DELIVERED ON LORD'S-DAY MORNING, SEPTEMBER 4, 1870,
BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.
"At the end of the days I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up my eyes unto
Heaven, and my understanding returned unto me, and I blessed the Most
High, and I praised and honored Him that lives forever, whose dominion
is an everlasting dominion, and His kingdom is from generation to
generation: and all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as
nothing: and He does according to His will in the army of Heaven, and
among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay His hand, or say
unto Him, What do You?" Daniel 4:34,35.
NO one has ever numbered Nebuchadnezzar with the Prophets, or believed
his language to be inspired. We have before us simply a statement made
by an uninspired man, after passing through the most extraordinary
experience. He had been among the greatest and proudest of men–he
suddenly fell into the condition of a grass-eating ox, by losing his
reason. And upon being restored, he acknowledged publicly the hand of
the Most High. I should not have taken his language as my text if it
had not happened to be, as it is, a most correct and vigorous statement
of sublime doctrines which are clearly stated by the Holy Spirit in
different parts of Scripture.
It is a singular instance of how, when God comes to deal with men in
afflicting Providences, He can make them clearly see many great Truths
concerning Himself, and can constrain them to express their convictions
in identically the same way as they would have done if His own Spirit
had dictated the terms. There are certain parts of the Divine Character
which even the unspiritual man cannot avoid seeing. And after passing
through certain processes of suffering and humiliation, the man is
compelled to add his witness to the testimony of God's Spirit with
regard to the Divine Character.
Every single word that Nebuchadnezzar here utters can be backed up and
supported by undoubtedly inspired words of men sent of God to proclaim
infallible Truth. We shall not, therefore, need to answer the objection
that our text is simply the statement of Nebuchadnezzar–we grant that
it is so–but we shall show as we proceed that Babylon's humbled
monarch herein has spoken most correctly and accurately–and in full
accordance with the testimony of other parts of Scripture.
Before I conduct your minds to a close consideration of the text, I
must make one remark. Many of you will very naturally suppose that the
chapter read during this service, the hymns and the sermon, were all
intended to have reference to a certain great political event reported
in the papers of last night [the surrender of Napoleon to the King of
Prussia]. But please observe that your supposition will be unfounded,
for my text was fixed upon yesterday morning, before any sort of news
had reached me, and the service would have been the same if that event
had not occurred. So that anything strikingly suggestive in the choice
of the passage may be looked upon, if you will, as denoting the
guidance of God's Spirit, but must not be imputed to any intentional
reference on my part.
We will now come first to consider the doctrinal instruction of the
text. Secondly, we would learn the practical teaching of it. And
thirdly, we would exhibit the spirit suitable after the contemplation
of such a subject.
I. First, then, let us turn to the text, and consider THE DOCTRINAL
INSTRUCTION here given to us. We have here plainly stated the doctrine
of the eternal Self-Existence of God. "I blessed the Most High, and I
praised and honored Him that lives forever." If this word needed to be
confirmed we would refer you to the language of John in the Book of the
Revelation where we find him describing, in the fourth chapter, at the
ninth and tenth verses, the living creatures and the four and twenty
elders as giving glory and honor and thanks, "to Him that sat on the
Throne, who lives forever and forever."
Better still, let us hear the witness of our own Redeemer, in the fifth
of John's Gospel, at the twenty-sixth verse, where He declares that,
"the Father has life in Himself." My Brethren, you need not that I
marshal in array a host of confirmative passages, for the eternal
Self-Existence of God is taught throughout the Scriptures, and is
implied in that name which belongs only to the true God, Jehovah, "I Am
that I Am," where, note that it is not "I was," which would imply that
in some measure or respect He had ceased to be.
Nor is it "I will be," which would intimate that He is not now what He
will be, but I AM, the only Being, the root of Existence, the
Immutable, and Eternal One. "We," as a venerable Puritan observes,
"have more of nothing than of being," but it is God's prerogative to
BE. He alone can say, "I am God, and beside Me there is none else." He
declares, "I lift up My hands to Heaven, and say I live forever." He is
the One only underived, Self-Existent, Self-Sustained Being. Let us
know of a surety that the Lord God whom we worship is the only Being
who necessarily and from His own Nature, Exists.
No other being could have been but for His Sovereign will, nor could it
continue were that will suspended. He is the only light of life, all
others are reflections of His beams. There must be God, but there was
no such necessity that there should be any other intelligences. In all
the future God must Be, but the necessity for the continuance of other
spirits lies in His will and not in the very nature of things. There
was a time when the creatures were not. They came from Him as vessels
from the potter's wheel. They all depend upon Him for continuance, as
the streamlet on the fountain from where it flows.
And if it were His will, they all would melt away as the foam upon the
water. That immortality of spirits implied in such passages as Matthew
25:46, "These shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the
righteous into life eternal," is the result of His own resolve to make
spirits whose duration should be eternal. And though He will never
withdraw the endowment of immortality which He has bestowed, yet the
reason for eternal existence is not in the beings, but entirely in
Himself, for essentially, "He only has immortality"–
"He can create and He destroy." All that is, whether material or
intellectual, if so it had pleased God to ordain, might have been as
transient as a sunbeam and have vanished as speedily as the rainbow
from the cloud. If anything now exists of necessity, that necessity
sprang from God, and still depends upon the necessity of Divine Decree.
God is independent–the only being who is so. We must find food with
which to repair the daily wastes of the body. We are dependent upon
light and heat, and innumerable external agencies–and above all we are
primarily dependent upon the outgoings of the Divine power towards us.
But the I AM is Self-Sufficient and All-Sufficient–
"He sits on no precarious throne, Nor borrows leave to be."
He was as glorious before He made the world as He is now. He was as
great, as blessed, as Divine in all His attributes before sun and moon
and stars leaped into existence as He is now. And if He should blot all
out as a man erases the writing of his pen, or as a potter breaks the
vessel he has made, He would be none the less the supreme and
ever-blessed God.
Nothing of God's Being is derived from another, but all that exists is
derived from Him. You hills and mountains, you seas and stars, you men
and angels, you heavens and you Heaven of heavens–you minister nothing
to Him who made you–you all stand up together in existence flowing
from your Creator. God ever lives in this respect, that He undergoes no
sort of change. All His creatures must, from their constitution,
undergo more or less of mutation. Of them all it is decreed, "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."
Our life is made up of changes. From childhood we hasten to youth, from
youth we leap to manhood, from manhood we fade into old age. Our
changes are as many as our days. "The creature" is, indeed, in our
case, "made subject to vanity." Lighter than a feather, more frail than
the flower of the field, brittle as glass, fleeting as a meteor, tossed
to and fro like a ball, and quenched as a spark–"Lord, what is man?"
There comes to us all in the time appointed the great and ultimate
change when the spirit is separated from the body–to be followed by
another in which the divided manhood shall be re-united. But with God
there are no changes of this or any other kind. Has He not declared, "I
am God, I change not"?
God is essentially and evermore pure Spirit, and consequently undergoes
no variableness nor shadow of a turning. Of none of the creatures can
this be said. Immutability is an attribute of God only. The things
created were once new–they are waxing old–they will become older
still. But the Lord has no time, He dwells in eternity. There is no
moment of beginning with the Eternal, no starting point from which to
calculate age. From of old He was the Ancient of Days, "from
everlasting to everlasting You are God."
Let your mind retreat as far as its capacities will allow into the
remote past of old eternity, and there it finds Jehovah alone in the
fullness of His glory. Then let the same thought flash forward into the
far off future, as far as imagination can bear it, and there it beholds
the Eternal, unchanged, unchangeable. He works changes and effects
changes, but He Himself abides the same. Brethren, let us worship Him
with words like these–
"Your throne eternal ages stood, Before seas or stars were made. You
are the Ever-Living God. Were all the nations dead. Eternity with all
its years, Stands present in Your view To You there's nothing old
appears Great God! There's nothing new. Our lives through various
scenes are drawn, And vexed with trifling cares, While Your eternal
thought moves on Your undisturbed affairs."
That He lives forever is the result, not only of His essential and
necessary Self-Existence, of His independence, and of His
unchangeableness, but of the fact that there is no conceivable force
that can ever wound, injure, or destroy Him. If we were profane enough
to imagine the Lord to be vulnerable, yet where is the bow and where
the arrow that could reach Him on His Throne? What javelin shall pierce
Jehovah's buckler? Let all the nations of the earth rise and rage
against God, how shall they reach His Throne? They cannot even shake
His footstool.
If all the angels of Heaven should rebel against the Great King, and
their squadrons should advance in serried ranks to besiege the palace
of the Most High, He has but to will it, and they would wither as
autumn leaves, or consume as the fat upon the altar. Reserved in chains
of darkness, the opponents of His power would forever become mementos
of His wrath. None can touch Him. He is the God that ever lives. Let us
who delight in the living God bow down before Him, and humbly worship
Him as the God in whom we live and move, and have our being.
In our text we next find Nebuchadnezzar asserting the everlasting
dominion of God. He says, "Whose dominion is an everlasting dominion,
and His kingdom is from generation to generation." The God whom we
serve not only exists, but reigns. No other position would become Him
but that of unlimited Sovereign over all His creatures. "The most high
God, possessor of Heaven and earth has prepared His Throne in the
heavens, and His kingdom rules over all." As David said so, we say
also, "Yours O Lord, is the greatness, and the power, and the glory,
and the victory, and the majesty: for all that is in the Heaven and in
the earth is Yours. Yours is the kingdom, O Lord, and You are exalted
as head above all." "The Lord sits upon the flood; yes, the Lord sits
King forever."
The Lord is naturally the Ruler of all, but who shall pretend to rule
over Him? He is not to be judged of man's finite reason for He does
great things which we cannot comprehend. Amazing is the impertinence of
man, when the creature dares to sit in judgment on the Creator! His
Character is not to be impugned or called into question. Only the
boundless arrogance of our pride would so dare to insult the thrice
holy God. "Be still, and know that I am God," is a sufficient reply to
such madness. The Lord's place is on the Throne, and our place is to
obey. It is His to govern, ours to serve–His to do as He wills, and
ours, without questioning, to make that will our constant delight.
Remember, then, that in the universe God is actually reigning.
Never let us conceive of God as being infinitely great, but not
exerting His greatness–infinitely able to reign–but as yet a mere
spectator of events. It is not so. The Lord reigns even now. Though in
one sense we pray, "Your kingdom come," yet in another we say, "Yours
is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever." The
Throne of the universe is not vacant, nor its power in abeyance. God
does not hold a bare title to kingship–He is actually King. The
government is upon His shoulders, the reins of management are in His
hands. Even at this hour He speaks to the sons of men, "See now that I,
even I, am He, and there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive. I
wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of My
hand."
Before your very eyes He has fulfilled His word. (Luke 1:51, 52.)
Events appear to fly at random like the dust in the whirlwind, but it
is not so. The rule of the Omnipotent extends over all things at all
times. Nothing is left to its own chance happening, but in wisdom all
things are governed. Glory be unto the Omnipresent and Invisible Lord
of All!
This Divine kingdom appeared very plainly to the once proud monarch of
Babylon, to be an everlasting one. The reign of the Ever-Living extends
as other kingdoms cannot, "from generation to generation." The
mightiest king inherits power and soon yields his scepter to his
successor. The Lord has no beginning of days nor end of
years–predecessor or successor are words inapplicable to Him. Other
monarchies stand while their power is not subdued, but in an evil hour
a greater power may crush them down. There is no greater power than
God–there is no other power but that which proceeds from God, for,
"God has spoken once; twice have I heard this. That power belongs unto
God." Therefore His monarchy cannot be subdued, and must be
everlasting.
Dynasties have passed away, dying out for lack of heirs, but God the
Ever-Living asks none to succeed Him and to perpetuate His name.
Internal corruptions have often blasted empires which stood aloft like
forest trees, defiant of the storm–at the core the tree was rotten,
and before long, weakened by decay–it tottered to its fall. But the
infinitely Holy God has no injustice, error, partiality, or evil motive
in the government of His affairs–everything is arranged with spotless
holiness, unimpeachable justice, unvarying fidelity, untarnished truth,
amazing mercy, and overflowing love. All the elements of His kingdom
are most conservative, because radically right. There is no evil leaven
in the council chamber of Omniscience, no corruption on the Judgment
Seat of Heaven. Therefore, "His Throne is established in
righteousness." Because His Throne is holy we rejoice that it can never
be moved.
Pause here, dear Hearer, and let your soul's eye behold again this view
of things. God has reigned from the first day, God shall reign when
days are gone. Everywhere He is the reigning God–reigning when Pharaoh
said, "Who is Jehovah, that I should obey Him?" as much as when Miriam
took her timbrel, and said, "Sing unto the Lord, for He has triumphed
gloriously." He was reigning when Scribe and Pharisee, Jew and Roman,
nailed His Only Begotten Son to the Cross, as much as when the angelic
cohorts shouted in triumph, "Lift up your heads, O you gates, and be
you lift up, you everlasting doors, that the King of Glory may come
in."
He is reigning amid all the calamities which sweep the globe as much as
He shall be in the halcyon days of peace. Never is the Throne vacant,
never is the scepter laid aside. Jehovah is always King, and shall be
King forever and forever. Oh, happy subjects, who have such a Throne to
look to! Oh, blessed children, who have such a King to be your Father!
You, as a royal priesthood, may feel your royalties and your
priesthoods both secure for this unconquerable King sits securely on
His Throne. Your monarch has not yielded up His sword to a superior
foe. You have not to search for another leader. In the Person of His
dear Son He walks among our golden candlesticks, and holds our stars in
His right hand. He keeps Israel, and never slumbers nor sleeps.
But we must hasten on. Nebuchadnezzar, humbled before God, uses, in the
third place, extraordinary language with regard to the nothingness of
mankind. "All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing."
This is Nebuchadnezzar, but his words are confirmed by Isaiah, "Behold
the nations are as a drop of a bucket," the unnoticed drop which
remains in the bucket after it has been emptied into the trough, or the
drip which falls from it as it is uplifted from the well–a thing too
inconsiderable to be worthy of notice. "And are counted as the small
dust of the balance." As the dust which falls upon scales, but is not
sufficient to affect the balance in any degree whatever.
"Behold, He takes up the isles as a very little thing." Whole
archipelagos He uplifts as unconsidered trifles. This triple kingdom of
ours He reckons not only to be little, but "a very little thing." The
vast island of Australia, the gems of the Pacific, the nations of the
Southern Ocean, all these He handles as children lift their toys. "All
nations before Him are as nothing. And they are counted to Him less
than nothing, and vanity." So if Nebuchadnezzar goes far, Isaiah,
inspired of the Spirit, goes farther. The one calls the nations
"nothing," and the other "less than nothing," and "vanity."
You will find the passage in the fortieth of Isaiah, at the fifteenth
and seventeenth verses. Now mark the force of each word, "all the
inhabitants of the earth," not some of them only, not the poor ones
among them, but the rich, the kings, the wise, the philosophers, the
priests–all put together–"are as nothing." What an assembly would
there be if all the
nations could be gathered together! An impressive spectacle rises
before my vision! One had need possess an eagle's wing merely to pass
over the mighty congregation. Where could a plain be found which could
contain them all? Yet all of them, says the text, are, "as nothing."
Now, observe they are so in themselves, for concerning all of us who
are gathered here it is certain that there was a time when we were
not–we were then in very deed "nothing." At this very moment, also, if
God wills it, we may cease to be, and so in a step return to nothing.
We are nothing in ourselves, we are only what He chooses to allow us to
be, and when the time comes and it will be a very short time, so far as
this world is concerned, we shall be nothing. All that will remain of
us among the sons of men will be some little hillock in a cemetery or a
country Churchyard, for we shall have no part in anything which is done
under the sun.
Of what account at this day, my Brethren, are all the antediluvian
millions? What are the hosts of Nimrod, of Shishak, of Sennacherib, of
Cyrus? What reeks the world of the myriads who followed the march of
Nebuchadnezzar, who obeyed the beck of Cyrus, who passed away before
the eye of Xerxes? Where are the generations which owned the
sovereignty of Alexander, or the legions which followed and almost
adored the eagles of the Caesars? Alas, even our grandsires, where are
they? Our sons forewarn us that we must die. Have they not been born to
bury us? So pass the generations like the successive series of forest
leaves. And what are they but at their best estate, "altogether
vanity?"
The nations are nothing in comparison with God. As you may place as
many ciphers as you like together, and they all make nothing, so you
may add up as many men, with all their supposed force and wisdom, as
you please, and they are all nothing in comparison with God. He is the
Unit. He stands for All in All, and comprehends all. And all the rest
are but so many valueless ciphers till His Unity makes them of account.
Here let me remind you that every man who is spiritually taught of God
is made to feel experimentally on his own account his own utter
nothingness. When his inner eye, like that of Job, beholds the Lord, he
abhors himself, he shrinks into the earth, he feels he cannot contrast
or compare himself with the Most High even for a single second.
"Great God, how infinite are You! What worthless worms are we!" is the
verse which naturally leaps to the lip of any man who knows himself and
knows his God.
Spiritually, our nothingness is very conspicuous. We were nothing in
our election–"You have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you." "The
children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that
the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but
of Him that calls." "It is not of him that wills, nor of him that runs,
but of God that shows mercy." We were nothing in our redemption. We
contributed nothing to that price which Jesus paid–"I have trod the
winepress alone. And of the people there was none with Me." We are
nothing in our regeneration–can the spiritually dead help the blessed
God to quicken them? "It is the Spirit that quickens, the flesh profits
nothing." "We are His workmanship, created anew in Christ Jesus." We
shall, when we get to Heaven, make it part of our adoration to confess
that we are less than nothing and vanity, but that God is All in All.
Therefore shall we cast our crowns at His feet, and give Him all the
praise forever and ever.
"The inhabitants of the earth are as nothing." It is a wonderful
expression, and you see I do not attempt to expound it or any part of
the text. I rather repeat words of the same meaning with the text by
way of illustration. Before me is a great deep, and who shall fathom
it? I would not darken counsel by words without knowledge. If there
were an ant's nest somewhere in a farmer's estate and suppose he had
ten thousand acres of land. That ant's nest would bear some portion,
though a very small one, to the ten thousand acres of land. It could
not be so strictly said to be as nothing as the whole world can when
compared with God.
This round earth bears a very insignificant proportion to the vast
creation of God, even to that which is revealed to us by the telescope.
And we have reason to believe that all which can be seen with the
telescope–if indeed it is a mass of worlds, and all inhabited–is but
as a pin's prick compared with the city of London, to the far-reaching
universe. If it is so, and your mind were capable of compassing the
entire creation of God, yet it would be only as a drop of a bucket
compared with God Himself who made it all, and could make ten thousand
times ten thousand as much, and then be but at the beginning of His
power.
This world, then, bears no such proportion to the Lord as an ant's nest
to the estate of ten thousand acres. Now if the farmer wishes to till
the soil, it is not at all probable that he will take any cognizance
whatever of that ant's nest in
the arrangement of his affairs. And in all probability will overturn
and destroy it. This proves the insignificance of the emmet, and the
greatness of man as compared with ants. But as it involves a degree of
forgetfulness or overlooking on the farmer's part, the ants are great
enough to be forgotten–but the nations are not great enough even for
that. If it were possible for the farmer to arrange without difficulty
all his plans so that without disturbing his proceedings, every bird,
emmet, and worm should be cared for in his scheme, how great then would
he be compared with the ants!
And this is just the case with the Lord–He so arranges all things that
apparently without effort the government of Providence embraces all
interests, wrongs none, but yields justice to all. Men are so little in
the way of God that He never finds it necessary to perpetrate an
injustice even on a single man, and He has never caused one solitary
creature to suffer one unnecessary pang. Herein is His greatness, that
it comprehends all littleness without a strain–the glory of His wisdom
is as astonishing as the majesty of His power, and the splendors of His
love and of His Grace are as amazing as the terror of His Sovereignty.
He may do what He wills, for none can stop Him. But He never wills to
do in any case anything that is unjust, unholy, unmerciful, or in any
way inconsistent with the perfection of His matchless Character. Here
let us pause, and worship. I at least must do so. For my soul's eyes
ache, as though I had been gazing at the sun.
We turn now to the next sentence, which reveals the Divine power at
work sovereignly. "He does according to His will in the army of Heaven,
and among the inhabitants of the earth." This is easy to understand in
reference to the celestial host, for we know that God's will is done in
Heaven–we devoutly pray that it may yet be done on earth after the
same fashion. The angels find it their Heaven to be obedient to the God
of Heaven. Under the term, "army of Heaven," is comprehended fallen
angels who were once numbered with that band, but were expelled from
Heaven for their rebellion.
Devils unwillingly, but yet of necessity, fulfill the will of God.
"Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did He in Heaven, and in earth, in
the seas, and all deep places." When we read in the text that on earth
God's will is done, we see that it is so in a measure among the
righteous whose renewed hearts seek after God's glory. But the Truth
goes further, for that will is also accomplished in the unrighteous,
and by those who know Him not. Yes, in those whose will is determined
to oppose Him–but in some way unknown to us the will of God is still
achieved (Prov. 19:21; Acts 4:27, 28.)
I can understand a man taking so many pieces of wood and arranging them
just as he pleases, nor can I see any very remarkable skill in so
doing. But the miracle of Divine Glory lies in this–that He has made
men free agents, has endowed them with a will with which He never
interferes except according to the laws of mind. That He leaves them
absolutely free to do what they will, and they will universally of
themselves to do contrary to His will. And yet, such is the magnificent
strategy of Heaven, such is the marvelous force of the Divine mind,
that despite everything, the will of God is done!
Some have supposed that when we believe with David, in Psalm 65, that
God has done whatever He has pleased, we deny free agency, and of
necessity moral responsibility also. No, but we declare that those who
would do so are tinctured with the old captious spirit of him who said,
"Why does He yet find fault, for who has resisted His will?" And our
only answer is that of Paul, "No, but O man, who are you that replies
against God?" Can you understand it, for I cannot– how man is a free
agent, a responsible agent, so that his sin is his own willful sin and
lies with him and never with God– and yet at the same time God's
purposes are fulfilled, and His will is done even by demons and corrupt
men?
I cannot comprehend it, but without hesitation I believe it, and
rejoice to do so. I never hope to comprehend it. I worship a God I
never expect to comprehend. If I could grasp Him in the hollow of my
hand, I could not call Him my God. And if I could understand His
dealings so that I could read them as a child reads his spelling book,
I could not worship Him. But because He is so infinitely great I find
Truth here, Truth there, Truth multiform. And if I cannot compress it
into one system-I know it is all clear to Him–and I am content that He
should know what I know not.
It is mine today to adore and obey–by-and-by when He sees fit I shall
know more and adore better. It is my firm belief that everything in
Heaven, and earth, and Hell will be seen to be, in the long run, parts
of the Divine Plan. Yet never is God the Author or the accomplice of
sin–never is He otherwise than the Hater of sin and the Avenger of
unrighteousness. Sin rests with man, wholly with man, and yet by some
strange overruling force, Godlike and mysterious, like the existence of
God, His supreme will is accomplished. Observe how the two truths
combine in practice, and are stated in the same verse in reference to
our Lord's crucifixion, in Acts 2:23–"Him, being delivered by the
determinate council and foreknowledge of God, you have taken, and by
wicked hands have crucified and slain."
Now, to deny this Truth because we cannot understand it, were to shut
ourselves out of a great deal of important knowledge. Brethren, if God
does not rule everywhere, then something rules where He does not, and
so He is not Omnipresent supreme. If God does not have His will,
someone else does, and so far that someone is a rival to God. I never
deny the free agency of man, or diminish his responsibility, but I dare
never invest the free will of man with Omnipotence, for this were to
make man into a sort of God, an idolatry to be loathed.
Moreover, admit chance anywhere, and you have admitted chance
everywhere, for all events are related and act on one another. One cog
of the wheel of Providence disarranged or left to Satan, or man's
absolute freedom apart from God, would spoil the whole machinery. I
dare not believe even sin itself to be exempt from the control of
Providence, or from the overruling dominion of the Judge of all the
earth. Without Providence we were unhappy beings. Without the
universality of the Divine power, Providence would be imperfect, and in
some points we might be left unprotected and exposed to those evils
which are, by this theory, supposed to be beyond Divine control. Happy
are we that it is true, "the Lord does as He wills in the army of
Heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth."
Let us now consider the fifth part of the text–"None can stay His
hand, or say unto Him, What do you?" I gather from this that God's fiat
is irresistible and unimpeachable. We are told by some annotators that
the original has in it an allusion to a blow given to a child's hand to
make him cease from some forbidden action. None can treat the Lord in
that manner. None can hinder Him, or cause Him to pause. He has might
to do what He wills. So also says Isaiah–"Woe unto him that strives
with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the
earth. Shall the clay say to him that fashions it, What make you? Or
your work, He has no hands?"
Man is powerless, then, to resist the fiat of God. Usually he does not
know God's design, although he blunderingly thinks he does–often in
opposing that apparent design he fulfils the secret design of God
against his will. If man did know God's design, and should set himself
with all his might against it, yet as the chaff cannot resist the wind,
as it is not possible for the wax to resist the fire, so neither can
man effectually resist the absolute will and Sovereign good pleasure of
the Most High. Only here is our comfort–it is right that God should
have this might, because He always uses His might with strictest
rectitude. God cannot will to do anything unjust, ungenerous, unkind,
ungod-like.
No laws bind Him as they bind us, but He is a Law to Himself. There is,
"You shall," and, "You shall not," for me, for you–but who shall put,
"You shall," to God, or who shall say, "You shall not"? Who shall
attempt to be legislator for the King of kings? God is Love. God is
Holiness. God is the Law. God is Love, and doing as He wills, He wills
to love. God is Holy, and doing as He wills, He wills holiness, He
wills Justice, He wills Truth. And though there were raised a thousand
questions as to how is this just? How is that loving? How is that wise?
The one sufficient answer is–
"God is His own interpreter And He will make it plain."
O sons of men, it is not for me to solve the enigmas of the Infinite,
he shall explain Himself. I am not so impertinent as to be His
apologist, He shall clear Himself. I am not called to vindicate His
Character. "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" What folly
to hold up a candle to show the brightness of the sun! How much more
foolish to attempt to defend the thrice holy Jehovah! Let Him speak for
Himself if He will deign to contend with you. If you do but hear His
thunders, how you tremble! When His lightning sets the heavens on fire,
how amazed you are! Stand forth, then, and question Him if you dare.
If you are at sea in a storm, when every timber of your vessel creaks,
when the mast is broken, when the mariners stagger like drunken men,
when overhead is the horrible tempest, and the thundering voice of God
in the tempest, and all around you the howling winds, then cease your
caviling, and cry unto Him in your trouble. Act, then, this day as you
would do in such a case, for you are equally in His hands. (Psalm 99:1,
5; 1OO:3, 4). Thus have I tried to set forth the doctrine of the text.
II. Now, very briefly, consider its PRACTICAL INSTRUCTION. I think the
first lesson is how wise to be at one with Him! As I bowed before the
majesty of this text in my study, I felt within my soul, "Oh, how I
long to be perfectly at one with this infinitely mighty, glorious and
holy God. How can I dare to be His enemy?" I felt then if I had not
yielded before, I must yield now, subdued before Him. I would that any
of you who are not doing His will would give up your hopeless
rebellion. He invites you to come. He might have commanded you to
depart. In His infinite Sovereignty He has appointed Christ Jesus to be
the Savior of men. Come and accept that Savior by faith.
How encouraging this is to those who are at one with God! If He is on
our side, who shall be against us? "The Lord of Hosts is with us, the
God of Jacob is our refuge." We ought to be of the same mind as that
believing woman who, during an earthquake, was observed to be very
happy. Everybody else was afraid–houses were falling, towers were
rocking, but she
smiled. And when they asked her why, she replied, "I am so glad to find
that my God can shake the world. I believed He could, and now I see
that He can."
Be glad that you have One to trust in to whom nothing is impossible,
who can and will achieve His purposes. My heart feels that she would
give Him the power if He had it not, and if it were all mine. I would
leave all power in His hands even if I could remove it. "Great God,
reign You supremely, for there is none like unto You." "The Lord
reigns; let the earth rejoice. Let the multitude of isles be glad
thereof." How joyful this thought ought to be to all holy workers! You
and I have enlisted on the side of God and of His Christ, and, though
the powers against us seem very strong, yet the invincible King will
surely put them to rout before long.
Romanism, idolatry, infidelity–these all appear mighty things. And so
seem those pots fresh from the potter–a child thinks them to be stone.
But when the Lord Jesus smites them with the rod of iron, see how the
potsherds fly! This shall He do before long. He will lift the might of
His terrible arm and bring down His iron rod! Then shall it be seen
that the Truth of God as it is in Jesus must and shall prevail.
How this should help you that suffer! If God does it all, and nothing
happens apart from God, even the wickedness and cruelty of man being
still overruled by Him, you readily may submit. How graciously and with
what good face can you kiss the hand which smites you! The husband is
gone to Heaven, God took him. The property has melted, God has
permitted it. You were robbed, you say–well, think not so much of the
second cause, look to the great first cause. You strike a dog, he bites
the stick. If he were wise, he would look at you who use it.
Do not look at the second cause of the afflictions, look to the great
first cause. It is your God who is in it all, your Father God, the
Infinitely good. Which would you desire to have done on earth, your
will or God's will? If you are wise, you say, "Not my will, but Yours
be done." Then accept the ways of Providence. Since God appoints them,
accept them with grateful praise. Herein is true sacrifice to God when
we can say, "Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him." We have
received good at His hands, and we have blessed Him–heathen men and
publicans might have done that. But if we receive evil and still bless
Him, this is Divine Grace, this is the work of His Holy Spirit!
If we can bow before His crushing strokes, and feel that if the
crushing of us by the weight of His hand will bring Him honor, we are
content. This is true faith. Give us Grace enough, O Lord, never to
fail in our loyalty, but to be Your faithful servants even to
sufferings' bitterest end. Oh, to have the mind thus subjected to God!
Some kick at the doctrine of Divine Sovereignty, but I fear it is
because they have a rebellious, unhumbled spirit. Those who feel
obedient to God cannot have God cried up too much, cannot yield Him too
absolute an authority. Only a rebellious child in a house wishes the
father to be tied by rules and regulations. No, my Father must do
right, let Him do what He wills!
III. What is THE RIGHT SPIRIT in which to contemplate all this? The
first is humble adoration. We do not worship enough, my Brethren. Even
in our public gatherings we do not have enough worship. O worship the
King! Bow your heads now–bow your spirits, rather, and adore Him that
lives forever and ever. Your thoughts, your emotions–these are better
than bullocks and he-goats to be offered on the altar–God will accept
them. Worship Him with lowliest reverence, for you are nothing, and He
is All in All. Next let the spirit of your hearts be that of
unquestioning acquiescence. He wills it! I will do it or I will bear
it. God help you to live in perfect resignation.
Next to that, exercise the spirit of reverent love. Do I tremble before
this God? Then I must seek more Grace that I may love Him as He is. Not
love Him when my thoughts have diminished Him of His splendor, and
robbed Him of His Glory, but love Him even as an absolute Sovereign,
for I see that sovereignty exercised through Jesus Christ, my Shield
and His Anointed. Let me love my God and King, and be a courtier, happy
to be admitted near His Throne, to behold the light of the Infinite
Majesty.
Lastly, let our spirit be that of profound delight. I believe there is
no doctrine to the advanced Christian which contains such a deep sea of
delight as this. The Lord reigns! The Lord is King forever and ever!
Why, then all is well! When you get away from God, you get away from
peace. When the soul dives into Him, and feels that all is in Him, then
she feels a calm delight, a peace like a river, a joy unspeakable.
Strive after that delight this morning, my Beloved, and then go and
express it in your songs of praise.
If you are alone this afternoon, any of you, and not engaged in
service, be sure to bless and magnify your God. Lift up your hearts in
His praise, for "whoso offers praise glorifies God." May the Lord bring
us all, through faith in Jesus Christ, into harmony with this
ever-blessed and ever-living God, and unto Him be praise and glory
forever and forever. Amen.
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Means for Restoring the Banished