Blessings Traced to Their Source
(No. 3213)
A SERMON PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1910.
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.
"All my springs are in You." Psalm 87:7.
It does one good to think that there are such things in the world as
springs bubbling up in the shady nooks. Places of sweet refreshment in
this dusty earth. The mouth waters at the very thought of the palms of
Elim and the wells there. If even to us fresh springs are a blessing,
much more must they have been so to the Psalmist who lived in a dry and
thirsty land which owed almost all its fertility to irrigation. Nothing
is more precious to the Oriental than a well. And he who finds a spring
of water counts himself a much happier man than he who has found a vein
of precious metal. We must, therefore, transfer the thought of precious
water springing up copiously, bubbling up with living force, to our
spiritual condition–and then say with David, "All my springs are in
You." That is to say, we trace all the mercies we receive to their
fountainhead! The Psalmist was grateful for the blessings that were
conferred upon him. He did not receive them with selfish inattention
but, considering them well, he found that every good gift and every
perfect gift came from his God. He had learned that not only everything
good around him, but everything that was within him that was good came
from the same source! And discovering within himself a living power, a
living well of water within his own nature, he traced that, also, to
the Grace of God–and said, "All my springs are in You."
Did he not mean, first, "all the springs I drink of are in You"
Secondly, did he not mean, "All the springs within myself come from
You" I do not know that those two heads comprise even one-tenth of the
thoughts that might arise out of our text, but then we have not time to
take such a great text as this and consider it in full. We shall,
therefore, just take the two series of thoughts that will spring up
under those heads.
I. The first thought is, ALL THE SPRINGS I DRINK OF ARE IN YOU.
To begin, he may have remembered the deep which lies under In the
benediction upon Joseph, Moses said that he was to have the blessing of
the deep which couches beneath. Deep down in the earth are vast
reservoirs of water and when these are tapped, they spring up and we
are refreshed by them. These are symbolical of the mighty fountains of
Eternal Love, the electing Grace of God, the Infinite fullness of the
heart of God in His own Nature, for, "His nature and His name are
Love." When we get to the great fountains of the Infinite, Eternal,
Immutable Love of the Father towards His chosen people, then, indeed,
we come to the fountainhead of all the streams which make the people of
God glad! There is not a blessing we receive but it may be traced to
the eternal purpose of God! We may see, on every single benediction of
the Covenant, the stamp of the eternal purpose and decree–
"The streams of love I trace
Up to the Fountain, God.
And in His mighty breast I see
Eternal thoughts of love to me." Every Christian who is rightly taught,
who understands the Word of God and is not afraid of the fullness of
the Truth of God, will ascribe all the springs of Grace that he ever
drinks of, to the eternal Fountain. God said to Job, "Have you entered
into the springs of the sea? Or have you walked in the search of the
depth?" This is a mysterious subject and we cannot find these secret
springs, but yet we know that they are there. We rejoice in them and
bless the Lord for them!
But, using only illustrations from Scripture, when the Psalmist said,
"All my fresh springs are in You"–for that is the force of the
expression he uses–may he not have thought of that Rock from which the
living water leaped in the wil-derness,so that all the multitude that
were in the desert drank of the stream? Those who had true knowledge of
God also drank of that spiritual Rock which followed them and we know
that, "that Rock was Christ." That Rock, too, was
struck and, straightway it became a spring of water for all the tribes,
even as our smitten Savior has now become the Spring from which all of
us drink. So I may say–
"Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
You my sacred Fount shall be." We find, leaping from the cleft in His
side, the cleansing blood and the refreshing water, too. As I said at
first, that we may trace all our blessings to electinglove, I may now
say with equal truthfulness, that we may trace them all to
redeem-inglove. There is a crimson mark on every blessing of the
Covenant!–
"There's never a gift His hand bestows
But cost His heart a groan."
That is a most sure and precious Truth of God! As we look to our dear
Lord upon the Cross and see Him also exalted in His Glory, remembering
that "it pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell," and
that of His fullness have all we received, and Grace for Grace," we can
truly say to Him, "Emmanuel, all my springs are in You."
We meet, in Holy Scripture, with another illustration. In the times of
Abraham there were certain wells which he dug, the possession of which
were disputed by the Philistines. And when Isaac afterwards had to go
into Philistia, he found that the wells which Abraham had dug had been
filled up by the Philistines. He therefore dug others and when the
Philistines began to argue with his herdsmen, he moved on further and
dug another well–and the Philistines strove again for that. He moved
again, for he was a peaceful man, and found they strove for that–it
seemed as if he could have no water without having to contend for it.
Sometimes the wells of which we drink are springs concerning which
there is grave contention. There are some that deny the most precious
Doctrines of the Gospel. There is a sound of the shooting of archers at
the place of the drawing of water. And when a poor, simple child of God
would come and let down his bucket and take a draught, he finds the
bowman's shaft flying past his ears! Somebody has discovered that one
Doctrine is not Scriptural, and that another Doctrine is not rational,
so the thirsty soul becomes afraid to drink of that well! What is
worse, if there should not be any controversy about the Truth, itself,
he will find a controversy in his own soul as to his right to
appropriate it. Satan, the accuser of the brethren, will remind him of
his faults, will tell him he can have no part or lot in the matter, or
else he would not be what he is. They who are delivered from the noise
of the archers in the place, of drawing water shall, bless the name of
the Lord as they drink!
And truly, Brothers and Sisters, if we did but always remember that all
our mercies come from God–hat whatever logic may insist upon, it must
be true that salvation is of the Lord–that whichever ism may be right,
whichever side of controversy may have made an accurate statement, it
must be correct that every good gift comes from "the Father of lights,
with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning"–then we would
find that, let the enemy contest as he will, we have access to the
refreshing stream! Since all the springs worth drinking are in God our
Father and Christ our Redeemer, we can come to these and drink without
fear, for God is ours, Christ is ours and, therefore, every Covenant
blessing is ours, too! Therefore, laying aside all disputing and
contention, we come and drink of these wells because they are in God
and in Christ our Savior!
We read, in the Book of Judges, of two springs of water. You often
mention them in prayer. Indeed, they are a kind of proverb in the
Christian Church. There were the upper springs and the nether springs.
Now every child of God who judges rightly knows that the nether springs
are in his God. I mean his lower comforts, his temporal mercies. What
would we have of earthly good worth enjoying if God did not give it to
us? If you get wealth, who gives you power to get it? And if you have
health, who is it that preserves your strength of limb and the blood
that still leaps within your veins? He has but to will it and you would
be a paralytic, or a consumptive like so many others. Your children are
spared to you–bless God for each of them, for it is He that spares
them! Your husband or your wife, your brother or your sister, the joys
that cluster around the hearth–all these come to you through Him. They
are common mercies, we say, but we would not think them so common if we
had to miss them for a while! Let us bless God and see His hand in them
all, and say, "Great Father, even my nether springs are in You."
But when we come to the thought of the upper springs, we have no
question connecting them. If we possess eternal life, God gave it to
us. If we believe in Jesus, faith is not a flower that ever springs
from the natural soil of man's heart. If we have repentance unto life,
it is the work of the Spirit of God. If we have been kept until now,
faithful to our profession, we have nothing of which we can glory–we
would have gone back from it if God had not preserved us. We have not
had one single jot of anything from the first day until now, but we
have derived it from the Lord's Infinite Mercy! All our upper springs
are in Him–shall we not bless His name? And while we say, "Spring up,
O well," shall we not also
add, "Sing you unto it," and bless and magnify that perennial Fountain
of Mercy which perpetually flows to us? The old classical poets went to
Helicon for their inspiration–they drank of that spring upon Mount
Parnassus. But as for us, we will say, with that poetess of the
sanctuary–
"Come, You Fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Your Grace,
Streams of mercy, never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise." We have no Parnassus, but we have a
better Mountain–
"Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above!
Praise the Mount–oh, fix me on it,
Mount of God's unchanging love!" From this source will we derive the
inspiration of our muse. Here shall we find the burden of our song. The
upper and the nether springs come alike from God–yes, "All my springs
are in You."
You may read, if you turn to the 104th Psalm, of the springs that flow
into the valleys. They are the places for springs where the wild beasts
come to drink, and each of them does quench his thirst. And where the
birds sing among the branches. You and I have had our valley mercies.
We have been humiliated, perhaps, and we have sung with the shepherd's
boy in the Valley of Humiliation–
"He that is down needs fear no fall.
He that is low, no pride.
He that is humble, ever shall
Have God to be his Guide."
We have been in the Valley of Baca and made it a well–and the rain has
filled the pools. We have been in the Valley of Fellowship with Christ,
walking along the cool vale of communion with our Father who is in
Heaven–and behold, it has been a place of springs–of springs full of
water! There is not one joy in our best and happiest time but comes
from God. In our choicest moments, when we are most like our Lord and
most free from the encumbrances of the earth, never, even then, have we
anything good that is to be ascribed to ourselves! If it be good, it
all comes from God!
Then, we read in Isaiah, and in some other passages which I need not
quote, of the streams in the desert "In the wilderness shall waters
break out, and streams in the desert…I will open rivers in high
places." That is an odd place for rivers! "Rivers in high places, and
fountains in the midst of the valleys: I will make the wilderness a
pool of water, and the dry land springs of water." Do you, Beloved,
remember your dry-land springs? Can you not remember when you ate of
treasures hidden in the sand–when it was dark, and yet was never so
much light? When you were in the land of barrenness, and yet were never
so filled with plenty? When you had abounding troubles and yet never
had such super abounding comforts? Oh, let us bless the Lord that our
desert springs were in Him! They were in Him, or we would not have had
them! Had not the Lord been with us, we would have fallen and died in
the wilderness like those who came out of Egypt, whose carcasses
strewed the plain!
If you turn to the 4th Chapter of Deuteronomy, verse 49, you will read
about springs that some of God's saints drink of that are not often
mentioned–the springs of Pisgah. Moses there speaks of the springs
that came from the foot of Pis-gah. And believe me, they are cool
streams, indeed, and supply drink that goes down sweetly and makes the
lips of them that sleep to speak! He who knows what Heaven is and has,
by faith, viewed it–who has seen its security, its purity, its
nearness to God, its revelation of the face of Christ, its communion of
saints, its joy of the Lord–such an one has found the Pisgah springs
to be very precious and very soul-reviving! Oh, for a draught of them
now! I think some of us had such a draught at our last Prayer Meeting
when we talked together, and sang the hymn that ends–
"A scrip on my back, and a staff in my hand, I march on in haste
through an enemy's land. The road may be rough, but it cannot be long,
And I'll smooth it with hope, and cheer it with song." The prospect of
the coming Glory makes the Pisgah springs well up–and all of them are
in our God, for there is no true hope of Heaven without Him! There
would be banishment into eternal woe if it were not for His Infinite
Grace!
Thus I might continue to use the similes of Scripture, and show that
whatever sort of springs there may be, they all come from the great
deep of the Infinite Love of God and that all our springs are in Him.
II. But now we come to our second point, namely, that ALL THE SPRINGS
THAT ARE WITHIN US COME FROM THE SAME SOURCE.
You know that our Savior says, concerning the man who drinks of the
water that He gives, that it "shall be in him a well of water springing
up into everlasting life." A Christian is not a cistern that is filled
and emptied, but, by God's Grace, he becomes a living well! He is not a
puppet moved with strings. He is not a machine that is wound up and
goes by wheels mechanically worked–there is a living Power in him! He
is a new creature in Christ Jesus, instinct with the highest form of
life and that life possessed in the highest degree of freedom, for
while a man is naturally a free agent, yet he is in a far superior
sense a free agent when he becomes a converted soul! "If the Son shall
make you free, you shall be free indeed."
Our text, then, may mean this–that all the springs of our inner life
lie in God. "For you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in
God." "And you has He quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins."
Christ is your life. All the springs of life are in Him.
And hence, next, all the springs of our secret thought and of our
devotion are in Him. You cannot always think of God and worship God
alike. At least if you can, and it is real devotion, I greatly envy
you. I find that in my soul, there are times when I have the wings of
an eagle and can mount up and, with unblinking eyes, look into the
Infinite Glory and I can soar on and on in strange ecstasy and delight.
At another time, I cannot rise from the ground. The chariot wheels are
taken off, as in Pharaoh's case, so that we drag heavily. Then Dr.
Watts' words seem appropriate–
"Our souls can neither fly nor go, To reach eternal joys."
The preacher, too, is sometimes fertile enough and, at another time
barren. Truly, the Christian's experience is not unlike Pharaoh's
dreams. He has lean and fat cattle, withered ears, and ears rank and
good come up. This is doubtless to show him that when he has sacred
thoughts and devotion, they come from God. In order that he may see
that, he is sometimes left to prove his own emptiness. To show that the
strength of Sampson does not lie in muscle and sinew and bone, alone,
his hair is shorn and when he goes forth as before, he performs no feat
of strength–he is as weak as any other man. Yes, Beloved, if we have
any power of thought, or sweetness of devotion in drawing near to God,
all the springs lie in Him.
So is it, most certainly, with the springs of our emotions. Do you not
find yourselves sometimes sweetly melted down by the power of God's
Word? Could you not, at such times, sit and weep under the thought of
the death of Jesus and His unspeakable love to you? Sometimes do you
not feel stirred with sacred joy, so that you could burst out with an
impromptu hallelujah, or begin to sing a new song to the praise of His
great love wherewith He has loved you? At other times you think about
the same theme, but your heart feels no power–the same song is sung,
but though your lips join in it, your heart does not go with the
melody. You know it is so.
You cannot command your own spirit–the Lord must help you. The springs
of your emotions lie in His hands. If He leaves you, you are like the
Arctic sea, frost-bound. But when He comes and smiles upon you, all the
icebergs melt in a moment and your heart feels the warm Gulf Stream of
Eternal Love flowing right through it! Then there comes the time of the
blossoming of Spring and the singing of the birds–the whole heart is
alive unto the Most High! The springs of your emotions, as well as of
your sacred thought and devotion all lie in Him!
And I am sure it is so with regard to the springs of all true actions.
Christians are not all thought and all emotion– they are practical men
and women–and seek to work for God. But did any of us ever do a good
work in our own strength? We have done many works in our own strength,
but were they good for anything? The Savior shall decide that question.
"Without Me you can do nothing," He says. You can bring forth fruit
without Him, but your fruits are as the vines of Sodom and of the
fields of Gomorrah. Only that is right which comes from Him. When He
blesses us, our actions done for Him are accepted through Him.
Well, Beloved, it will always be so, that our springs of holy zeal, our
springs of joy, our springs of fellowship, our springs of every kind
that are worth the having, all lie in Him! And it will be good if the
whole Church recognizes that fact. We cannot get up a revival–it is a
great pity that we should ever try to do so–for such a revival, if we
seem to get it, will be very mischievous. But the Lord can send us a
true revival! All our springs are in Him. We must not depend upon
ministers and pray, "If So-and-So shall preach, good results will
follow." Our springs are not in these poor cisterns, they are in our
God! When will the Church try to look away from the creature to the
Creator? When will she purge herself of that hereditary fault of hewing
out for herself, broken cisterns, and forgetting the Fountain of
Livings Waters? I am persuaded, from my own experience, that the more I
live upon God, alone, the more I truly live and the less I know of
anything like power, or wisdom, or anything of the sort pertaining to
myself, the better! The more I decrease and He
increases, the more do I grow up in the Lord in all things. May we,
then, each one of us, adopt this sweet motto and always say, "All my
springs which are within me, as well as those of which I drink, are in
my God." I shall only keep you long enough to say three more things–
The first of which is, let us look to these springs. If you do not feel
up to the mark, if you are dull and heavy and have no springs in
yourself, remember that they never were there! "All my springs are in
You." Do you feel empty? Well, you only feel just as you are! You feel
as though there was death written upon you. Quite so, there is! Your
life is in Christ! Your fullness is in Christ! Your strength is in
Christ! Has it been reported to you that Christ has lost His power,
that His life has declined? If it were so, you would have great cause,
indeed, for weeping, but while He is the same, the well of water is the
same! I know, tonight that you are like Hagar–the water is spent in
the bottle. Well, it never was much of a bottle, and it leaks. Now you
think, "What shall I do? All my little store is gone." "What ails you,
Hagar?" There is a well near you. Open your eyes, for God sees you and
God provides for you! Christ is always the same.
"Oh, but I think I have forgotten Him," you say. Then remember Him.
"But I fear I am not one of His people." Well, if you are not a saint,
you are a sinner–and He came to save sinners. I always find the short
cut to Christ to be the best one. "Oh," says Satan, "you are no child
of God." "No," I say to him, "nor are you, either." "Ah," he says, "but
you have no true experience." "No," I reply, "I have not, nor have you,
either, but one thing I know–I am sinful and Christ has said that
washing in His blood by faith, I shall be made clean. If I cannot go to
Him as a saint, I will go even now as a sinner! Suppose I have been
mistaken in the past, I will begin again." Child of God, that is the
only way to end the controversy. Go and stand at the foot of the Cross,
again. Begin again, for all your springs are still there! Though you
cannot find any springs in yourself, they are still in God!
The next thought is this. If all my springs are in God, then let all my
streams flow to God. All the rivers run into the sea because they all
came from the sea. It was from the sea that the sun drew up the clouds
which fed the thousand rills which fall into the rivers–and so the
rivers run back to the sea. Let us do the same. What we have had from
God must go to God. Even in temporals we ought to do this. I remember a
story of Martin Luther's. When certain monks complained that the income
of the monastery had got very slack, he said, "Yes, and no wonder,
because once they used to entertain two strangers at the monastery, the
one named Date, the other named Dabitur. Give was the name of one. It
shall be given was the name of the other. Now," said Martin Luther,
"you turned out, Give, and very soon God took away It shall be given,
for they are brothers and they live together. If you would have Dabitur
back, you must also have Date. If you would have back, It shall be
given, you must also have back, Give."
When we are not serving God acceptably–consecrating everything to
God–we lose supplies from God. In temporals, I have known men give to
God by the shovelfuls–and God sent silent wagon loads by the back
door–they could not send back their substance as fast as He sent it
in! Jesus said, "Give, and it shall be given to you; good measure,
pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give
into your bosom"–and many have found it so. Your mean skinflints have
gone on flint-skinning until they died and have left hardly enough to
be buried with respectably. While others have scattered and yet
increased. If our springs are in Him even in temporal things, let the
streams run back to Him. Let us not rob God! And as to spiritual
things, let us give back to God the more He gives us–the faith He
gives us, the spiritual strength He gives us. Let us use for Him the
experience He has given us, the instruction He has given us. Let us
instruct and encourage others to His Glory with what we have received!
Let us lay out every talent and keep none buried in the earth. May the
Lord grant to each of us Divine Grace to always say to Him, "As all my
springs are in You, so all my streams shall be to You."
And, lastly, let us have a great deal of hope about other people,
because if all the streams are in God, I have not to consider, when I
go forth to do good to my fellow man, what is in them–I have to
consider what is in God! When I address a sinner and say, "Believe on
the Lord Jesus Christ," I do it because God tells me to do it–just as
I would have said to the dry bones, "Live"–and if I do it in God's
name, being perfectly sure they cannot believe of themselves, then I am
doing right, for I am exercising my own faith! It is an act of faith on
the preacher's part–and God will bless that act of faith–and many of
the dry bones will live, sinners will repent and will, by His Grace,
believe the Gospel!
We must not think that our hope lies in what is in the sinner. I heard
a man preach about the adaptation of the sinner to the Gospel and I
thought he was very foolish, for what is there in the sinner but
everything that is opposed to the Gospel, everything uncongenial,
everything that would put the Gospel to death if it could?
All the power of the Gospel lies in itself, not in the
sinner–salvation comes from God, and God alone. Therefore there is no
reason why I should not preach the Gospel with a hope of success in
Wandsworth Prison, or in the lowest slums in London! You may distribute
tracts and give warnings to the harlot and the thief with good hope of
success. In fact, there are often ridges in the lowest soils, like the
clearings of the backwoods in the West, which are not plowed and tilled
till the goodness has gone out, as it were–to them the Gospel comes as
a strange novelty. It was so in the Savior's day. The Pharisees, who
knew so much, rejected His Word, but the publicans and harlots entered
into the Kingdom of Heaven before them.
Therefore, there is nothing about the sinner to make us hesitate to
preach to him because if he is dead, God can lift him up. Yes, if he is
like Lazarus, dead and buried, the Voice of God can call him forth from
the tomb! Yes, if he were as nothing, God makes the things that are
not, to be mightier than the things that are! He can bless where all
was cursed. Out of the stones of the brook He can raise up children to
Abraham. Let us have great comfort, next Sunday, in going to preach, or
to teach in the Sunday school, or to engage in other forms of
usefulness. All the springs lie in God and if we are going to work in a
dry and thirsty land where there is no water, never mind! Our springs
are in God–our faith is in Him and, according to our faith, so shall
it be done to us. Amen.
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: PSALM34
Verse 1 I will bless the LORD at all times: His praise shall
continually be in my mouth. What a sweet resolve! Oh, that all of us
who know the Lord would make that resolve and keep it all our days–"I
will bless the Lord at all times." In dark times and bright times, as
long as I live. "His praise shall continually be in my mouth"–that is
the most delightful mouthful that a man can possibly have!
2. My soul shall make her boast in the LORD. We do not like boasters,
but we would encourage every child of God to boast in the Lord as much
as he pleases!
2. The humble shall hear thereof and be glad.There is nothing that
humble people dislike more than to hear others boasting–yet there is
nothing that they like more than to hear anyone boast in the Lord!
3. Omagnify the LORD with me. There is a sweet contagion about the
praise of God. We want others to help us to spread it everywhere, so we
say with David, "O magnify the Lord with me"–
3-4. Andlet us exalt His name together. Isought the LORD, andHe
heardme, and deliveredme from allmy fears. There is nothing that is so
effective as personal testimony to the Lord's saving power. How often
is the skill of a physician commended by the grateful testimony of the
patients who have been healed by him! So, shall not the prayer-hearing
God be commended by those of us who have had our prayers answered by
Him? Let us not be slow to say, "I sought the Lord and He heard me, and
delivered me from all my fears."
5. They looked unto Him and were lightened: and their faces were not
ashamec. [See Sermon #195, Volume 4–looking unto
JESUS.] "They looked unto Him"-a whole army of them, an
innumerable company–"They looked unto Him and were lightened: and
their faces were not ashamed." There never was a face that was ashamed
of being turned Christward and Godward!
6. This poor man cried, and the LORD heard him, and saved him out of
all his troubles. [See Sermon #2193, Volume 27–A
POOR MAN'S CRY–AND WHAT CAME OF IT.] Here David speaks of himself
again, but he refers to himself in the third person–"This poor man
cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles."
7. The angel of the LORD encamps round about them that fear Him, and
delivers them. The great Angel of the Covenant, the Lord Jesus Christ,
surrounds with His army the dwellings of the saints and takes care to
have them in safe keeping.
8-10. O taste and see that the LORD is good: blessed is the man that
trusts in Him. O fear the LORD, you His saints. For there is no need to
them that fear Him. The young lions do lack and suffer hunger: but they
that seek the LORD shall not want any good thing.[See Sermon #65,
Volume 2–LIONS LACKING BUT THE CHILDREN SATISFIED.] We are often in
need because we are not seeking the Lord, but are seeking what we think
we need, whereas, if we sought Him and left the supply of our needs to
Him, He would supply all our need according to His riches in Glory by
Christ Jesus. Christ's command is, "Seek you first the Kingdom of God
and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you."
Men think that they will not get what they want except they seek it,
but if they seek God, He will give them what they really need even if
He does not give them all that they want!
11. Come, you children, hearken unto me. This man of God has made his
confession to the saints and now he tells it to the children. There is
nothing like working on material that will last–and those who are now
children will, most of them, be alive when those who are now old men
are dead and gone. So David says, "Come you children, hearken unto
me"–
11-13. I will teach you the fear of the LORD. What man is he that
desires life, and loves many days; that he may see good? Keep your
tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking guile. There is life or
death in the human tongue! There is life in the tongue that is under
subjection to the will of God. There is death, there is mischief of all
sorts in a wild un-governed tongue!
14. Depart from evil, and do good. Get away from evil as far as you
can–that is the negative side. Do good–that is the positive side of
piety. He who obeys these two commands shall find happiness and
blessing.
14. Seekpeace, and pursue it Do not be of an angry, irritable,
quarrelsome frame of mind. If you do not at once find peace, seek it.
And if it runs away from you, pursue it until you overtake it. Remember
that it is the meek who shall inherit the earth–and that it is the
peaceful spirit that is the happiest spirit.
15. The eyes of the LORD are upon the righteous, and His ears are open
unto their cry. He gives them His eyes and His ears–and this means
that He gives them Himself and that He is always ready to perceive
their needs and to hear their cries.
16. The face of the LORD is against them that do evil. He sets His face
against them–and this means that He is, Himself, eternally opposed to
all their wicked ways.
16, 17. To cut off the remembrance of them from the earth. The
righteous cry, and the LORD hears and delivers them out of all their
troubles. Not only out of some of them, but out of allof them. It is
often a very long, "all." The list of their troubles is often difficult
to read through but in due time there comes a "finis," to it written by
the hand of Divine Mercy–"The Lord delivers them out of all their
troubles."
18. The LORD is near unto them that are of a broken heart; and saves
such as are of a contrite spirit Not your proud spirits, not your
hectoring ones, but your lowly, penitent souls are the ones that are
dear to the heart of God. He is near to them and saves them.
19, 20. Many are the afflictions of the righteous; but the LORD
delivers him out of them all. He keeps all his bones: not one of them
is broken.He will have many a flesh wound, but there shall be no
permanent injury to him. And even though his body were diseased, his
soul would be saved.
21, 22. Evil shall slay the wicked: and they that hate the righteous
shall be desolate. The LORD redeems the soul of His servants.Great as
the price is, He pays it! They are so precious to Him that He minds not
what price He pays so that He may redeem the souls of His servants.
22. And none of them that trust in Him shall be desolate. Blessed be
His holy name!