and bereavement, and loneliness; or out of the deep of poverty; or out of
the deep of persecution and ill-usage; or out of the deep of sin, and
shame, and weakness which he hates yet cannot conquer; or out of the deep
of doubt, and anxiety--and ah! how common is that deep; and how many
there are in it that swim hard for their lives: may God help them and
bring them safe to land;--or out of the deep of overwork, so common now-a-
days, when duty lies sore on aching shoulders, a burden too heavy to be
borne.
Out of some one of the many deeps into which poor souls fall at times,
and find themselves in deep water where no ground is, and in the mire
wherein they are ready to sink, the Psalmist cries. But out of the deep
he cries--to God. To God, and to none else.
He goes to the fountain-head, to the fount of deliverance, and of
forgiveness. For he feels that he needs, not only deliverance, but
forgiveness likewise. His sorrow may not be altogether his own fault.
What we call in our folly "accident" and "chance," and "fortune,"--but
which is really the wise providence and loving will of God--may have
brought him low into the deep. Or the injustice, cruelty, and oppression
of men may have brought him low; or many another evil hap. But be that
as it may, he dares not justify himself. He cannot lift up altogether
clean hands. He cannot say that his sorrow is none of his own fault, and
his mishap altogether undeserved. If Thou, Lord, wert extreme to mark
what is done amiss, O Lord, who could abide it? "Not I," says the
Psalmist. "Not I," says every human being who knows himself; and knows
too well that--"If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the
truth is not in us."
But the Psalmist says likewise, "There is forgiveness with Thee,
therefore shall Thou be feared."
My friends, consider this; the key of the whole psalm; the gospel and
good news, for the sake of which the psalm has been preserved in Holy
Scripture, and handed down to us.
God is to be feared, because He is merciful. It is worth while to fear
Him, because He is merciful, and of great kindness, and hateth nothing
that He hath made; and willeth not the death of a sinner, but rather that
he should turn from his wickedness and live.
Superstitious people, in all ages, heathens always, and sometimes, I am
sorry to say, Christians likewise, have had a very different reason, an
opposite reason, for fearing God.
They have said: Not--there is mercy: but there is anger with God:
therefore shall He be feared. They have said--We must fear God, because
He is wrathful, and terrible, and ready to punish; and is extreme to mark
what is done amiss, and willeth the death of a sinner: and therefore they
have not believed, when Holy Scripture told them, that God was love, and
that God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, and sent
Him to visit the world in great humility, that the world through Him
might be saved.
God has seemed to them only a proud, stern, and formidable being; a
condemning judge, and not a merciful Father; and therefore, when they
have found themselves in the deep of misery, they have cried out of it to
saints, angels, the Virgin Mary; or even to sun, moon, and stars, and all
the powers of nature; or even, again--what is more foolish still,--to
astrologers, wizards, mediums, and quacks of every shape and hue; to any
one and any thing, rather than to God.
But do not you do so, my friends. Fix it in your hearts and minds; and
fix it now, before you fall into the deep, as most are apt to do before
they die; lest, when the dark day comes, you have no time to learn in
adversity the lesson which you should have learnt in prosperity. Fix in
your hearts and minds the blessed Gospel and good news--"There is mercy
with Thee, O God; therefore shall Thou be feared." There is mercy with
Him, pity, tenderness, sympathy; a heart which can be touched with the
feeling of our infirmities; which knoweth what is in man; which despiseth
not the work of His own hands; which remembereth our weak frame, and
knoweth that we are but dust: else the spirit would fail before Him, and
the souls which He has made. Think of God as that which He is--a
compassionate God, a long-suffering God, a generous God, a magnanimous
God, a truly royal God; in one word, a Perfect God; who causeth His sun
to shine on the evil and on the good, and sendeth His rain on the just
and on the unjust; a God who cannot despise, cannot neglect, cannot lose
His patience with any poor soul of man; who sets Himself against none but
the insolent, the proud, the malicious, the mean, the wilfully stupid and
ignorant and frivolous. Against those who exalt themselves, whether as
terrible tyrants or merely contemptible boasters, He exalts Himself; and
will shew them, sooner or later, whether He or they be the stronger;
whether He or they be the wiser. But for the poor soul who is abased,
who is down, and in the depth; who feels his own weakness, folly,
ignorance, sinfulness, and out of that deep cries to God as a lost child
crying after its father--even a lost lamb bleating after the ewe--of that
poor soul, be his prayers never so confused, stupid and ill-expressed--of
him it is written: "The Lord helpeth them that fall, and lifteth up all
those that are down. He is nigh to all that call on Him, yea, to all
that call upon Him faithfully. He will fulfil the desire of those that
fear Him, He also will hear their cry and will help them."
Yes. To all such does God the Father, God who made heaven and earth,
hold up, as it were, His only-begotten Son, Christ, hanging on the Cross
for us; and say: Behold thy God. Behold the brightness of God's glory,
and the express image of God's person. Behold what God gave for thee,
even His only-begotten Son. Behold that in which God the Father was well
pleased: in His Son; not condemning you, not destroying you, but humbling
Himself, dying Himself awhile, that you may live for ever. Look; and by
seeing the Son, see the Father also--your Father, and the Father of the
spirits of all flesh; and know that His essence and His name is--Love.
Therefore, when you are in the deep of sorrow, whatever that depth may
be, cry to God. To God Himself; and to none but God. If you can go to
the pure fountain-head, why drink of the stream, which must have gathered
something of defilement as it flows? If you can get light from the sun
itself, why take lamp or candle in place of his clear rays? If you can
go to God Himself, why go to any of God's creatures, however holy pure,
and loving? Go to God, who is light of light, and life of life; the
source of all light, the source of all life, all love, all goodness, all
mercy. From Him all goodness flows. All goodness which ever has been,
shall be, or can be, is His alone, the fruit of His Spirit. Go then to
Him Himself. Out of the depth, however deep, cry unto God and God
Himself. If David, the Jew of old, could do so, much more can we, who
are baptized into Christ; much more can we, who have access by one Spirit
to the Father; much more can we, who--if we know who we are and where we
are--should come boldly to the throne of grace, to find mercy and grace
to help us in the time of need.
Boldness. That is a bold word: but it is St Paul's, not mine. And by
shewing that boldness, we shall shew that we indeed fear God. We shall
shew that we reverence God. We shall shew that we trust God. For so,
and so only, we shall obey God. If a sovereign or a sage should bid you
come to him, would you shew reverence by staying away? Would you shew
reverence by refusing his condescension? You may shew that you are
afraid of him; that you do not trust him: but that is not to shew
reverence, but irreverence.
If God calls, you are bound by reverence to come, however unworthy. If
He bids you, you must obey, however much afraid. You must trust Him; you
must take Him at His word; you must confide in His goodness, in His
justice, in His wisdom: and since He bids you, go boldly to His throne,
and find Him what He is, a gracious Lord.
My friends, to you, every one of you--however weak, however ignorant, ay,
however sinful, if you desire to be delivered from those sins--this grace
is given; liberty to cry out of the depth to God Himself, who made sun
and stars, all heaven and earth; liberty to stand face to face with the
Father of the spirits of all flesh, and cling to the one Being who can
never fail nor change; even to the one immortal eternal God, of whom it
is written, "Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the
earth, and the heavens are the work of Thy hands. They shall perish, but
Thou shalt endure. They all shall wax old, like a garment, and as a
vesture shalt Thou change them, and they shall be changed. But Thou art
the same, and Thy years shall not fail."
But it is written again, "My soul waits for the Lord." Yes, if you can
trust in the God who cannot change, you can afford to wait; you need not
be impatient; as it is written--"Fret not thyself, lest thou be moved to
do evil;" and again--"He that believeth shall not make haste." For God,
in whom you trust, is not a man that He should lie, nor a son of man that
He should repent. Hath He promised, and shall He not do it? His word is
like the rain and dew, which fall from heaven, and return not to it again
useless, but give seed to the sower and bread to the eater. So is every
man that trusteth in Him. His kingdom, says the Lord, is as if a man
should put seed into the ground, and sleep and wake, and the seed should
grow up, he knoweth not how. So the seed which we sow--the seed of
repentance, the seed of humility, the seed of sorrowful prayers for
help--it too shall take root, and grow, and bring forth fruit, we know
not how, in the good time of God, who cannot change. We may be sad; we
may be weary; our eyes may wait and watch for the Lord as the Psalmist
says; more than they that watch for the morning: but it must be as those
who watch for the morning, for the morning which must and will come, for
the sun which will surely rise, and the day which will surely dawn, and
the Saviour who will surely deliver, and the God who is merciful in
this--that He rewardeth every man according to his work.
"Oh trust in the Lord. For with the Lord there is mercy, and with Him is
plenteous redemption; and He shall deliver His people from all their
sins."
From their sins. Not merely from the punishment of their sins; not
always from the punishment of their sins in this life: but, what is
better far, from the sins themselves; from the sins which bring them into
fresh and needless troubles; and which make the old troubles, which
cannot now be escaped, intolerable.
From all their sins. Not only from the great sins, which, if persisted
in, will surely destroy both body and soul in hell: but from the little
sins which do so easily beset us; from little bad habits, tempers,
lazinesses, weaknesses, ignorances, which hamper and hinder us all every
day when we try to do our duty. From all these will the Lord deliver us,
by the blood of Christ, and by the inspiration of His Holy Spirit, that
we may be able at last to say to children and friends, and all whom we
love and leave behind us--
"Oh taste and see that the Lord is gracious. Blessed is the man that
trusteth in Him."
Yes. This at least we may do--Trust in our God, and thank God that we
may do it; for if men may not do that, then is that true of them which
Homer said of old--that man is more miserable than all the beasts of the
field. For the animals look neither forward nor back. They live but for
the present moment; and pain and grief, being but for the moment, fall
lightly upon them. But we--we who have the fearful power of looking
back, and looking forward--we who can feel regret and remorse for the
past, anxiety and terror for the future--to us at times life would be
scarce worth having, if we had not a right to cry with all our hearts--
"O God, in Thee have I trusted, let me never be confounded."
SERMON XXIV. THE BLESSING AND THE CURSE.
Preached on Whit-Sunday.
DEUT. XXX. 19, 20.
I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have
set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose
life, that both thou and thy seed may live: that thou mayest love the
Lord thy God, and that thou mayest obey His voice, and that thou
mayest cleave unto Him: for He is thy life, and the length of thy
days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the Lord sware unto thy
fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.
These words, the book of Deuteronomy says, were spoken by Moses to all
the Israelites shortly before his death. He had led them out of Egypt,
and through the wilderness. They were in sight of the rich land of
Canaan, where they were to settle and to dwell for many hundred years.
Moses, the book says, went over again with them all the Law, the
admirable and divine Law, which they were to obey, and by which they were
to govern and order themselves in the land of Canaan. He had told them
that they owed all to God Himself; that God had delivered them out of
slavery in Egypt; God had led them to the land of Canaan; God had given
them just laws and right statutes, which if they kept, they would live
long in their new home, and become a great and mighty nation. Then he
calls heaven and earth to witness that he had set before them life and
death, blessing and cursing. If they trusted in the one true God, and
served Him, and lived as men should, who believed that a just and loving
God cared for them, then they would live; then a blessing would come on
them, and their children, on their flocks and herds, on their land and
all in it. But if they forgot God, and began to worship the sun, and the
moon, and the stars, the earth and the weather, like the nations round
them, then they would die; they would grow superstitious, cowardly, lazy,
and profligate, and therefore weak and miserable, like the wretched
Canaanites whom they were going to drive out; and then they would die.
Their souls would die in them, and they would become less than men, and
at last--as the Canaanites had become--worse than brutes, till their
numbers would diminish, and they would be left, Moses says, few in number
and at last perish out of the good land which God had given them.
So, he says, you know how to live, and you know how to die. Choose
between them this day.
They knew the road to wealth, health, prosperity and order, peace and
happiness, and life: and they knew the road to ruin, poverty, weakness,
disease, shame and death.
They knew both roads; for God had set them before them.
And you know both roads; for God has set them before you.
Then he says--I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day,
that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing.
He called heaven and earth to witness. That was no empty figure of
speech. If you will recollect the story of the Israelites, you will see
plainly enough what Moses meant.
The heaven would witness against them. The same stars which would look
down on their freedom and prosperity in Canaan, had looked down on all
their slavery and misery in Egypt, hundreds of years before. Those same
stars had looked down on their simple forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob, wandering with their flocks and herds out of the mountains of the
far north. That heaven had seen God's mercies and care of them, for now
five hundred years. Everything had changed round them: but those stars,
that sun, that moon, were the same still, and would be the same for ever.
They were witnesses to them of the unchangeable God, those heavens above.
They would seem to say--Just as the heavens above you are the same,
wherever you go, and whatever you are like, so is the God who dwells
above the heaven; unchangeable, everlasting, faithful, and true, full of
light and love; from whom comes down every good and perfect gift, in whom
is neither variableness nor shadow of turning. Do you turn to Him
continually, and as often as you turn away from Him: and you shall find
Him still the same; governing you by unchangeable law, keeping His
promise for ever.
And the earth would witness against them. That fair land of Canaan
whither they were going, with its streams and wells spreading freshness
and health around; its rich corn valleys, its uplands covered with vines,
its sweet mountain pastures, a very garden of the Lord, cut off and
defended from all the countries round by sandy deserts and dreary
wildernesses; that land would be a witness to them, at their daily work,
of God's love and mercy to their forefathers. The ruins of the old
Canaanite cities would be a witness to them, and say--Because of their
sins the Lord drove out these old heathens from before you. Copy their
sins, and you will share their ruin. Do as they did, and you will surely
die like them. God has given you life, here in this fair land of Canaan;
beware how you choose death, as the Canaanites chose it. They died the
death which comes by sin; and God has given you life, the life which is
by righteousness. Be righteous men, and just, and God-fearing, if you
wish to keep this land, you, and your children after you.
And now, my dear friends, if Moses could call heaven and earth to witness
against those old Jews, that he had set before them life and death, a
blessing and a curse, may we not do the same? Does not the heaven above
our heads, and the earth beneath our feet, witness against us here? Do
they not say to us--God has given you life and blessing. If you throw
that away, and choose instead death and a curse; it is your own fault,
not God's?
Look at the heaven above us. Does not that witness against us? Has it
not seen, for now fifteen hundred years and more, God's goodness to us,
and to our forefathers? All things have changed; language, manners,
customs, religion. We have changed our place, as the Israelites did; and
dwell in a different land from our forefathers: but that sky abides for
ever. That same sun, that moon, those stars shone down upon our heathen
forefathers, when the Lord chose them, and brought them out of the German
forests into this good land of England, that they might learn to worship
no more the sun, and the moon, and the storm, and the thunder-cloud, but
to worship Him, the living God who made all heaven and earth. That sky
looked down upon our forefathers, when the first missionaries baptized
them into the Church of Christ, and England became a Christian land, and
made a covenant with God and Christ for ever to walk in His laws which He
has set before us. From that heaven, ever since, hath God been sending
rain and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness, for
a witness of His love and fostering care; prospering us, whensoever we
have kept His laws, above all other nations upon earth. Shall not that
heaven witness against us? Into that heaven ascended Christ the Lord,
that He might fill all things with His power and His rule, and might send
from thence on us His Holy Spirit, the Spirit whom we worship this day,
the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might,
the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. By that same Spirit,
and by none other, have been thought all the noble thoughts which
Englishmen ever thought. By that Spirit have been spoken all the noble
words which Englishmen ever spoke. By that Spirit have been done all the
noble deeds which Englishmen have ever done. To that Spirit we owe all
that is truly noble, truly strong, truly stable, in our English life. It
is He that has given us power to get wealth, to keep wealth, to use
wealth. And if we begin to deny that, as we are inclined to do now-a-
days; if we lay our grand success and prosperity to the account of our
own cleverness, our own ability; if we say, as Moses warned the
Israelites they would say, in the days of their success and prosperity,
not--"It is God who has given us power to get wealth," but--"Mine arm,
and the might of my hand, has gotten me this wealth;"--in plain words--If
we begin to do what we are all too apt to do just now, to worship our own
brains instead of God: then the heaven above us will witness against us,
this Whitsuntide above all seasons in the year; and say--Into heaven the
Lord ascended who died for you on the Cross. From heaven He sent down
gifts for you, and your forefathers, even while you were His enemies,
that the Lord God might dwell among you. And behold, instead of thanking
God, fearing God, and confessing that you are nothing, and God is all,
you talk as if you were the arbiters of your own futures, the makers of
your own gifts. Instead of giving God the glory, you take the glory to
yourselves. Instead of declaring the glory of God, like the heavens, and
shewing his handiwork, like the stars, you shew forth your own glory and
boast of your own handiwork. Beware, and fear; as your forefathers
feared, and lived, because they gave the glory to God.
And shall not the earth witness against us? Look round, when you go out
of church, upon this noble English land. Why is it not, as many a land
far richer in soil and climate is now, a desolate wilderness; the land
lying waste, and few men left in it, and those who are left robbing and
murdering each other, every man's hand against his fellow, till the wild
beasts of the field increase upon them? In that miserable state now is
many a noble land, once the very gardens of the world--Judaea, and almost
all the East, which was once the very garden of the Lord, as thick with
living men as a hive is with bees, and vast sheets both of North Africa,
and of South and of North America. Why is not England thus? Why, but
because the Lord set before our forefathers life and death, blessing and
cursing; and our forefathers chose life, and lived; and it was well with
them in the land which God gave to them, because they chose blessing, and
God blessed them accordingly? In spite of many mistakes and
shortcomings--for they were sinful mortal men, as we are--they chose life
and a blessing; and clave unto the Lord their God, and kept His covenant;
and they left behind, for us their children, these churches, these
cathedrals, for an everlasting sign that the Lord was with us, as He had
been with them, and would be with our children after us.
Ah, my friends, while we look round us over the face of this good land,
and see everywhere the churches pointing up to heaven, each amid towns
and villages which have never seen war or famine for now long centuries,
all thriving and improving year by year, and which never for 800 years
have been trodden by the foot of an invading enemy, one ought to feel, if
one has a thoughtful and God-fearing heart--Verily God has set before us
life and blessing, and prospered us above all nations upon earth; and if
we do not cleave to Him, we shall shew ourselves fools above all nations
upon earth.
And then when one reads the history of England; when one thinks over the
history of any one city, even one country parish; above all, when one
looks into the history of one's own foolish heart: one sees how often,
though God has given us freely life and blessing, we have been on the
point of choosing death and the curse instead; of saying--We will go our
own way and not God's way. The land is ours, not God's; the houses are
our own, not God's; our souls are our own, not God's. We are masters,
and who is master over us? That is the way to choose death, and the
curse, shame and poverty and ruin, my friends; and how often we have been
on the point of choosing it. What has saved us? What has kept us from
it? Certainly not our own righteousness, nor our own wisdom, nor our own
faith. After reading the history of England; or after recollecting our
own lives--the less we say of them the better.
What has kept us from ruin so long? We are all day long forgetting the
noble things which God did for our forefathers. Why does not God in
return remember our sins, and the sins of our forefathers? Why is He not
angry with us for ever? Why, in spite of all our shortcomings and
backslidings, are we prospering here this day?