The Cedars Of Lebanon

The Cedars Of Lebanon
A SERMON DELIVERED ON SUNDAY MORNING, SEPTEMBER 13, 1863, BY THE REV.
C. H. SPURGEON, AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.
"The trees of the Lord are full of sap. The cedars of Lebanon, which He
has planted." Psalm 104:16.
IF Solomon were here this morning, who spoke of all trees, from the
hyssop on the wall to the cedar that is in Lebanon, he would greatly
instruct us in the natural history of the cedar and, at the same time,
uttering allegories and proverbs of wisdom, he would give us apples of
gold in baskets of silver. But since the Lord Jesus Christ has said,
"Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world," we can
dispense with the company of Solomon. For if Christ is present, behold,
a greater than Solomon is here. Solomon probably would confine his
remarks simply to the physical conformation and botany of the wonderful
tree. But our Lord, I trust, will speak to our hearts this morning
concerning those who are "planted in the courts of the Lord," and
therefore flourish like cedars. May our communications this morn be
blessed to us while we talk of those trees of the Lord, those plants of
His own right hand planting which grow in the garden of the Lord.
I shall have to say some things this morning which are not for
beginners in the Gospel school. I shall have to handle some lofty
matters which belong to the more advanced of the Lord's family. For
Lebanon is a high hill and the ascent is very craggy. The pathway to
the summit is not for the feet of babes–it is rather fit for those
lion-like men, those men of experience–who, by reason of use, have had
their feet made like hind's feet that they may stand on the high
places. Follow me as I may be led of the Spirit to climb that arduous
pathway. Let us stand this morning under the venerable shadow of those
ancient cedars which, to this very day, are the Lord's witnesses and
are as before, full of sap–the cedars of Lebanon, which the Lord has
planted.
There are three things I shall bring before your attention this
morning, in the cedars of Lebanon. First of all, the absence of all
human cultivation. Secondly, the presence of Divine care. And thirdly,
the fullness of vital principle.
You may not see all this at first, but remember that our translation is
not exactly correct. You will observe that the word "sap," is inserted
in italics–it is not there in the Hebrew. "The trees of the Lord are
full," or rather, which gives the meaning clearly, "The trees of the
Lord are satiated–are satisfied–the cedars of Lebanon, which He has
planted."
I. That rendering of the text gives me my first point. We see in yonder
venerable trees, crowning the ridge of the Lebanese range, THE ABSENCE
OF ALL HUMAN CULTIVATION.
1. Note first, that these trees are peculiarly the Lord's trees,
because they owe their planting entirely to Him. "The cedars of
Lebanon, which He has planted." No diligent hands dug the soil, no
careful farmer dropped in the fruitful cone. How those ancient giants
of the grove came there, no tongue can tell. It must be left among the
mysteries. Perhaps the waters of the tremendous deluge washed up the
cones and laid them safely upon the ledge of rock at the top of the
hill, and there they sprouted and grew. That would be but a guess. We
must leave the early planting of those mighty trees among the secrets
which belong unto God. Certain it is that they owe nothing to men, that
there is not a tree of Lebanon of which we may not safely say, "This is
one of the cedars which the Lord has planted."
Beloved, it is quite true of every child of God. The Lord uses
instrumentality, but the instrument has no real power except as God
puts power into it. If we have been converted, we were not converted of
ourselves, of the energy of our own free will. We are not self-planted,
but God-planted. If we have been turned from nature's darkness to
marvelous light, it was not through the oratory or eloquence of the
minister. If so, our religion would be in vain. It was God whose fiat
said, "Let the light be," and light was.
It was He who said, "Let that dried branch be planted in My garden,"
and planted we were–and grow we must– and shall, while He supports
us. The mysterious finger of the Divine Spirit dropped the living seed
into a heart which He had Himself prepared for its reception. And there
it sprang up and continued to grow from the tender shoot until it
towered aloft as a goodly cedar of mighty girth. Every true heir of
Heaven, like the cedar, owns the Great Farmer as His planter.
2. As I look upon those noble trees, I note that they are not dependant
upon man for their watering. Yonder trees in the plain are fertilized
by little canals running at their roots, and therefore are they green.
But these on the top of Lebanon, who shall find a stream for them? Who
shall bring the rivers of water to their feet? How shall the gardener
empty his bucket, that they may drink? No, there they stand on the
lofty rock, not moistened by human irrigation. And yet your heavenly
Father supplies them. The clouds, those wandering cisterns of the sky,
arrested by their branches, hover round them and at last pour down in
deluges the fructifying rain.
Or the ledges of the rock retain the streamlets which trickle from
Lebanon's snowy peaks and then the roots of the cedar drink up the
nourishment which they require. But man has nothing to do with it.
Man's cultivation withers in the plain below. When autumn comes, the
fields are all dry and parched. Man only preserves to himself a little
spot of green by perpetually using the processes of irrigation, but
these cedars owe not a single drop to the power and energy of man.
Well, now, so is it to the Christian who has learned to live by faith.
He can say–
"My trust is in the Lord alone,
My rock and refuge in His Throne;
In all my fears, in all my straits,
My soul on His salvation waits."
He is independent of man, even in temporal things, because he has
learned to trust in his God. He believes the promise–"Your bread shall
be given you and your water shall be sure." And the bread and the water
are sure to him in spirituals. Though he uses the means, though he
loves the pastor after God's own heart, though he loves the pastures
where he feeds and is made to lie down. Yet still he sings, The Lord is
my Shepherd, therefore I shall not want. He leads me beside the still
waters, He makes me to lie down in green pastures." On no priest does
he rely, on no persuasions of eloquent tongues does he depend. For his
full and his continued maintenance he looks to the Lord his God and to
Him alone. The dew of Heaven is his portion and the God of Heaven is
his Fountain. Every Christian, thus, is a tree of the Lord, in His
planting and in His watering.
3. Furthermore, if your eyes look attentively at yonder cedars, you
will see that no mortal might protects them. They are planted on a
mountain ridge no less than six thousand feet above the level of the
sea. The snow frequently lies upon their branches in enormous masses.
They are in the most exposed position conceivable. When the cedars were
as yet but young, the browsing goat might have destroyed them. As they
grew up, the heavy falls of snow must have completely buried the young
trees.
Afterward they were subjected to many dangers. Up there the lightning
is at home. There the callow tempests try their young wings. Lebanon's
towering peaks must be a frequent mark for the thunderbolts of God and
sometimes when the time has come, the voice of the Lord, that makes the
hinds to calve, also rends the cedars of Lebanon and the hoary prince
of the forest bows humbly at the touch of the scepter of his King.
These trees owe nothing–for their preservation from storm, wind and
tempest–to man. There is no hedge set about them. There are no means
used to shore up the limbs as they begin to drop by weight–man does
not even keep the goat from them. They are left there unprotected in
the pitiless storm and terrible blast, and yet the veterans survive.
The cedars of Lebanon have not all fallen even beneath the insatiable
axe of man–still they stand–God's trees, kept and preserved by Him
and by Him alone.
It is precisely the same with the Christian. He is not a hot-house
plant, sheltered from temptation. He does not live in a world of holy
and hallowed influence, preserving him from sin. He stands in the most
exposed position, on yonder bare rock, where winds of mysterious
Satanic influence and dreadful earthquakes of his own doubts and fears
daily try him. Where terrific thunderbolts from God's right hand, the
thunderbolts of desertion and stern affliction all come against him. He
has no shelter, no protection, except this–that the broad wings of the
Eternal God always cover the cedars which he himself has planted.
Oh, it is magnificent to think how the Christian bears up! Weak,
feeble, less than nothing in himself, yet so mighty that all Hell
cannot crush him and the united hosts of the world, the flesh and the
devil, cannot prevail against him. Me-thinks I hear the cedars, as the
trees of the woods clap their hands, shouting aloud–"In all these
things we are more than conquerors," as they remember lightning and
snow and storm. And so with the cedars of the Lord, when tribula- tion
and trial and distress come upon them–"We are more than conquerors
through Him that has loved us." Brethren, forget not that our refuge is
in the Lord alone.
4. Fourthly, as to their inspection–they also preserve a sublime
indifference to human gaze. Perhaps for thousands of years they may not
have been looked upon by human eyes at all. Moses desired to see "that
goodly land and Lebanon." David often saw them and he sang of that
handful of corn whose fruit shall shake like Lebanon. But I cannot find
that the cedars have become a whit more green now that they are visited
by pilgrims, nor, on the other hand, that they lose anything of their
verdure because the evil eyes of man may have glanced upon them.
Solomon spoke of one who was "excellent as the cedars." Sacred to God,
they stand high up in lonely grandeur, indifferent to mortal judgment.
When the virgin snows of Lebanon were untouched by man's polluted foot,
and the Eternal walked in tempest, stepping from crag to crag. Or when
in the cool eventide the Unseen One trod their hallowed aisles, these
trees were God's trees and God's trees alone, stretching out their
broad branches for Him to gaze upon. They were quite content if at high
noon, or in the deep gloom of midnight, the Great Planter in solitary
glory looked down upon them.
It is just so with the Christian. He stands, like the cedars, in a
conspicuous position, but he courts not observation. He is like a city
set upon a hill, yet still consciously he walks before the Lord in the
land of the living. He owes nothing to the smiles of men, and he cares
as little for their frowns. I mean that true Believer who has so grown
in faith that he no longer leans upon an arm of flesh, but understands
how to stand upright. I mean that advanced Christian who has not one
foot upon the sea and the other on the land, but has put both his feet
on the Rock of Ages and lets earth reel if it will, and bids the storms
come and the winds blow, unmoved, possessing a deep calm within,
because he looks to God. This is his joy and his only joy, "You, God
see me, my Father who is in Heaven knows my needs, He looks upon me and
regards me."
Out with the piety which depends upon the public eye! Away, away, away
with the religion that needs to be watched and guarded lest it desert
the standard. I am not to have religion like a dog collar, which I may
slip off and on and feel glad to be rid of it. It must be part and
parcel of my being. My religion must be a thing which lives in the
notice of God, in my closet, and in my secret heart. Mine must be a
religion which I bring into public because I cannot leave it behind. It
must not be the Pharisees' paint and tinsel which he puts on in the
public place and privately laughs at when he gets alone.
Ah, my Brothers and Sisters, we want to be like the cedars, caring only
for God, minding little whether we are praised or blamed by any of
human shape. If you cannot feel it sufficient honor to be known of Him
who sees in secret, you have need to begin to live aright.
5. Nor have we finished here the glorious independence of the cedar. I
would I had a tongue to tell it all out, it is a theme for poet or
bard. We want a Coleridge or a Milton to sing the majesty of those
grand old trees in their solitary glory. Note that their exultation is
all for God and not for man. When the fig tree yields its figs, it may
well say, "Thanks to the cultivator who has taken so much care of me."
When the vine gives up her luscious clusters she has to thank the
vinedresser who has used the pruning knife. When you walk your gardens,
all your plants praise you as well as God, because of your care for
them.
But what say the cedars? Who has planted the cedars, or who has watered
them? Who has pruned them–who has hedged them about and kept them in
the day of storm? The Lord, even the Lord, alone, has been everything
unto the cedars and, therefore, David very sweetly puts it in one of
the last Psalms, "Praise you the Lord, fruitful trees and all cedars."
The cedars have not a green leaf to magnify man with, nor a single cone
with which to make him proud. The cedar's silent song is, "Let Jehovah,
God of Israel, be praised and when we fall, let our split timbers build
a temple to His praise, for unto Him and unto Him alone we grow."
They fell, you know, many of them, beneath the axe of Hiram and floated
on the sea to Joppa. And then again were carried to Jerusalem. But it
was that they might make the holy place and build the pillars of the
temple of God. So, Christians, is it with you. There is nothing in you
that can magnify man. If you understand yourselves aright you give unto
the Lord glory and strength, for your only thanks are due to Him. Your
praise, your gratitude shall ascend to Him who chose you before ever
the earth was. To Him who bought you with His precious blood. To Him
who quickens and preserves you by His Spirit. And when you die, this is
your hope and joy–that you shall be pillars in the temple of your
God and go no more out forever. You are the Lord's trees from first to
last. If you know yourselves aright, the Author and Finisher of your
Faith is your Divine Redeemer.
6. I do not know that there is a cedar upon Lebanon which is not also
independent of man in its expectations. They never expect to be fenced
about and hedged. They never reckon upon being preserved and watered by
man. We have many schemes, but I have heard of none for preserving the
cedars. Speculations are rife every day and one would scarcely be
astonished by a projected railroad to the moon. But yet I have never
heard of anyone who has attempted to purchase the cedars of Lebanon, to
preserve them, or make them his private property.
Arabs and Turks do their best to ruin the whole grove, but yet there
they stand, expecting as little from man as they have ever received
from him, giving him their shadow, yielding him their fragrance, but
getting nothing and expecting nothing from him in return. That is your
example, O Christian. You are to live expecting nothing from man and
you shall never be disappointed. You are to live looking upon the Lord
alone and there again disappointment shall never come. You are to
understand that one of God's objects with you is to knock away every
prop from you, to take away every buttress and to make you lean upon
God alone.
There is the round world, what bears it up? He hangs the world upon
nothing. If you are what you should be you are just like that
earth–you have no visible support–there is nothing upon which you can
depend that the carnal eye can see. But yet as the earth moves not and
falls not from her orbit, so you, by the power of faith, shall be
maintained and kept just where you are. "The young lions do lack and
suffer hunger, but they that wait on the Lord shall not want any good
thing." It is a life's work to learn independence of the creature and
almost another life's work to learn dependence upon the Creator.
To wean us from the breasts of this world is a long and painful
process. To get us clean rid of that walking by sight, which is the
disease of man, and to bring us to walk by faith in the Spirit, which
is the glory of a Christian–this is a work well worthy of a God–and
blessed is the man who has this work to a great extent accomplished in
himself. I do feel, Brothers and Sisters, more and more that my soul
must wait only upon the Lord, and that my expectation must be from Him
alone. You, too, must come here and learn that the Lord will provide,
but it is only in the mountain of the Lord that this sweet Truth of God
can be seen.
II. Now for the next point. The cedars of Lebanon are a GLORIOUS
DISPLAY OF DIVINE CARE.
1. First, in the abundance of their supply. No river, as I have
observed, rolls at their feet. No canals keep their leaf from
withering–man uses no labor and employs no skill to irrigate the
steeps of Lebanon–and yet do the cedars need anything? Look at them!
Stand under their shadow and see if they want any good thing. The text
tells us, that so far from wanting, they are saturated–"The trees of
the Lord are full." Man's trees may sometimes be ready to perish for
lack of moisture. They may be frostbitten and their shoots may be
nipped– but the trees of the Lord are full–there is never any want
there. There is no want to them that fear Him.
Dear Friends, those Believers who have learned most to live by faith
possess the richest part of the land of promise. Other Believers live
in the land of Egypt and are often making bricks without straw. But
these dwell in the land which flows with milk and honey. They have
passed the wilderness, and having believed, they have entered into
rest. The lot of the truly full grown Believer who stays himself upon
his God alone, is well set forth in the promise, "His soul shall dwell
at ease and his seed shall inherit the earth."
He has his troubles, but faith makes them light. He has his wants, but
faith never permits him to call them wants, for they are always
supplied before the necessity begins to pinch him. Other men may, with
all their watching and wisdom, come to nothing. They may rise up early
and sit up late and eat the bread of carefulness and yet be poor. But
they who stay upon God in temporals and spirituals, if Heaven should
shake, and if the pillars of the earth should be moved and the sea
should be dried up, yet their place of defense shall be munitions of
rocks. "Their bread shall be given them and their water shall be sure."
See this on a large scale in the case of our dear brother Muller's
institution at Bristol. We often see institutions sending out fresh
begging appeals–there is some new claim upon their funds. The
Lancashire distress has turned aside very much contributions from this
object and that society. Of course it is so–these societies usually
lean on man and rest upon an arm of flesh. But our Bristol Brother, by
prayer and faith makes known his wants unto God and when does he lack
any good thing? When needs he issue a begging appeal? Verily, I do
believe that if all England were in famine, the orphan house at Bristol
would have sufficient supplies. Whatever may happen, the Lord has
promised to hear prayer, and He will honor faith–the cedars of Lebanon
shall be full if all the trees of the plain be famished.
I would to God we could exhibit still more and more of the same
principle of faith in the conduct of our college. And in that case,
too, I am persuaded that whatever may occur and whatever may happen, as
that is God's work, it never can lack. My confidence in that matter is
in my God. I am glad that so many of the Lord's people are made the
instruments to supply the wants of the college, but still I look far
higher. Sometimes when friends say, "Mention it to the people," I do
not like to do it, lest I should lean too much on you. God's own work
shall be carried on by God's own means. And I am sure He will send what
it requires and in a way which shall be for the glory of His name. They
are happy–I am a witness that they are–Brothers and Sisters, they are
well supplied, who, like the cedars, exhibit Divine cultivation and
independence of man.
2. Again, note concerning these cedars that they are not only well
supplied, but they are always green. Other trees refreshed with rivers,
if they have the whole Nile at their roots, must drop their leaves once
every year at the command of winter–and then they stretch out their
bare limbs, as if they prayed for the return of spring. The oaks of
Bashan languish, the fig tree casts her leaves, the ash and the elm are
ashamed, but you, O cedar, you live in perpetual spring! The green
lawns of your horizontal branches fail not even in the year of drought.
The birds always sing in her branches, and the storks make their nests
in due season among her boughs. Dear Brothers and Sisters, it is so
with the man who lives upon Christ alone. He has not the changes of
other men. He has his trials, but he sings through them. The reason why
many of us sink so low in spirit and hang our harps on the willows, is
only this–want of faith. But if–
"Our faith is in the Lord alone, Our rock and refuge is His Throne," so
that we can say with Habakkuk, "Though the fig tree shall not blossom,"
and so on, "yet will I rejoice in the Lord." Let our faith be vigorous
and unstaggering, let us be planted up there where God has put us–on
the rocky side of Lebanon–in the midst of all kinds of difficulties
and dangers, yet our leaf shall be always green and we shall not know
when drought comes.
3. Observe the grandeur and size of these trees. I have found upon
reference to Mr. Thompson's work, "The Laud and the Book," that several
of the trees measure forty-one feet in girth, so that they are real
giants of the forest. Think of it and admire–never watered by man,
never cared for by him–depending upon God and upon God alone–and yet
they have grown to the height of one hundred feet and forty feet in
girth! Ah, and what magnificent Christians those are who come to rest
upon God alone. You think, perhaps, that they, having so little supply
from second causes, would be feeble!
But, dear Brothers and Sisters, it is often that supply from beneath
which makes us feeble. I believe it is our riches which make us poor
and our strength which makes us weak, for when I am weak then am I
strong. When I am brought down to feel that all the creatures put
together could not help me the turn of a penny, when I know that all my
power and wisdom and strength is not worth so much as a rusty nail, if
I put it altogether and strain it to the utmost, O then it is so
blessed to get a grip of God–to strike one's root down to the heart of
the Rock of Ages and to rest alone on Him!
The best Christians, the most splendid specimens of Divine husbandry
are those who are most delivered from confidence in the creature. You
shall read all biographies and you shall find in proportion as men
become little in self, and little in creature love and creature trust,
they become great and mighty in their doings for the Lord.
4. Note next, the fragrance of these venerable trees. Hosea speaks of
the smell of Lebanon and we know that cedar wood was among the aromatic
substances burned upon the altar of the sanctuary. Travelers tell us
that when they stand under the cedars of Lebanon the smell is most
delightful, the fragrant cedar wood perfumes all the air. Now few of
men's trees do that. Some of them do. The citron and the orange and
lemon load the air with sweets, but many others, cultivate them as we
may, and nurture with the greatest care, never can or will perfume the
air. How sweetly do God's trees sweeten all about them!
If your piety comes from God and if you wait in spirit upon God and
lean only upon Him, there will be about you such a sweet fragrance that
you shall be acceptable unto God in Christ Jesus and acceptable to your
Brothers and Sisters, and even an ungodly world shall perceive that
there is in you the smell of a field that the Lord has blessed. No man
will yield so delightful a perfume as the man who is much with Christ.
The scented piece of clay declared that it owed its per- fume to
sleeping with a rose–and if we have learned to rest upon the bosom of
the Savior, if we have taught our soul to say, "My soul, wait only upon
God, for my expectation is from Him"–our companionship and confidence
in God will yield a sweet fragrance both to our words, to our actions,
and to everything to which we set our hands.
5. Attentively think upon the perpetuity of these cedars. Do you
remember how carnal men said, concerning certain works of faith which
we ourselves attempted, "Ah, well, it may be all very well, it will
last for a time, it is a sort of spurt of enthusiasm. It will last for
a time and then die out like the wick of a candle." Societies that are
blessed with patrons, vice-presidents, secretaries, directors,
subscribers and that use flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, dulcimer and
all kinds of music–those will get on. There is something to look at
there. There is something tangible.
But a scheme which lives only upon God! The business man says, "I do
not see it. I look at the pounds, shillings and pence. I have not
learned to look at things unseen, I cannot confide in these visionary
ideas." Now, every year somebody has said, "Muller, of Bristol, will
come to nothing, Mr. So-and-So has died, that old gentleman who used to
give him two thousand pounds and three thousand pounds a year. Now he
is dead, now it will come to an end and cannot keep on." After his
death somebody else was going to die, and that somebody died, but the
orphans were still fed and housed. Even at this moment, the men of
sight are prophesying evil against that marvel of faith in the same way
they might tremble for the cedars and talk thus.
Now, here are these cedars of God upon the top of Lebanon, with nobody
to take care of them, they will surely be destroyed. What? No society
pledged to guarantee their preservation! Why, there will not be one of
them left in three weeks. They will be cut down for the sake of their
timber, or carried off piecemeal by tourists. Ah, but my dear Brothers
and Sisters, there are some of those cedars that can be reckoned to be
at the very least three thousand five hundred years old and some of
them are doubtless older. And we cannot, of course, except by cutting
them down, discover their precise age by counting the rings.
But there they stand and have stood all those hundreds and thousands of
years with no ranger of the forest to look after them–just God Himself
to be the Farmer and Keeper of them all! Depend upon it, Christian, if
you rest upon God, your simple faith is a principle which you may use,
not only for ten or twenty years, but all your threescore years and
ten! It serves you in your youth to be your joy–it shall serve you in
your old age to be your staff. If you could outlive Methuselah, yet
still you should find that God would keep the cedars full and preserve
you among them safely even to the end.
6. I conclude this head by noticing that these cedars are very
venerable. A traveler declares that often as he has stayed beneath
their shadow, he has never done so without feeling a solemn awe. Mr.
Thompson has slept under their shade on one or two occasions, and as he
has looked up and seen the stars and sometimes climbed up the cedars
and marked how they spread out all their branches horizontally, making
a series of green lawns one above another, he says he has never gazed
upon them without feeling there was something holy in the spot.
The mountain tribes treat them with superstitious reverence, calling
them saints and giving to each a name. They command, for their
antiquity and glory, the veneration of man. Scarcely could even the
brute pass them, one would think, without looking up with something of
respect. It is most evidently so with the Christian who lives wholly
upon God. Your common sort of Christians who have very little faith and
live by feelings–your ordinary sort of Christians who live half by
faith and half by works–mere professors who have never entered into
the secret place of the tabernacle of the Most High and think all I am
talking about to be mere mysticism.
These, I say, who do not understand the word "faith" to be so broad
that it encompasses the whole of human life, so deep that it penetrates
to the depths of the heart and yet so high that hope cannot desire
anything greater than faith can give–these who have not learned faith
fully, have no respect from among men–but those who can act upon the
supernatural principle of depending upon God, sooner or later will get
the respect even of the most careless. The day is coming when these
cedars of God shall be honored in the eyes of the most ungodly–in that
great day when the wicked shall rise to shame and everlasting contempt,
then these cedars of God shall have their time of honor and the whole
world shall know them to be plants of the Lord's right-hand planting.
I leave this point. I would, dear Friends, that you and I knew more and
more what it was to live upon the Lord alone. I believe it is the
safest way of life and I am certain it is the happiest. Let the cedar's
lot be my lot, let me have my God to be my sole stay and my support and
I shall be rich to all the intents of bliss.
III. Now for the third and last point. Taking the text as it stands and
reading it, "The trees of the Lord are full of sap," which, although it
is not in the original, is not, after all, a violence to it. It is not
a literal translation, but still it is a free translation that does not
violate the sense of the Hebrew. Taking our version, I get my third
particular, FULLNESS OF LIVING PRINCIPLE.
1. "The trees of the Lord are full of sap," of which, I shall notice
first, that this is vitally necessary. Without sap, the cedar is no
tree, it becomes a dead post and nothing more. Sap is needful to make
it flourish and exist. Without the life of God in the heart, a man is
no Christian. He may attend His Church twice every Sunday, or he may go
to Chapel. He may read his Bible regularly and have family prayers in
his house. He may subscribe his guineas to all sorts of societies. He
may be very kind to the poor. He may be one whose outward life and
conversation are quite beyond rebuke and yet, unless he has been born
again and has been made a partaker of the mysterious Spirit of the
living God, he is not one of the Lord's trees.
Vitality is essential to a Christian. We call not dead ones, sons, and
if you have not been quickened, you cannot be children of God. It is
not likely that Christ is married to a dead corpse. And if you have not
been quickened by Divine Grace, you are not His bride, nor even a
member of His family. The body always ejects dead substances. With
great pain and difficulty, a decayed bone is pushed out from the flesh,
through an ulcer, perhaps–but out it must come. Even so, there are no
dead members of Christ's body. Painfully would the body strive to eject
such a member. There must be life– a vital principle infused into us
by God the Holy Spirit. The trees of the Lord are, without exception,
full of sap.
2. Next, essentially mysterious. I do not understand the sap–I suppose
the botanist may. The sap is the blood of the tree and in the tree
there is a circulation very much like the circulation of the blood
through our veins and heart. But who understands the circulation of the
blood–it is a great mystery–by what force it rises and by what power
it descends again? Who shall tell how that river of life is guided? It
is a Divine mystery. So is it with the Life within us–it is a greater
mystery still. You may discover the sea and understand it, but never
the Life of God in a Christian.
This is God Himself in a Christian, God infused into the Christian's
soul as a Divine principle. How shall I set this forth? Regeneration is
the Holy Spirit coming into a man and becoming that man's Life. And the
Life in a Believer afterward feeds upon the flesh and blood of
Christ–like sustaining like–Divine Life being sustained by Divine
food. Do you know anything about this mystery? "The wind blows where it
lists and you hear the sound thereof, but cannot tell where it comes
and where it goes: so is everyone that is born of the Spirit." Everyone
who is a tree of the Lord must be full of this essential mystery–"The
trees of the Lord are full of sap."
3. Thirdly, it is radically secret. Note that. Who knows how the roots
get their sap? They go searching through the soil with their little
roots, looking after that food which is exactly suitable to the
constitution of the tree. But how they transmute the mineral into the
vegetable, how they suck out the various gasses, or draw out the
particles they need, who can tell? Now our root is Christ, our life is
hid in Him. This is the secret of the Lord. The root of the Christian
is as secret as the life itself. Who can comprehend the mystery of the
life within the Believer? The root of that life, that vital union with
Christ, that reception of Divine Grace–of his very soul out of the
wounds of the Savior–who shall explain this? Only this we must say,
however Divine Grace flows there from Jesus, it must be there and it
must come from Christ–for all the trees of the Lord are full of sap.
4. Then, again, it is permanently active. In the Christian the Divine
Life is always active–not in fruit-bearing, but in some operation
within. The sap in the cedar never lies still. The sap in common trees
is still in the winter, and if you cut a tree in the early spring, as I
unfortunately did, then the sap comes streaming down in great white
streams from the wound you have made, because the sap has begun to
flow. The tree should be cut at some other period of the year–but the
cedar always has its sap active. Perforate it when you may, a gum
begins to exude at all times. So is it with the Christian.
His Divine Graces, are not all of them in activity, but the Life is
always in activity. My hand is not always moving, but my blood is. I am
not always working for God, but my heart is always living upon God. The
essential Life of the Christian never dies–never ceases from being in
active operation. There is a seed in him which cannot sin, because it
is born of God, but which must still go towards holiness, because it
comes from God. I do not understand this permanent activity, but still,
I know it is in everyone of you, if you are Christians, for "the trees
of the Lord are full of sap."
5. I shall almost have finished when I notice, in the next place, that
it is externally operative. A traveler tells us that in the wood, the
bark, and even the cones of the cedar there is an abundance of resin.
They are saturated with it so that he says he can scarcely touch one of
the cedars of Lebanon without having the turpentine or resin of them
upon his hands. That is always the way with a truly healthy
Christian–his Divine Grace is externally manifested. There is the
inner Life within, it is active, and by-and-by, when it is in a right
state, it saturates everything. You talk with the gracious man, he
cannot help talking about Christ. You go into his house, you will soon
see that a Christian lives there.
You notice his actions and you will see he has been with Jesus. He is
so full of sap that the sap must come out. He has so much of the Divine
Life within, that the holy oil and Divine balsam must flow from him. I
am afraid this cannot be said of all of us. It is because we get to be
dependent upon man and not on God, and therefore have little of this
sap. But if we are independent of man and live wholly upon God, we
shall be so full of sap that every part of us will betray our piety.
6. And then let me say lastly, that this sap is abundantly to be
desired. Oh, when I think what glory a full grown Christian brings to
God, what honor the faith of a Believer puts upon Jesus! When I think
what a knowledge of God and Divine things an advanced Believer
possesses, when I contemplate his joy and peace of mind–I could wish
that everyone of you, (though it is well to be hyssops on God's
wall)–could be cedars upon God's Lebanon! Oh that we would grow in
Grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!
There is something of the sap in us, let us pray for more. We live upon
Christ. If our hearts do not awfully deceive us, you and I can say–
"On Christ the solid Rock I stand, All other ground is sinking sand."
The Lord knows our hearts and He Himself knows that we can say as Peter
did, "Lord, You know all things: You know that I love You." But oh, is
there one among you that is content with himself? I am not–I am
ashamed of myself– forgetting the things that are behind, I would
press forward to that which is before. Not as though I had already
obtained, either were already perfect. Ah, Brothers and Sisters, there
is such a height of glorious independence of man and a confident
dependence upon God! And there is such a blessed internal joy and
peace, such a Divine fullness of sap which we may yet have that I pray
none of you rest till you obtain it to the praise and the glory of His
Grace, who has made you accepted in the Beloved.
Sinner, that which I have been holding up as the strength and beauty of
a Christian, must be Life to you. Come, every man, and trust in the
Lord, for if you trust in Him, you shall never be confounded. The Lord
add now a blessing upon you, for Christ's sake. Amen.