Suggested by the loss of the "Princess Alice,"
Delivered on Lord's-Day Morning, September 8th, 1878, by
C.H. SPURGEON,
At the [1]Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington
"He sent from above, he took me, he drew me out of many waters."Psalm
18:16.
I DO not know how you feel, my brethren, at this time, but as for
myself, a heavy cloud seems to hang over me all the day. The
overwhelming calamity of last Tuesday, so crushing and so far reaching,
of which we must have spoken to each other, I suppose, every hour
during the past week, cannot be removed from the thoughts of our minds
or from the affections of our hearts. The whole of London may well be
likened to that ancient city of which we read"The city Shushan was
perplexed." Every man has been asking his fellow, "Have you lost a
friend?" and no man wonders when the answer is, "Alas, I have been
sorely bereaved." In our own immediate circle we have borne a special
share of the grief, for five, at least, of those who are in church
membership with us have been removed from our midst, and we can
scarcely speak with any of our brethren without discovering that they
have lost some connection or friend. Alas, that unhappy vessel has sunk
with a more precious freight than ever loaded Spanish galleon, and her
wreck has brought a greater loss to our city than if she had carried
untold gold. We cannot help thinking of this dire affliction, and,
therefore, we had better think of it with some practical purpose.
I believe that this sudden grief comes, like every other event, from
God, and comes as a voice from God to this our citya voice which, we
trust, will be heard and regarded. "The Lord's voice crieth unto the
city, and the man of wisdom shall see thy name: hear ye the rod, and
who hath appointed it." We are of the mind of that old prophet who
said, "Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?"
(Amos 3:6.) Cometh there anything in the form of calamity upon the sons
of men without the permission, control, and overruling of the Lord?
Assuredly not. "The Lord killeth and maketh alive: he bringeth down to
the grave, and bringeth up." I know that many minds are so stunned by
this tremendous blow, that they can hardly think of God in connection
with it, and half wish to believe that the Omnipresent was not there.
The problem staggers their reason, and they are unable to leave it
among the mysteries of faith. As yet they have not gained the
confidence of Job, who denied that affliction cometh out of the dust,
but attributed it to the Lord, saying, "He taketh away: who can hinder
him?" Even some who love the Lord, and trust him, are somewhat of the
mind of Mary and Martha when they said, "Lord, if thou hadst been here,
my brother had not died"; while others who should know better would
timidly conceal their belief in an overruling providence, lest the
ribald world should scoff at them. Let them scoff, I say; for our God
is none the less glorious because his ways are far above and out of our
sight. It is an atheistical thought which would put God out of any
place; if he be not everywhere, he is nowhere; omnipresence is an
essential of Godhead. If his hand ruleth not over evil it is not
omnipotent, and thus again it lacks another essential attribute of
deity. It would be dreadful to suppose him to have a limited dominion:
"His kingdom ruleth over all."
We are not as those who believe in two co-existent forces, each
supreme, one of whom shall create disasters, and the other shall
distribute blessings. The prince of evil is, according to our faith,
subordinate to the great Lord of all. Thus saith Jehovah, by the mouth
of his servant Isaiah, "I form the light, and create darkness: I make
peace, and I create evil: I the Lord do all these things." He reigneth
in the calm summer's day, and gives us the precious fruits of harvest,
but he is equally present and regnant in the hurricane which destroys,
or the blight which desolates. His providence speeds the ship to its
desired haven, but it is equally his providence which sinks the barque
and its mariners to the bottom of the sea. It is his power which looses
the bands of Orion and binds the sweet influence of the Pleiades; his
are the lightnings as well as the sunbeams, the thunderbolts as well as
the raindrops. He is able to make the heaven as iron and the earth as
brass, so that our land shall not yield her increase; he can call for a
famine and break the whole staff of bread; for famine, pestilence, and
war are as rods in his hand. Everywhere is God, and in all things his
hand is present: in the things which seem to us to be evil as well as
in the events which appear to us to be good, God is at work. He doeth
no wrong, for God is not tempted of evil, neither tempteth he any man,
but we speak of physical evil, which causeth sorrow, pain, and death
among men, and we say that certainly God is there. If not a sparrow
falleth to the ground without our Father, we are sure that no great
calamity can befall us apart from him. He is not far from us in our
deepest sorrow, and however we may trace a calamity to the carelessness
or the mistake of men, these are but the second causes, and we see
behind all mere detail the permit of the Lord. If it were not so,
mourners would be deprived of the greatest reason for submission, and
the surest source of consolation.
Even where a terrible event is the result of crime God is not excluded.
He shares not the guilt, but he overrules the act. Think of the
crucifixion of our Lord, and remember that though the sin of it lay
heavy upon those who perpetrated it, yet the grand design of it was
God's. Read Peter's words in the Acts: "Him, being delivered by the
determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by
wicked hands have crucified and slain." Who shall deny that God was at
Calvary, though sin there reached its culminating point?
We freely admit that we do not understand this, and therefore we do not
attempt to explain it; but we believe and adore. Happily, we need not
attempt to justify the ways of God to man, for he asks no defense at
our hands, and deigns not to give any account of his matters: this only
is our resolve, "Though he slay me yet will I trust in him."
Now, the question which has very naturally suggested itself to many is
this,If there be a providence, why does it permit these terrible
evils? It is dreadful that human life should be lost on such a scale:
God is omnipotent, nobody doubts that; why, then, does he not interfere
to save? That shall suggest to us the first point of our discourse this
morning, that miraculous interpositions in the affairs of this life are
not to be expected, and we may not hope literally to use the words of
our text and say," He sent from above, he took me, he drew me out of
many waters." Still, secondly, we shall note that, according to our
text, providential interpositions of another kind are vouchsafed; and
thirdly, and best of all, gracious interpositions are given for the
salvation of men. What though the Lord doth not nowadays send from
above, and take his servants, and draw them by miracle out of the
waters of the river, yet doth he uplift us from the depths of trouble,
and especially doth he upbear us from the deeps of sin to our eternal
salvation, for thus saith the Lord, "I will bring again from Bashan, I
will bring my people from the depths of the sea."
I. First, then, MIRACULOUS INTERPOSITIONS IN THE CALAMITIES OF THIS
LIFE ARE NOT TO BE EXPECTED. I am not standing here as an advocate for
God to defend his character because he does not thus interpose, for to
objecters his sole answer is, "Nay, but O man, who art thou that
repliest against God?" If you will accuse your Maker he will not care
to answer you. You who have forged the accusation may fashion an
answer, if it seem good unto you. Yet there is a difficulty which none
can deny, and that difficulty lies in a fact. Why is there any evil at
all, seeing that the good God is almighty, and sits upon the throne?
This is the old puzzle which none can answer. The negro put it in a
very natural form when he asked the missionary, if God be so much
stronger than the devil, why does he not kill the devil and make an end
of his mischief? Just so: that is the top and bottom of the matter.
There is the question, but who can answer it? A fool may raise in an
hour more objections than the wisest man could remove in a century.
Now, the cleverest theory will not alter facts. What you and I may
think is a very small matter compared with what really is, and it is
quite certain that there is moral evil in the world, and that there is
also a God; that there is physical evil in the world, and yet love is
supreme; and that the Almighty permits fire and water to destroy his
creatures, and does not interpose to rescue them, and yet he is full of
tenderness and pity. There be some of course who will dare to condemn
their Maker, and call him by I know not what horrible names. I have
even heard such a word as "monster" hissed from between proud lips.
Again I say it is not worth our while to answer such objectors, because
such persons are not pervious to explanation, nor willing to receive
it; and then again, it is a small matter to the Most High what such
persons may think of him. He doeth as he pleases and asks no leave from
his creatures.
But now just for a minute let us consider the question which we trust
is modestly proposed. Suppose that every time a great danger threatened
we might expect a miraculous interposition from heaven, what then? The
supposition is not absurd, for there might be such an interposition: we
must admit the possibility since God is almighty. The train is
thundering along the iron way, it will dash into another, and many
lives will be destroyed, but if the Lord willed it he could put his
hand upon the engine and stay it in its full career. The vessel
freighted with eight hundred lives is about to sink: but if the Lord
willed it he could buoy it up in the hollow of his hand. Yet he does
not move; the iron road is strewn with the dead, the river is gorged
with corpses. We do not know all the reasons for this non-interference,
but yet we think we can see a little, which little we will think upon.
For, first, such interpositions would change the whole arrangement of
the world: it would not be the same place at all. The Lord has made
this world, and he governs it by certain fixed laws. If those laws were
variable, and were continually being altered, it would be another form
of creation altogether, and man had need to be another creature. His
physical, moral, and even spiritual condition would be changed from top
to bottom. It was the Lord's arrangement that he should put forth his
power in certain ways which we call the laws of nature, and by that
arrangement he abides. There is no such independent force as "nature,"
as some are always dreaming; nor is there any energy in mere laws of
nature apart from God's own power. You may write all the laws you like,
but there is no power in laws, there must be a power in the king to
carry out the laws. All power emanates from God, be it what it may; he
is the source and fountain of all the forces which operate throughout
creation; but he has been pleased from the beginning to determine that
his power shall usually go forth in certain ways, and under fixed laws
and regulations. He can suspend those laws when he pleases; he can
quench the violence of fire, stop the mouths of lions, and make water
to stand upright as a heap; but he has not often done so, and in these
days he never does so. I think we can in a measure see why; for if such
were the case continually, the whole plan and purpose with which he
made the present world would have been abandoned, and another mode of
power would have taken its place.
Recollect, too, that whatever the plan of God is, it is now being
carried out under the shadow of the Fall. There had been, I suppose,
neither pain, nor sickness, nor sighing, nor death, had there been no
sin. If had been possible for a race to have multiplied from the glades
of Eden, and to have gone forth into a wider Paradise as pure and holy
as Adam first came from his Maker's hands, I can believe that there
would have been no famine, no war, no catastrophe of shipwreck by sea,
nor of accident by land; but however multitudinous the human race might
have become its records would have been all unstained with agonizing
details such as those which blacken the broad-sheets of to-day. But,
alas, man has fallen, and to a race in such a condition it would not be
consistent that everything should be of sunlight and summer; there must
now be heard the roar of the storm and the cry of death, as the fruit
of sin. Render calamity impossible and what mark would there be of the
divine displeasure for man's revolt? Wherein indeed would sin differ as
to its consequences from obedience and holiness? Think for a little,
and you will see reason for God's staying his hand from rescue.
Furthermore, if interpositions were given to save the lives of godly
men alone, as some would have it, then this world would became the
place of judgment, which it is not intended to be. It still remains
among many persons as a superstition that if there is an accident, and
people suffer, there must have been some special sin in the victims of
the disaster; and yet our Lord has told us that the men upon whom the
tower of Siloam fell were not sinners above others, and the Galileans
who were slain by Pilate were not sinners above other Galileans. I pray
you dismiss from your minds the idea that a sudden death is necessarily
a judgment. Never draw any inference from the destruction of a
building, or the wreck of a ship, or an explosion, or aught of that
nature, as to the character of the persons who perish, for if you do
you will be guilty of cruel injustice. What if some gracious man be
spared, ascribe the deliverance to providence, but do not suppose that
those who perished were less gracious than he. You shall find that men
of bad character sometimes escape where saints are left to die. Because
I said the other day that providence had saved a certain godly woman,
foolish persons drew the inference that I condemned those who perished.
No sentiment could have been further from my mind. I ascribe to
providence death as well as life, and draw no inference as to the
character of the person. What if a man has found a watery grave in the
Princess Alice, do not therefore imagine that God was angry with him,
for he may now be in Paradise, and at any rate the same wreck carried
down with it many of the Lord's beloved. Now, if God were to interpose
and save his own people whenever they were in danger, this world would
become the place of judicial separation, which it is not and is not
meant to be: judgment is reserved for the world to come. When Christ
shall descend from heaven with a shout, and sit upon his great white
thronethen will he separate the tares from the wheat, but now they are
to grow together. Then will he put the goats on the left and the sheep
on the right, but for the time present they feed in the same pastures.
One event happeneth to them all; as it happeneth to the fool so
happeneth it to the wise. This is not the land of judgment, but of
longsuffering; not the place wherein God giveth sentence, but waiteth
patiently awhile. There is a judgment of nations in this world, but
that of individuals, with rare exceptions, is reserved for the final
account.
Beloved, note once again that if God were to interpose in the case of
all calamities it would involve many evils. For, observe, if next year
the mass of farmers should refuse to sow the fields, if over whole
nations the land should be left to produce only weeds, there would be
great scarcity of corn. Suppose that in such cases God should interpose
and cause harvests suddenly to grow by miracle, that our teeming
millions might escape starvation, what would be the consequence? Why,
it would encourage idleness everywhere; men would say, "The Lord is too
good to let us starve, and therefore we may allow the plough to rust,
and dance away the hours." Would that be well? Suppose again that when
a contagious disease comes into a district the Lord miraculously
prevented it from being fatal, although the carelessness of men may
have left feverlairs in rotting, overcrowded houses enough to pollute
the very air. Suppose, I say, that we all neglected sanitary laws, and
then knew that a merciful God would not let the poor people die of
fever, or of cholera, then the filthiness of our cities would increase
till they became huge dunghills, and man who is great enough now at
polluting rivers and defiling God's earth in every imaginable way,
would go on to turn the whole earth into one monstrous globe of
rottenness. But now even pests and plagues and fevers have their good
side, they are watchmen to sound an alarm, prophets to give us warning.
They arouse man to discover the laws of his being, and thus they
benefit the race. Suppose again that whenever there is a likelihood of
there being an accident God were to send an angel at once to interpose,
and avert the collision or the wreck, what would happen? Why then, of
course, every railway and steamboat company might go in for accidents
in any quantity, seeing they would be harmless, and might even become
attractive. There would be no reason for keeping a watch at the ship's
bow, and no necessity for breaks or signals. There would be no longer
any need to be careful about human life, but we might each one be as
reckless as he pleased, and gratify himself with experiments which
could not end fatally. Such a state of things would destroy many of the
virtues, and render many vices harmless. I cannot suppose a world
regulated upon such a system; I can imagine God divinely interposing
and suspending his own laws now and then, as pleaseth him, for some
great purpose of instruction; but it appears wise and good for all
concerned that, having made man what he is, the Creator should rather
leave him to take the consequence of violating the fixed laws of matter
than make those laws variable and uncertain.
Again, dear friends, divine interpositions of a miraculous sort would
not be attended with the advantage to the ungodly which we might
suppose, because if there were miracles of mercy on the behalf of God's
people to snatch them from a watery grave, or from the devouring
element of fire, or from the deadly consequences of a collision, then
we might expect to have, and naturally should have, miracles of
judgment, too. If you get into the wilderness, and manna falls from
heaven, and water leaps from the rock, remember you have also entered a
land where the earth opens to swallow up Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, and
where the very sand breeds fiery serpents to sting to death the rebels
against God. You cannot have the mercywonder interposing without
having the judgmentwonder side by side with it: and on the whole it is
a more lenient mode of dealing on God's part to let sinners alone, and
to let one event happen to all men for a while, because the
longsuffering of God leadeth the sinner to repentance, and the sorrow
that falleth upon the child of God is blessed to him. If all accidental
deaths were punishments it would be a far more terrible state of things
than that which is now before us; and therefore the matter is best as
it is.
If we had wonders of miraculous deliverance often before us they would
not impress mankind as we imagine. If God were always suffering the
wicked to drown or burn, and always snatching the righteous from the
midst of every danger, men would not think much of it after all; they
might be slightly impressed at first, but by-and-by they would harden
their hearts. In Egypt there was light in the houses of the Israelites
when all was dark with the Egyptians, and God smote Egypt heavily while
he was blessing Israel; but this fact did not affect Pharaoh, for he
only hardened his heart the more. When in the wilderness the
Israelites, murmuring against God, saw some of their companions
swallowed up and destroyed, it very little affected them; for soon
after they began murmuring against Moses, and charged him with
destroying the people of God. All things considered, the arrangement is
best as it is, and the Lord knows it is so, and, therefore, continues
the method of letting physical law take its course, although
occasionally it may destroy hundreds of lives.
Neither would it be so great a gain to the godly, as some imagine,
always to have their lives spared in times of danger. We have to die
some day, brothers and sisters, and we have nothing here below which
might make us anxious to postpone the hour of our departure. It is as
well to die one way as another: at least, there is small choice in the
modes of death. If one were asked by what death he should glorify God,
he might be long in the choosing, and probably would then choose that
which would be most painful. Some are afraid to go to sea lest they
should be drowned, and yet there is little reason for the fear. When a
captain was asked whether he was not afraid to go to sea he said, "Not
at all." "But your father was drowned, captain?" "Yes." "Your
grandfather was drowned?" "Yes." "Your brothers have been drowned?"
"Yes." "Are you not afraid to go to sea?" "No," said he, "not at all;
for I may ask you the same question. Your father is dead?" "Yes."
"Where did he die?" "In his bed." "And his father, where did he die?"
"In his bed." "And his father?" "In his bed." "And your brothers, where
have they died?" "In their beds." "Are you not, then, afraid to go to
bed?" Certainly we must die somewhere or other, and we shall not die
one single minute before the ordained period. I am a sufficient
believer in predestination to feel sure that every bullet has its
billet, and that no death can befall the man whom God ordains to live,
God hath appointed all things, and his people are safe everywhere,
whether they live or die. "Surely there is no enchantment against
Jacob, nor divination against Israel;" the powers of darkness cannot
harm us though they put forth all their craft and power. The Lord has
declared that he who hath made God his refuge shall abide beneath his
shadow, and therefore we may go where duty calls us without trembling,
and we may die when God bids our spirit return without the slightest
fear. We ask no immunity from death. Why should we be absolved from it?
It is better to die than to live full often, inasmuch as it is better
to be in heaven than to remain in banishment below. So there I leave
that matter of the non-interposition of God to think very briefly of
interpositions which do occur.
II. PROVIDENTIAL INTERPOSITIONS ARE FREQUENT AMONG GOD'S PEOPLE: they
can often say, "He sent from above, he took me, he drew me out of many
waters." Divine interpositions come in the way of deliverance from
floods of trouble. Have you not experienced them? How strikingly has
God delivered some of us! What remarkable preservations of life have we
enjoyed; not miraculous, certainly, but full of wonder for all that. We
have as much reason to praise God for our deliverances as if the laws
of nature had been suspended, for we have been quite as completely
preserved. What helps we have had in the hour of sorrow, when one after
another our beloved have been taken from us, or when they have gone to
the very edge of the grave, and yet have been spared to us. How often
have we been helped in business troubles and saved from impending
failure or serious loss! In times of slander, when our character has
been belied, how graciously has God brought to light our innocence! I
say again, not by miracle, but yet very marvellously has our God
delivered us. In answer to prayer God worketh in his own way for the
good of his people without stopping one single wheel of providence:
without violating one single law of nature, God is able to work the
same end as we sometimes wish he would work by a miracle. He will not
quench the violence of the flame, but yet a precious life shall be
snatched from a burning house. He will not prevent the water from
drowning, and yet in how many cases in answer to prayer have vessels
been saved and the lives of men preserved by unexpected incidents! He
will not stop the ordinary run of business, nor alter the way in which
the world goes on, and yet he knows how to help the poor, and to bless
the struggling tradesman, and to bring up the righteous from deep
distress. A miracle is a rough procedure after all, if I may dare say
so, compared with the Lord's present methods. The grandest achievement
of all is for the Lord God to work miraculous results without miracles,
to produce by common means, in answer to the cry of his servants, that
which appears to be impossible without a suspension of natural laws.
See how the Lord allows all the forces of nature to drive on in their
ordinary course, and yet the outcome of it all is that his servant is
delivered and his prayers answered.
God doth this by very varied ways. We have known some who have been
brought out of deep waters by having health suddenly restored to them,
or by having the health of those upon whom their maintenance depended
renewed. This is God's mercy, and let him be praised for it. Sometimes
circumstances have greatly changed; a man has been going down hill for
years as to his business, but something quite unexpected has happened,
and he has just as gradually risen to a position of comfort. My
friends, believe in the unexpected. I was about to utter a paradox, and
say expect the unexpectable. Believe that God will do for you something
which you know nothing about. The Lord always has a plan in reserve.
You think he has reached his last, and you will be left to perish; but
it is not so. At the right moment he will bring forth some new and
surprising stroke of wisdom, which he did but postpone to the
particular moment, so that when he performs it, and draws his servant
out of deep waters, the praise and the glory will the more fully
redound to his name. We have known the Lord save his servants in the
hour of trouble by touching the hearts of their enemies; those that
were most unkind and cruel have suddenly become the most generous and
thoughtful. At other times enemies have died or have been put to
confusion, like the wicked Haman when he plotted the destruction of the
Jews. The Lord has hanged up Haman that his chosen might be delivered.
Mordecai has gone from the king's gate to the king's house, and Haman
has ascended from the king's table to the king's gallows. I cannot
instance all the ways in which the Lord makes clear the pathway of his
people, but this I know that often in our lives some of us have had to
pause and sing, "He sent from above, he took me, he drew me out of many
waters."
Some will not see the hand of God, but I warrant you, brethren, those
who have been delivered out of the deep waters will see it. Their
experience teaches them that God is yet among us. Others may talk about
"laws of nature," as if God were gone to sleep and had left the world
wound up like a watch to go without him; but those who have been in
sore affliction and tribulation, and have been brought out therefrom,
will for ever bless and extol him who is a very present help in
trouble. Yes, my brethren, the way by which we have come hitherto is as
full of God as this city is full of men. There are deserts which the
foot of man hath never trodden, but there is no wilderness where the
foot of God hath not been. What say you, my beloved friends, you are
not fanatics, neither has the enthusiasm of devotion carried you out of
your minds; but are you not conscious of distinct providential
deliverances? "Conscious of them," say you, "indeed, if we did not
speak of them with joy and thankfulness, the very stones of the street
would cry out against us for our wicked silence. Many and many a time
hath he sent from above, and rescued us. We are, like Moses, drawn out
of the waters, and like him we would be servants of the Lord."
III. Now, thirdly, INTERPOSITIONS IN MATTERS OF GRACE ARE THE CHIEF OF
ALL. As best I can I should like to conclude with a few words upon this
subject. God does not, even to save the souls of his chosen, violate
any of his laws. "The soul that sinneth, it shall die." "Every
transgression shall have its just punishment and reward." Yet the Lord
would save his people. How should he make these two things agree,how
should he be just and yet the justifier of the ungodly? It is in the
person of our blessed Lord Jesus Christ that we see how one law has
been made to counteract and yet to honor another, to remove its direful
consequence and yet to make it honorable. You recollect that the law of
the Medes and Persians could not be altered; and there was a law made
by Ahasuerus that on a certain day the people of all countries might
gather themselves together and kill the Jews. Haman had promulgated
this royal edict far and wide, and the king could not alter it. Mark
the wise method by which the cruel law was met; they made another law,
which wasthat the Jews might defend themselves, might slay those who
tried to kill them, and take all their property for a spoil. This met
the case, though no edict was revoked. Now, God does not and never will
alter his law that sin must be punished; but forth comes another law
that, inasmuch as the first sin was committed by a representative man,
a representative man should be permitted to come in and bear the
penalty which was consequent thereon. This has been done; no law has
been broken, and yet God's mercy has had free course.
Now let us think a minute or two upon this great salvation and how it
is described in the text. "He sent from above." Oh, blessed Lord, the
whole race of man was sinking in the old vessel of the covenant of
works which had been cut in pieces by the first sin; they were all
going down en masse to destruction. Then thou didst send from above.
But who was he that was sent? Not the brightest of the cherubim nor the
chief of the angelic band, but HE came, the messenger of the covenant,
whom we delight in, the Son of God, the only begotten of the Most High,
the brightness of his Father's glory. He was the Messiah, the sent one,
and he descended from above that he might work out our redemption.
Brethren, let your hearts leap for joy as you behold the messenger of
the covenant of grace, even Jesus Christ, the adorable and ever blessed
Son of the Highest.
Now, note the next word, "He took me." When we had lost all hold on God
then did this blessed messenger take hold on us. He accepted us as the
Father's gift to him, and accepted a charge as the great Shepherd of
the sheep, that he would keep and preserve those whom his Father gave
him, though they were ready to perish. Then what a hold he took on us.
He took not up angels, but he took up the seed of Abraham, by becoming
a man. Babe in Bethlehem, laborer at Nazareth, suffering man at
Gethsemane, thou hast taken indeed a hold on us, such as thou wouldst
not relax in life or death! "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among
us," and so being sent from above he took hold upon us.
Then what a wondrous drawing took place after that grip had once been
given, He drew us out of many waters, entering into them himself,
plunging into the rivers of grief and infirmity, and then into the
waters of the curse, being "made a curse for us": descending deep, as
it were, into the very depths of hell to bring up the Lord's jewels,
that they might be delivered from the pit. Oh, the matchless uplifting
which he gave to us when he drew us out of many waters by his own
suffering life and agonizing death. Fix your eyes, brethren, upon the
work of Jesus. See the human race all sinking. Behold how hopeless and
helpless it is; and see him descending, walking the waters, snatching
with his own right hand sinking men and women from the billows of
destruction, and landing them on the Rock of Ages, putting a new song
into their mouths. As you feel that you are partakers of this
deliverance, let each one of you say, "He sent from above, he took me,
he drew me out of many waters."
This was the great deed itself, but, just a minute, I ask you to
remember the application of it to your own experience. Do you recollect
when you felt everything sinking from beneath you? My own self-wreck
will help me to describe your experience. I had sailed on gallantly in
the good vessel of my own works, hearing music, and full of delight,
never dreaming of danger; but suddenly the law of God came along,
moving unswervingly in its terrible course, and it cut into the vessel
of my works, as though it had been vanity itself. Down it began to
sink, and I with it. I looked around for something I could lay hold
upon, but nothing availed. The priest was there and offered me his
inventions, but I knew him of old, and knew that he would sink as well
as I. What, then, could he do for me? Ceremonials were there, but I
knew that they prove bubbles to a man who trusts in them. Hopes of
salvation by self-mortification were there, and the like, but they
clearly could not bear the weight of such a sinner as I was. I sank, I
sank, nor had I will or wish to be saved, nor did I struggle for life;
yet Jesus came, whose will of grace precedes our will, whose purpose of
love outruns our desire for salvation. "He took me": well do I
recollect his grasp. He took me and made me more conscious of my danger
than I had been before. He took me, by his Holy Spirit, and I knew that
he had taken me, for I began to feel his grip tightening upon me. He
drew me gradually to look at him, to trust him, and to leave myself and
all my hopes entirely in his hand, then he drew me right out of the
many waters and made my heart to sing for joy. Do you not recollect the
time with yourself? As you look with wonder upon some friend who has
been rescued from the great calamity of this week, I want you to feel
that you may look with equal wonder upon yourself, for you have
experienced a greater rescue. You have been delivered from sinking into
the pit that hath no bottom, a sinking down in sin and into the lower
depths of corruption. He came from heaven, he took you, he drew you out
of many waters, therefore praise and bless his name! You were too
anxious to hope, and yet he taught you to hope in his mercy. You were
too despairing to struggle, but he made you exercise holy violence to
enter the kingdom. You were too weary and despondent to trust, but he
led you to faith. His divine Spirit wrought all your works in you, and
here you are sitting in this house of prayer this morning to say, "He
hath delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet
from falling."
Now, I should not wonder if since then you have been pretty nearly
shipwrecked as to your spiritual hopes, and have a second and a third
time been rescued. You have begun to grow somewhat cold, and you have
wandered from the Lord, and you have, therefore, dreaded the total
destruction of all true religion within your spirit. Then you have
cried out in fear "I have been a hypocrite, or a mere formalist, and
shall perish after all." But when you were ready to give all up under
the temptation of the powers of darkness the Lord has again restored
you. Has he not sent from above and taken you out of the deep yet
again? Yes, blessed be his name, he has sought you and led you back to
his ways. If I address a backslider who feels as if he were sinking
deeper and deeper, I would pray for him that he may yet know how Christ
can save a sinking Peter and bring a runaway Jonah to the shore again.
Last of all, we shall soon come into the many waters of death: sooner,
perhaps, than we think. To some the stream of death is very shallow. We
have known certain of the saints go over dry-shod, singing all the way.
They can hardly have been conscious of death, nor have known when they
were last on earth and when they were first in heaven. But there are
others who have to cross Jordan at a time when it overfloweth its
banks, and, like Christian in the "Pilgrim's Progress," they are up to
their necks in the stream, and need words of comfort. You remember how
one said, "Fear not, brother, I feel the bottom, and it is good." There
is a rocky bottom all the way across. No slippery sand nor sucking mud,
but sound rock from shore to shore, and however deep it is, it is never
so deep as to drown a believer's hope, nor destroy his soul. Yet I can
imagine the best of saints to be flooded with many troubles in their
last hoursphysical weakness, depression of spirit, temptations of
Satan, family difficulties, all increase the swellings of Jordan. Do
you know what will happen? He will send from above, he will take you,
and he will draw you out of many waters, and you shall rise to glory.
What a heaven of heavens above others will you feel when you go right
up from the depths to the heights! To leap right away from de profundis
to in excelsis, from the death-sweat and the expiring faintness to the
ecstasy and the ineffable glory, how transcendent the bliss! What an
exchange it will be, brethren, for those who have grown old and
decrepit, or for those who could scarcely say even a word to testify
their dying faith, to find themselves on a sudden rid of every ache and
pain, and all their withering flesh, and to be disembodied in perfect
liberty, charmed with the beatific vision of their Lord, from whom they
are never to part again. Why, methinks, we might almost choose the
death-road of the two. Some are very fond of expecting that their Lord
will surely come in time to prevent their dying. Ah, well, you may be
very thankful if it happens, but I do not think it is the way I shall
go, nor can I say that I envy you the prospect in which you delight. In
heaven you will come to us who die, and ask usWhat was it to fall
asleep in Jesus? What was the feeling of putting off the body? What was
the joy of being made like our Covenant Head in death? I do not say
that you will regret that you did not descend into the tomb, but of
this I am sure, none of us who shall sleep will think that you had any
preference over us.
"Where should the dying members rest,
But with their dying Head?"
If the Master went that way, descending into the sepulcher, and so up
by the hill of resurrection to the golden gate, we will not even envy
Enoch and Elias, though they were permitted to take the reserved route,
and enter the city by the postern gate. It shall be all well with us if
we are resting in Jesus, for at the last he will send from above and
take us, and draw us out of many waters. To his name be praises. Amen.
PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON Psalm 18:1-31.
HYMNS FROM "OUR OWN HYMN BOOK"18, 296, 428.