that of this Psalmist, who\nencourages and stimulates himself by that strong 'I _will_ lift up my\neyes'? You will not do it unless you make a dead lift of effort. It is a\ngreat deal easier for a man to look at what is at his feet than to crane\nhis neck gazing at the stars.\n\nAnd so, unless we take up and persevere in maintaining a habitual\nattitude of stirring up and lifting up ourselves, gravitation will be\ntoo much for us, and down will go the head, and down the eyes; and down\nwill go the desires, and we shall be like men that live in some\nmountainous country, who never lift their gaze to the solemn white\nsummits that travellers come across half Europe to see. Christian men\nand women too often walk beneath the very peaks of the mountains of God,\nand rarely lift their vision there. They perhaps do so for an hour and a\nhalf on a Sunday morning, or an hour on a Wednesday evening, when there\nis no other engagement, or for a minute or two in the morning before\nthey hurry down to breakfast, or a minute or two at night when they are\ndead beat and unfit for anything. For the rest of the time, _there_ are\nthe mountains and _here_ is the saint, and he seldom or never turns his\nhead to look at them! Is that the sort of Christianity that is likely to\nbe a power in the world, or a blessing to its possessor?\n\nII Further, notice the question of weakness.\n\n'From whence cometh my help?' The loftier our ideal, the more painful\nought to be our conviction of incapacity to reach it. The Christian\nman's one security is in feeling his peril, and the condition of his\nstrength is his acknowledgment and vivid consciousness always of his\nweakness. The exile in Babylon had a dreary desert, peopled by wild Arab\ntribes hostile to him, stretching between his present home and that\nwhere he desired to be, and it would be difficult for him to get away\nfrom the dominion that held him captive, unless by consent of the power\nof whom he was the vassal. So the more the thought of the mountains of\nIsrael drew the Psalmist, the more there came into his mind the thought,\n'How am I to be made able to reach that blessed soil?' And surely, if\n_we_ saw, with anything like a worthy apprehension and vision, the\ngreatness of that blessedness that lies yonder for Christian souls, we\nshould feel far more deeply than we do the impossibility, as far as we\nare concerned, of our ever reaching it. The sense of our own weakness\nand the consciousness of the perils upon the path ought ever to be\npresent with us all.\n\nBrethren! if, on the one hand, we have to cultivate, for a healthy,\nvital Christianity, a vision of the mountains of God, on the other hand\nwe have to try to deepen in ourselves the wholesome sense of our own\nimpotence, and the conviction that the dangers on the road are far too\ngreat for us to deal with. 'Blessed is the man that feareth always.'\n'Pride goeth before destruction.' Remember the Franco-German war, and\nhow the French Prime Minister said that they were going into it 'with a\nlight heart,' and how some of the troops went out of Paris in railway\ncarriages labelled 'for Berlin'; and when they reached the frontier they\nwere doubled up and crushed in a month. Unless we, when we set ourselves\nto this warfare, feel the formidableness of the enemy and recognise the\nweakness of our own arms, there is nothing but defeat for us.\n\nIII. Finally, notice the assurance of faith.\n\nThe Psalmist asks himself, 'From whence cometh my help?' and then the\nbetter self answers the questioning, timid self: 'My help cometh from\nthe Lord, which made heaven and earth.' There will be no reception of\nthe divine help unless there is a sense of the need of the divine help.\nGod cannot help me before I am brought to despair of any other help. It\nis only when a man says, 'There is none other that fighteth for us, but\nonly Thou, O God!' that God comes to help.\n\nThere is a story in the Book of Chronicles, about one battle in which\nJudah engaged, of a very singular kind. The first step in the campaign\nwas that the king of Judah gathered all his people together, and prayed\nto God, and said, 'We know not what we shall do. We have no strength\nagainst this great multitude that cometh against us, but our eyes are\nunto Thee.' Then a prophet came and assured him of victory, and next day\nthey arrayed the battle. It was set in this strange fashion: in the\nforefront were put the priests and Levites, with their instruments of\nmusic, and not soldiers with spears and bows, and they marched out to\nbattle with this song, 'The Lord is gracious and merciful. His mercy\nendureth for ever.' Then, without the stroke of sword or thrust of\nspear, God fought for them and scattered their foes.\n\n'Which things are an allegory.' If we recognise our helplessness, God is\nour help. If we conceit ourselves to be strong, we are weak; if we know\nourselves to be impotent, Omnipotence pours itself into us. We read once\nthat Jesus Christ healed 'them that had need of healing.' Why does the\nEvangelist not say, without that periphrasis, 'healed the sick'? Because\nhe would emphasise, I suppose, amongst other things, the thought that\nonly the sense of need fits for the reception of healing and help.\n\nIf, then, we desire that God should be 'the Strength of our hearts, and\nour Portion for ever,' the coming of His help must be wooed and won by\nour sense of our own impotence, and only they who say, 'We have no might\nagainst this great multitude that cometh against us,' will ever hear\nfrom Him the blessed assurance, 'The Lord will fight for you.' 'Stand\nstill, and see the salvation of the Lord!' So, brethren! the assurance\nof faith follows the consciousness of weakness, and both together will\nlead, and nothing else will lead, to the realisation of the vision of\nfaith, and bring us at last, weak as we are, to the hills where the\nweary and foot-sore flock 'shall lie down in a good fold, and on fat\npasture shall they feed upon the mountains of Israel.'\n\n\n\n\nMOUNTAINS ROUND MOUNT ZION\n\n\n    'They that trust in the Lord shall be as Mount Zion, which cannot be\n    removed, but abideth for ever. 2. As the mountains are round about\n    Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about His people from henceforth,\n    even for ever.'--PSALM cxxv. 1, 2.\n\nThe so-called 'Songs of Degrees,' of which this psalm is one, are\nprobably a pilgrim's song-book, and possibly date from the period of the\nrestoration of Israel from the Babylonish captivity. In any case, this\nlittle psalm looks very much like a record of the impression that was\nmade on the pilgrim, as he first topped the crest of the hill from which\nhe looked on Jerusalem. Two peculiarities of its topographical position\nare both taken here as symbols of spiritual realities, for the\nsingularity of the situation of the city is that it stands on a mountain\nand is girdled by mountains. There is a tongue of land or peninsula cut\noff from the surrounding country by deep ravines, on which are perched\nthe buildings of the city, while across the valley on the eastern side\nis Olivet, and, on the south, another hill, the so-called 'Hill of Evil\nCounsel'; but upon the west and north sides there are no conspicuous\nsummits, though the ground rises. Thus, really, though not apparently,\nthere lie all round the city encircling defences of mountains.\nSimilarly, says the Psalmist, set and steadfast as on a mountain, and\ncompassed about by a protection, like the bastions of the everlasting\nhills, are they whose trust is in the Lord. Faith, then, gives inward\nstability, and faith secures an encircling defence.\n\nBut, more than that, notice that the mountains encompass a mountain.\nFaith, in some measure, makes the protected like the Protector. And\nthen, beyond that, notice the two 'for evers.' Zion cannot be moved, it\n'abideth for ever,' and 'the Lord is about His people from henceforth\nand for ever.' To trust in God gives the transitory creature a kind of\nshare in the uncreated eternity of that in which he trusts. Now these\nare four thoughts worth carrying away with us.\n\nI. The simple act of trust in God brings inward stability.\n\nThe word here that is rightly translated 'trust,' like most expressions\nin the Old Testament for religious emotion, has a distinctly\nmetaphorical colouring about it. It literally means to 'hang upon'\nsomething, and so, beautifully, it tells us what faith is--just hanging\nupon God. Whoever has laid his tremulous hand on a fixed something,\npartakes, in the measure in which he does grasp it, of the fixity of\nthat on which he lays hold; so 'they that trust in the Lord shall be as\nMount Zion,' that stands there summer and winter, day and night, year\nout and year in, with its strong buttresses and its immovable mass, the\nvery emblem of solidity and stability.\n\nAy! and this is true about these tremulous hearts of ours. There is one\nway to make them stable, and only one; and that is that they shall be\nfastened, as it were, to that which is stable, and so be steadfast\nbecause they hold by what is steadfast. There is no other means by which\nany heart can be made immovable, except in so far as it may be moved by\nholy impulses and sweet drawings of love and loftinesses of aspiration\ntowards God; there is no other means by which a heart, with all its\ninward perturbations and all its outward sources of agitation, can be\nmade calm and still, except by living, deep, continual fellowship with\nHim who is the Eternal Calm, and from whose stable Being we mutable men\ncan derive serenity which is a faint likeness of His immutability. 'We\nwhich have believed do enter into rest.'\n\nHow can I still these hot desires of mine, this self-asserting will, all\nthese various passions and emotions which sweep through my soul, and\nwhich must not be made mute and dead--or else there will come corruption\nand stagnation--but must be made so to move as that in their very motion\nshall be rest? How can I do that? By one way, and one only. Live in\nfellowship with God, and that will quiet perturbations within and\ntumults without. The foot of the Master on the midnight stormy sea will\nsmooth the waves which the moonbeams have not power to still, but only\nto reveal their heavings. 'They that trust in the Lord shall be like\nMount Zion, which cannot be moved,' and yet is not torpid in its\nimmobility, but full of fertility and of beauty wedded to its\nsteadfastness.\n\nIn like manner, the only way by which not only the inward storms can be\nquieted, but the outward assaults of perturbing circumstances,\ndisasters, changes, difficult duties, and the like, can ever be received\nwith tranquillity is, that they should be received in quiet faith. And,\nin like manner, the only way by which men can be made steadfast and\nimmovable in brave, pertinacious adherence to the simple law of right,\nwhatsoever temptations may try to draw them aside, and whatsoever frowns\nmay gather upon the face of affairs so as to frighten them from the path\nof rectitude--the only way by which they can conquer evil, so as not to\nbe hurried into forbidden paths, is this same making sure of their hold\nupon God, and carrying with them day by day, and moment by moment, into\nall the little difficulties and small temptations that would lead to\ntrivial faults, the one solemn thought that bids all these back into\ntheir lairs--God is near me and I am with Him.\n\nOh, brethren! if we could live in touch with Him and, as this great word\nfor 'trust' suggests, be fastened to Him, as a man, swinging from a\ncliff over the crawling sea, fathoms below him, clutches the rope that\nis his safety--then we should live in tranquillity, and be steadfast,\nimmovable.\n\nThey say that in the great church of St. Peter there is only one\ntemperature in summer and winter; that the fiercest heat may be pouring\ndown in the colonnades, or the sharpest frost may have silenced the\ntinkling fall of the fountains in the Piazza; but within the great\nportal the thermometer stands the same. Thus, if we live in the Temple,\nand keep inside its doors, the thermometer in our hearts will be fixed;\nand the anemometer--the measurer of the wind--will point to calm all the\nyear round. 'They that trust in the Lord shall be as Mount Zion, which\ncannot be moved.'\n\nII. Again, this same attitude of realising the divine Presence, Will,\nand Help, will bring around us encircling defences.\n\nI have already said that one peculiarity of the topography of the sacred\ncity is that, at first sight, the metaphor of my text seems to break\ndown, for nobody, looking at the situation of the city with uninstructed\neye, would say that it was compassed all around with mountains. On two\nsides it manifestly is; on two sides it apparently is not, though the\nland rises on the north and west till it is higher than the tops of the\nhouses. We may not be fanciful in taking that as a parable. 'As the\nmountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about His\npeople'--a very real defence, but a defence that it takes an instructed\neye to see; no obvious protection, palpable to the vulgar touch, and\nmanifest to the sensuous eye, but something a great deal better than\nthat--a real protection, through which we may be sure that nothing which\nis evil can ever pass.\n\nWhatsoever does get over the encircling mountains, and reaches us, we\nmay be sure, is not an evil but a very real good. Only we have to\ninterpret the protection on the principles of faith, and not on those of\nsense. When, then, there come down upon us--as there do upon us all,\nthank God!--dark days, and sad days, and solitary days, and losses and\nbitternesses of a thousand kinds, do not let us falter in the belief\nthat if we have our hearts set on God, nothing has come to us but what\nHe has let through. Our sorrows are His angels, though their faces are\ndark, and though they bear a sword that flames and turns every way. It\nis hard to believe; it is certainly true, and if we could carry the\nconfidence of it as a continual possession into our ordinary lives, they\nwould be very different from what they are to-day.\n\nIII. And then, remember the other thing that I said. My text suggests\nthat--\n\nSimple trust in God, in some measure, assimilates the protected to the\nProtector.\n\nThe mountains girdle a mountain, and so my trust opens my heart to the\nentrance into my heart of something akin to God. As the Apostle Peter,\nin his brave way, is not afraid to say, it makes us 'partakers of the\ndivine nature.' The immovableness of the trustful man is not all unlike\nthe calmness of the trusted God; and the steadfastness of the one is a\nreflex of the unchangeableness of the other. We have not understood the\nmeaning of faith, nor have we risen to the experience of its best\neffects upon ourselves, unless we understand that its great blessing and\nfruit, and the purpose for which we are commanded to cherish it, is that\nthereby we may become like Him in whom we trust. 'They that make them\nare like unto them; so is every one that trusteth in them.' That is the\nkey to the degradations that inhere in idolatrous worship, and that\nprinciple is true about all worship--as the god so is every one that\ntrusteth in it. 'As the mountains are round about Mount Zion,' God is\nround about the people that are becoming Godlike.\n\nIV. Mark further the significant repetition of the same expression in\nreference to the stability of the man protected and the continuance of\nthe protection. Both are 'for ever'. That is to say, if it is true that\nGod is round about me, and that, in some humble measure, my heart has\nbeen opening to be calmed and steadied by the influx of His own life,\nthen His 'for ever' is my 'for ever,' and it cannot be that He should\nlive and I should die. The guarantee of the eternal being of the\ntrustful soul is the experience to-day of the reality of the divine\nprotection. And thus we may face everything--life, death, whatsoever may\ncome, assured that nothing touches the continuity and the perpetuity of\nthe union between the trusting soul and the trusted God. 'The mountains\nshall depart and the hills be removed, but My lovingkindness shall not\ndepart from thee; nor shall the covenant of My peace be removed, saith\nthe Lord.' The earthquake comes. It shatters a continent and changes the\nface of nature; makes valleys where there were mountains, and mountains\nwhere there were vales, and open seas where there were fertile plains\nand covers everything with ruin and with rubbish. But there emerge from\nthe cloudy and chaotic confusion the city perched on the hill and its\nencompassing heights. 'The world passeth away, and the fashion thereof,\nbut he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE CHARGE OF THE WATCHERS IN THE TEMPLE\n\n\n    'Behold, bless ye the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord, which by\n    night stand in the House of the Lord. 2. Lift up your hands in the\n    Sanctuary, and bless the Lord. 3. The Lord that made Heaven and\n    earth bless thee out of Zion.'--PSALM cxxxiv.\n\nThis psalm, the shortest but one in the whole Psalter, will be more\nintelligible if we observe that in the first part of it more than one\nperson is addressed, and in the last verse a single person. It begins\nwith 'Bless _ye_ the Lord'; and the latter words are, 'The Lord bless\n_thee_.' No doubt, when used in the Temple service, the first part was\nchanted by one half of the choir, and the other part by the other. Who\nare the persons addressed in the first portion? The answer stands plain\nin the psalm itself. They are, 'All ye servants of the Lord, which by\nnight stand in the House of the Lord.' That is to say, the priests or\nLevites whose charge it was to patrol the Temple through the hours of\nnight and darkness, to see that all was safe and right there, and to do\nsuch other priestly and ministerial work as was needful; they are called\nupon to 'lift up their hands in'--or rather _towards_--'the Sanctuary,\nand to bless the Lord.'\n\nThe charge is given to these watching priests, these nightly warders, by\nsome single person--we know not whom. Perhaps by the High Priest,\nperhaps by the captain of their band. They listen to the exhortation to\npraise, and answer, in the last words of this little psalm, by invoking\na blessing on the head of the unnamed speaker who gave the charge. So we\nhave in this antiphonal choral psalm a little snatch of musical ritual\nfalling into two parts--the charge to the watchers and the answering\ninvocation. We may find a good deal of practical teaching in it. Let us\nlook, then, at this choral charge and the response to it.\n\nThe charge to the watchers.\n\nWe do not know what the office of these watchers was, but in the second\nTemple, to the period of which this psalm may possibly belong, their\nduties were carefully defined, and Rabbinical literature has preserved a\nminute account of the work of the nightly patrol.\n\nAccording to the authorities, two hundred and forty priests and Levites\nwere the nightly guard, distributed over twenty-one stations. The\ncaptain of the guard visited these stations throughout the night with\nflaming torches before him, and saluted each with 'Peace be unto thee.'\nIf he found the sentinel asleep he beat him with his staff, and had\nauthority to burn his cloak (which the drowsy guard had rolled up for a\npillow). We all remember who warned His disciples to watch, lest coming\nsuddenly He should find them asleep. We may remember, too, the blessing\npronounced in the Apocalypse on 'Him who watcheth and keepeth his\ngarments, lest he walk naked.' Shortly before daybreak the captain of\nthe guard came, as the Talmud says: 'All times were not equal. Sometimes\nhe came at cockcrow, or near it, before or after it. He went to one of\nthe posts where the priests were stationed, and opened a wicket which\nled into the court. Here the priests, who marched behind him torch in\nhand, divided into two companies which went one to the east, and one to\nthe west, carefully ascertaining that all was well. When they met each\ncompany reported \"It is peace.\" Then the duties of the watch were ended,\nand the priests who were to prepare for the daily sacrifice entered on\ntheir tasks.'\n\nOur psalm may be the chant and answering chant with which the nightly\ncharge was given over to the watchers, or it may be, as some\ncommentators suppose, 'the call and counter-call with which the watchers\ngreeted each other when they met.'\n\nFigure then, to yourselves, the band of white-robed priests gathered in\nthe court of the Temple, their flashing torches touching pillar and\nangle with strange light, the city sunk in silence and sleep, and ere\nthey part to their posts the chant rung in their ears:--'Bless ye the\nLord, all ye servants of the Lord which by night stand in the House of\nthe Lord! Lift up your hands to the Sanctuary, and bless the Lord!'\n\nNotice, then, that the priests' duty is to praise. It is because they\nare the servants of the Lord that, therefore, it is their business to\nbless the Lord. It is because they stand in the House of the Lord that\nit is theirs to bless the Lord. They who are gathered into His House,\nthey who hold communion with Him, they who can feel that the gate of the\nFather's dwelling, like the gate of the Father's heart, is always open\nto them, they who have been called in from their wanderings in a\nhomeless wilderness, and given a place and a name in His House better\nthan of sons and daughters, have been so blessed in order that, filled\nwith thanksgiving for such an entrance into God's dwelling and of such\nan adoption into His family, their silent lips may be filled with\nthanksgiving and their redeemed hands be uplifted in praise.\n\nSo for us Christians. We are servants of the Lord--His priests. That we\n'stand in the House of the Lord' expresses not only the fact of our\ngreat privilege of confiding approach to Him and communion with Him,\nwhereby we may ever abide in the very Holy of Holies and be in the\nsecret place of the Most High, even while we are busy in the world, but\nit also points to our duty of ministering; for the word 'stand' is\nemployed to designate the attendance of the priests in their office, and\nis almost equivalent to 'serve.' 'To bless the Lord,' then, is the work\nto which we are especially called. If we are made a 'royal priesthood,'\nit is that we 'should show forth the praises of Him who has called us\nout of darkness into His marvellous light.' The purpose of that full\nhorn of plenty, charged with blessings which God has emptied upon our\nheads, is that our dumb lips may be touched into thankfulness, because\nour selfish hearts have been wooed and charmed into love and life.\n\nThe Rabbis had a saying that there were two sorts of angels: the angels\nthat served, and the angels that praised; of which, according to their\nteaching, the latter were the higher in degree. It was only a\nhalf-truth, for true service is praise.\n\nBut whatever the form in which praise may come, whether it be in the\nform of vocal thanksgiving, or whether it be the glad surrender of the\nheart, manifested in the conscious discharge of the most trivial duties,\nwhether we 'lift up our hands in the Sanctuary, and bless the Lord' with\nthem, or whether we turn our hands to the tools of our daily occupation\nand handle them for His sake, alike we maybe praising Him. And the thing\nfor us to remember is that the place where we, if we are Christians,\nstand, and the character which we, if we are Christians, sustain, bind\nus to live blessing and praising Him whilst we live. 'Behold!'--as if He\nwould point to all the crowded list of God's great mercies--'Bless ye\nthe Lord, all ye servants of the Lord that ... stand in the house of the\nLord.'\n\nAnd then there is another point that comes out of this charge to the\nwatchers, viz. the necessity of strenuously trying to unite together\nservice of God and communion with God. These priests might have\nsaid--'When we go our rounds through the empty and echoing corridors of\nthe dark Temple, we perform the charge which God gave us; and it needs\nnot that we pray. We are working for Him and doing the work which He\nappointed us; and that is better than all external ritual.' But this\nunknown speaker who charges them knew better than that. The priests'\nservice under the Old Covenant was very unspiritual service. Their work\nwas sometimes very repulsive and always purely external work, which\nmight be done without one trace of religion or devotion in it. And so\nthe speaker here warns them, as it were, against the temptation which\nbesets all men that are concerned in the outward service of the house of\nGod, to confound the mere outward service with inward devotion. The\ncharge bids us remember that the more sedulously our hands and thoughts\nare employed about the externals of religious duties, the more must we\nsee to it that our inmost spirits are baptized into fellowship with God.\n\nIt is not enough to patrol the Temple courts unless we 'lift up our\nhands to the sanctuary,' and with our hearts 'bless the Lord.' And all\nwe who in any degree and any department are officially or\nsemi-officially connected with the work of the Christian Church have\nvery earnestly and especially to lay this to heart. We ministers,\ndeacons, Sunday-school teachers, tract distributors, have much need to\ntake care that we do not confound watching in the courts of the Temple\nwith lifting up our own hands and hearts to our Father that is in\nheaven; and remember that the more outward work we do, the more inward\nlife we ought to have. The higher the stem of the tree grows and the\nbroader its branches spread the deeper must strike and the wider must\nextend its underground roots, if it is not to be blown over and become a\nwithered ruin.\n\nAnd so all you Christian men and women! will you take the plain lesson\nthat is here? All ye that stand ready for service, and doing service,\nall 'ye that stand in the house of the Lord, behold' your peril and your\nduty--and 'bless ye the Lord,' and remember that the more work the more\nprayer to keep it from rotting; the more effort the more communion; and\nthat at the end we shall discover with alarm, and with shame confess 'I\nkept others' vineyards and my own vineyard have I not kept'; unless,\nlike our Master, we prepare for a day of work and toil in the Temple by\na night of quiet communion with our Father on the mountainside.\n\nAnd then there is another lesson here which I only touch, and that is\nthat all times are times for blessing God. 'Ye who _by night_ stand in\nthe house of the Lord, bless the Lord': so though no sacrifice was\nsmoking on the altar, and no choral songs went up from the company of\npraising priests in the ritual service; and although the nightfall had\nsilenced the worship and scattered the worshippers, yet some low murmur\nof praise would be echoing through the empty halls all the night long,\nand the voice of thanksgiving and of blessing would blend with the clank\nof the priests' feet on the marble pavements as they went their\npatrolling rounds; and their torches would send up a smoke not less\nacceptable than the wreathing columns of the incense that had filled the\nday. And so as in some convents you will find a monk kneeling on the\nsteps of the altar at each hour of the four-and-twenty, adoring the\nSacrament exposed upon it, so (but in inmost reality and not in a mere\nvulgar outside form that means nothing) in the Christian heart there\nshould be a perpetual adoration and a continual praise--a prayer without\nceasing. What is it that comes first of all into your minds when you\nwake in the middle of the night? Yesterday's business, to-morrow's\nvanities, or God's present love and your dependence upon Him?\n\nIn the night of sorrow, too, do our songs go up, and do we hear and obey\nthe charge which commands not only perpetual adoration, but bids us fill\nthe night with music and with praise? Well for us if it be, anticipating\nthe time when 'they rest not day nor night saying, Holy! Holy! Holy!'\n\nNow, that is the priests' charge. Look for a moment at the answering\nblessing: 'The Lord that made heaven and earth bless thee out of Zion.'\n\n'Thee?' Whom? Him who gave the solemn charge. Their obedience to it is\nimplied in the blessing which the priests invoke on the head of the\nunnamed speaker. So they express their joyful consent to his charge, and\ntheir desires for his welfare whose clear voice has summoned them to\ntheir high duty and privilege. They obey, and their first prayer is a\nprayer for him.\n\nMay we venture to draw from this interchange of counsel and benediction\na simple lesson as to the best form in which mutual goodwill and\nfriendship may express itself? It is by the interchange of stimulus to\nGod's service and praise, and of grateful prayer. He is my best friend\nwho stirs me up to make my whole life a strong sweet song of\nthanksgiving to God for all His numberless mercies to me. Even if the\nexhortation becomes rebuke, faithful are such wounds. It is but a\nshallow affection which can be eloquent on other subjects of common\ninterests, but is dumb on this, the deepest of all; which can counsel\nwisely and rebuke gently in regard to other matters, but has never a\nword to say to its dearest concerning duty to the God of all mercies.\n\nAnd the true response to any loving exhortation to bless God, or any\nreligious impulse which we receive from one another, is to invoke God's\nblessing on faithful lips that have given us counsel.\n\nThis is the best recompense to Christian teachers. If any poor words of\nours have come to any of your hearts with power for conviction, or\ninstruction, or encouragement, let your response be, I beseech you, 'The\nLord that hath made heaven and earth bless _thee_.' We need your\nprayers. We are weak, often sad, often discouraged. We are tempted ever\nto handle God's truth professionally, instead of living on it for\nourselves. We are tempted to think that our work is in vain, and to lose\nheart because we do not see the spiritual results which we would fain\nreap. And in many an hour of languor and despondency, when the wheels of\nlife turn heavily and the sky seems very far away, and our message seems\nto have lost its grandeur and certainty to ourselves, and our handling\nof it looks as if it had been one long failure, then we need and may be\nhelped by the voice of cheer coming through the night from those whom we\nhave tried to counsel: 'The Lord that made heaven and earth bless thee.'\n\nBut observe, further, the two kinds of blessing which answer to one\nanother--God's blessing of man, and man's blessing of God. The one is\ncommunicative, the other receptive and responsive. The one is the great\nstream which pours itself over the precipice; the other is the basin\ninto which it falls and the showers of spray which rise from its\nsurface, rainbowed in the sunshine, as the cataract of divine mercies\ncomes down upon it. God blesses us when He gives. We bless God when we\nthankfully take, and praise the Giver. God's blessing then, must ever\ncome first. 'We love Him because He first loved us.' Ours is but the\necho of His, but the acknowledgment of the divine act, which must\nprecede our recognition of it as the dawn must come in order that the\nbirds may wake to sing.\n\nOur highest service is to take the gifts of God, and with glad hearts to\npraise the Giver.\n\nOur blessings are but words. God's blessings are realities. We wish good\nto one another when we bless each other. But He does good to men when He\nblesses them. Our wishes may be deep and warm, but, alas! how\nineffectual. They flutter round the heads of those whom we would bless,\nbut how seldom do they actually rest upon their brows. But God's\nblessings are powers. They never miss their mark. Whom He blesses are\nblessed indeed.\n\nThat experience of the ineffectual emptiness of blessings from the most\nloving hearts gives point to the emphatic designation here of 'the Lord\nwhich made heaven and earth,' a formula which is common in this\nconnection. It brings before the eye of faith the mighty Name, and the\nmighty work of Him in whose blessing we shall be rich. He is the Lord,\nthe Eternal and the Covenant King. He has made heaven and earth. If He\nwho lives above all limitations of time, the Source of life, who has the\nfulness of life in Himself, He who has revealed Himself to Israel and\nbound Himself to fulfil His covenant with all who plead it, He whose\nsovereign effortless power willed and spake into being the azure deeps\nof heaven with all its stars, and the solid earth with its tribes--if\nHe, with such infinite resources to bestow on us as we need, if He\nblesses us, it will be with no vain wishes nor with the invoking of the\ngoodwill of a higher power, but with the veritable communication of\ngood, and we shall be blessed indeed.\n\nObserve, too, the channel through which God's blessings come--'out of\nZion.' For the Jew, the fulness of divine glory dwelt between the\nCherubim, and the richest of the divine blessings were bestowed on the\nwaiting worshippers there, and no doubt it is still true that God dwells\nin Zion, and blesses men from thence. The New Testament analogue to the\nOld Testament Temple is no outward building. That would be absurd\nconfusing of the very nature of type and antitype. A material type must\nhave a spiritual fulfilment. A rite cannot correspond to a rite, nor a\nbuilding to a building. But the correspondence in Christianity to the\nTemple where God dwelt, and from which He scattered His blessings is\ntwofold--one proper and original, the other secondary and derived. In\nthe true sense, Jesus Christ is the Temple. In Him God dwelt; in Him,\nman meets God; in Him was the place of revelation; in Him the place of\nsacrifice. 'In this place is one greater than the Temple,' and the\nabiding of Jehovah above the mercy-seat was but a material symbol,\nshadowing and foretelling the true indwelling of all the fulness of the\nGodhead bodily in that true Tabernacle which the Lord hath pitched and\nnot man. So the great fountain of all possible good and benediction\nwhich was opened for the believing Jew in 'Zion,' is opened for us in\nJesus Christ who stood in the very court of the Temple, and called in\ntones of clear, loud invitation: 'If any man thirst let him come unto Me\nand drink.' We may each pass through the rent veil into the holiest of\nall, and there, laying our hand on Jesus, touch God, and opening our\nempty palm extended to Him, can receive from Him all the blessing that\nwe need.\n\nThere is another application of the Temple symbol in the New\nTestament--a derivative and secondary one--to the Church, that is, to\nthe aggregate of believers. In it God dwells through Christ. Receiving\nHis Spirit, instinct with His life, it is His Body, and as in His\nearthly life 'He spake of the Temple of His \"literal\" body,' so now that\nChurch becomes the Temple of God, being builded through the ages. In\nthat Zion all God's best blessings are possessed and stored, that the\nChurch may, by faithful service, impart them to the world. Whosoever\ndesires to possess these blessings must enter thither--not by any\nceremonial act, or outward profession, but by becoming one of those who\nput their whole heart's confidence in Jesus Christ. Within that sacred\nenclosure we receive whatever divine love and power can give. If we are\nknit to Christ by our faith, we share in proportion to our faith in all\nthe wealth of blessing with which God has blessed Him. We possess Christ\nand in Him all. The ancient benediction, which came from the lips of the\npriestly watchers, and rang through the empty corridors of the darkened\nTemple, asked for much: 'The Lord who made heaven and earth bless thee\nout of Zion.' But the Apostolic assurance sounds a yet deeper and more\nwonderful note of confidence when it proclaims that already, however to\nourselves we may seem sad and needy, and however little we may have\ncounted our treasures or made them our own, 'God hath blessed us with\nall spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.'\n\n\n\n\nGOD'S SCRUTINY LONGED FOR\n\n\n    'Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts;\n    24. And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way\n    everlasting.'--PSALM cxxxix. 23, 24.\n\nThis psalm begins with perhaps the grandest contemplation of the divine\nOmniscience that was ever put into words. It is easy to pour out\nplatitudes upon such a subject, but the Psalmist does not content\nhimself with generalities. He gathers all the rays, as it were, into one\nburning point, and focusses them upon himself: 'Oh, Lord! Thou hast\nsearched _me_, and known _me_.' All the more remarkable, then, is it\nthat the psalm should end with asking God to do what it began with\ndeclaring that He does. He knows us each, altogether; whether we like it\nor not, whether we try to hinder it or not, whether we remember it or\nnot. Singular, therefore, is it to find this prayer as the very climax\nof all the Psalmist's contemplation. It is more than the 'searching'\nwhich was spoken of at the beginning, which is desired at the end. It is\na process which has for its issue the cleansing of all the evil that is\nbeheld. The prayer of the text is in fact the yearning of the devout\nsoul for purity. I simply wish to consider the series of petitions here,\nin the hope that we may catch something of their spirit, and that some\nfaint echo of them may sound in our desires. My purpose, then, will be\nbest accomplished if I follow the words of the text, and look at these\npetitions in the order in which they stand.\n\nI. Note then, first, the longing for the searching of God's eye.\n\nNow, the word which is here rendered 'search' is a very emphatic and\npicturesque one. It means to dig deep. God is prayed, as it were, to\nmake a cutting into the man, and lay bare his inmost nature, as men do\nin a railway cutting, layer after layer, going ever deeper down till the\nbed-rock is reached. 'Search me'--dig into me, bring the deep-lying\nparts to light--'and know my heart'; the centre of my personality, my\ninmost self. That is the prayer, not of fancied fitness to stand\ninvestigation, but of lowly acknowledgment. In other words, it is really\na form of confession. 'Search me. I know Thou wilt find evil, but\nstill--search me!' It seems to me that there are two main ideas in this\npetition, on each of which I touch briefly.\n\nOne is, that it is a glad recognition of a fact which is very terrible\nto many hearts. The conception of God as 'knowing me altogether,' down\nto the very roots of my being, is either the most blessed or the most\nunwelcome thought, according to my conception of what His heart to me\nis. If I think of Him, as so many of us do, as simply the 'austere man'\nwho 'gathers where he did not straw,' and 'reaps where he did not sow';\nif my thought of God is mainly that of an Investigator and a Judge, with\npure eyes and rigid judgment, then I shall be more ignorant of myself,\nand more confident in myself, than the most of men are when they bethink\nthemselves, if I do not feel that I shrink up like a sensitive plant's\nleaf when a finger touches it, and would fain curl myself together, and\nhide from His eye something that I know lurks and poisons at the centre\nof my being.\n\nThe gaoler's eye at the slit in the wall of the solitary prisoner's cell\nis a constant terror to the man who knows that it may be upon him at\nevery moment, and does not know where the eyehole is, or when the\nmerciless eye may be at it, but if we love one another we do not shrink\nfrom opening out our inward baseness to each other. We can venture to\ntell those that are dear to us as our own hearts the things that lie in\nour own hearts and make them black and ugly in all eyes but love's; or\nif we cannot venture to do it wholly, at all events we do it more fully,\nand more willingly, and with more of something that is almost pleasure\nin the very act of confession, in proportion as we are bound by the\nsacred ties of love to the recipient of the confession. There is a joy,\nand a blessedness deeper than joy, in discovering ourselves, even our\nunworthy selves, when we know that the eye that looks is a loving eye.\n\nIf, then, we have rightly conceived of our relation to Him, that\ninfinite Lover of all our hearts, who looks, 'with other eyes than ours,\nand makes allowance for us all,' there will be a certain blessedness,\nalmost like joy, in turning ourselves inside out before Him; and in\nfeeling that every corner of our hearts lies naked and opened unto the\neyes of Him with whom we have to do. 'Search me, O God!' is the voice of\nconfident love, which is sure of the love that contemplates the sinner.\n\nAnd for us Christian people, to whom all these attributes of Deity are\ngathered together and brought very near our hearts and our experiences\nin the person of our Brother Christ, the thought of such knowledge of us\nbecomes still more blessed. Just as the Apostle who was conscious of\nmany sins, could say to his Master, not in petulance, but in\ndeeply-moved confidence, 'Thou knowest all things! Why dost Thou ask me\nquestions? Thou knowest all things; Thou knowest, notwithstanding my\ndenials, that I love Thee,' so may we turn to Jesus Christ, who knows\nwhat is in men, and who knows each man, and may be sure that the eye\nwhich looks upon our unworthiness pities our sinfulness, and is ready to\nbear it all away. There is a deeper gladness in pouring out our hearts\nto our loving Lord than in locking them in sullen silence, with the vain\nconceit that we thereby hide ourselves from Him. Make a clean breast of\nyour evil, and you will find that the act has in it a blessedness all\nunique and poignant. 'Pour out your hearts before Him, O ye people! God\nis a refuge for us.'\n\nThis prayer is also an expression of absolute willingness to submit to\nthe searching process. God is represented in my text as searching the\nsecrets of a man's heart, not that God may know, but that the man may\nknow. By His Spirit He will come into the innermost corners of our\nnature, if this prayer is a real expression of our desire, and there the\nillumination of His presence will flash light into all the dark places\nof our experience and of our natures. We cannot afford to be in\nignorance of these. Pestilence breathes in the unventilated, unlighted,\nuncleansed recesses of a neglected nature. It is only on condition of\nthe light of God's convincing Spirit being cast into every part of our\nbeing that we shall be able to overcome and annihilate the creeping\nswarms of microscopic sins that are there, minute but mighty in their\nmyriads to destroy a man's soul. 'Search me' is the expression of a\npenitence that knows itself to be full of evil, that does not know all\nthe evil of which it is full, that needs enlightenment, that desires\ndeliverance, that is sure of the love that looks, and that so spreads\nitself, as a bleacher spreads some piece of stained cloth in the\ngracious sunshine and sprinkles it with the pure water of heaven that\nall the stains may melt away.\n\nIt is useless to ask God to search us if we lock our hearts against His\nsearching. The mere natural exercise, if I may so say, of the divine\nattribute of Omniscience we cannot hinder. He knows us thereby\naltogether, whether we like it or not; but the 'searching' of my text is\none which He cannot put in force without our consent. We have to confess\nour sins unto the Lord ere this kind of divine scrutiny can be brought\nto bear. By His natural Omniscience, He knows them altogether, but the\nseeing which is preparatory to destroying them depends on our\nwillingness to submit ourselves to the often painful process by which He\ndrags our sins to light. Do you want Him to come and search your hearts,\nand tell you in your spirits what He has found there? Do you desire to\nknow your hidden evil? Then keep close to Him, and tell Him what the sin\nis which you know to be sin; and ask Him to show you what the sins are\nwhich, as yet, you have not grown up to the height of understanding and\nacknowledging.\n\nII. Next, there follows the longing for the divine testing of our\nthoughts.\n\nNow you will have observed, I suppose, that in the second clause of my\ntext, 'try me, and know my thoughts' the result of the investigation is\nsomewhat different from that of the previous clause. The 'searching'\nissued in a divine knowledge of the heart; the 'trying,' or testing,\nissues in a divine knowledge of the thoughts. The distinction between\nthese two, in the Biblical use of the expressions, is not precisely the\nsame as in our modern popular speech. We are accustomed to talk of the\nheart as being the seat of emotions, affections, feelings, whereas we\nrelegate thoughts to the head. But Scripture does not quite take that\nmetaphorical view. In it the heart is the centre of personal being, and\nout of it there come, not only emotions and loves, but 'thoughts and\nintents.' The difference, then, between these two, 'heart' and\n'thoughts' is this, the one is the workshop and the other is the\nproduct. The heart is the place where the thoughts are elaborated. So\nyou see the process of the Psalmist's prayer is from the centre a little\noutwards, first the inmost self, and then the 'thoughts,' meaning\nthereby the whole web of activities, both intellectual and emotional, of\nwhich the heart, in his sense of the word, is the seat and source. In\nlike manner as the field of investigation is somewhat shifted in the\nsecond petition, so the manner of investigation is correspondingly\ndifferent. 'Search' is the divine scrutiny of the inner man by the eye;\n'test' is the trial as metals are tried and proved by the fiery furnace.\n\nSo, then, the innermost man is searched by the divine knowledge, and the\nthoughts which the innermost man produces are tested by the divine\nprovidence. And our second petition is for a trial by facts, by external\nagencies, of the true nature and character of the purposes, desires,\ndesigns, intentions, as well as of the affections and loves and joys.\nThat is to say, this second prayer submits absolutely to any discipline,\nfiery and fierce and bitter, by which the true character of a man's\nactivities may be made clear to himself. Oh! it is a prayer easily\noffered; hard to stand by. It is a prayer often answered in ways that\ndrive us almost to despair. It means, 'Do anything with me, put me into\nany seven-fold heated furnace of sorrow, do anything that will melt my\nhardness, and run off my dross, which Thy great ladle will then skim\naway, that the surface may be clear, and the substance without alloy.'\n\nDo you pray that prayer, brother! knowing all that it means, and being\nwilling to take the answer, in forms that may rack your heart, and\nsadden your whole lives? If you are wise, you will. Better to go\ncrippled into life than, 'having two hands or two feet, to be cast into\nhell fire'! Better to be saved though maimed, than to be entire and\nlost.\n\n'Try me.' It is an awful prayer. Let us not offer it lightly, or\nunadvisedly; but if we are wise let it be our inmost desire. And when\nthe answer comes, and sorrows fall, do not let us murmur, do not let us\nkick, do not let us wonder, but let us say, 'Thou art a God that hearest\nprayer,' and 'I will glorify God in the fires.' Then 'the trial of your\nfaith being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be\ntried with fire, shall be found unto praise and honour and glory.'\n\nIII. The next petition of my text is a longing for the casting out of\nevil.\n\n'See if there be any wicked way in me.' Now, that _if_ is not the 'if'\nof doubt whether any such 'ways' are in the man, but it is the 'if' of\nconsciousness that there are such, though what they are he may not\nclearly discern. And so, it is the 'if' of humility--knowing that he is\nnot justified because he knows nothing against himself--and not the 'if'\nof presumption.\n\nI have only time to observe here, in a word or two, what would well\ndeserve more expanded treatment, and that is, the very striking and\nsignificant expression here employed for this evil way that the Psalmist\ndesires to be detected, that it may be cast out. The word rendered\n'wicked'--or more properly, wickedness--is literally 'forced labour,'\nwhich was, in old times, and still is in some countries, laid upon the\ninhabitants at the command of authority; and then, because forced labour\nis grievous labour, it comes to mean sorrow. So the 'way of wickedness'\nthat the Psalmist feels is in him is the way of compulsory service, and\nthe way that leads to sorrow. That is to say, all sin is slavery, and\nall sin leads to a bitter and a bad end, and its fruit is death. And so,\nbecause the man feels that his better self is in bondage, and\nshudderingly apprehends that the courses which he pursues can only end\nin bitterness and misery, he turns to God and asks Him that He would\nenlighten him as to what these fatal courses are. 'See if there be any\nway of wickedness in me,' because he is quite sure that the evil which\nGod sees, God will help him to overcome.\n\nAh, friends! we all have such ways deeply lodged within us, and we do\nnot always know that we have; but if we will turn ourselves to Him, He\nwill prevent our 'condemning ourselves in things that we allow' and\nincreasing the sensitiveness of our consciences, He will teach us that\nmany things that we did not know to be wrong are harmful.\n\nAs soon as we learn that they are, He will help us to cast them out. God\nhas nothing to do with our evil but to fight against it. Be sure of\nthis, that whatsoever evil in us He thus searches and shows us. He does\nso in order to fling it from us. He goes down into the cellars of our\nhearts, with the candle of His Spirit in His hand, in order that He may\nlay hold of all the explosives there, and having drenched them so that\nthey shall not catch fire, may cast them clean out so that they may not\nblow us to destruction.\n\nIV. The last petition of my text is for guidance in 'the everlasting\nway.'\n\nThe 'ways of wickedness' are in us; the 'way everlasting' we need to be\nled into. That is to say, naturally we incline to evil; it must be the\ndivine hand and the divine Spirit that lead our feet in the paths of\nrighteousness. When we ask Him to 'guide us in the way everlasting,' we\nask that we may know what is duty, and that we may incline to do it. And\nHe answers it by the gift of His divine Spirit, by the quickening of our\nconsciences, by bringing nearer to our hearts the great Example who has\nleft us His footsteps as a legacy that we may tread in them.\n\nWhosoever walks in Christ's footsteps is walking in 'the way\neverlasting,' for that path is rightly so named which leads to eternal\nblessedness. It is everlasting, too, inasmuch as nothing of human effort\nor work abides except that which is in conformity with the will of God,\nand inasmuch as it, and it alone, is not broken short off by death, but\nruns, borne upon one mighty arch that spans the gorge, clean across the\nblack abyss, and continues straight on in the same course, only with a\nswifter upward gradient, through all the ages of eternity. The man who\nhere has lived for God will live yonder as he has lived here, only more\ncompletely and more joyously for ever. 'A highway shall be there, and a\nway, and the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with\nsongs, and everlasting joy upon their heads.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE INCENSE OF PRAYER\n\n\n    'Let my prayer be set forth before Thee as incense, and the lifting\n    up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.'--PSALM cxli. 2.\n\nThe place which this psalm occupies in the Psalter, very near its end,\nmakes it probable that it is considerably later in date than the prior\nportions of the collection. But the Psalmist, who here penetrates to the\ninmost meaning of the symbolic sacrificial worship of the Old Testament,\nwas not helped to his clear-sightedness by his date, but by his\ndevotion. For throughout the Old Testament you find side by side these\ntwo trends of thought--a scrupulous carefulness for the observance of\nall the requirements of ritual worship, and a clear-eyed recognition\nthat it was all external and symbolical and prophetic. Who was it that\nsaid 'Obedience is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of\nrams'? Samuel, away back in the times when many scholars tell us that\nthe loftier conceptions of worship had not yet emerged. Similar\nutterances are scattered throughout the Old Testament, and the\nprominence given to the more spiritual side depends not on the speaker's\ndate but on his disposition and devotion. So here this Psalmist, because\nhis soul was filled with true longings after God, passes clear through\nthe externals and says, 'Here am I with no incense, but I have brought\nmy prayer. I am empty-handed, but because my hands are empty, I lift\nthem up to Thee; and Thou dost accept them, as if they were--yea, rather\nthan if they were--filled with the most elaborate and costly\nsacrifices.'\n\nSo here are two thoughts suggested, which sound mere commonplace, but if\nwe realised them, in our religious life, that life would be\nrevolutionised; first, the incense of prayer; second, the sacrifice of\nthe empty-handed. Let us look at these two points.\n\nI. The Incense of Prayer. 'Let my prayer come before Thee as incense.'\n\nNow, that symbol of incense is thus used in many places in Scripture. I\nneed only remind you of one or two instances. You remember how, when the\nfather of John the Baptist went into the Holy Place, as was his priestly\nduty at the time of the offering of the evening oblation, the whole\nmultitude were in the Outer Court praying; he in the Inner Court,\npresenting the symbolical worship, and they, without, offering the real.\nThen, if we turn to the grand imagery of the Book of the Revelation,\nwhere we find the heavenly temple opened up to our reverent gaze, we\nread that the elders, the representatives of redeemed humanity, have\n'golden bowls full of odours, which are the prayers of the saints.' So\nthere is no fancifulness in interpreting the incense of the ancient\nritual as meaning simply the prayers of devout hearts. Of course there\nhas been a great deal of nonsense talked about the symbolical\nsignification of these Old Testament rites, and there is need for sober\nsense to put the rein upon a vivid imagination in interpreting these;\nstill clear utterances of Scripture as well as this verse itself remove\nall need for hesitation to accept this meaning of the symbol.\n\nNow, let me remind you of the place which the Altar of Incense occupied.\nThe Temple was divided into three courts, the Outer Court, the Holy\nPlace, and the Holiest of All. The Altar of Incense stood in the second\nof these, the Holy Place; the Altar of Burnt Offering stood in the court\nwithout. It was not until that Altar, with its expiatory sacrifice, had\nbeen passed, that one could enter into the Holy Place, where the Altar\nof Incense stood. There were three pieces of furniture in that Place,\nthe Altar of Incense, the Golden Candlestick, and the Table of the\nShewbread. Of these three, the Altar of Incense stood in the centre.\nTwice a day the incense was kindled upon it by a priest, by means of\nlive coals brought from the Altar of Burnt Offering in the Outer Court,\nand, thus kindled, the wreaths of fragrant smoke ascended on high. All\nday long the incense smouldered upon the altar; twice a day it was\nkindled into a bright flame.\n\nNow, if we take these things with us, we can understand a little more of\nthe depth and beauty of this prayer, and see how much it tells us of\nwhat we, as the priests of the most High God--which we are, if we are\nChristian people at all--ought to have in our censers.\n\nI need not dwell upon the careful and sedulous preparation from pure\nspices which went to the making of the incense. So we have to prepare\nourselves by sedulous purity if there is to be any life or power in our\ndevotions. But I pass from that, and ask you to think of the lovely\npicture of true devoutness given in that inflamed incense, wreathing in\ncoils of fragrance up to the heavens. Prayer is more than petition. It\nis the going up of the whole soul towards God. Brother! do you know\nanything of that instinctive and spontaneous rising up of desire and\naspiration and faith and love, up and up and up, until  they reach Him?\nDo you realise that just in the measure in which we set our minds as\nwell as our affections, and our affections as well as our minds, on the\nthings which are above, just to that extent, and not one hairsbreadth\nfurther, have we the right to call ourselves Christians at all? I fear\nme that for the great mass of Christian professors the great bulk of\ntheir lives creeps along the low levels like the mists in winter, that\nhug the marshes instead of rising, swirling up like an incense cloud,\nimpelled by nothing but the fire in the censer up and up towards God.\nLet us each ask the question for himself, Is my prayer '_directed_'--as\nis the true meaning of the Hebrew word--'before Thee as incense'?\n\nRemember, too, that the incense lay dead, unfragrant, and with no\ncapacity of soaring, till it was kindled; that is to say, unless there\nis a flame in my heart there will be no rising of my aspirations to God.\nCold prayers do not go up more than a foot or two above the ground; they\nhave no power to soar. There must be the inflaming before there can be\nthe mounting of the aspiration. You cannot get a balloon to go up unless\nthe gas within it is warmer than the atmosphere round it. It is because\nwe are habitually such tepid Christians that we are so tongue-tied in\nprayer.\n\nWhere was the incense kindled from? From coals brought from the Altar of\nBurnt Offering in the outer court; that is to say, light the fire in\nyour heart with a coal brought from Christ's sacrifice, and then it will\nflame; and only then will love well upwards and desires be set on the\nthings above. The beginning of Christian fervour lies in the habitual\nrealising as a fact of the great love which 'loved me and gave itself\nfor me.' There is no patent way of getting a vivid Christian  experience\nexcept the old way of clinging close to Jesus Christ the Saviour; and in\norder to do that, we have to think about Him, as well as to feel about\nHim, a great deal more than I fear the most of us do.\n\nFurther, does not this lovely symbol of my text suggest to us a glorious\nthought, the acceptableness even of our poor prayers, if they come from\nhearts inflamed with love because of Christ's great redeeming love? The\nPsalmist, thinking humbly of himself and of the worth of anything that\nhe can bring, says, 'Let my prayer come before Thee as incense,' an\n'odour of a sweet smell, acceptable to God'; yes, even our prayers will\nbe sweet to Him if they are prayers of true aspiration and mounting\nfaith, leaping from a kindled heart, kindled at the great flame of\nChrist's love.\n\nWere you ever in a Roman Catholic cathedral? Did you ever see there the\nlittle boys that carry the censers, swinging them backwards and forwards\nevery now and then, and by means of the silver chains lifting the\ncovers? What is that for? Because the incense would go out unless the\nair was let into it. So a constant effort is needed in order to keep the\nincense of our prayers alight. We have to swing the censer to get rid of\nthe things that make our hearts cold; we have to stir the fire, and only\nso shall we keep up our devotion. Remember the incense burned all day\nlong on the altar; though perhaps but smouldering, like the banked-up\nfires in the furnaces of a steamer that lies at anchor, still the glow\nwas there; and twice a day there came the priest with his pan full of\nfresh glowing coals from the altar in the Outer Court, and kindled it up\ninto a flame once more. Which things are thus far an allegory that our\ndevotion is to be diffused throughout our lives in a lambent glow, and\nif it is, it will have to be fed by special acts of worship day by day.\n\nYou hear people talk of not caring about times and seasons of prayer,\nand of the beauty of making all life a prayer. Amen! I say so too. But\ndepend upon it that there will never be devotion diffused through life\nunless there is devotion concentrated at points in the life. There must\nbe reservoirs as well as pipes in order to supply the water through the\nwhole city. So the incense is perpetually to be heaped on the Altar of\nIncense, but also it is to be stirred to a fragrant blaze and fed,\nmorning and evening, by fresh coals from the altar.\n\nII. Now let me say a word about the other thought here--the sacrifice of\nthe empty-handed.\n\n'The lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.' In accordance\nwith the genius of Hebrew poetry the same general idea is repeated in\nthe second member of the parallelism, but with modifications. What is\nimplied in likening the uplifted empty hands to the evening sacrifice?\nFirst, it is a confession of impotent emptiness, a lifting up of\nexpectant hands to be filled with the gift from God. And, says this\nPsalmist, 'Because I bring nothing in my hand, Thou dost accept me, as\nif I came laden with offerings.' That is just a picturesque way of\nputting a familiar, threadbare truth, which, threadbare as it is, needs\nto be laid to heart a great deal more by us, that our true worship and\ntruest honour of God lies not in giving but in taking. 'He is not\nworshipped with men's hands, as though He needed anything, seeing that\nHe giveth to all life, and breath, and all things.' That one truth, Paul\nfelt on Mars Hill, was sure enough to make all the temples and statues\nby which he was surrounded  crumble into nothingness. But it does not\nmerely destroy idolatry. It cuts up by the root much of what we call\nChristian worship. How many people worship because they think they\nought? How many people talk about Christian worship as being a\nduty--'Our duty we have now performed'? How many have never had a\nglimpse of this thought, that God wills us to draw near to Him, not\nbecause it pleases Him but because it blesses us, and that we are to\nworship, not in order that we may bring anything, either the sacrifices\nof bulls and goats, or the more refined ones that we bring nowadays, but\nin order that, bringing our emptiness into touch with His infinite\nfulness, as much of that fulness as we need to make us full, and as much\nof that blessedness as we need to make us blessed, may pass into our\nlives. Oh! if we understand 'the giving God,' as James calls Him in his\nletter; and if we had learned the old lesson of that fiftieth Psalm, 'If\nI were hungry I would not tell thee.... Will I eat  the flesh of bulls\nand drink the blood of goats? He that offereth praise glorifieth Me, and\nto him that  ordereth his conversation aright will I show the salvation\nof God'--if we had learned that, and laid it to heart, and applied it to\nour own worship and our lives, mountains of misconception would be\nlifted away from many hearts. In our service we do not need to bring any\nmerit of our own. This great principle destroys not only the gross\nexternalities of heathen sacrifice, and the notion that worship is a\nduty, but it destroys the other notion of our having to bring anything\nto deserve God's gifts. And so it is an encouragement to us when we feel\nourselves to be what we are, and what we should always feel ourselves to\nbe, empty-handed, coming to Him not only with hearts  that aspire like\nincense, but with petitions that confess our need, and cast ourselves\nupon His grace. See that you desire what God wishes to give; see that\nyou go to Him for what He does give. See that you give to Him the only\nthing that He does wish, or that it lies in your power to give, and that\nis yourself.\n\n  Nothing in my hand I bring,\n  Simply to Thy Cross I cling.\n\n'Let the lifting of my hands be as the evening sacrifice';  as the\nPsalmist has it in another place, 'What shall I render to the Lord for\nall His benefits?'--it is not a question of rendering, but 'I will\n_take_ the cup of salvation.' Taking is our truest worship, and the\nlifting up of empty, expectant hands is, in God's sight, as the evening\nsacrifice.\n\n\n\n\nTHE PRAYER OF PRAYERS\n\n\n    'Teach me to do Thy will; for Thou art my God! Thy spirit is good;\n    lead me into the land of uprightness.'--PSALM cxliii. 10.\n\nThese two clauses mean substantially the same thing. The Psalmist's\nlongings are expressed in the first of them in plain words, and in the\nsecond in a figure. 'To do God's will' is to be in 'the land of\nuprightness.' That phrase, in its literal application, means a stretch\nof level country, and hence is naturally employed as an emblem of a\nmoral or religious condition. A life of obedience to the will of God is\nlikened to some far stretching plain, easy to traverse, broken by no\nbarren mountains or frowning cliffs, but basking, peaceful and fruitful,\nbeneath the smile of God. Into such a garden of the Lord the Psalmist\nprays to be led.\n\nIn each case his prayer is based upon a motive or plea. 'Thou art my\nGod'; his faith apprehends a personal bond between him and God, and\nfeels that that bond obliges God to teach him His will. If we adopt the\nreading in our Bibles of our second clause a still deeper and more\nwonderful plea is presented there. 'Thy Spirit is good,' and therefore\nthe trusting spirit has a right to ask to be made good likewise. The\nrelation of the believing spirit to God not only obliges God to teach it\nHis will, but to make it partaker of His own image and conformed to His\nown purity. So high on wings of faith and desire soared this man, who,\nat the beginning of his psalm, was crushed to the dust by enemies and by\ndangers. So high we may rise by like means.\n\nI. Notice, then, first, the supreme desire of the devout soul.\n\nWe do not know who wrote this psalm. The superscription says that it was\nDavid's, and although its place in the Psalter seems to suggest another\nauthor, the peculiar fervour and closeness of intimacy with God which\nbreathes through it are like the Davidic psalms, and seem to confirm the\nsuperscription. If so, it will naturally fall into its place with the\nothers which were pressed from his heart by the rebellion of Absalom.\nBut be that as it may, whosoever wrote the psalm, was a man in extremest\nmisery and peril, and as he says of himself, 'persecuted,'\n'overwhelmed,' 'desolate.' The tempest blows him to the Throne of God,\nand when he is there, what does he ask? Deliverance? Scarcely. In one\nclause, and again at the end, as if by a kind of after-thought, he asks\nfor the removal of the calamities. But the main burden of his prayer is\nfor a closer knowledge of God, the sound of His lovingkindness in his\ninward  ear, light to show him the way wherein he should walk, and the\nsweet sunshine of God's face upon his heart. There is a better thing to\nask than exemption from sorrows, even grace to bear them rightly. The\nsupreme desire of the devout soul is practical conformity to the will of\nGod. For the prayer of our text is not 'Teach me to _know_ Thy will.'\nThe Psalmist, indeed, has asked _that_ in a previous clause--'Cause me\nto know the way wherein I should walk.' But knowledge is not all that we\nneed, and the gulf between knowledge and practice is so deep that after\nwe have prayed that we may be caused to know the way, and have received\nthe answer, there still remains the need for God's help that knowledge\nmay become life, and that all which we understand we may do. To such\npractical conformity to the will of God all other aspects of religion\nare meant to be subservient.\n\nChristianity is a revelation of truth, but to accept it as such is not\nenough. Christianity brings to me exemption from punishment, escape from\nhell, deliverance from condemnation and guilt, and by some of us, that\nis apt to be regarded as the whole Gospel; but pardon is only a means to\nan end. Christianity brings to us the possibility of indulgence in sweet\nand blessed emotions, and a fervour of feeling which to experience is\nthe ante-past of heaven, and for some of us, all our religion goes off\nin vaporous emotion; but feeling alone is not Christianity. Our religion\nbrings to us sweet and gracious consolations, but it is a poor affair if\nwe only use it as an anodyne and a comfort. Our Christianity brings to\nus glorious hopes that flash lustre into the darkness, and make the\nsolitude of the grave companionship, and the end of earth the beginning\nof life, but it is a poor affair if the mightiest operation  of our\nreligion be relegated to a future, and flung on to the close. All these\nthings, the truth which the Gospel brings, the pardon and peace of\nconscience which it ensures, the joyful emotion which it sets loose from\nthe ice of indifference, the sweet consolations with which it pillows\nthe weary head and bandages the bleeding heart, and the great hopes\nwhich flash light into glazing eyes, and make the end glorious with the\nrays of a beginning, and the western heaven bright with the promise of a\nnew day--all these things are but subservient means to this highest\npurpose, that we should do the will of God, and be conformed to His\nimage. They whose religion has not reached that apex have yet to\nunderstand its highest meaning. The river of the water of life that\nproceeds from the Throne of God and the Lamb is not sent merely to\nrefresh thirsty lips, and to bring music into the silence of a waterless\ndesert, but it is sent to drive the wheels of life. Action, not thought,\nis the end of God's revelation, and the perfecting of man.\n\nBut, then, let us remember that we shall most imperfectly apprehend the\nwhole sweep and blessedness of this great supreme aim of the devout\nsoul, if we regard this doing of God's will as merely the external act\nof obedience to an external command. Simple doing is not enough; the\ndeed must be the fruit of love. The aim of the Christian life is not\nobedience to a law that is recognised as authoritative, but joyful\nmoulding of ourselves after a law that is felt to be sweet and loving.\n'I delight to do Thy will, yea! Thy law is within my heart.' Only when\nthus the will yields itself in loving and glad conformity to the will of\nGod is true obedience possible for us. Brother! is that your\nChristianity?  Do you desire, more than anything besides,  that what He\nwills you should will, and that His law should be stamped upon your\nhearts, and all your rebellious desires and purposes should be brought\ninto a sweet captivity which is freedom, and an obedience to Christ\nwhich is kingship over the universe and yourselves?\n\nII. Note, secondly, the divine teaching and touch which are required for\nthis conformity.\n\nThe Psalmist betakes himself to prayer, because he knows that of himself\nhe cannot bring his will into this attitude of harmonious submission.\nAnd his prayer for 'teaching' is deepened in the second clause of our\ntext into a petition, which is substantially the same in meaning, but\nyet sets the felt need and the coveted help in a still more striking\nlight, in its cry for the touch of God's good spirit to guide, as by a\nhand grasping the Psalmist's hand, into the paths of obedience.\n\nWe may learn from this prayer, then, that practical conformity to God's\nwill can never be attained by our own efforts. Remember all the\nhindrances that rise between us and it; these wild passions of ours,\nthis obstinate gravitating of tastes and desires towards earth, these\nanimal necessities, these spiritual perversities, which make up so much\nof us all--how can we coerce these into submission? Our better selves\nsit within like some prisoned king, surrounded and 'fooled by the rebel\npowers' of his revolted subjects; and our best recourse is to send an\nembassy to the Over-lord, the Sovereign King, praying Him to come to our\nhelp. We cannot will to will as God wills, but we can turn ourselves to\nHim, and ask Him to put the power within us which shall subdue the evil,\nconquer the rebels, and make us masters of our own else anarchic and\ntroubled spirits. For all honest attempts to make  the will of God our\nwills, the one secret of success is confident and continual appeal to\nHim. A man must have gone a very little way, very superficially and\nperfunctorily, on the path of seeking to make himself what he ought to\nbe, unless he has found out that he cannot do it, and unless he has\nfound out that there is only one way to do it, and that is to go to God\nand say, 'O Lord! I am baffled and beaten. I put the reins into Thy\nhand; do Thou inspire and direct and sanctify.'\n\nThat practical conformity to the will of God requires divine teaching,\nbut yet that teaching must be no outward thing. It is not enough that we\nshould have communicated to us, as from without, the clearest knowledge\nof what we ought to be. There must be more than that. Our Psalmist's\nprayer was a prophecy. He said, 'Teach me to do Thy will.' And he\nthought, no doubt, of an inward teaching which should mould his nature\nas well as enlighten it; of the communication of impulses as well as of\nconceptions; of something which should make him love the divine will, as\nwell as of something which should make him know it.\n\nYou and I have Jesus Christ for our Teacher, the answer to the psalm.\nHis teaching is inward and deep and real, and answers to all the\nnecessities of the case. We have His example to stand as our perfect\nlaw. If we want to know what is God's will, we have only to turn to that\nlife; and however different from ours His may have been in its outward\ncircumstances, and however fragmentary and brief its records in the\nGospels may sometimes seem to us, yet in these little booklets, telling\nof the quiet life of the carpenter's Son, there is guidance for every\nman and woman in all circumstances, however complicated, and we do not\nneed anything more to teach us what God's will is than the life of Jesus\nChrist. His teaching goes deeper than example. He comes into our hearts,\nHe moulds our wills. His teaching is by inward impulses and\ncommunications of desire and power to do, as well as of light to know. A\nlaw has been given which can give life. As the modeller will take a\npiece of wax into his hand, and by warmth and manipulation make it soft\nand pliable, so Jesus Christ, if we let Him, will take our hard hearts\ninto His hands, and by gentle, loving, subtle touches, will shape them\ninto the pattern of His own perfect beauty, and will mould all their\nvagrant inclinations and aberrant distortions into 'one immortal feature\nof loveliness and perfection.' 'The _grace of God_ that bringeth\nsalvation hath appeared unto all men _teaching_ that, denying\nungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly,' controlling\nourselves,  'righteously,' fulfilling all our obligations to our\nfellows, 'and godly,' referring everything to Him,  'in this present\nworld.'\n\nThat practical conformity to the divine will requires, still further,\nthe operation of the divine Spirit as our Guide. 'Thy Spirit is good\nlead me into the land of uprightness.' There is only one power that can\ndraw us out of the far-off land of rebellious disobedience, where the\nprodigals and the swine's husks and the famine and the rags are, into\nthe 'land of uprightness,' and that is, the communicated Spirit of God,\nwhich is given to all them that desire Him, and will lead them in paths\nof righteousness for His name's sake. It is He that works in us, the\nwilling and the doing, according to His own good pleasure. 'He shall\nguide you,' said the Master, 'into all truth'--not merely into  its\nknowledge, but into its performance, not merely into truth of\nconception, but into truth of practice, which is righteousness, and the\nfulfilling of the Law.\n\nIII. Lastly, note the divine guarantee that this practical conformity\nshall be ours.\n\nThe Psalmist pleads with God a double motive--His relation to us and His\nown perfectness, 'Thou art my God; therefore teach me.' 'Thy Spirit is\ngood; therefore lead me into the land of uprightness.' I can but glance\nfor a moment at these two pleas of the prayer.\n\nNote, then, first, God's personal relation to the devout soul, as the\nguarantee that that soul shall be taught, not merely to know, but also\nto do His will. If He be 'my God,' there can be no deeper desire in His\nheart, than that His will should be my will. And this He desires, not\nfrom any masterfulness or love of dominion, but only from love to us. If\nHe be my God, and therefore longing to have me obedient, He will not\nwithhold what is needed to make me so. God is no hard Taskmaster who\nsets us to make bricks without straw. Whatsoever He commands He gives,\nand His commandments are always second and His gifts first. He bestows\nHimself and then He says, 'For the love's sake, do My will.' Be sure\nthat the sacred bond which knits us to Him is regarded by Him, the\nfaithful Creator, as an obligation which He recognises and respects and\nwill discharge. We have a right to go to Him and to say to Him, 'Thou\nart my God; and Thou wilt not be what Thou art, nor do what Thou hast\npledged Thyself to do, unless Thou makest me to know and to do Thy\nwill.'\n\nAnd on the other hand, if we have taken Him for ours, and have the bond\nknit from our side as well as from His, then the fact of our faith gives\nus a claim  on Him which He is sure to honour. The soul that can say, 'I\nhave taken Thee for mine,' has a hold on God which God is only too glad\nto recognise and to vindicate. And whoever, humbly trusting to that\ngreat Father in the heavens, feels that he belongs to God, and that God\nbelongs to him, is warranted in praying, 'Teach me, and make me, to do\nThy will,' and in being confident of an answer.\n\nAnd there is the other plea with Him and guarantee for us, drawn from\nGod's own moral character and perfectness. The last clause of my text\nmay either be read as our Bible has it, 'Thy Spirit is good; lead me,'\nor 'Let Thy good Spirit lead me.' In either case the goodness of the\ndivine Spirit is the plea on which the prayer is grounded. The goodness\nhere referred to is, as I take it, not merely beneficence and\nkindliness, but rather goodness in its broader and loftier sense of\nperfect moral purity. So that the thought just comes to this--we have\nthe right to expect that we shall be made participant of the divine\nnature for so sweet, so deep, so tender is the tie that knits a devout\nsoul to God, that nothing short of conformity to the perfect purity of\nGod can satisfy the aspirations of the creature, or discharge the\nobligations of the Creator.\n\nIt is a daring thought. The Psalmist's desire was a prophecy. The New\nTestament vindicates and fulfils it when it says 'We shall be like Him,\nfor we shall see Him as He is.' Since He now dwells in 'the land of\nuprightness,' who once dwelt among us in this weary world of confusion\nand of sin, then we one day shall be with Him. Christ's heart cannot be\nsatisfied, Christ's Cross cannot be rewarded, the divine nature cannot\nbe at rest, the purpose of redemption cannot be accomplished, until all\nwho have trusted in Christ be partakers of divine purity, and all the\nwanderers be led by devious and yet by right paths, by crooked and yet\nby straight ways, by places rough and yet smooth, into 'the land of\nuprightness.' Where and what He is, there and that shall also His\nservants be.\n\nMy brother! if to do the will of God is to dwell in the land of\nuprightness, disobedience is to dwell in a dry and thirsty land, barren\nand dreary, horrid with frowning rocks and jagged cliffs, where every\nstone cuts the feet and every step is a blunder, and all the paths end\nat last on the edge of an abyss, and crumble into nothingness beneath\nthe despairing foot that treads them. Do you see to it that you walk in\nways of righteousness which are paths of peace; and look for all the\nhelp you need, with assured faith, to Him who shall 'guide us by His\ncounsel and afterwards receive us to His glory.'\n\n\n\n\nTHE SATISFIER OF ALL DESIRES\n\n\n    'Thou openest Thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living\n    thing ... 19. He will fulfil the desire of them that fear Him: He\n    also will hear their cry, and will save them.'--PSALM cxlv. 16, 19.\n\nYou observe the recurrence, in these two verses, of the one emphatic\nword 'desire.' Its repetition evidently shows that the Psalmist wishes\nto run a parallel between God's dealings in two regions. The same\nbeneficence works in both. Here is the true extension of natural law to\nthe spiritual world. It is the same teaching to which our Lord has given\nimmortal and inimitable utterance, when He says, 'Your heavenly Father\nfeedeth them.' And so we are entitled to look on all the wonders of\ncreation, and to find in them  buttresses which may support the edifice\nof our faith, and to believe that wherever there is a mouth God sends\nfood to fill it. 'Thou openest Thine hand'--that is all--'and satisfiest\nthe desire of every living thing.' But to fulfil the desires of them who\nare not only 'living things,' but 'who fear' Him, is it such a simple\ntask? Sometimes more is wanted than an open hand before that can be\naccomplished. So, looking not only at the words I have read, but at the\nwhole of their setting, which is influenced by the thought of this\nparallelism, we see here two sets of pensioners, two kinds of wants, two\nforms of appeal, two processes of satisfaction.\n\nI. Two kinds of pensioners.\n\n'Every living thing--' life makes a claim on God, and whatever desires\narise in the living creature by reason of its life, God would be untrue\nto Himself, a cruel Parent, an unnatural Father, if He did not satisfy\nthem. We do not half enough realise the fact that the condescension of\ncreation lies not only in the act of creating, but in the willing\nacceptance by the Creator of the bonds under which He thereby lays\nHimself; obliging Himself to see to the creatures that He has chosen to\nmake. And so, as one of the New Testament writers puts it, in his simple\nway, with a profound truth, 'He is a faithful Creator'; and wherever\nthere is a creature that He has made to need anything, He has thereby\nsaid, 'As I live, that creature shall have what it needs.'\n\nThen, take the other class, 'them that fear Him'; or as they are\ndescribed in the context--by contrast with 'the wicked who are\ndestroyed'--'the righteous.' That is to say, whilst, because we are\nliving things, like the bee and the worm, we have a claim on God\nprecisely parallel with theirs for what we may need by reason of His\ngift, which we never asked for, His gift of life, we shall have a\nsimilar but higher claim on Him if we are 'they that fear Him' with that\nloving reverence which has no torment in it, and that love Him with that\nreverential affection which has no presumption in it, and whose love and\nfear coalesce in making them long to be righteous like the Object of\ntheir love, to be holy like the Object of their fear. And just as the\nfact of physical life binds God to care for it, and to give all that is\nneeded for its health, growth, blessedness, so the fact of man's having\nin his heart the faintest tremor of reverential dread, the feeblest\naspiration of outgoing affection, the most faltering desire after purity\nof life and conduct, binds God to answer these according to the man's\nneed. Of all incredibilities in the world, there is nothing more\nincredible, because there is nothing more contrary to the very depths of\nthe divine nature, than that desires, longings, expectations, which are\nthe direct result of the love and fear of God, and the hunger and thirst\nafter righteousness, should not be answered.\n\nNow that is a very wide principle, and I do not believe that it is\ntrusted enough by many. It comes to this--wherever you find in people a\nconfidence which grows with their love of God, be sure that there is,\nsomewhere or other in the universe of things, that which answers it.\n\nTake a case. If there was not a word in the New Testament about Jesus\nChrist's resurrection, the fact that just in proportion as men grow in\ndevotion, in love of God, in fear of Him, in longing to be good and to\nappear like Him, in that same proportion does their conviction that\nthere must be a life beyond the  grave become firm and certain--that\nfact would be enough to make any one who believed in God sure that the\nhope thus rooted in love to Him, and fed by everything that draws us\nnearer to Him, could not be a delusion, nor be destined to be left\nunfulfilled.\n\nAnd we might go round the whole circle of dim religious aspirations and\ndesires, and find in all of them illustrations of the principle so\nprofoundly and so simply put in our psalm, that the same Love which, in\nthe realm of the physical world, binds itself to satisfy the life which\nit imparts, is at work in the higher regions, and will 'fulfil the\ndesires of them that fear Him.'\n\nII. Again, there are two sets of needs.\n\nThe first of them is very easily disposed of. 'The eyes of all wait upon\nThee, and Thou givest them their meat.' That is all. Feed the beast, and\ngive it the other things necessary for its physical existence, and there\nis no more to be done. But there is more wanted for the desires of the\nmen that love and fear God. These are glanced at in the context, 'He\nalso will hear their cry, and will save them'; 'the Lord preserveth all\nthem that love Him.' That is to say, there are deeper needs in our\nhearts and lives than any that are known amongst the lower creatures.\nEvils, dangers inward and outward, sorrows, disappointments, losses of\nall sorts shadow our lives, in a fashion which the happy, careless life\nof field and forest knows nothing about. Give them their meat, and they\ncurl themselves up and lie down to sleep, satisfied. Man longs for\nsomething more and needs something more.\n\n'He will save them.' Now, I do not suppose that 'save' here is employed\nin its full New Testament  sense, but it approximates to that sense.\nAnd, further, there are other aspects of our needs set forth in the\ncontext, on which I briefly touch. Do not let us vulgarise such a saying\nas this of my text, 'He will fulfil the desire of them that fear Him,'\nas if it only meant that if a man fears God he may set his longing upon\nany outward thing, and be sure to get it. There is nothing so poor, so\nunworthy as that promised in Scripture. For one thing, it is not true;\nfor another, it would not be good if it were. The way to spoil children\nis not the way to perfect saints; and to give them what they want\nbecause they want it, is the sure way to spoil children of all ages. We\nmay be quite certain that our heavenly Father is not going to do that.\nThe promise here means something far nobler and loftier. The fact of\ncreation binds God to supply all the wants which spring from life. The\nfact of our loving and fearing Him binds Him to supply all the wants\nwhich spring from our love and fear. And it is these desires which the\nPsalmist is thinking of.\n\nWhat is the object of desire to a man who loves God? God. What is the\nobject of desire to a man who fears Him? God. What is the object of\ndesire to a righteous man? Righteousness. And these are the desires\nwhich God is sure to fulfil to us. Therefore, there is only one region\nin which it is safe and wise to cherish longings, and it is the region\nof the spiritual life where God imparts Himself. Everywhere else there\nwill be disappointments--thank Him for them. Nowhere else is it\nabsolutely true that He will 'fulfil the desires of them that fear Him.'\nBut in this region it is. Whatever any of us desire to have of God, we\nare sure to get. We open our mouths and He fills  them. In the Christian\nlife desire is the measure of possession, and to long is to have. And\nthere is nowhere else where it is absolutely, unconditionally, and\nuniversally true that to wish is to possess, and to ask is to have.\n\nOh! then, is it not a foolish thing for us to worry and torture and\nsweat, in order to win for ourselves for a little while the uncertain\npossession of incomplete bliss? Would it not be wiser, instead of\nletting the current of our desires dribble itself away through a\nthousand channels in the sand and get lost, to gather it all into one\ngreat stream which is sure to find its way to the broad ocean? 'Delight\nthyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart,'\nfor these will then be after Himself, and Himself only.\n\nIII. Further, there are here two forms of appeal.\n\n'The eyes of all wait upon Thee.' That is beautiful! The dumb look of\nthe unconscious creature, like that of a dog looking up in its master's\nface for a crust, makes appeal to God, and He answers that. But a dumb,\nunconscious look is not for us. 'He also will hear their cry.' Put your\nwish into words if you want it answered; not for His information, but\nfor your strengthening. 'Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need\nof these things before ye ask Him.' What then? Why should I ask Him?\nBecause the asking will clear your thoughts about your desires. It will\nbe a very good test of them. There are many things that we all wish,\nwhich I am afraid we should not much like to put into our prayers, not\nbecause of any foolish notion that they are too small to find a place\nthere, but because of an uncomfortable suspicion that perhaps they are\nnot the kind of things that we ought to wish. And if we cannot make the\ndesire into a cry, the sooner we make it dead as well as dumb the better\nfor ourselves. The cry will serve, too, as a stimulus to the wishes\nwhich are put into words. Silent prayer is well, but there is a\nwonderful power on ourselves--it may be due to our weakness, but still\nit exists--in the articulate and audible utterance of our petitions to\nGod. I would fain that all of us were more in the habit of putting into\ndistinct words that we ourselves can hear, the wishes that we cherish. I\nam sure our prayers would be more sincere, less wandering, more earnest\nand real, if they were spoken, as well as felt, prayers.\n\nLet us remember, dear brethren! that the condition of our getting the\nhigher gifts is not only that we should love and fear, and in the\nsilence of our own hearts should wish for, but that we should definitely\nask for, them. Not only desire, but 'their cry,' brings the answer.\n\nIV. And now one last word. Note the two processes of satisfying.\n\n'Thou openest Thine hand.' That is enough. But God cannot satisfy our\ndeepest desires by any such short and easy method. There is a great deal\nmore to be done by Him before the aspirations of love and fear and\nlonging for righteousness can be fulfilled. He has to breathe Himself\ninto us. Lower creatures have enough when they have the meat that drops\nfrom His hand. They know and care nothing for the hand that feeds. But\nGod's best gifts cannot be separated from Himself. They are Himself, and\nin order to 'satisfy the desires of them that fear Him' there is no way\npossible, even to Him, but the impartation of Himself to the waiting\nheart.\n\nThat is a mystery deep and blessed. Oh, that we  may all know, by our\nown living experience, what it is to have not only the gifts which drop\nfrom His hands, but the gifts which cannot be parted from Him, the\nGiver! He has to discipline us for His highest gifts, in order that we\nmay receive them. And sometimes He has to do that, as I have no doubt He\nhas done it with many of us, by withholding or withdrawing the\nsatisfaction of some of our lower desires, and so emptying our hearts\nand turning the current of our wishes from earth to heaven. If you are\ngoing to pour precious wine into a chalice, you begin by emptying out\nthe less valuable liquid that may be in it. So God often empties us, in\norder that He may fill us, and takes away the creatures in order that we\nmay long for the Creator.\n\nNot only has He to give us Himself, and to discipline us in order to\nreceive Him, but He has to put all His gifts which meet our deepest\ndesires into a great storehouse. He does not open His hand and give us\npeace and righteousness, and growing knowledge of Himself, and closer\nunion, and the other blessings of the Christian life, but He gives us\nJesus Christ. We are to find all these blessings in Him, and it depends\nupon us whether we find them or not, and how much of them we find. You\nwill always find as much in Christ as you want, but you may not find\nnearly as much in Him as you could; and you will never find as much in\nHim as there is. God sends His Son, and in that one gift, like a box\n'wherein sweets compacted lie,' are all the gifts that even His hand can\nbestow, or our desires require. So be sure that you have what you have,\nand that you suck out of the Rose of Sharon all the honey that lies deep\nin its calyx. Expand your desires to the width of Christ's great\nmercies; for the  measure of our wishes is the limit of our possession.\nHe has laid up the supply of all our need in the storehouse, which is\nChrist; and He has given us the key. Let us see to it that we enter in.\n'Ye have not because ye ask not.' 'To him that hath shall be given, and\nhe shall have abundance.'\n\nEND OF VOL. II.","title":"Expositions of Holy Scripture: Psalms","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":244197}