The first of them is very easily disposed of. 'The eyes of all wait upon
Thee, and Thou givest them their meat.' That is all. Feed the beast, and
give it the other things necessary for its physical existence, and there
is no more to be done. But there is more wanted for the desires of the
men that love and fear God. These are glanced at in the context, 'He
also will hear their cry, and will save them'; 'the Lord preserveth all
them that love Him.' That is to say, there are deeper needs in our
hearts and lives than any that are known amongst the lower creatures.
Evils, dangers inward and outward, sorrows, disappointments, losses of
all sorts shadow our lives, in a fashion which the happy, careless life
of field and forest knows nothing about. Give them their meat, and they
curl themselves up and lie down to sleep, satisfied. Man longs for
something more and needs something more.
'He will save them.' Now, I do not suppose that 'save' here is employed
in its full New Testament sense, but it approximates to that sense.
And, further, there are other aspects of our needs set forth in the
context, on which I briefly touch. Do not let us vulgarise such a saying
as this of my text, 'He will fulfil the desire of them that fear Him,'
as if it only meant that if a man fears God he may set his longing upon
any outward thing, and be sure to get it. There is nothing so poor, so
unworthy as that promised in Scripture. For one thing, it is not true;
for another, it would not be good if it were. The way to spoil children
is not the way to perfect saints; and to give them what they want
because they want it, is the sure way to spoil children of all ages. We
may be quite certain that our heavenly Father is not going to do that.
The promise here means something far nobler and loftier. The fact of
creation binds God to supply all the wants which spring from life. The
fact of our loving and fearing Him binds Him to supply all the wants
which spring from our love and fear. And it is these desires which the
Psalmist is thinking of.
What is the object of desire to a man who loves God? God. What is the
object of desire to a man who fears Him? God. What is the object of
desire to a righteous man? Righteousness. And these are the desires
which God is sure to fulfil to us. Therefore, there is only one region
in which it is safe and wise to cherish longings, and it is the region
of the spiritual life where God imparts Himself. Everywhere else there
will be disappointments--thank Him for them. Nowhere else is it
absolutely true that He will 'fulfil the desires of them that fear Him.'
But in this region it is. Whatever any of us desire to have of God, we
are sure to get. We open our mouths and He fills them. In the Christian
life desire is the measure of possession, and to long is to have. And
there is nowhere else where it is absolutely, unconditionally, and
universally true that to wish is to possess, and to ask is to have.
Oh! then, is it not a foolish thing for us to worry and torture and
sweat, in order to win for ourselves for a little while the uncertain
possession of incomplete bliss? Would it not be wiser, instead of
letting the current of our desires dribble itself away through a
thousand channels in the sand and get lost, to gather it all into one
great stream which is sure to find its way to the broad ocean? 'Delight
thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart,'
for these will then be after Himself, and Himself only.