It is intended to strengthen and confirm the feeble. God's messengers
are to speak words by which faith and courage be reanimated. They
contain--
1. _An assurance of deliverance._ The deliverance of the Jewish
people included the punishment of their enemies. God saves in a way
suitable to each case. If your own resources are inadequate, the
Divine resources are equal to the emergency. He will save you from
your spiritual fears. Has He not sent His Son? Has not Jesus died and
risen again? Does He not intercede? Does not His Spirit work? His
willingness to save is equal to His ability. What wondrous love to
man in the work of redemption! Do you fear that you will be
eventually rejected, or that you will fail in the service to which He
calls you? (John vi. 37; Matt. xxviii. 20). The message is addressed
to your faith. It reminds you of God's power and grace in Christ. It
casts you on the all-sufficiency of God.
2. _A rebuke of fear._ "Fear not." Hope is the opposite of fear and
the accompaniment of courage. The fear of the unaccustomed sailor is
dissipated when the captain announces that the storm is passing away.
The little child alone in a dark room is afraid, although she knows
not why. But the mother comes and says there is nothing to fear;
there is no fear where she is. So let God's presence and promise
drive away all fear respecting our spiritual condition and our
Christian work (P. D. 1248, 1257, 1258).
3. _An incitement to labour._ "Be strong." When God's work calls, we
must neither yield to fear nor indolence. The father leads his child
to the post of duty where his life-work must be done. He sees
something of the complicated work of the manufactory, and fears that
he will never be equal to it. His father says, "Be a man; face your
work, and strength for it will come." So God says, "Be strong." Here
is work in the Church and the world. You are weak. Use the strength
He gives. It will grow by use. "Be strong in the grace that is in
Christ Jesus" (1 Tim. ii. 1). "Strong in the Lord, and in the power
of His might" (Eph vi. 10).
Thus God sends the message of encouragement. Weak hands are
strengthened. Feeble knees are confirmed. Fearful hearts are rendered
courageous. And His encouragement is necessary to comfort in the
Christian life, performance of duty, endurance of suffering and
reproach. And it helps to recommend the Gospel.--_J. Rawlinson._
Presumption and fear are the Scylla and Charybdis of the Christian
life, and it requires Divine guidance, together with all our own
watchfulness, to steer safely between them. On the one hand, many are
inclined to indulge in vain confidence, and take to themselves the
Christian name and hope when not entitled to them; and on the other,
many are fearful and disposed to shrink back from duties and
privileges which really belong to them. It demands much wisdom on the
part of a pastor so to speak as not to encourage false hopes, nor
discourage weak and timid piety, especially in reference to a public
profession of religion. My object is, to suit the case of those who
are well entitled to hope for the Divine mercy through Christ Jesus,
but are disquieting themselves, or are disquieted by the enemy, with
needless fears. In meeting their wants I will state, and reply to,
the reasoning by which I know that many disturb their own peace.
1. "I cannot indulge the hope that I am a Christian, _because I have
never passed through the same religious exercises and experience that
others profess to have felt and enjoyed._" It is not necessary to
dwell at large upon this difficulty. God has brought many sons to
glory, but no two of them have been led thither in precisely the same
way, or have been exercised with precisely the same feelings. If, in
the main, our experiences correspond with the Word of God in the
great points of faith and love, it need not disquiet us though we
never heard of another case exactly like our own (H. E. I. 1410-1429).
2. _"If I were truly a child of God, sin would not prevail against me
as I find it does."_ Answer:--Sin is never perfectly subdued in our
hearts as long as we remain upon earth. Some boast of having attained
to sinless perfection, but they seem to be labouring under a sort of
hallucination, like that of one in an insane asylum, amid his straw
and rags, who fancies himself a king, when he is indeed but a poor
pitiable object. "The righteous falleth seven times a day," &c. Read
St. Paul's experience in the last part of the 7th of Romans and be
encouraged thereby (H. E. I. 329, 1057, 2313, 2861, 4571-4573).
3. "I find that sin not only prevails against me, _but I seem to be
worse than when I first strove against it; my heart appears to grow
more wicked, my corruptions stronger, and my strength to resist to be
less._" Answer:--To _perceive_ more of our sin than usual does not
always prove that we are more sinful, but often the reverse, just as
when one cleanses a room, though the air is filled with dust floating
in the sunbeams, there is no more of it actually than before, and
there will soon be less of it as the operation goes on. We do not
know the strength of our evil passions until we begin to oppose them.
It is also undoubtedly true that when one is making a special effort
to lead a Christian life, that then he is especially tempted and
hindered, and that the motions of sin are then more violent. And
further than this, when any are endeavouring to break away from the
dominion of Satan, then he assails them with his most powerful
temptations (H. E. I. 1060-1062, 1066-1068, 2524, 2525).
4. Another class of disquieted ones affirm that they cannot hope they
are true Christians, _because they seem to love everything else more
than God._ But in estimating our love to God compared with our love
to earthly things, we are not to conclude that we love that most
which most excites our affections. It has been well remarked "that a
man may be more moved when he sees a friend that has long been
absent, and seem to regard him more for the moment than he does his
own wife and children, and yet none would think that the friend was
loved the most;" so neither must we conclude because when we are
abroad in the world we find our affections vehemently stirred towards
its various objects, that therefore they are supreme in our hearts.
We should judge of our comparative affection by asking ourselves
soberly which of the two objects we should prefer to part with
(H. E. I. 3365, 3366, 4188, 4189).
5. _"A person may in appearance be like a Christian, and yet be
really destitute of any true piety."_ Answer:--Fear is usually the
best remedy against the thing feared, and none are farther from the
danger of making a false profession than those who are most afraid of
it (H. E. I. 339, 2050-2053).
6. Some again have fears that they are not true Christians, _because
they come so far short of the attainments of some eminent Christians
of their acquaintance._ We reply that the worst part of the character
of those exalted saints may not be known to us, or they may not have
our hindrances, or they may have been long in growing up to that
state, while we are only, as it were, babes in Christ (H. E. I.
2508-2526).
7. Another class say _that they cannot think any real Christian ever
was so tempted and distressed with evil thoughts as they are._ We
reply, Job was tempted to curse God, and Christ Himself to worship
Satan. We may have very wicked thoughts entering our minds, but if we
strive against them and they are painful to us, they are no evidence
against us. Christ had thoughts as vile as these suggested to Him,
but He remained sinless (H. E. I. 4767-4779).
8. Another class say _that they have doctrinal difficulties, that
certain things in the Bible do not appear clear to them,_ and they
fear to make any public confession of Christ till these things are
made plain. We reply that the best way to solve doctrinal
difficulties is to engage in practical duties. Any one perplexed upon
points of doctrine should read but little on those points, but engage
earnestly in all acts of obedience which the Bible enjoins, praying
fervently and humbly to be guided into all truth. One day's labour in
the field of charity, or one step onward in the path of known duty,
will bring more light into the soul upon disputed points than weeks
of speculation and controversy (H. E. I. 590-596, 1797). It would be
endless to recount all the ways in which doubts and fears assail us.
Their name is legion, and our prayer should be that Christ would
command them to come out of the man who is troubled with them, and to
enter no more into him.--_W. H. Lewis, D.D.: Plain Sermons for the
Christian Year._