Four Contrasts
(No. 2548)
INTENDED FOR READING ON LORD'S-DAY, DECEMBER 19, 1897.
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON LORD'S-DAY EVENING,
SEPTEMBER. 28, 1884.
"But now thus says the Lord that created you, O Jacob, and He that
formed you, O Israel, fear not: for I have redeemed you, I have called
you by your name; you are Mine. When you pass through the waters, I
will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overflowyou:
when you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned; neither shall
the flame kindle upon you. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of
Israel, your Savior: I gave Egypt for your ransom, Ethiopia and Seba
for you. Since you were precious in My sight, you have been honorable,
and I have loved you: therefore will I give men for you, and people for
your life. Butyou have not called upon Me, O Jacob; butyou have been
weary of Me, O Israel. You have not brought Me the small cattle of your
burnt offerings; neither have you honored Me with your sacrifices. I
have not caused you to serve with an offering, nor wearied you with
incense. You have bought Me no sweet cane with money, neither have you
filled Me with the fat of your sacrifices: but you have made Me to
serve with your sins, you have wearied Me with your iniquities. I, even
I, am He that blots out your transgressions for My own sake, and will
not remember your sins." Isaiah 43:1-4;22-25.
Beloved Friends, there are many lights in which we can see sin. And our
perception of sin very much depends upon the light in which we look at
it. Sin is very terrible by the blaze of Sinai, when the mountain of
Law and terrors is altogether on a smoke. It is a dreadful thing to
look at sin when God speaks in thunder and all the earth trembles
before Him. It is an awful thing to see sin by the light of your dying
day. More terrible, still, will it be to see it by the light of the
Judgment Day. When Abraham rose up early in the morning and looked
towards Sodom, it was a lurid light that met his gaze as he saw the
guilty cities blazing and smoking up towards Heaven like a vast
furnace. To see sin in that light is a solemn thing. But of all the
lights that ever fall upon sin, that which makes it, "like itself
appear," is that which falls upon it when it is set in the light of
God's Countenance. To see sin by the light of God's Love, to read its
awful character by the light of the Cross–beholding Christ bleeding
and dying–is the way to see sin. Nothing makes us feel sin to be so
vile and guilty a thing as when we realize that it was perpetrated
against the God of Infinite Love.
I am going to speak at this time mainly concerning God's own people.
They are to be the direct object of my talk, and I want to set their
sins in the light of God's Love to them. I mean, Beloved, your sins and
my own. Let us set our sin in the light of God's eternal Love and if
the sight should break us down, so much the better. If it should send
us away humbled and ashamed, so much the better. And if it should make
us praise eternal love beyond anything we have ever done before, so
much the better. My one objective will be to set before you the
contrast between God's action towards His people and His people's usual
action towards Him. He is all Love, but I fear that some of us who love
Him from the bottom of our hearts do not always show it in our
lives–and we give much cause for Him to set our conduct in direct
contrast to His own.
I pray, dear Brothers and Sisters, that your consciences may be wide
awake while I am preaching, and that you will not so much listen to me
as make heart-searching inquisition into your own spiritual state and
your own behavior towards your God. I do not want so much to preach to
you, as just to help you while you take the candle and the broom and
sweep the house. There may be some piece of silver that you have lost
which you will find very speedily by that process. It may be that you
will learn to love the Savior better after you have thoroughly searched
yourself and seen the contrast between His action towards you and yours
towards Him.
I. The first contrast lies in THE CALL. Please open your Bibles at the
first verse, and read with me–"I have redeemed you, I have called you
by your name." Now read in the 22nd verse–"But you have not called
upon Me, O Jacob."
We will begin by speaking of God's call to us. God has had much
converse with those of us who are His people. We are not strangers to
the sound of His voice and that method of communication from God came
forth toward us even before we knew anything about it, for, first, God
called us out of nothing. See how He begins this chapter–"Thus says
the Lord that created you, O Jacob." Our creation is entirely due to
God. An ungodly man can hardly bless God for having made him, for his
end may be terrible. But you and I can bless the day of our birth and
praise the Lord that we ever were created to be His sons and His
daughters and to enjoy so much, as we already do, of His infinite love
and mercy. Blessed be God for our being, because it is followed by our
well-being! Blessed be God for our first birth, because we have also
experienced a second birth! We praise the Lord that it pleased Him to
make us to be His people!
Our Lord has done more than make us, for He has educated us. He has
continued the fashioning of us. We are still like the unfinished vessel
in the potter's hands–the wheel is yet revolving and God's fingers are
still at work upon us, molding and shaping us as He, Himself, would
have us to be. "Thus says the Lord that created you, O Jacob, and He
that formed you, O Israel." Israel is the "formed" Jacob. By God's
Grace, Jacob grows into Israel. Let us think for a minute of all the
sweet experiences of God's forming and fashioning touch that we have
had. Sometimes it has been a rough stroke that was necessary for the
molding of our clay. Only by affliction could we be made to assume the
shape and pattern that the Lord had determined for us. At other times
it has been the touch of very soft fingers. Divine love and kindness
and tenderness have molded us. As David said to the Lord, in his Psalm
of Thanksgiving, so can each true child of God say, "Your gentleness
has made me great." "The Lord has done great things for us, whereof we
are glad." He has had wonderful dealings with us in creating us and in
forming us!
Think what wonderful dealings He has had, next, in consoling us, for
the Lord goes on to say, "fear not." Oh, how often He has cheered us up
when our spirit was sinking! With the Psalmist, we have been able to
say, "My flesh and my heart fails, but God is the strength of my heart,
and my portion forever." When it has been very dark with us, the Lord
has lighted our candle. When we have been quite alone, then we have not
been alone, for He has been with us. "A Syrian ready to perish," was a
true description of Israel going down into Egypt, but the Lord did not
leave him to perish–and He has not left us to perish, and He never
will! Friends have sometimes failed to cheer us, but our Best of
Friends has always comforted us. There are many who call themselves
comforters, to whom we can truly say, "Miserable comforters are you
all." But what a Comforter is the God of All Comfort! He knows how to
comfort those that are cast down. He takes care that His comforts are
given to us just as we need them and that they always come to us in the
best possible way.
O Beloved, the Lord has had strange dealings with some of you which you
could never tell! You could not even recount them to yourself in quiet
soliloquy. You have lost, one after another, those who were dear to
you, and yet you have not been permitted to sink down into despair. You
have been brought into great straits, yet you have not been deserted by
your God. You have been cast down, but not destroyed. You have gone
through fire and through water, yet you have been brought out into a
wealthy place and your soul has had to extol the Lord who has dealt
with you in loving kindness and tender mercy!
So, you see, we have had from God the blessings of creation, formation,
and consolation. But that is not all, for the Lord has also called us
and conversed with us in the matter of redemption. How sweetly it runs,
"for I have redeemed you." Yes, blessed be God, whether we are poor, or
sick, or obscure, we who believe in Jesus are bought with His precious
blood! I would give up my eyes rather than give up that thought, "I am
bought with the precious blood." I would give my hands, arms and every
sense I have, sooner than give up that inward delightful confidence,
"He loved me, and gave Himself for me. Upon the Cross of Calvary, when
He was paying down His life-price, He gave Himself a ransom for me and
I am a sharer in the effectual purchase of His redeeming blood."
Beloved, has not the Lord also told you that, sometimes, in His Word
and by His Spirit? Has he not made it come home so blessedly to you
that you have cried out with joy, "It is true, it is verily true, the
Lord says to me, 'I have redeemed you'"? this is a choice way in which
God has spoken to you, cheering and comforting your heart by a sense of
His redeeming Love.
The Lord has done even more than that for each of His children. He has
given a special nomination– "I have called you by your name." You know
what your name was, once, but, blessed be God, He has given you a new
name, and He has called you to Himself by name as much as Mary of
Bethany was called, when her sister Martha said to her, "the Master is
come and calls for you," or when Mary Magdalene turned herself and
said, "Rabboni," because her beloved Master had called her by her name,
"Mary." The Lord delights to call His people by their name, just as
mothers and fathers do, but specially as mothers do when they repeat
the child's pet name which they have given it–some fondling name which
is the mother's own particular register and mark upon the child. "I
have called you by your name." Then comes this blessed appropriation,
"You are Mine." Dear child of God, your Heavenly father says to you,
"You are Mine. You do not belong to the world, now, much less to the
devil. You do not even belong to yourself. I have made you. I have
formed you. I have consoled you. I have upheld you. I have redeemed
you. I have called you by your name, you are Mine and I will never part
with you."
This is the way that God talks to us! You recognize that Divine
language, do you not? You have heard it many a time. You are, perhaps,
hearing it now. Then turn with me to the other side of the
question–the neglected call on our part. Listen again to this sad
sentence from the 22nd verse. "But you have not called upon Me, O
Jacob." That may not mean that there has been literally no calling upon
God on your side, but it does mean that there has been too little of
it. Come, Brothers and Sisters, let us put this matter to the test.
What about our prayers. I have no wish to judge anybody, but I know
that there are some who, I trust, do love the Lord, who have so little
of the spirit of prayer that, broadly speaking, this accusation is
true, "You have not called upon Me, O Jacob." Are there not some of you
who spend only a very little time in secret prayer with God? Just a few
hurried words in the morning, just a few more at night, when you are
tired out and half asleep, but few, if any prayers all day long? Now, I
consider brief, pious prayer to be the very best form of prayer. I do
not think that length in prayer often ministers to strength in prayer,
but those breathings of the soul's desire during the day–
"The upward glancing of an eye, When none but God is near."
That sigh, that "Ah!" "Oh!" "Would that!" "O God!"–that is the style
of supplication which reaches the Throne of God! Yet are there not some
of you who forget to present these brief prayers? Thus there is much
less prayer than there ought to be, and the Lord has to say, "You have
not called upon Me, O Jacob."
Some who do, I trust, love the Lord, are very lax about prayer with
their Brothers and Sisters. I think that next to united praise, united
prayer is the most delightful thing that can ever occupy the human
mind. I believe that our Monday evening gatherings and our other Prayer
Meetings are among the sweetest enjoyments that Christians can have
this side of Heaven! Yet there are some who never come to them at
all–and to them the Lord seems to address the language of the text,
"You have not called upon Me, O Jacob."
True as this is of our prayers, I am sure that it is still more true of
our praise. How little praise, my Brothers and Sisters, does the Lord
get from us! Our "Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs," we sing here,
but how little of singing is there usually in our own houses! I will
not blame you if you cannot sing vocally, but how little is there of
that heart-music which is the very heart of music, that praising with
the soul without any words, when we sit still and bless the Lord, and
all that is within us magnifies His holy name! Is there not too little
of this heart-music? The revenue of praise paid into the Divine
exchequer is so sadly little that I am sure that the Master is robbed.
We do not send in a fair estimate of our income of mercy and we do not
pay unto the Lord that portion of praise that is due to Him and,
therefore, He is obliged to say to us, "You have not called upon Me, O
Jacob."
I will tell you what I think this sentence further means, and that is
that there are many with whom God has dealt well, who do not venture to
call upon Him for special help in His service. They keep plodding along
the old roads and mostly in the old ruts, but they do not dare to
invoke the aid of the Lord for some novel form of service, some fresh
enterprise upon which they can strike out for God. It has been my lot,
in years past, to call upon God to help me in what men judged to be
rash and imprudent enterprises, but oh, how grandly the Lord always
answers to the holy courage of His people if they will but do and dare
for Him! Yet, too often, He has to say, "You have not called upon Me, O
Jacob."
I wish we would put God to the test and see what He is both able and
willing to do for us and by us. There are the promises, but they are
often like locked-up boxes. They lie like that mass of coin which the
German Emperor is said to be storing up in a fortress–keeping it all
idle and useless–to come in handy, I suppose, one day, for blood and
iron. But, meanwhile, it is doing no service to anybody. Let us not
keep God's mercies locked up after that fashion, but let us utilize
them wherever we can!
I am also afraid that sometimes, in our trouble, we do not call upon
God as we should. I may be addressing a Christian here who is in deep
trouble and who has, in vain, tried 50 ways of getting out of it, but
he has not yet tried what calling upon God would do. They have in
Jersey, as you may know, the habit, when they think they are being
wronged, of calling, "Ha! Ro! Ha! Ro! Ha! Ro!" and straightway, having
called upon the prince, according to the feudal custom, to come to
their defense, all action must be stopped, for the prince is supposed
to intervene to take up the quarrel of his subjects. And it is always a
wise thing, when you are getting into the deep waters of trouble, not
to battle, worry, and fret, but just to say, "O God, my God, I do
invoke You! I put this case into Your hands. This man has slandered me,
but I will never answer him. You shall answer for me, O God! I am being
wronged, but I shall not go to law. I will bear this burden, O God,
until You, who are the Judge of the oppressed, shall see fit to right
me!" Whenever Christian men can act like this in time of trouble, or in
time of service, then they do well. But the Lord still has to say to
many of His people, "I have been speaking to you in love, and mercy,
and tenderness, but you have not called upon Me." If this accusation
touches the heart of any Believer, here, let him pray for forgiveness
and begin, from this time on, to call upon the name of the Lord.
II. Now, secondly and more briefly, let us consider another contrast
which is equally striking–upon the matter of THE CONVERSATION between
the Lord and His people.
Notice, first, God's side of it, as it is given in the second
verse–"When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and
through the rivers, they shall not overflow you: when you walk through
the fire, you shall not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon
you, for I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior."
Now read the other side, in the 22nd verse–"But you have been weary of
Me, O Israel." Notice how God is with His people in strange places.
Wherever they are, He will not leave them. He will go right through the
waters with them. God also keeps close to His people in dangerous
places, fatal places as they seem–"When you walk through the fire, you
shall not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon you." There is
God keeping pace with His people through fire and through water, never
leaving them, but always making this cheering message to be the comfort
of each one of them, "I am with you! I am with you! I am with you!" Our
faithful God always keeps close to His people. Is it not perfectly
wonderful how close Christ has kept to His Church? Even when she had
sinned, He would not leave her. When she had fallen and was ready to
perish, He would not desert her–
"'Yes,' says the Lord, 'with her I'll go Through all the depths of sin
and woe! And on the Cross will even dare The bitter pangs of death to
share.'"
He cannot be separated from His people–to every one of them He has
given the personal promise, "I will never leave you, nor forsake you."
Now listen to your side of this matter of conversation with God–"But
you have been weary of Me, O Israel." Has it not been so with regard to
private prayer? A very little of that is quite enough for you, for you
soon get tired of it! You actually went to sleep, the other night, in
the middle of your prayers. Was it not so? Well, I am not going to
blame you too much, but it is truly sad if this is the case with you.
Is it not the same, often, with your reading of the Scriptures? When
you have taken your Bible to read a portion, have you not had to school
yourself to do it? It has been quite a task for you. Did you ever hear
how Hone, the author of The Every Day Book, who had been an infidel,
was brought to the Savior's feet? He was in Wales, one day. He never
read the Bible, or thought of God, but he saw a girl, sitting at a
cottage door, reading her Bible. He said, "Oh, the Bible?" "Yes, Sir,"
she answered, "it is the Bible." He said, "I suppose you are getting
your task." "Task?" she enquired. "Task?" "Yes, my dear, I suppose your
mother has set you so much to read." "Mother set me so much to read?"
"Yes," he replied, "I suppose you would not read the Bible, otherwise.
It is a task, is it not?" "Task?" she said, "Oh, no! I only wish I
could read it all day long. It is my joy and my delight, when my work
is done, to get a few minutes to read this precious Book." That simple
testimony was the means of converting the infidel and of bringing him
to trust the Savior for himself! I am afraid that there are many who
could not have said what that girl did, for they have been weary of
God's Word and weary of God, Himself!
When they have come up to God's House, they have been weary of hearing
the Word. Look at many, many, many professors. I trust that they are
God's children–but, oh, they like very short sermons–and if they do
attend to what the preacher says, he has to be very careful to put in
plenty of illustrations and striking sayings. Then they will listen,
but if he does not preach so as to please them, they say, "Well, you
know, it was very warm, and I could not help just dropping off into a
doze." Yes, I know. I know. "He that keeps Israel shall neither slumber
nor sleep," but poor Israel, himself, often sleeps, to his own serious
loss! And the Lord has to say to him, "You have been weary of Me, O
Israel."
Are there not some, also, whom God loves, who get weary of their work?
They used to be Sunday school teachers, but, you see, they now live out
in the country, and they need the Sabbath day's quiet, so they cannot
teach any longer. They used to preach at the corner of the street, or
in a room somewhere, or do anything that they could for Christ, but
they are getting old, they say, and so they must just do a little less.
They used to give generously to the cause of God, but their means are
reduced, and they are obliged to draw in–so they draw in first in the
matter of giving to God! They begin to pinch God's cause before they
pinch themselves! So the Lord has, again, to say, "You have been weary
of Me, O Israel." Possibly, there are some things in which each one of
us has failed to take that delight in God which we ought to have taken.
We have not been half so delighted with God as He has been with us. And
we have not been so willing to converse with Him as He has been willing
to go with us through the floods and through the flames.
III. Now, next, and very briefly, indeed, I want you to notice the
contrast in THE SACRIFICE. Turn to the third verse–"I gave Egypt for
your ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for you." Now read in the 23rd
verse–"You have not brought Me the small cattle of your burnt
offerings; neither have you honored Me with your sacrifices. You have
bought Me no sweet cane with money, neither have you filled Me with the
fat of your sacrifices: but you have made Me to serve with your sins,
you have wearied Me with your iniquities."
Here is God giving up everybody else for the sake of His people! Egypt,
Ethiopia and Seba were great nations, but God did not choose the
greatest Is it not an extraordinary thing that the Lord should ever
have loved some of us? We are nothing in particular and there are
mighty men, learned men, men of rank and station, yet He has passed
them by. "Not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many
noble are called: but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to
confound the wise; God has chosen the weak things of the world to
confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and
things which are despised, has God chosen, yes, and things which are
not, to bring to nothing things that are: that no flesh should glory in
His Presence." That is a very wonderful declaration on God's part–"I
gave Egypt for your ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for you." That is to say,
"I passed others by, and chose you."
We may see another meaning in these words, for God has given us His
choicest Gift Christ is infinitely more precious than Egypt, Ethiopia
and Seba, though they were lands of great abundance of wealth. God had
but one Son, yet He gave Him up that He might die for us and that,
through His death, we might live! There can be no gift equal to this,
for that Son of God was God's own Self–and in the death of Christ, it
was God Himself who came to earth for our redemption! Will you just
try, dear child of God, to think over that great fact, for you know
that it is true!
Now look at the other side. Will any of you to whom this applies,
remember the charge God here makes? "You have not brought Me the small
cattle of your burnt offerings." I wonder how little some people really
give to God! I believe, in some cases, not as much as it costs them for
the blacking of their boots. If you were to set it all down, there are
some professors whose sacrifice to God might be put–I was about to
say, in their eyes–but certainly they would not feel it if it were put
in their mouths, for it is so little. "I gave Egypt for your ransom,
Ethiopia and Seba for you; yet you have not brought Me the small cattle
of your burnt offerings."
Then the Lord adds, "You have bought Me no sweet cane with money." Not
even the smallest offering has been given to the Most High by some who
profess to have been redeemed by the precious blood of Christ! How
little is given by the most generous of us! How little, even, by those
who live nearest to God! As if His Words ought to touch our
consciences, the Lord says, "I have not caused you to serve with an
offering, nor wearied you with incense"–as much as to say, "I have
left it entirely up to you what you would bring. I have not demanded
anything, I have not fixed any rate, I have not taxed you. And this
voluntary principle–has it failed? I have not put you under the Law
and said that you shall give just so much–I have left it wholly to
your love."
I read somewhere that in the Roman Catholic times, men were very
generous because they thought that they could purchase salvation by
their alms and their gifts to the church. And it is said that the
doctrine of Free Grace makes people stingy! I do not believe that it is
so–I believe that the natural effect of Grace upon any true heart is
to make the man feel that if God has done so much for him, it is his
joy and his delight to do all that lies in his power for God and His
cause. At any rate, dear Friends, let us be sure to make it so in our
case. I am not going to press this matter upon you, but I want you to
take it home to yourselves, as I take it home to myself. Let not the
Lord have to say to any one of us, "I gave Egypt for your ransom,
Ethiopia and Seba for you…but you have bought Me no sweet cane with
money."
IV. I close with one more contrast, which refers to THE HONOR given by
God and the honor given to God.
Read with me in verse four–"Since you were precious in My sight, you
have been honorable, and I have loved you." Then here is the contrast,
in the 23rd verse–"neither have you honored Me with your sacrifices."
The words seem to answer to each other in the declaration of God's love
to His people and in His lamentation for the lack of their love to Him!
"Since you were precious in My sight, you have been honorable." This is
a very wonderful passage and it is blessedly true that God gives great
honor to those whom He saves. I have known persons who, before their
conversion, were unclean in their lives–men who had been everything
that was despicable and women who had lost all honor–and when they
have been converted, they have joined a Christian Church and, in the
society of God's people, they have become honorable! They have been
taken into the fellowship of the saints just as if there had never been
a fault in their lives! Nobody has mentioned the past to them–it has
been forgotten. If ever any professed Christian has spoken of it, it
has been a disgrace to him to do so, but in the Church of God in
general, we take in those who have been the vilest of the vile. And if
they have but new hearts and right spirits, they are our Brothers and
Sisters in Christ, and they are honorable among us, and the Lord says
to each one of them, "Since you were precious in My sight, you have
been honorable."
All God's people are honorable people, they are the true "right
honorables," for God has made them so! They are honorable as to their
new nature, for that is holy and they seek after holiness. They are
honorable as the sons of God, for they are of the blood royal of
Heaven. They are honorable as wedded to Christ, for He becomes their
Husband. They are honorable because of their inheritance, for they can
sing–
"This world is ours, and worlds to come! Earth is our lodge and Heaven
our home." They are honorable as to their station throughout eternity,
for they shall dwell forever at the right hand of God. Even those who
were once so dishonorable that we could not have associated with them,
then, are brought near by the blood of Christ and God makes them
honorable.
I think that if you and I, poor creatures that we are, are made
honorable by God, the very least thing we can do is to honor Him in
return. This is the highest honor that God can put upon us, that He
fixes His love upon us–"You have been honorable, and I have loved
you." Drink in that nectar if you can. I cannot preach about it. I
always feel as if, when I get to that theme, I must just sit down and
think over this great wonder, that God loves me! "I have loved you–I,
the Great, the Infinite Jehovah, have loved you!" Well, then, the very
least thing we can do is to honor with our whole heart and soul Him who
has so greatly honored us!
Now, Beloved, have you honored God? He says in our text, "Neither have
you honored Me with your sacrifices." Have you honored God by your
lives, dear Brothers and Sisters? Have you honored God by your
confidence in Him? Have you honored God by your patience? Have you
honored God by defending His Truth when it has been assailed? Have you
honored God by speaking to poor sinners about Him? Are you trying every
day to honor Him? Surely, it is the very least thing we can do who have
been–
"Chosen of Him before time began," and then redeemed with the heart's
blood of the Son of the Highest. It is the least we can do, to make
every faculty we possess subordinate to this end of honoring and
glorifying God! It is for this He has created us, for this He has
called us, for this He has redeemed us, for this He has sanctified us!
Therefore let us set about it at once and think and plan within our
hearts what we can do for the glory and honor of Him who has redeemed
us unto Himself. The Lord bless this message to all here present, for
Jesus' sake! Amen.
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON:
ISAIAH 43:1-7; 21-28; 44:1-5.
Isaiah 43:1. But now thus says the Lord that createdyou, O Jacob, andHe
that formedyou, OIsrael, fearnot: forI have redeemed you, I have called
you by your name; you are Mine. "Fear not," is a command of God and is
a command which brings its own power of performance with it. God, who
created and formed us, says to us, "fear not," and a secret whisper is
heard in the heart by which that heart is so comforted that fear is
driven away. "Fear not: for I have redeemed you." That is a good reason
why we should never fear again! Redemption is a well of consolation and
the redeemed of the Lord have nothing whatever to fear.
2. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you. The godly have
the best company in the worst places in which their lot is cast.
2. And through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. The godly have
special help in their times of deepest trouble. 2. When you walk
through the fire, you shall not be burned. The godly are the subjects
of miracles of mercy in seasons of greatest distress.
2. Neither shall the flame kindle upon you. You shall come out of the
furnace as the three holy children did, with not so much as the smell
of fire upon you, for, where God is, all is safe. "You shall not be
burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon you."
3. For I am the Lord your God. This is the grandest possible reason for
not fearing! Fall back upon this when you have nothing else upon which
to rely. If you have no goods, you have a God. If your gourd is
withered, your God is still the same as He ever was–"For I am Jehovah,
your God."
3, 4. The Holy One ofIsrael, your Savior: Igave Egypt for your ransom,
Ethiopia andSeba for you. Since you were precious in My sight, you have
been honorable, and I have loved you: therefore will I give men for
you, and people for your life. All that God has given, if it were not
enough, He would still add to it. He has redeemed us, so there is no
need of more, but if there were, God would go through with it even to
the end.
5. Fear not: for I am with you. This is the second time that the
blessed words, "fear not," ring out like the notes of the silver
trumpet proclaiming the jubilee to poor trembling hearts! "Fear not,
for I am with you." The Lord seems to say to each troubled Believer,
"My honor is pledged to secure your safety, all My attributes are
engaged on your behalf right to the end. Yes, I am, Myself, with you.
Therefore, fear not."
5-7. I will bring your seed from the east, and gather you from the west
I will say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not back:
bring My sons from far, and My daughters from the ends of the earth;
even every one that is called by My name. Whatever happens, God will be
with His Church. His own chosen people shall all be gathered in. There
shall be no frustration of the Divine purpose. From east or west, north
or south, all His sons and daughters shall come unto Him, even every
one that is called by His name.
7. For I have created him for My glory, I have formed him; yes, I have
made him. And God will be glorified in His people; the object of their
creation is the glory of their God and that end shall, somehow or
other, be answered in the Lord's good time. Now I want you to notice
the other side of the question. God says, in the 21st verse–
21. This people have I formed for Myself; they shall show forth My
praise. But–A sorrowful, "but." And the strain sinks from a triumphant
shout to a doleful lamentation. "But"–
22. You have not called upon Me, O Jacob; but you have been weary of
Me, O Israel How sad it is that those who have been loved so much
should make such a shameful return for it all!
23. You have not brought Me the small cattle of your burnt offerings.
No kids of the goats, or lambs from the fold.
23. Neither have you honored Me with your sacrifices. I have not caused
you to serve with an offering, nor wearied you with incense. ' 'I have
not been a cruel taskmaster, or tyrant, demanding of you more than you
could give."
24. You have bought Me no sweet cane with money. "No calamus has sent
forth its perfume from My altar."
24. Neither have you filled Me with the fat of your sacrifices: butyou
have made Me to serve with your sins, you have wearied Me with your
iniquities. These are the people whom God had loved so long and so
well, those upon whom He had set His unchanging affection! Yet they
acted shamefully. What will follow upon such conduct as this? Their
swift destruction? No! Listen to the Lord's gracious message.
25. I, even I, am He that blots out your transgressions for My own
sake, and will not remember your sins. Here is a great wave of mercy
washing away everything that could bear witness against the people of
God!
26-28. Put Me in remembrance: let us plead together: declare you, that
you may be justified. Your first father has sinned, and your teachers
have transgressed against Me. Therefore Ihave profaned the princes of
the sanctuary, and have given Jacob to the curse, and Israel to
reproaches.
Isaiah 44:1-5. Yet now hear, O Jacob My servant; and Israel, whom Ihave
chosen: thus says the Lord that made you, and formed you from the womb,
which will help you; fear not, O Jacob, My servant; and you, Jeshurun,
whom I have chosen. For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and
floods upon the dry ground: I will pour My spirit upon your seed, and
My blessing upon your offspring: and they shall spring up as among the
grass as willows by the water courses. One shall say, I am the Lord's
and another shall call himself by the name of Jacob. And another shall
subscribe with his hand unto the Lord, and surname himself by the name
of Israel. There are different ways of making the same profession of
attachment to the Lord. All do not acknowledge in the same way their
faith in God, but it is a great blessing when our offspring acknowledge
it. Let us end our reading with that sweet blessing upon our
children–"I will pour My spirit upon your seed, and My blessing upon
your offspring. May it come to pass in all our families, for our Lord
Jesus Christ's sake! Amen.