Warning and Encouragement
(No. 3013)
A SERMON PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 1906.
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON LORD'S-DAY EVENING, IN
THE YEAR 1864.
"I sleep, but my heart wakes: it is the voice of my beloved that
knocks, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled:
for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the
night." Song of Solomon 5:2.
How changeable is the creature! In the verse preceding our text, we
find the spouse in a happy, healthy, heavenly frame of mind, for her
Beloved was with her and she was in the enjoyment of the closest
communion with him. We find him saying, "I am come into my garden, my
sister, my spouse: I have gathered my myrrh with my spice; I have eaten
my honeycomb with my honey; I have drunk my wine with my milk; eat,
friends; drink, yes, drink abundantly, O beloved." Yet, from the height
of this glorious fellowship, how soon the spouse comes down to the
depths of such a cry as this, "I sleep, but my heart wakes"! Truly, the
weather of our isle is not more variable than the feelings of
Believers. One day the sun shines hot and strong. The next day comes a
black cloud, accompanied with the lightning flash and the voice of
thunder. Then come the rattling drops of hail and then, in a few more
hours, it is hot again, or perhaps the chilly North wind begins to
blow. Have you not been on Mount Tabor at one moment and at another in
the Valley of Achor? Have you not been at one time like the chariots of
Amminadib, driving so fast that the axles were hot with speed, and soon
after you have been like Pharaoh's chariots when the wheels were taken
off so that you drove heavily? Now you mount as upon eagle's wings and
soon you sink as in deep mud where there is no standing! At one moment
delighting in God's goodness and mercy, but the next moment, crying,
"All Your waves and Your billows have gone over me." Lord, what a
changeable creature is man! When You have taken him up to his highest
altitude, how speedily he comes down, by the force of Your hand, to the
very depths! How soon do You bring him down from his highest eminence
even to the very dust!
Christian, when the Lord favors you and your soul walks in near
fellowship with Him, remember that there is a devil within you and a
devil outside you. Be careful of your footsteps–even when you are on
the top of the mountain, even when Jesus is sitting by you and
whispering in your ear that you are His, watch with the greatest,
possible care, for you never lose your corruption! Your communion may
be transient, but your corruption is perpetual. To be with Christ is
but a thing of a moment with you, but to be with your corruption is a
thing of every hour in the day! I pray you, keep this in mind and
whenever you are in your best frame, then be doubly careful lest you
should lose your Beloved and have to cry once again, "I sleep, but my
heart wakes!" Dr. Ives, who used to live on the road to Tyburn at the
time when prisoners were always carried in a cart to be hanged there,
would frequently say, when he had any friends with him, if he saw the
criminals riding by, "There goes Dr. Ives." And when they asked him
what he meant, he replied, "Such crimes as that felon has committed I
would have committed but for the Grace of God." That is true even of
you who live nearest to God. You who have the most familiarity with
Christ and enjoy the most holy fellowship with Him may soon become the
very leaders of the hosts of Satan if your Lord withdraws His Grace!
David's eyes go astray and the sweet Psalmist of Israel becomes the
shameless adulterer who robs Uriah of his wife. Samson one day slays a
thousand of his enemies with the might of his arm and the velour of his
heart–another day his honor is betrayed, his locks are shorn, and his
eyes are put out by a strumpet's treacherous wiles.
How soon are the mighty fallen! Behold Solomon, the wisest of men, yet
the greatest fool who ever lived! Even Job fails in patience and
Abraham staggers as to his faith. "Let him that thinks he stands take
heed lest he fall." These observations seem to rise at once to our
minds when we consider such passages as abound in this "Song of Songs,
which is
Solomon's." We find, at one moment, that the spouse is so happy that
she cries out, "Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples; for I am
sick of love," and, at another moment, she is searching for her Beloved
and cannot find him, and mourning because of the darkness, and of the
cruelty of "the watchmen that go about the city."
The text very readily suggests three subjects for meditation–first, a
lamentable state–"I sleep." Secondly, a hopeful sign–"but my heart
wakes." And thirdly, a potent remedy–"It is the voice of my Beloved."
Nothing can wake a Believer out of his sleep like the voice of his
Beloved!
I. First, here is A LAMENTABLE STATE–"I sleep."
I think I can describe this state pretty well because I experience it
too often and I am afraid many of you could also describe it with some
degree of accuracy, for frequently you, too, fall into it. What is it
for a Christian to sleep? Well, thank God, there is a sleep which the
Believer never knows. He can never again sleep that deadly sleep in
which Christ found him while he was in his sinful state–he shall never
sleep the judicial sleep into which some were cast as the result of
sin! He shall not sleep, as do others, to his eternal ruin, yet he may
sleep dangerously and sinfully–and this is the state in which the
Christian is found when he thus sleeps–in a state of inaction. You are
doing something for God but you are doing it as a matter of custom than
as a matter of loving earnestness. You pray. You go up to the House of
God. You teach in the Sunday school but you do these things
mechanically, as a man walks who is sound asleep. You are in a sort of
spiritual somnambulism! The work that you are called upon to perform,
you do after a fashion, but there is none of the power of God in the
work–there is no earnestness thrown into it. It is done, and that is
the end of it–but your heart has been absent from it.
Coupled with this, there is a need of vigor in everything to which such
a man sets his hand. If he preaches, there is no force or burning
energy, no boiling, scalding periods–he just takes his text and speaks
upon it. Perhaps God's people are edified, perhaps sinners are saved,
but that man has no enjoyment in his work during the whole time that he
sluggishly performs it thus. A man, to enjoy the work of the Lord, must
throw his whole strength into it. It is the same when you come to
prayer. You pray after a sort, but it is not that wrestling with the
Angel which gets the blessing from Him. You knock at the door, but not
with that force which causes it to open. You have forgotten your former
vigor. Whereas once your place of prayer was the witness of groans and
tears, now you can go into it and come out of it without so much as a
single sob. And it is just the same when you read the Scriptures. Once
the page sparkled with promises and your soul was satisfied with marrow
and fatness. But when you read it now it is very dull and you no longer
derive refreshing consolation from it. Like the temple out of which God
has moved, you walk through it–there are the pillars, there stand all
the symbols of worship. The altar is there, but God, the King, has gone
and a voice has been heard to say, "Arise, let Us go from here." And
so, you go through the sacred edifice and find nothing there. In this
same sleepy state, we go up to the House of God to listen to His Word
and if our sleep has got a strong hold upon us, we cannot get any
comfort. We begin to rail at the minister because we are not edified as
we used to be–we think that a change has come over him. That is
possible, but it is just as likely, and more so, that our lack of
enjoyment of God's Word is owing to ourselves. We sit and hear as God's
people hear–and we sing as God's people sing, and pray as they
pray–after the outward form, but we go out as a man rises from his bed
whereon he has tossed all night and we feel that we are not a whit
refreshed! And the Sabbath that was once a joy and delight to us, has
perhaps become a weariness and a burden!
There is no enjoyment while a man is thus asleep and, as there is no
enjoyment, there is no consciousness of pain. Ah, Beloved, I have known
seasons when I would almost have given my right arm to be able to shed
tears of repentance– wherein I wished that I might again have a broken
heart–when I have longed to make my soul feel even the pains of Hell
rather than not feel anything! This is one of the worst states a
Christian can be in–to go nodding on through life, slumbering over
eternal realities, dreaming over Heaven, nodding his head and
continuing to sleep when he is in the Presence of the Most High God and
should have gathered up all his powers and strung them to the highest
pitch of intensity! Have you not been in such a state? If you have not,
happy man are you! There are most holy men, some of the giant servants
of God, who have fallen into this state and have been compelled to cry
out, "I sleep," finding themselves happy, indeed, if they could add, "I
sleep, but my heart wakes."
Such a state as this is very sinful Is it not sinful, O my Soul, to be
trifling with the eternal state, to be playing at prayer? Can you be so
dull and heavy about eternal things when worldlings are so thoroughly
awake about their silver and gold and commercial pursuits? When souls
are being hurried to eternity, how is it that I can still be
indifferent?
While time is speeding on and eternity is so near, how can I still go
to my slothful couch and cry, "A little sleep, a little slumber, a
little folding of your hands to sleep"? Chosen in Christ, redeemed with
His precious blood, quickened by the Divine Spirit and made partakers
of the Divine Nature, how can it be consistent with our position and
condition to sleep as do others? The light of God's Grace has shone
upon us–is this a time to slumber? Let the world sleep if it will, for
its object and aims are not worthy of the Christian's high ambition,
but shall you and I sleep when Heaven is before us and Hell behind
us–when there is temptation surrounding us everywhere and angels
beckon us to Heaven while a glorious company of saints holds us in full
survey? Come, my Brothers and Sisters, we must feel that such a state
as this is sinful in the highest degree!
And how dangerous it is, tool A man who sleeps in his enemy's camp is
exposed to imminent peril. There lies Sisera asleep in Jael's tent.
Little do you know, O silly Dreamer, when that woman's hand lifts up
the mallet to drive the nail through your brain! If you desire to
sleep, Christian, wait until you get Home! There you shall have rest
enough forever in your Father's House, but, to sleep here is to sleep
in the dragon's jaw! To sleep on the top of the mast when the ship is
driving before the storm! No, awake and think of your position and
condition and sleep no longer! O God, have mercy upon Your people who
have long prosperity! There is the pinnacle of the Temple and blessed
is the man whose feet slip not when he stands there. I do not think we
sleep so much, spiritually, when we have bodily affliction, though
pains of body frequently make a Christian long for his rest. Nor do I
think we have slumbering times when we are losing our friends. Men
cannot easily sleep when the funeral knell is tolling in their ears and
when they are following dear departed ones to the grave. Nor do I think
we sleep much when we are the subjects of very violent temptations and
have a great many doubts and fears. But when we are in our vessel when
the day is fine and the sail is spread, and the wind blows softly, and
the ship goes on steadily without a motion, gliding as o'er a sea of
glass–then it is that the mariner, perhaps, forgets the rock and the
shoal! The poet was right when he said–
"More the treacherous calm I dread, Than tempests lowering overhead."
I do not like trouble and pray God to deliver me from it. I cannot well
endure bodily pain. I find myself impatient under tribulation, but I am
able to say this–if I had my choice between the severest affliction
and a state of sinful slumbering, I would prefer to have the
affliction. "There is no devil," said one, "like having no devil." That
is to say, there is no temptation like the temptation of not being
tempted! The worst form of danger is when a man is left to himself,
when he is not much tossed about, when he is quiet and easy. It ought
not to be so. The greater our prosperity, the better should we love
God. And the more our spirit is at ease, the more we should serve Him
with both our hands and render Him hearty thanksgiving for His favor
towards us! It should be so, but it is not so. In these smooth waters
we are sure to meet with mischief and, therefore, may the Lord, in His
mercy, watch over us when we are in much prosperity!
Do I hear somebody ask, "How may I know when I am asleep?" If you are a
true Christian, you will soon know it by a sort of instinct, when an
unutterable sense of misery comes over you. I may compare the sleep of
a sinner to the sleep produced by opium which gives its victim dreams
of the most magnificent character, carrying the soul up to Heaven and
then, soon, dashing it down to the depths. All sorts of fantastic
imaginations are the offsprings of that deadly drug, yet the man enjoys
himself while under its influence. But though it causes some happiness
in the use of it, it will bring him to Hell as surely as murder itself!
The sleep of a Christian, when he falls into this state, is rather like
the sleep produced by henbane–it is a kind of uneasy, short,
disturbed, unreeling rest. It does a man little harm compared with the
other and his constitution recovers from the shock much more readily.
Such, I say, is the Christian's sleep–there is no pleasure in it as
there is in the sinner's sleep, but his sleep is uneasy, his conscience
pricks him, his heart wakes and he finds no peace in it. It lasts but
for a little time and it does him much damage, but still, not the
deadly damage that the world's sleep of sin brings to its votaries. God
save you from it! May He ever keep you from falling into that kind of
sleep!
I think many of you will not need me to warn you of it. Still, if you
do need to know, let me ask you to compare yourself with what you used
to be. Are you as lively in Divine things as you once were? Is prayer
as fervent and refreshing to your souls as it once was? Do you find
that willingness to pray that you once had? Do you find that you have
to flog yourself into your closet and, when you get there, do you offer
up your prayers and desires with coldness which you were known to offer
with warm and loving fervor? Do you still continue to have the
blessedness you had when first you knew the Lord? If not, that is a
symptom of sleep. Then, compare yourself with what you ought to be.
Think how you ought to
have grown during the years that you have been a Believer. Are you what
you ought to have been? Then, if you are not, you must be asleep, or
else you would have made better progress. Compare yourself with what
others have been and you will see cause for shame! And if so, my
Brothers and Sisters, you are asleep! You are in a dangerous condition
and I pray the living God, by the demand for watchfulness when the
Prince of this world comes, by the agonies of Christ in Gethsemane,
yes, by the blood of Him who poured out His soul unto death, to awake
you out of this deadly sleep, for it is a state that will lead to some
great and grievous sin, some black and terrible fall unless God shall
prevent it by His Grace! First you sleep, then you slumber, then you
sin, then you sin again, then you go still deeper and so will you
continue unless God, in His Grace, steps in to deliver you from the
consequences of this dreadful sleep!
II. Yet, secondly, there is, in the text, A HOPEFUL SIGN.
I think that most of us, though we do sleep, can say as the spouse
does, "my heart wakes." Beloved, it is a blessed sign that the spouse
knows her state and truly confesses it She does not say, mark you, "I
am a little tired. My eyes are heavy." No, but with honesty of heart
she says, "I sleep." Ah, it is a good sign when you and I know our
state and are willing to confess it before God. I have heard of a
Believer in Christ who, on one occasion, was intoxicated, and he was
expelled from the church as the result of it. But he was visited by
many Christian Brothers and among the rest by one who prayed with him.
They prayed together to God, but he could not get any peace. "No," said
his friend, "and you never will until you come to the point and confess
your sin as it really is." And when the man said, in his prayer, "Lord,
You know that I have disgraced myself. I have been drunk," it was then
that he obtained peace. He had directed the lances to the wound–he had
put before God the right state of the case and this is what we must do,
Beloved, if we would have restoring and renewing Grace–we must tell
the Lord what our sin really is. As the spouse did, we must confess, "I
sleep."
But you will observe that the spouse is as bold in saying, "my heart
wakes," as she was in saying, "I sleep. "What does this mean, "my heart
wakes"? Why, just this. "My conscience tells me that this sleepy state
is not a proper one for me to be in and my heart cries that I must get
out of it. I cannot find any rest while I slumber. At a distance from
God, I cannot be happy." Peter may follow afar off, but Peter cannot be
happy afar off. Peter may sit and warm his hands with the servants in
Pilate's Hall, but he cannot warm his heart. Sinners may say, "Why make
all this fuss about a little sleep? There is no great sin in it." Ah,
but little sins trouble Believers far more than great sins trouble
sinners! If a Christian's soul is but a little away from God, it is
sufficient to mar his joy and make him unhappy. A man clad in armor may
go walking through the woods and may never feel the thorns, but another
man who has had his armor taken off, will be scratched and torn to
pieces! Sinners clad in the armor of sin feel not the thorn of Christ's
desertion–but saints who have thrown this armor aside and are tender
of heart, feel even His slightest frown.
My dear Hearer, perhaps you are slumbering this evening and are content
to be so. Then you are no child of God! But if you are slumbering and
there is some power–something within you that keeps crying out, "O
God, I would be delivered!" Though this voice is ever so feeble, though
this cruel sleep of yours may almost have gagged it, yet if it does
rebel against this state and cries out, "Lord, I would be changed! I
would be different! Turn You unto me and I shall be turned! Revive me,
and I shall be revived!" If there is such a longing as this in you, you
are still a child of God and well may you exclaim, "I sleep, but my
heart wakes. Lord, I would live near to You if I could. I am like a man
that rides a sorry jade of a horse–the horse will not go, but he spurs
him, hacks at the bit and strikes him again and again, for the man
would go if he could–and so it is with me! 'The spirit indeed is
willing, but the flesh is weak' and, 'when I would do good, evil is
present with me,' and 'how to perform that which is good I find not.'"
Lord, help Your servants and let them not sleep any longer!
III. Now, thirdly, here is A POTENT REMEDY–"the voice of my Beloved."
Some Christians try to get themselves into a healthy state of heart by
looking to the Law of God, by self-examination and by a thousand other
remedies. But, after all, the true cure for every disease in the
Christian is in Christ Himself You may try to chasten yourselves for
your sins, but you will continue to sin if that is all that you do.
Beloved, I know that the heart has a great objection to coming to
Christ after being in a sleepy state. Old Legality whispers in our ears
that, "You cannot go and trust Christ as you did, for see how badly you
have behaved? You must not go to the fountain filled with blood, now,
as you did at first, for look, you have played the harlot and you
cannot go with the same confidence as you went at first." "Ah, Old
Legality, I can, and I will!" The Law never did bring us out of our
state of nature and will it
bring us now out of our state of lethargy? If the Law had first of all
quickened us, then it would be well to look for restoration by the Law!
But inasmuch as we found our first life by simply believing in Christ,
the only way to renew that life is by believing in Jesus Christ again!
I will listen, then, not to the voice of the curse, not to the
condemnation of Moses, but to the voice of my Beloved, for no music is
like His and nothing can so wake my soul as hearing Him speak to me.
Hear, then, the voice of your Beloved in the Gospel! He is still your
Beloved, though you are asleep! But He sleeps not and He calls to you,
"Come to My bosom; come, My Beloved, open the doors of your heart to
Me. Come, My affianced and Precious One, I have not put you away,
though you have grieved Me and opened My wounds afresh. I have loved
you with an everlasting love. Open the doors of your heart to Me and
let Me come into communion with you." It is the voice of Jesus speaking
to you through your minister and He cries to you, "Come to Me now!
Trust Me once again and your spiritual strength shall be renewed."
Then turn to this precious Book and you will hear the voice of your
Beloved there. In words like these He speaks to you, "Turn, backsliding
children, says the Lord; for I am married unto you." Hear Him as He
cries to you, "I will be as the dew unto Israel: he shall grow as the
lily and cast forth his roots as Lebanon." Hear Him as He cries to you,
ungodly ones, "Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man
his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy
upon him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon"
Hear, then, your Beloved's voice and mark, dear Brothers and Sisters,
if you do not hear the voice of your Beloved in the days of prosperity,
you will be likely enough to hear it in affliction. If nothing else
will keep you awake, the rod will. If you will sleep in prosperity, you
shall have adversity–and sooner than you shall be lost, you shall lose
everything. If, my Brothers and Sisters, God sees we cannot stand our
present peace and prosperity, He will send His servant, Death, into our
families. He will take away our possessions. He will place us in
adversity. He will wither all our fair flowers and break all our idols
and dash in pieces everything that stands between our soul and Himself!
Oh, that we were wise, and would hear His gentle voice! "Be not as the
horse, or as the mule, which have no understanding: whose mouth must be
held in with bit and bridle," but hear what the Lord says to you from
the watchtower of His ministry and from the witness box of His
Word–and then you shall escape the rod.
And perhaps, my Brothers and Sisters, the Beloved may speak to you
without the ministry and without the Word. If He shall do so, I pray
you to catch His Words. It may be, while you are sitting here, or when
you are walking home, or perhaps at the Lord's Table, where some of us
hope to meet, directly, you will hear Him whisper some kind, assuring
Word that shall sink your fears again. I have known what it is to
preach, sometimes, on a Sunday, and I have felt like a butcher who
stands in his shop cutting out joints of meat for others–they are fed,
but he, himself, has nothing. Or as a cook who prepares and sends up
dinners, but cannot so much as get a taste, himself. Then I have gone
downstairs to the Lord's Table with a dull heart and, perhaps, in a
second, as though a strange miracle has been worked, my soul has been
as full of devout joy and holy mirth as ever spirit was out of Heaven!
And if you ask me how that has been caused, I would say it has been
caused by some kindly look of my Beloved, some loving glance of His
eyes, or some sweet Word from His mouth–and my soul has rejoiced with
unspeakable joy! Why should it not be so with you tonight? That is the
best thing to waken you up! If your heart is dull and heavy, as soon as
your Beloved speaks, you will at once awake to spirit and to life!
My time has gone but I want to say this to you. I am sometimes, no, I
am often haunted with the fear lest we, as a Church, should fall
asleep. Oh, how greatly has the Lord blessed us these many years! And
what favor seems to rest upon every agency! The preaching of the Word
has been very successful, but still it is open to the conversion of
many. In our classes how is God honored! Ah, you little know, some of
you, what others of us see–and even we do not see one-tenth of what
God is doing in the class conducted by one of our sisters here. And our
Sunday schools may very well be a delight, for the Lord is working a
great work in them! But I am always jealous over you, lest you should
slumber. How easy it is to fall asleep! I often fear that my voice,
which was once like a trumpet to you, will become like sleep music–
that you will become so accustomed to it, and I, perhaps, shall become
so dull and heavy, that the life of God will almost die out among us.
My soul weeps and cries to God over this matter! My Master knows that I
would cheerfully resign, that another voice might speak to you, if that
would keep alive your zeal and enthusiasm. If it is, however, not my
fault, even a changed ministry would not suffice. When Churches grow to
a great size, people think they must always continue so,
and that God will always bless them as He has done. Why, Sirs, as our
first blessings came in answer to prayers–all future blessings must
come in the same way!
I remember well, when we used to meet together in Park Street to have
holy communion with the Lord, how we used to wrestle with Him in
prayer, so much so that I have scarcely been able to pronounce the
benediction, much less give any address, because we all seemed to be
carried away in the mighty majesty of wrestling prayer! We have now,
sometimes, very choice seasons, but I am afraid not altogether such as
we once had. At any rate, if there is any falling off, I thank God
there is very little, indeed. It is scarcely perceptible as yet, but
how soon may there be, unless we watch and are jealous with a holy
jealousy? Let us work with Christian earnestness in prayer. O you who
have done little for Christ of late, I pray you, do more for Him! You
who think your time of service is over and that you may retire like
pensioners, and no more fight, I want you to enlist again! Put on the
colors once more as if you were but raw recruits! You who once could
defy persecution and stand up in the street to preach Christ and laugh
at all your fears, gather up your courage once again! Oh, that you
would wake up, as a Church, and put on your beautiful array of past
times when you were despised and persecuted–and the minister's name
was a byword and a proverb, and you, yourselves, because you were
linked with him, were thought to be fools and the off-scouring of all
things! But now I tremble lest we should grow respectable and great,
and lest men should think we are respectable and depart from us. My
soul begs and beseeches you to renew your prayers for me, that I may
preach with greater vigor. What if my ministry should become as dull
and stupid as the ministry of one-half of my Brothers–what if it
should become as useless and as unprofitable as the ministry of nine
out of ten who occupy the pulpit? I had sooner die than live to be such
a being as many who stand up in the pulpit wholly to waste people's
time and not to win souls! My spirit pants to have the consuming zeal
of Baxter and the earnest, passionate enthusiasm of Whitefield–but I
cannot get it except through your prayers! Or getting it, it cannot be
maintained without your vehement cries and entreaties before the Lord!
Perhaps we, as a Church, have been brought to our present state for a
great purpose which has never dawned upon us. We have already done
something for God–we are filling the pulpits of our village churches
with men sound in the faith and earnest for God. We are erecting a
great barrier against the everyday increasing encroachment of heresy
and infidelity–but we need to do something more and something looms
upon us in the future–I scarcely know what– some high and holy
purpose which this Church has been brought up to this point to
accomplish. Shall we draw back? Men of Ephraim, will you draw back in
the day of battle? Will you be condemned for not coming to the help of
the Lord against the mighty? Shall the angel pronounce over you the
sentence, "Ichabod, for the Glory of the Lord has departed from you
because of your declining to continue earnest in zeal"? If it is so to
any extent, let us return unto the Lord! Let us take to Christ words of
repentance and faith and let us beseech Him to make this Church again
His buckler and two-edged sword and to make His minister once more a
captain in the midst of the Lord's hosts, for the day of the Lord is
mighty and the battle of the Lord is terrible–and every man must take
his place and every soldier must draw his weapon from his thigh–for
the day of the Lord draws near and the battle of God is to be fought
now, even now! Let us arise, my Brothers and Sisters! Let us rush like
lions to the prey, like swift eagles to the chase! And God shall help
us, God shall help us, and that right early!
This Church cries tonight, "I sleep." But she can also say, "my heart
wakes." The heart of the Church is still awake! I think my voice to you
tonight is an echo of the voice of your Beloved. Sisters, Brothers,
bestir yourselves! Let us cry mightily unto God! Let us labor for the
winning of souls! Let us pant and pray for a great increase to our
membership and God will save sinners, in answer to our prayer, and His
name shall be glorified forever and ever! Amen.
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: EXODUS 12:1-27.
Verses 1, 2. And the Lord spoke unto Moses and Aaron in the land of
Egypt, saying, This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it
shall be the first month of the year to you. And for this reason that,
now, as a nation, they were to begin their separate history, separate
in existence from all the rest of mankind!
3, 4. Speak you unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the
tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb,
according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for a house: and if the
household is too little for the
lamb, let him and his neighbor next unto his house take it according to
the number of the souls; every man according to his eating shall make
your count for the lamb. The separation of the lamb was to take place
some four days before the time of its slaughter. Probably it was kept
in the house, according to the Jewish tradition it was so, and they
would hear it bleating and be reminded of the purpose for which it was
to be slain.
5. Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year: you
shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats. You know what a
type this is of Christ, "without blemish," offered up for us in the
very fullness of His strength, in the prime and glory of His Manhood,
giving Himself up to be our Paschal Lamb, "The Lamb of God."
6. And you shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month:
and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in
the evening. Just as the sun went down, or just before it set for the
evening. There is also the marginal reading "between the two evenings."
The evening before the sun set, was the first, and then the daylight
after the sun set was the second evening.
7. And they shall take of the blood, and strike it on the two side
posts and on the upper door post of the houses, wherein they shall eat
it. Not on the threshold, lest it should be trodden upon–and woe be
unto the man who shall trample upon the blood of Christ! On the two
side posts and on the lintel was placed the mark indicating that God
had redeemed the inmates of that house with blood.
8. 9. And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with fire, and
unleavened bread; and with bitter herbs they shall eat it Eat not of it
raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire; his head with
his legs, and with the innards thereof We are to have a whole Christ,
with His head of wisdom and His heart of love, the walk and
conversation of Christ, and all the inward secret life and Grace of
Christ to be ours.
10. And you shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; and that
which remains of it until the morning you shall burn with fire. Not a
bone was to be left for the Egyptians to treat with dishonor, but all
was to be consumed.
11, 12. And thus shall you eat it; with your loins girded, your shoes
on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it in
haste: it is the Lord's Passover For I willpass through the land
ofEgypt this night, and willsmite all the first-born in the land
ofEgypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods ofEgypt I will
execute judgment: I am the LORD. All those false gods had been smitten
in the different plagues and now, inasmuch as the Egyptians regarded
the first-born in the family with veneration, the last stroke was about
to be struck–and Pharaoh and all his subjects would stagger under the
tremendous blow.
13. And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where you
are. Oh that we would all look upon the blood of Jesus as a token–a
token of Divine Love in giving the Well-Beloved to die for us–a token
that Justice has had its due–a token that we are perfectly secure
forever!
13. And when I see the blood, I willpass over you. It is God's view of
the blood of Christ, which is the all-important matter! When He looks
at Christ upon the Cross and is satisfied with the Atonement that He
there offered, the Lord passes over all those for whom Christ died as a
Substitute.
13-15. And the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I
smite the land ofEgypt And this day shall be unto you for a memorial,
and you shall keep it a feast to the Lord throughout your generations;
you shall keep it a feast by an ordinance forever Seven days shall you
eat unleavened bread; even the first day you shall put away leaven out
of your houses: for whoever eats leavened bread from the first day
until the seventh day, that soul shall be cut off from Israel.
Therefore he was no partaker in the redemption purchased by blood. He
who is not purged from hypocrisy may say what he likes, but the blood
will not save him unless he repents–there must be the putting away of
this leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy, or else even the
blood of Atonement will not avail.
16. And in the first day there shall be an holy convocation, and in the
seventh day there shall be an holy convocation to you, no manner of
work shall be done in them, save that which every man must eat, that
only may be done of you. What rest this brought into the houses of the
Israelites! There was not only deliverance from the plagues, but there
was also rest from all manner of work. Herein is the blessedness of the
blood of the Lamb–when it comes to the home and the heart of the
Believer, it gives him rest of soul while others are toiling in vain to
get relief by their own works!
17-25. And you shall observe the feast of unleavened bread, for in this
selfsame day have I brought your armies out of the land ofEgypt:
therefore shall you observe the day in your generation, by an ordinance
forever In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at
evening, you shall eat unleavened bread, until the twenty-first day of
the month at evening. Seven days shall there be no leaven found in your
houses: for whoever eats that which is leavened, even that soul shall
be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he is a stranger,
or born in the land. You shall eat nothing leavened; in all your
habitations shall you eat unleavened bread. Then Moses called for all
the elders of Israel, and said unto them, Draw out and take you a lamb
according to your families, and kill the Passover And you shall take a
bunch of hyssop, and dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and
strike the lintel and the two side posts with the blood that is in the
basin, and none of you shall go out at the door of his house until the
morning. For the LORD willpass through to smite the Egyptians and when
He sees the blood upon the lintel, and on the two side posts, the LORD
willpass over the door, and will not suffer the Destroyer to come in
unto your houses to smite you. And you shall observe this thing for an
ordinance to you and to your sons forever And it shall come to pass,
when you come to the land which the LORD will give you. According as He
has promised, that you shall keep this service. What? Were they never
to forget the slaying of the lamb and the sprinkling of the blood? No,
never! Not when they came to Canaan, to the land that flowed with milk
and honey, and when God had worked other great marvels for them? No,
never! And the highest honor that we shall ever have will be this, to
be able truthfully to sing–
"A monument of Grace,
A sinner saved by blood."
26, 27. And it shall come to pass, when your children shall say unto
you, What mean you by this service? That you shall say, It is the
sacrifice of the LORD'S Passover, who passed over the houses of the
children of Israel in Egypt, when He smote the Egyptians, and delivered
our houses. And the people bowed the head and worshipped.