Gratitude for Great Deliverances
(No. 3113)
A SERMON PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1908.
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON THURSDAY EVENING, OCTOBER
29, 1874.
"For He has looked down from the height of His sanctuary; from Heaven
did the LORD behold the earth, to hear the groaning of the prisoner, to
loose those that are appointed to death; to declare the name of the
LORD in Zion, and His praise in Jerusalem; when the people are gathered
together, and the kingdoms, to serve the LORRD." Psalm 102:19-22.
I SUPPOSE the first sense of this passage would be just this. Israel
had been carried away captive and only the poorest of the people had
been left in the land. Jerusalem was a heap. Zion had been plowed with
the plow of desolation. The whole country was, compared with its former
state, like a desert. But in due time, God, who had peculiar favor
towards His people, though He had sorely smitten them, would look down
upon them. From the height of His sanctuary in Heaven, He would look
down upon the ruins of His sanctuary on earth. From His heavenly city
above, He would look down upon His earthly city below. And as He looked
and listened, He would be attracted by the moans of His people, and
especially of some who were appointed to death, or, as the margin
renders it, "the children of death." Upon these He would look with
tender pity and, in due time He would so come to the deliverance of His
scattered people, Israel, and bring them back to their own land and
work for them such wonderful mercy that, ever afterwards that
deliverance would be spoken of with praise and thanksgiving! Even in
the last days when all nations shall serve the Lord, the memory of this
deliverance shall not be forgotten! Still shall it be the theme
ofjoyous song and the subject of holy contemplation, just as when
Israel was in Egypt, the Lord heard their groaning and with a high hand
and a stretched-out arm brought them up out of the land of bondage–and
ever afterwards among the sweetest patriotic songs of the nation was
the one which Moses and Miriam sang on the further shore of the Red
Sea–"Sing you to the Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously; the horse
and his rider has He thrown into the sea." And all along Jewish
history, whatever of her songs there may have been, that one has never
gone into oblivion. And even in Heaven, itself, "they sing the song of
Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb." So that the
deliverance promised here to Israel was to be as noteworthy as that
which was given at the Red Sea and it was to be forever kept in memory
by the Lord's chosen people!
Now I am going to leave the more immediate sense of our text, yet still
give you its meaning. It has been said that if a great crystal is
broken into the smallest fragments, each piece will still be
crystallized in the same form and, in like manner, the dealings of God
with His Church, as a whole, will be found to be of the same kind as
His dealings with the various parts of His Church and also with
individuals. And in dealing with individuals, each separate act of God
will have about it the same attributes and be of the same character as
His dealings on a large scale with the whole of His people. So, if we
break down the great Truth of the text, which is like a mass of bread,
into small crumbs so that each one of the Lord's children may have a
portion, it will still be bread! The Truth of God will be the same as
we try to bring it home to individual experience–and that we shall now
try to do. May the eternal Spirit, the Comforter, help us in the doing
of it!
I. And first, dear Friends, our text speaks of MISERY AT ITS EXTREME.
You observe that it speaks of prisoners who are groaning and of those
who are appointed unto death–who are evidently in chains because they
are spoken of as being loosed. It has been well said that one half of
the people in the world do not know how the other half lives, and it is
certainly true that there are sorrows in this world of which some of us
have no conception or imagination! Complaint was made, some time ago,
by a hearer in a certain place of worship, that most of the sermons
that he heard there were composed upon the principle that everybody was
happy–and it did
not appear to him that the preacher had much, if any sympathy with
those who were of a sorrowful spirit, like Hannah,
[See Sermon #1515, Volume 26–A WOMAN OF A SORROWFUL SPIRIT] or those
who were in an afflicted and depressed condition who could not rejoice
as he could. I do not think that charge could be truthfully brought
against me. If it could, I would be sorry, for where the Spirit of God
rests upon any man at all after the manner in which it rested upon
Christ, that man will repeat, in his measure, what his Lord could say
in the fullest
possible sense, "He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, [See Sermon
#1604, Volume 27–HEART DISEASE CURABLE] to preach deliverance to the
captives, [See Sermon #2371, Volume 40–FREEDOM AT ONCE AND FOREVER]
and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at
liberty they who are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the
Lord." The ministry that God sends, though it will be a ministry of
warning and threats to the ungodly, will be a ministry of consolation
to those who are sorrowing over their sins and seeking Divine
deliverance from them! So you who are the sons and daughters of joy
will pardon me if there should seem to be less than usual for you in my
present discourse. When someone is sick, nobody blames the physician
for giving his main attention to the invalid of the house, nor finds
fault with the nurse for her assiduous attentions to the poor suffering
one. There are many sorrows, Brothers and Sisters, in this world, and
there are many sorrows even in the Church of God! And yet, for my part,
I see much for which I can thank God, especially when I look upon the
people of God. Then I say, with Moses, "Happy are you, O Israel: who is
like unto you, O people saved by the Lord?" Yet there are still many
sons and daughters of affliction and there are many trials and
tribulations for each of us to pass through before we reach that land
where sorrow is unknown.
There are some sad souls who are comparable to prisoners, prisoners
that groan most mournfully. And there are some who are convinced of
sin, but who have not yet found the Savior–and some who, having found
that Savior, have fallen into doubts and fears, or who have backslidden
from Him and so lost their comforting assurances. And they are now
crying, "Oh that I knew where I might find Him!" There are also some
who have experienced heavy losses and are bearing heavy crosses–some
who have seen the desire of their eyes taken away with a stroke, some
to whom the shafts of death have flown once, twice, thrice–each time
smiting down a beloved one. There are some very dear children of God
who do not always see the light of His Countenance–precious sons of
God who are like fruit brought forth by the moon–those who are the
bruised spices of the sanctuary all the sweeter for being bruised and
just now is the time of their sorrow, when they are prisoners that cry
and sigh and groan by reason of their hard bondage.
A prisoner is often a solitary man. Yet much of the sorrow of
imprisonment lies in separation from friends and in utter loneliness.
Perhaps I am addressing some whose condition is that of extreme
solitude. You are alone in the streets of this great wilderness of a
city and there is no such loneliness as that! Or you live in a house
where you wish that you could be alone in one sense, for you are sadly
alone in another sense, for nobody seems to understand your case, or to
enter into your experience. You wear a fetter which never fretted human
wrists before–at least so you think. You are in solitary confinement
and in that confinement you are in the dark. The light in which you
once rejoiced has gone from you. The joyous flow of spirits and the
cheery countenance which you used to possess have departed from you.
Your heart is troubled and you are vexed with inward doubts and fears.
It is a sorrowful case when a man is in that condition and is alone in
it.
It may be, also, that you feel as if you were jailed. The power to act,
which you once had, has gone from you. Your former energy has departed.
You are like a man spellbound. Just as sometimes, in troubled dreams, a
man tries to run but cannot even lift a foot, or seeks to grasp
something, but his hands seems turned to stone, so is it with you–or
so, at any rate, has it been with some of us! We were chained and in
the dark, and solitary. And we have tried hard to convince ourselves of
the truth of what people said to us–that it was only a matter of
nerves and that we must be energetic and make up our minds to get out
of that state–which is what only fools say, for wise men know that
such talk as this is like pouring vinegar into open wounds, making them
smart still more and never producing any healing effects! You have,
perhaps, been like a prisoner who has well-near escaped, but who has
been detected by the ever-watchful guards and so had to go back to his
cell and to wear double chains for trying to escape! And, possibly,
your imprisonment has lasted long. Some of you young people may feel
frightened when you hear me talk like this. Do not be alarmed, yet lay
up in your memories what I am saying, because if these dark days never
come to you, you will be all the more thankful that they do not! But if
they do, you will remember that I told you about them. You will then
say, "This is no strange thing that
has happened to us, for the preacher said it might be so, and the
preacher was a man of a cheery spirits yet he said it might be so with
us. As it now is so, we need not be surprised and we may know that we
may be the children of God and that God may be looking down from Heaven
in pity upon us–and resolving to set us free–and yet for the present
we are fettered and unable to escape from our prison."
Now observe that according to the text, there are some who are in a
worse plight even than prisoners, for they are "appointed to
death"–some who feel in their bodies that they will soon die, but who
have not yet learned to exult in that fact. They have not looked at the
heavenward side of it and said, "Ah, we shall soon be where we shall
shake off every infirmity and sickness, and see our Savior face to face
and praise Him without sinning forever!" But they have said, "We are
appointed to death. We have sharp pains to undergo and the dying strife
to endure when the clammy sweat will thicken upon our brow." And as
yet, that is all that they have thought of, or, at least they think
most of that. If there are any such people here, I pray God to now give
them the comfort which they so sorely need–that they may even rejoice
in the prospect of departing to be with that dear Lord whom they have
so long loved and served! And, alas, there are some who are "appointed
to death" in a far worse sense than that for "to die is gain" to us who
are believers in Christ, but the ungodly feel that they are "appointed
to death" in a much more terrible meaning of the word, "death!"
Their sins are standing out before them and crying out against them!
They feel like a murderer who is standing under the gallows–they are
afraid that the floor will fall from beneath their feet and that they
will sink down to destruction! They have not yet learned the power of
the precious blood of Jesus and they have not yet heard the voice of
God saying to them, "Your sins, which are many, are all forgiven you
for Christ's sake." They are under conviction of sin and under that
conviction they feel that they are "appointed to death" eternal–their
own conscience affirms that the Divine sentence is a just one and they
dare not argue with it. Such is their own sense of their condition in
the sight of God that if they had to judge themselves, they would have
to condemn themselves! And, perhaps, meanwhile, Satan is reminding them
of the wrath to come and making them feel how certain it is that it
will be their portion. They also believe themselves to be "appointed to
death" because even their fellows seem to shun them. Christian people
appear to have given them up as hopeless. Their old companions look
upon them as though they were too far gone for the mercy of God to
reach them. If there should be one such sinner in this building, I am
right glad of it, for it is to him and to those like he that this text
is especially sent! The Lord is, at this moment, looking down from
Heaven with those piercing eyes of His which can discern the exact
condition of all hearts here–and those eyes of His are gazing with
Infinite pity upon the groaning prisoners who are "appointed to death."
Now, Brothers and Sisters in Christ, there are some of us who are
neither prisoners nor "appointed to death." Let us bless the Lord who
has set us free and given us eternal life in His Son, Jesus Christ! But
let us not forget what we used to be, nor forget those who are still in
bonds and under sentence of death. Let us pray the Lord to bless them
and to bring them out into liberty and joy this very hour! Whenever I
meet with a poor enslaved, sin-sick soul, I say, "Ah, my Friend! I can
pity you. I still have the scars upon my soul where the iron fetters
used to hold me fast–and the bitterness of heart that I then
experienced makes me always feel a tender, loving sympathy with the
weak ones among God's people and the tried ones among His saints."
Those who are pushed about by many as though they were not fit to live
are the very ones for whom I would gladly make a way and bring them to
the softest place and say, "Be of good comfort, for it is for you and
such as you that God has sent His Son and His Spirit into the world."
II. Now, secondly, in our text we notice MISERY OBSERVED.
I want you carefully to note these words, "For the Lord has looked down
from the height of His sanctuary; from Heaven did the Lord behold the
earth to hear the groaning of the prisoner." This expression is, of
course, not strictly applicable to God, for He sees all things. But,
speaking after the manner of men, it describes Him as going up to the
highest part of Heaven, as a watchman goes up to the top of the tower,
where the widest range of vision can be obtained and looks over sea and
land with keen and searching eyes. The original appears to mean, "The
Lord leans from the height of His sanctuary," as if He bent down over
the battlements of Heaven in order to get nearer to the object of His
search and to gaze the more intently at it. And as He looks and
listens, His eyes and ears are riveted upon a prison through whose
dreary, grated window He sees what others cannot–a pining
prisoner–and He hears a moan which others cannot bear to hear. And far
off, yonder, in the place of shame and death, He sees poor wretches
taken out to die. And all His heart goes out in pity towards them. We
naturally look for some pleasing sight–we like to let our eyes rest
upon that beautiful lake in the distance, or that forest browning with
the tints of autumn, or that green hill, or that sky checkered with a
thousand hues as the sun is setting. But here is the great God looking
out for miserable objects, keenly observing those who are the most
miserable of men and women! We like to have our ears charmed by the
sweet sounds of melody and harmony, but God opens His ears to catch the
sound of a moan or a groan, and turns His eyes, not to search for a
diamond, but to look for a tear! O wondrous mercy of God! How strange
that the King of kings should go to the top of His castle to look for a
poor wretched soul!
And yet, dear Friends, after this manner do the benevolent of the
earth, who are most like their God, act. See the man whose duty it is
to watch the coast–observe him going up and down the seashore and the
cliffs, walking to and fro with his telescope under his arm. There is a
pleasure yacht yonder, but he does not especially notice that. There is
a steamer plowing the deep, but he does not notice that. Here are
little rowing or sailing boats flitting about, but he does not notice
them. Now it is night and presently a rocket flies up into the air. Ah,
he is all attention now! There is another rocket. He calls his fellows
and soon they will be off with the lifeboat in answer to the signals of
distress at sea! Just so is it with God–He is looking for signals of
distress. Some of you are bent on pleasure, but He does not take
special note of you. Some of you are full of pride, you are rich and
increased in goods, you have all your canvas spread and all your flags
flying–but the Lord does not notice you except in sorrow and anger!
But if there is a signal of distress anywhere about, or a poor anxious
soul is crying, "O God, have mercy upon me," or one that cannot get as
far as that, but whose moan is too suffocating to become an articulate
prayer, (for that is what is implied in the word, groaning, here), God
is sure to notice that, to hear the groaning and mark the falling tear
of the penitent!
To my mind it is very wonderful that while God is Omniscient and so
sees everything, there should be some special objects of His Omniscient
regard. Think for a moment what concentrated Omniscience must be–each
individual as closely looked upon by God as if there were not another
person for Him to look upon–as if he were as much the sole object of
the thought of the Most High as if He had forgotten the whole universe
besides! That is really the purport of what we are here taught. God is
reading you through and through, poor Soul–watching you as if He had
nobody else to watch, understanding you as fully as if there were
nobody else to be understood–leaning over you that He may get the
better view of you, bringing all His Infinite faculties to bear upon
your case, searching it from top to bottom–the origin of your sorrow,
the ramifications of your grief, planning the outcome of the whole
matter, what balms and what catholicons you need to heal your wounds
and charm away your distresses! Why, it is really worthwhile to be a
prisoner to have God looking upon one like this! It is worthwhile to
feel the sentence of death in one's soul in order to know, by the
testimony of Inspiration, that God is looking upon one out of Heaven in
this special and peculiar sense! He can never forget His children
anywhere, but if there is one place where He remembers them more
specially than anywhere else, it is in the place of their sorrow!
I wonder whether you, good mother, have been especially thinking of
anyone at home while I have been preaching? I should not wonder if it
is so and I can guess which member of your family you have thought of
more than of all the rest! Of course you have been thinking of the
little one whom you left so ill. You were scarcely sure whether you
might venture to steal out this evening, but you said, "I think I must
go and bow before the Lord in His House." And while you have been here,
you have been wondering whether the nurse has been properly caring for
your sick child. Why have you not been concerned about your big boy,
John, who is away at school, or about your daughter, Mary, who is well
and strong? Ah, no, you have been able to keep your thoughts away from
them, but you could not keep your thoughts away from the little sick
one. Now, like as a father and a mother of a family pity their
children, so the Lord pities them that fear Him– and He especially
pities His poor tried and troubled ones.
III. Thirdly, keeping to the same strain, we see MISERY RELIEVED.
God looks down from Heaven to hear the groaning of the prisoner and to
loose those that are appointed to death. God's thoughts do not end in
thoughts, nor do His words end in words. David wrote truly, "How
precious also are Your thoughts unto me, O God!" So they are, but how
precious also must His actions be! Our text is one of many proofs that
God does really hear prayer. My dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, I
would be greatly grieved if any of you were moved in the slightest
degree by the assertion that is made, in these evil days, that our
prayers are really not heard by God. The persons who make that
assertion do not know anything at all about the matter, for they do not
themselves pray to God, so what can they know about it? If I were to
contradict one of these philosophers concerning certain natural
phenomena
which I have never observed, he would at once say that I was out of
court! If I said that I did not believe in the result which he said he
had attained, he would say, "But I have proved it and, therefore, I am
able to speak positively concerning it." If I were to say, "I have not
tried it and so do not believe it," he would say to me, "Negative
evidence is of no use in such a case as this." I cannot help using this
simple illustration, which I have used before, concerning a man who was
charged with theft. They brought five persons to prove that he stole
the goods, and they all saw him do it, "but," he said, "that is
nothing! I can bring 50 people who did not see me steal the goods."
Just so. But the magistrate knew that there was not anything in the
evidence of the 50 people who did not see the theft–the evidence of
the five people who did see it was much stronger! So if there is but a
very small number of us who have really proved the power of prayer and
who know that we have obtained answers to our petitions, the evidence
of the small number who have tested the matter is worth far more than
the evidence of any number who have not tried it and who, therefore,
cannot say anything about it! Some of us have been to God about great
things and little things, temporal things and spiritual things–we are
in the habit of going to Him all day long! There is scarcely an hour in
the day in which we do not ask Him for something or other–and for us
to receive answers to our prayers is as common a thing for us as
breathing the air, or seeking the sunshine by day or the stars by
night! It has become such an ordinary, common occurrence with us that
we cannot doubt it.
Our text also reminds us that God hears the very poorest prayers, those
which are the poorest in the judgment of men–the groaning of the
prisoners. I do not think them the poorest prayers–I consider that
they are really the most powerful prayers. The prayers of the heart are
often the most prevalent with God when they cannot be expressed in
words, for the weight of meaning would break the backs of the words and
human language would stagger beneath the crushing load. Then it is that
we often pray best of all. If a man gets up from his knees and groans,
and says, "I cannot pray," he need not fret about not finding suitable
words, for he has prayed! But our wordy prayers, whether in our private
devotions or in public Prayer Meetings, are often so much chaff and
nothing more. God does not need our words, yet we sometimes string them
together as if we were displaying our oratory before the Eternal. This
must not be! God loves the heart of the suppliant to be poured out
before Him. The best prayer is when a man can take his heart and turn
it bottom upwards and let all that is in it run out! That is the style
of praying that has most influence with God.
He does "hear the groaning of the prisoner" and with God, to hear means
to answer We need not say, as many do, that "He is a prayer-hearing and
prayer-answering God," for prayer-hearing involves prayer-answering! O
mourners, still mourn before your God, but mourn with this mixture of
hope–that God will not suffer the groaning that arises from your
heart, in the name of Jesus, to be like the mere whisperings of the
wind! He will hear them before long.
It is also said, in our text, that the Lord will "loose those that are
appointed to death."fs it not wonderful that God should deliver men
just when it seems as if all is over with them? I remember lying in the
condemned cell–I mean spiritually. I thought I heard the bell tolling
out my doom and I expected to soon be taken away to execution! But it
was just then that God came and loosed my bonds. I had tugged hard at
them, trying to untie the knots that Moses had tied and seeing if I
could break the iron fetters of conviction and condemnation which were
riveted upon me, but I could not. But the sight of Jesus Christ and Him
crucified, and the Omnipotent might of His atoning Sacrifice broke
every bond from off my soul in a single moment and I leaped into
ecstatic liberty! And this is how God will deal with every soul that
will but turn to Jesus on the Cross and leave itself in the hands of
Infinite Love! Sinner, even if you are on the very verge of Hell, if
you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, He will loose your bonds and set
you at liberty! Even though your death warrant seems to be signed and
sealed, the prey shall be taken from the mighty and the lawful captive
shall be delivered, for the Lord, your Redeemer, is almighty and none
can withstand Him when He resolves to bring up His children even from
their prisons! Only trust in Jesus! Rest your soul upon Him and God
will yet come to your deliverance!
IV. The last thing in our text is ELOQUENT GRATITUDE. "To declare the
name of the Lord in Zion, and His praise in Jerusalem; when the people
are gathered together, and the kingdoms, to serve the Lord."
One of the most powerful preachers who ever lived was the Prophet
Jonah. And I believe that Jonah learned to preach by going, in the
whale's belly, to the bottom of the Mediterranean. That voyage was
better than a university education for him and he became a good sound
Calvinist before he was cast up again upon the land. He said,
"Salvation is of the Lord," before the Lord told the fish to give him
up and I have no doubt that he often preached that doctrine afterwards!
And if some preachers whom I know, instead of having lessons in
elocution, were sent for a little while down into the depths of
soul-despair. If they were tried, plagued, vexed and chastened every
morning, they would learn a way of speaking which would reach the
people's hearts far better than any that can be learned by human
teaching!
We need, dear Brothers, if we are to speak aright for God, to know
something of our soul's need, the depths of it, and then something of
the Grace of God and the height of it in bringing us out of our
distresses! Hence, according to our text, those who are set free
declare or publish the name of the Lord. You cannot keep a man quiet if
he has been, spiritually, in prison and has been brought out by God! If
he has been condemned to die and has had his sentence canceled at the
last moment, you cannot make him hold his tongue! You may tell him that
he must keep his religion to himself, but it is impossible. He is so
overjoyed about it–it has so charmed him that he must begin to tell
somebody about it! You know that John Bunyan said that he wanted to
tell the crows on the plowed land all about his conversion. It seems
quite natural that he should feel like that and he did tell a great
many besides the crows about it! There is something in a man who gets
joy and peace in believing that will not be quiet. Perhaps some of you
have been very ill and a certain medicine has been recommended to you
and it has restored you. Now, do you not always feel, when you meet
anybody who is ill as you were, that you must tell him about the remedy
that cured you? You say, "You should try so-and-so! Look what it has
done for me." Why do you need to tell him? You do not know why! You do
not claim any very great measure of benevolence for doing it, for you
cannot help communicating the good news to others. So is it with the
man who is really saved by the Grace of God! He needs to communicate it
and he is the fit man to communicate it because he who speaks from the
heart speaks to the heart and he who speaks experimentally is the man
by whom the Holy Spirit is most likely to speak to those who are in a
similar experience. Perhaps, my dear Friends, some of you are now
suffering on purpose that God may afterwards fit you the better to
speak to others in a similar case–I believe it is often so and trust
that it may turn out to be so in your case.
These people declared the goodness of God among the saints. So ought we
to do. Some Christians cannot tell their experience very readily, but I
think they should try to do so. Tell your Brothers and Sisters in
Christ what the Lord has done for you. If there were more commerce
among Christians with their experience, they would be mutually the more
enriched. But these people also declared the name of the Lord among the
nations when they were gathered together. And Soul, if God has allowed
you to go down into the deeps of the prison and to lie in the condemned
cell–and has brought you out to life and liberty–you will surely not
blush to tell all what great things God has done for you! I think you
must sometimes feel in your heart as if you wished you had a whole
universe for an audience–the devils in Hell and the angels in Heaven,
the saints above and the saints below–and the sinners, too, and you
would like to say to them, "I sought the Lord and He heard me and
delivered me from all my fears. This poor man cried and the Lord heard
him and saved him out of all his troubles." You cannot have quite so
large an audience as that just yet, so, meanwhile, make use of the
audience you can have and–
"Tell to sinners round
What a dear Savior you have found!"
It is in part for this purpose that this great blessing has been given
to you that you might tell all you can about it to others. I pray you
not to rob God of the revenue of Glory which His Grace deserves at your
hands!
Brothers and Sisters, the gist of what I have said to you is just
this–Are we rejoicing in the Lord? Then let us turn our joy into
praise of Him! Are we very much cast down? Then let us look up to Him
who looks down upon us and let us rest in the Lord and wait patiently
for Him, for He will yet bring us out of our prison! Are we as yet
unsaved? Then let us catch at those words in the text that tell us that
God looks down from Heaven "to hear the groaning of the prisoner." Will
you not groan, poor prisoner? The devil tempted you never to do so any
more. You yourself said, "It is no use. I have been to the Tabernacle
so long and I have been to other places of worship, but I cannot get
any comfort. I will give up trying." Oh, do not do so, I pray you!
Have you come to the end of yourself? Well, then, now you have come to
the beginning of God! It is when the last penny of creature merit is
gone that God comes to us with the boundless treasures of His Grace! If
you have one moldy crust of your own homemade bread left, you shall not
have the Bread of Heaven! But when you are starved. When you have no
goodness in you–nor any hope of goodness, no merit, nor hope of merit,
no reliance, nor shadow of reliance upon anything that you are, or ever
can be–then is the time to cast yourself upon the all-sufficient mercy
of God in Christ Jesus! Everything that you can spin, God will unravel!
Everything that you can do for yourself, He will throw
down! Your spider webs He will break! You think to spin them into
silken robes, but He will strip you and He will slay you, for it is
written, "I wound and I heal. I kill and I make alive." Blessed is the
man who is wounded by God, for He will afterwards heal him! Blessed is
the man who is slain by God in this sense, for He will make him alive!
Blessed is the man who is empty, for God will fill him! That was the
theme of the Virgin's song and let it be ours as I close my
discourse–"He has filled the hungry with good things and the rich He
has sent away empty. He has put down the mighty from their seats and
exalted them of low degree." So may He do now, for His dear Son's sake!
Amen.
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: PSALM102.
Verses 1, 2. Hear my prayer, O LORD, and let my cry come unto You. Hide
not Your face from me in the day when I am in trouble; incline Your ear
unto me: in the day when I call, answer me speedily. Sincere suppliants
are not content with praying for praying's sake. They desire to really
reach the ear and heart of Jehovah. "Hear my prayer, O Lord, and let my
cry come unto You." When prayer is intensified into a cry, then the
heart is even more urgent to have audience of the Lord.
3-7. For my days are consumed like smoke, and my bones are burned as an
hearth. My heart is smitten, and withered like grass, so that I forget
to eat my bread. By reason of the voice of my groaning, my bones cleave
to my skin. I am like a pelican of the wilderness: I am like an owl of
the desert I watch and am as a sparrow alone upon the housetop. The
Psalmist gives us here a very graphic description of his sorrowful
condition at that time. He was moved to grief by a view of the national
calamities of the chosen people and these so worked upon his patriotic
soul that he was wasted with anxiety, his spirits were dried up and his
very life was ready to expire.
8. My enemies reproach me all the day; and they that are mad against me
are sworn against me. Their rage was unrelenting and unceasing and
vented itself in taunts and insults. With his inward sorrows and
outward persecutions, the Psalmist was in as ill a plight as may well
be conceived!
9-11. For I have eaten ashes like bread, and mingled my drink with
weeping because of Your indignation and Your wrath: for You have lifted
me up, and cast me down. My days are like a shadow that declines; and I
am withered like grass. This is a telling description of
all-saturating, all-embittering sadness. And that was the portion of
one of the best of men, and that for no fault of his own, but because
of his love to the Lord's people.
12. But You, O LORD, shall endure forever; and Your remembrance unto
all generations. All other things are vanishing like smoke and
withering like grass. But, overall, the one eternal, Immutable Light
shines on, and will shine on when all these shadows have declined into
nothingness.
13,14. You shall arise, and have mercy upon Zion: for the time to favor
her, yes, the set time is come. For Your
servants take pleasure in her stones, and favor the dust thereof [See
Sermon #2576, Volume 44–ZION'S PROSPERITY] They delight in her so
greatly that even her rubbish is dear to them. It was a good omen for
Jerusalem when the captives began to feel a homesickness and began to
sigh after her.
15-17. So the heathen shall fear the name of the LORD, and all the
kings of the earth Your Glory. When the LORD shall build up Zion, He
shall appear in His Glory. He will regard the prayer of the destitute,
and not despise their prayer
[See Sermon #1141, Volume 19–GOOD NEWS FOR THE DESTITUTE] He will not
treat their pleas with contempt. He will incline His ears to hear, His
heart to consider and His hands to help.
18. This shall be written for the generation to come: and the people
which shall be created shall praise the LORD. A note shall be made of
it, for there will be destitute ones in future generations–"the poor
shall never cease out of the land"–and it will make glad their eyes to
read the story of the Lord's mercy to the needy in former times.
19-23. For He has looked down from the height of His sanctuary; from
Heaven did the LORD behold the earth; to hear the groaning of the
prisoner; to loose those that are appointed to death; to declare the
name of the LORD in Zion, and His praise in Jerusalem; when the people
are gathered together, and the kingdoms, to serve the LORD. He weakened
my strength in the way; He shortened my days. Here the Psalmist comes
down again to the mournful string and pours forth his personal
complaint.
24-27. I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days: Your
years are throughout all generations. Of old have You laid the
foundations of the earth: and the heavens are the work of Your hands.
They shall perish, but You shall endure: yes, all of them shall wax old
like a garment; as a vesture shall You change them, and they shall be
changed: but You are the same, and Your years shall have no end. God
always lives on. No decay can happen to Him, nor destruction overtake
Him. O my Soul, rejoice you in the Lord always, since He is always the
same!
28. The children of Your servants shall continue, and their seed shall
be established before You.