There is almost a tone of glad surprise, as well as of triumphant
confidence, in this refrain of our psalm, which comes twice in it, and
possibly ought to have come three times--at the end of each of its
sections. The emphasis is to be laid on the 'us' and the 'our,' as if
that was the miracle, and the fact which startled the Psalmist into the
highest rapture of astonished thankfulness.
'The Lord of hosts is with _us_.' What does that say? It proclaims that
wondrous truth that no gulf between the mighty Ruler of all and us, the
insignificant little creatures that creep upon the face of this tiny
planet, has any power of separating us from Him. It is always hard to
believe that. It is harder to-day than it was when our Psalmist's heart
beat high at the thought. It is hard by reason of our sense-bound
blindness, by reason of our superficial way of looking at things, which
only shows us the nearest, and veils with their insignificances the
magnitude of the furthest. Jupiter is blazing in our skies every night
now; he is not one-thousandth part as great or bright as any one of the
little needle-points of light, the fixed stars, that are so much further
away; but he is nearer, and the intrusive brightness of the planet hides
the modest glories of the distant and shrouded suns. Just so it is hard
for us ever to realise, and to walk in the light of the realisation of,
the fact that the Lord of hosts, the Emperor of all things, is of a
truth with each of us.
It is harder to-day than ever it was; for we have learned to think
rightly--or at least more rightly and approximately rightly--of the
position and age of man upon this earth. The Psalmist's ancient question
of devout thankfulness is too often travestied to-day into a question of
scoffing or of melancholy unbelief: 'When I consider the heavens, the
work of Thy hands; what is man? Art Thou mindful of him?' This psalm
comes to answer that. 'The Lord of hosts is with us.' True, we are but
of yesterday, and know nothing. True, earth is but a pin-point amidst
the universe's glories. True, we are crushed down by sorrow and by care;
and in some moods it seems supremely incredible that we should be of
such worth in the scale of Creation as that the Lord of all things
should, in a deeper sense than the Psalmist knew, have dwelt with us and
be with us still. But bigness is not greatness, and there is nothing
incredible in the belief that men, lower than the angels, and needing
God more because of their sin, do receive His visitations in an
altogether special sense, and that, passing by the lofty and the great
that may inhabit His universe, His chariot wheels stoop to us, and that,
because we are sinners, God is with us.
Let me remind you, dear brethren! of how this great thought of my text
is heightened and transcended by the New Testament teaching. We believe
in One whose name is 'Immanuel, _God with us_.' Jesus Christ has come to
be with men, not only during the brief years of His earthly ministry, in
corporeal reality, but to be with all who love Him and trust Him, in a
far closer, more real, more deep, more precious, more operative Presence
than when He dwelt here. Through all the ages Christ Himself is with
every soul that loves Him; and He will dwell beside _us_ and bless _us_
and keep _us_. God's presence means God's sympathy, God's knowledge,
God's actual help, and these are ours if we will. Instead of staggering
at the apparent improbability that so transcendent and mighty a Being
should stoop from His throne, where He lords it over the universe, and
enter into the narrow room of our hearts, let us rather try to rise to
the rapture of the astonished Psalmist when, looking upon the
deliverance that had been wrought, this was the leading conviction that
was written in flame upon his heart, 'The Lord of hosts is with _us_.'
And then the second of the wonders that are here set forth in regard to
our relations to Him is, 'the God of Jacob is _our_ Refuge.'
That carries for us the great truth that, just as the distance between
us and God makes no separation, and the gulf is one that is bridged over
by His love, so distance in time leads to no exhaustion of the divine
faithfulness and care, nor any diminution of the resources of His grace.
'The God of Jacob is _our_ Refuge.' The story of the past is the
prophecy of the future. What God has been to any man He will be to every
man, if the man will let Him. There is nothing in any of these grand
narratives of ancient days which is not capable of being reproduced in
our lives. God drew near to Jacob when he was lying on the stony ground,
and showed him the ladder set upon earth, with its top in the heavens,
and the bright-winged soldiers and messengers of His will ascending and
descending upon it, and His own face at the top. God shows you and me
that vision to-day. It was no vanishing splendour, no transient
illumination, no hallucination of the man's own thoughts seeking after a
helper, and the wish being father to the vision. But it was the
unveiling for a moment, in supernatural fashion, of the abiding reality.
'The God of Jacob is _our_ Refuge'; and whatever He was to His servant
of old He is to-day to you and me.
We say that miracle has ceased. Yes. But that which the miracle effected
has not ceased; and that from which the miracle came has not ceased. The
realities of a divine protection, of a divine supply, of a divine
guidance, of a divine deliverance, of a divine discipline, and of a
divine reward at the last, are as real to-day as when they were mediated
by signs and wonders, by an open heaven and by an outstretched hand.
They who went before have not emptied the treasures of the Father's
house, nor eaten all the bread that He spreads upon the table. God has
no stepchildren, and no favourite and spoiled ones. All that the elder
brethren have had, we, on whom the ends of the dispensation are come,
may have just as really; and whatever God has been to the patriarch He
is to us to-day.
Remember the experience of the man of whom our text speaks. The God of
Jacob manifested Himself to him as being a God who would draw near to,
and care for, and help, a very unworthy and poor creature. Jacob was no
saint at the beginning. Selfishness and cunning and many a vice clung
very close to his character; but for all that, God drew near to him and
cared for him and guided him, and promised that He would not leave him
till He had done that which He had spoken to him of. And He will do the
same for us--blessed be His name!--with all our faults and weaknesses
and craftiness and worldliness and sins. If He cared for that
huckstering Jew, as He did, even in his earlier days, He will not put us
away because He finds faults in us. 'The God of Jacob,' the supplanter,
the trickster, 'is our Refuge.'
But remember how the divine Presence with that man had to be, because of
his faults, a Presence that wrought him sorrows and forced him to
undergo discipline. So it will be with us. He will not suffer sin upon
us; He will pass us through the fire and the water; and do anything with
us short of destroying us, in order to destroy the sin that is in us. He
does not spare His rod for His child's crying, but smites with judgment,
and sends us sorrows 'for our profit, that we should be partakers of His
holiness.' We may write this as the explanation over most of our
griefs--'the God of Jacob is our Refuge,' and He is disciplining us as
He did him.
And remember what the end of the man was. 'Thy name shall no more be
called Jacob, but Israel; for as a prince thou hast power with God, and
hast prevailed.' So if we have God, who out of such a sow's ear made a
silk purse, out of such a stone raised up a servant for Himself, we may
be sure that His purpose in all discipline will be effected on us
submissive, and we shall end where His ancient servant ended, and shall
be in our turn princes with God.
Let me recall to you also the meaning which Jesus Christ found in this
name. He quoted 'the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob' as being
the great guarantee and proof to us of immortality. 'The God of Jacob is
our Refuge.' If so, what can the grim and ghastly phantom of death do to
us? He may smite upon the gate, but he cannot enter the fortress. The
man who has knit himself to God by saying to God, 'Lo! I am Thine, and
Thou art mine,' in that communion has a proof and a pledge that nothing
shall ever break it, and that death is powerless. The fact of
religion--true, heartfelt religion, with its communion, its prayer, its
consciousness of possessing and of being possessed, makes the idea that
death ends a man's conscious existence an absurdity and an
impossibility.
'The God of Jacob is our Refuge,' and so we may say to the storms of
life, and after them to the last howling tornado of death--Blow winds
and crack your cheeks, and do your worst, you cannot touch me in the
fortress where I dwell. The wind will hurtle around the stronghold, but
within there shall be calm.
Dear brethren! make sure that you are in the refuge. Make sure that you
have fled for 'Refuge to the hope set before you in the Gospel.' The
Lord of hosts is with us,' but you may be parted from Him. He is our
Refuge, but you may be standing outside the sanctuary, and so be exposed
to all the storms. Flee thither, cast yourselves on Him, trust in that
great Saviour who has given Himself for us, and who says to us, 'Lo! I
am with you always.' Take Christ for your hiding-place by simple faith
in Him and loving obedience born of faith, and then the experience of
our Psalmist will be yours. Your life will not want for deliverances
which will thrill your heart with thankfulness, and turn the truth of
faith into a truth of experience. So you may set to your seals the great
saying of our psalm, which is fresh to-day, though centuries have passed
since it came glowing fiery from the lips of the ancient seer, and may
take up as yours the great words in which Luther has translated it for
our times, the 'Marseillaise' of the Reformation--
'A safe stronghold our God is still;
A trusty shield and weapon;
He'll help us clear from all the ill
That hath us now o'ertaken.'