The Wide-open Mouth Filled

The Wide-open Mouth Filled

(No. 2879)

A SERMON PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, APRIL 14, 1904.

DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE PASTOR'S COLLEGE CONFERENCE, ON FRIDAY MORNING, APRIL 7, 1876.

"I am the Lord your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt:
open your mouth wide, and I will fill it." Psalm 81:10.

You have, no doubt, met with various interpretations of this
metaphor–"Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it." You will find
that several expositors say that there is an allusion, here, to a
custom which is said to have been observed by the late Shah of Persia,
who, being greatly pleased with one of his courtiers, made him open his
mouth and then began to fill it with diamonds, pearls, rubies and
emeralds. I shall expect that, under such circumstances, the courtier
would open his mouth very wide indeed!

Well, you may use that incident as an illustration, if you like and,
certainly, the spiritual blessings which God gives to His children are
far more precious than pearls, diamonds and rubies–and there is every
inducement for you to open your mouth to receive such treasure as He is
waiting and willing to give you! But I do not feel sure that the Holy
Spirit intended the Psalmist to allude to any such custom as this. It
is too expensive an operation to be very frequently performed and it
strikes me that even such semi-maniacs as Shahs and Sultans usually
are, would not be likely to often attempt such a feat as that. In
default of a more suitable illustration, it might be used, but it does
not appear to me to be in accordance with the chaste and natural tone
of the Word of God.

Another illustration of the text may be found in a custom which is much
more common in the East. At Oriental feasts, when the head of the
household wishes to select the best part of the meat for an honored
guest, he usually chooses the fattest portion he can find, as the
Oriental mind conceives just what we would not conceive, namely, that a
mass of fat, all dripping with grease, is the most delicious morsel
that can possibly be given to a guest. So the host searches for the
fattest piece of meat in the dish, takes it in his hand and puts it
deliberately into the mouth of the principal guest, bidding him open
his mouth wide that he may receive it. This seems a revolting practice
to us, but it was evidently the custom then, as it still is in the
East. Thus we have David saying, "My soul shall be satisfied as with
marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise you with joyful lips"–as
if the lips sucked it with delight even while the fat was still upon
them.

But I am inclined to look for quite another explanation of the text,
though admitting that the second one is probably that upon which the
Psalmist was thinking when he wrote these words. One springtime I
discovered a bird's nest, in which there were a number of little birds.
They were not fledged enough to fly and their judgments were not well
developed and, therefore, they mistook me for their mother or father. I
would not touch them, but I held my fingers over them and they opened
their mouths wide–no, the little creatures seemed to me as if they
were all mouth! I could not see any other part of their bodies–all
seemed lost in one great vacuum. If you have ever seen the mother bird
come to the nest with a worm in its mouth, you have noticed that, in an
instant, all her little ones are up and eager to swallow that worm. She
can only fill the mouth of one and she can scarcely do that, for, no
sooner has it swallowed what she gives it than it begins to gape again!

So the parent birds have to keep flying very fast, all day long,
collecting food for their family but, however many times they come,
they never have to use the exhortation of our text! The little birds in
their nests are far more sensible than we are. When God hovers over us
with His wide-spread wings and covers us with His warm feathers, He has
need to

say to each one of us, "Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it." But
the little birds take good care, without any teaching, to open their
mouths wide that their mothers may fill them. This illustration may
occur again during the sermon, for, whether it is the one to which the
Psalmist alludes, or not, it is a very useful one and is full of
instruction. It also has the further advantage that it does not
appertain to either the East or the West and, as this blessed Book is
neither for East nor West, alone, but for both, I like to find an
illustration which, in all times and in every clime, may open up the
meaning of the Word. "Open your mouth," then, as a bird opens its mouth
when the mother bird returns with its food, and He who, in the
infinitude of His condescension, likens Himself to birds, says, "I will
fill it."

Let us imitate the Inspired teachers in using things in Nature to
illustrate the meaning of the messages they have to deliver. Look from
our Lord Jesus Christ, the Prince of Preachers, through the long line
of Prophets, to Evangelists and Apostles, and you will see that they
did not utter the Truth of God with their eyes closed, but, with large
sympathy, they looked abroad upon the whole range of creation, both
animate and inanimate, and yoked every creature to the chariot of
Truth, if, by any means, through the use of simile, metaphor and
illustration, they might enable the Divine message to ride triumphantly
into the hearts of the people!

If any of us are to succeed in teaching either few or many, we must
imitate these masters of the art. God has given the preacher eyes as
well as a tongue–yes, two eyes to one tongue–and he must take care to
observe all that can be seen and to make abundant use of his
observation. Otherwise he will find his speech prove to be, as
Shakespeare says, "stale, flat, and unprofitable." The true teacher
should not seek to soar on the gaudy wings of brilliant oratory,
pouring forth sonorous polished sentences in rhythmic harmony, but
should endeavor to speak pointed Truths of God–things that will strike
and stick–thoughts that will be remembered and recalled, again and
again, when the hearer is far away from the place of worship where he
listened to the preacher's words.

The text naturally divides itself into three parts. First, there is the
exhortation–"Open your mouth wide." Secondly, there is the promise–"I
will fill it." And thirdly, there is the encouragement contained in the
name by which God speaks of Himself–"I am Jehovah your God, which
brought you out of the land of Egypt."

I. First, then, Brothers, here is THE EXHORTATION–"Open your mouth
wide."

What does that expression mean? Well, I should have to open my mouth
very wide, indeed, if I were to explain all it means. You probably will
know, by putting it in practice, better than by any explanation that I
can give you, but, certainly, first of all, I should say that it means
that there should be a greater sense of your need. The wide-open mouth
means that you hunger. The little birds need no instruction in opening
their mouths except the inward monitor. They feel a lack of food–they
are growing, and growing fast, and feathers have to be made–and they
need much food and those strong needs of theirs make them open their
mouths by instinct, as we say. Brothers, if we had more sense of our
need, prayer would be more of an instinct with us–we would pray
because we could not help praying! We would pray, perhaps, less
methodically, but we would pray, probably more truly, if we prayed
because there were groans within us caused by intense pain and moaning
that came out of inward agony and longings that came out of the
consciousness of our dire necessities. Surely, this kind of opening of
the mouth, by the sense of our need, ought to be easy to us, for our
needs are very great. I must not say that they are infinite, for we are
only finite beings, but they are so vast that only Infinity can ever
supply them! What is there that you do notneed, my Brother? Someone
said in prayer, the other day, that we were "a bag of needs." That was
a very accurate description. Are we all conscious of our many needs?

Dear Brother, are you growing conscious of your own power? If so, pray
against it with all your might! A much better thing is to become
conscious of your own weakness. You will not open your mouth wide if
you do not realize how weak you are. If you feel that you are strong,
you will cease to cry to God for strength. Are you getting proud of
your experience of Divine things? Strive to hurl that pride down, for
you will be no wiser than a wild ass's colt if you rely on your own
experience. Do you feel that you have now attained to a very high
degree of Grace? You have certainly not attained it if you think you
have! If you are still conscious of your own shortcomings, you are
probably far ahead of your own belief–but if you are conscious of your
attainments, you are far behind those attainments, rest assured of
that.

I do solemnly believe, Brothers, that it is as good a test of a man's
spiritual riches as can be found, namely, his own sense of his
spiritual poverty. Oh, get less and less in your own esteem! Grow
poorer and poorer, weaker and yet weaker–become, in yourselves,
nothing and less than nothing! This is a grand way of opening the mouth
because our needs, when they are truly felt, are really prayers, for
prayers are merely the expression of the needs of our heart. And if, to
the

consciousness of our need, there is added the knowledge that God can
supply that need, we have, at any rate, the basis of all true prayer.
Oh, for a great sense of our spiritual poverty! Oh, for an awful vacuum
within the soul, a consciousness most truly felt that there is room for
God! Oh, for a deep chasm to yawn within one's nature, which only
Christ, Himself, can fill!

The next way of opening the mouth will be to increase the vehemence of
desire. How did the Psalmist do this? He said, "I opened my mouth and
panted." This is what we need to do, to get such vehement desires after
good things that we cannot take a negative answer to our petitions. We
know that what we ask is for God's Glory and our own good and,
therefore, we are not going to ask as men who may be put off, but our
resolve is like that of Jacob at Jabbok–

"With You all night I mean to stay,

And wrestle till the break of day." We cry, with good John Newton–

"No–I must maintain my hold,

'Tis Your goodness makes me bold.

I can no denial take,

When I plead for Jesus' sake."

Those prayers speed best that are most full of holy vehemence. There is
an evil kind of vehemence which we must get rid of. I am not sure that
all the expressions we sometimes hear in prayer are right–there is no
need for us to seem to fight with God at the Mercy Seat. I feel,
sometimes, a sort of shivering when I hear Brothers make a great noise
in prayer without any evidence of corresponding earnestness deep down
in their soul. Yet I know that our Lord Jesus said, "The Kingdom of
Heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force." If you want
to have great things of God, you must want them terribly! You must get
to want them more and more. Your sense of want must keep on growing.
You know also that our Lord Jesus said, "Blessed are they which do
hunger and thirst"–hunger is bad enough and thirst is awful, but
hunger and thirst combined bring a man to the verge of death–yet Jesus
says, "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness:
for"–Christ's promise is parallel to the text before us–"they shall
be filled." Get that blessed hunger and thirst, Brothers! When you
cannot live without conversions, you shall have conversions! When you
must have them, you shall have them! May the Lord drive that "must"
into us all! May He urge us on with a passionate desire to resolve that
we will know the reason why if souls are not converted to God!

Another way of opening the mouth is to ask for greater capacity. If you
have ever fed a lot of little birds–no doubt my friend, Archibald
Brown, has often done it–with pieces of egg. If you have some very
small pieces, you drop them into the smaller mouths, but if you have a
large piece of egg, where does it go? Into the biggest mouth you can
find! You seem to feel, "That little bird cannot have a large piece
because he has only a tiny mouth. But here is one whose mouth yawns
like the crater of a small volcano!" So you drop into his mouth a
larger piece and I have no doubt the mother birds exercise a good deal
of discretion in feeding their young. They do not give the large worms
to the little birds, but they drop the large ones into the large mouths
and, in like manner, if we get large capacities, we shall receive large
blessings.

What a wonderful difference there is in the capacity of different
individuals! I have heard it said that a sinner sucks in happiness,
such as it is, with the mouth of an insect, but that a Believer drinks
in bliss with the mouth of an angel–and it is so. The stream of mercy
seems to run right over some men because there is no place for it to
run in. It runs into others in driblets because there is only a little
hole into which it can drip. But when the mouth is opened wide to
receive the blessing of the Lord, how capacious it is! I should like,
spiritually, to have my mouth like that of Behemoth, of which the Lord
said to Job, "he trusts that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth." Oh,
for a mouth of such mighty capacity as to be capable of receiving a far
greater blessing than we have ever yet received!

Dear Brothers, we are not straitened in God. If we are straitened at
all, it is in ourselves. No wise man will try to put a gallon of any
liquid into a quart pot. You cannot expect to put a bushel of anything
into a peck measure. "Be you therefore enlarged," is still the message
we need to hear–and one part of that enlargement must consist in the
enlargement of the mouth in prayer and in holy vehemence! God grant to
all of us far greater capacity! What little men we all are! We
sometimes call one another great and perhaps fancy that we are. I
wonder what our Heavenly Father thinks of us? We see our little
children, one of them three years old and another only two, and another
only a month or two–they think the baby is a very little thing and
that they themselves are ever so big–and they talk of their big
brother who is only four or five years old! It is very much like that
with us! There is not much more difference between the greatest and

the least of us than between those children. So, if we can, we must
grow–grow at the mouth and grow all over. We need to have greater
Grace given to us, but the Lord will not give us great blessings until
we are able to bear them. You remember how He said to His disciples, "I
have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now"? And
He might say to us, "I have yet many things to give to you, but you
cannot bear them at present." If God were now to give to any man all
the blessings that He means to bestow upon him in a few years' time, it
would ruin him! When God has given us any success, it is a great
addition to the mercy if He has first fitted us to bear it. Some of us
can recollect Brothers taken almost straight from the miners' pit and
elevated suddenly into a position of great popularity with no training
for the ministry–no persecution, no criticism from the public press
and no unkind remarks from Christian men–and we remember with sorrow
how they failed. So, if you, while you are young men, have to run the
gauntlet of a good deal of trial, difficulty, opposition and failures,
you ought to thank God for it! You are now being made ready to receive
the blessing for which you were not fit before. The Lord is increasing
your capacity and when the capacity is sufficient, He will fill it.

Next, dear Brothers, I feel that the text must mean seek for greater
blessings than any that you have yet received. You have opened your
mouth and you have received something. Possibly you think that you have
received a great deal. But the Lord "is able to do exceeding abundantly
above all that we ask or think." I have heard people say in prayer,
"You are able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or
think." Well, I suppose that is true, but that is not what Paul was
Inspired to write. We can ask and can think a great deal, but Paul says
that God is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we actually
doask or think! Well, then, as this is the case, will we not ask for
greater things than we have ever asked for before? It is a singular
fact that the certainty of obtaining is in proportion to the largeness
of what you ask. Some men go to God and ask only for temporal favors
and, possibly, they do not obtain them. He who would be content with
this world will probably never get it–but he who craves spiritual good
may ask with the absolute certainty of receiving it! Christ's promise
is, "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock,
and it shall be opened unto you." If you ask only for temporal mercies
and can be satisfied with them, you may get what you ask. There are
gushing springs from which you might drink if you would, but the muddy
waters of Sihor are evidently good enough for you.

But if you ask the Lord for spiritualblessings, He is sure to give them
to you. It is more natural for God to give great things than little
things–they are more in His line–more in His way. You know that
certain men have certain ways. There are men whom you can get to do
anything if it is in their way, but they will not act in another way.
Well, now, the Lord's ways are as high above our ways as the heavens
are above the earth! Yet David knew what God's ways were, for he said,
"Then will I teach transgressors Your ways." One of the ways of God is
to do great things for His people. Some of them sang, "The Lord has
done great things for us; whereof we are glad." So you are more sure of
getting blessings from God if you ask Him for great things–therefore
be sure to ask for very great things! When you do get to the Mercy
Seat, do not begin asking for littles and go home with trifles, but ask
for as big things as ever your soul can desire and as big things as the
promises of God cover! There you have a task before you that will tax
your greatest powers, but give your heart and soul to it and you will
find it to be a very pleasant and profitable one!

Ask great things for yourselves, Brothers. Ask to know all the Truth of
God. Ask to know the fullness of God. Ask to know the riches of His
Grace. Ask to know "the love of Christ, which passes knowledge." And
when you have asked for all that, ask for holiness–and do not ask for
anything less than perfectholiness. Continue to open your mouth wide
that every Grace may be given to you, adding "to your faith, virtue,
and to virtue, knowledge, and to knowledge, temperance, and to
temperance, patience, and to patience, godliness, and to godliness,
brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness, love." And do not rest
satisfied until you have all these Christian virtues! You may also ask
for joy and oh, what an ocean of bliss is before you in the joy of the
Lord! In "the peace of God, which passes all understanding," what a
wondrous depth of joy there is laid up in store for you! Our Lord Jesus
said to His disciples, "These things have I spoken unto you, that My
joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full." It may be
the same with you–therefore ask for great things! Do not be satisfied
with being little Christians–seek to come to the full stature of men
in Christ Jesus! I will be thankful to get just inside the gate of
Heaven, but if I can sing more sweetly and if I can have more
fellowship with Christ nearer His Throne, why should I not get there?
God grant that we may all have that high privilege!

Once more, I think that this exhortation, "Open your mouth wide," means
attempt great things for God as well as ask great things from God.
Brothers, go in for something great! Go in for saving one soul–that is
something great. Go in for preaching the whole Truth of God–that is
something great. Go in to be faithful to the teaching of the whole Word
of God–that is something great. It is not sufficient if you have
filled your own place–a good many of you have not done that yet–go in
to preach the Gospel somewhere else as well. Open some other building
for worship! Penetrate into some region where the Gospel is not yet
known. I wish that our College would open its mouth so wide as to
include the whole world in the sphere of its operations. Brother
Wigstone tells us that if we open our mouth wide, we shall swallow up
the whole of Spain and Portugal. Other Brothers want us to open our
mouth wide enough to absorb France, Germany, Russia and all Europe!
Some of our Brethren have gone to India–there is a mouthful for us! If
we open our mouth wide, India may be evangelized–and China–and the
new world of America and the far-distant world of Australia will feel
the power of the Gospel that we take there in the name of the Lord! Let
us pray, as David did long ago, that the whole earth may be filled with
God's Glory! What is the whole earth, after all, compared with the
greatness of God, and with the Infinite Sacrifice that Christ has
offered? Well may the Lord say to each one of us, "Open your mouth
wide, and I will fill it."

I like big prayers, Brothers. I have some regard for the memory of
William Huntington, though I would be sorry to endorse all that he said
and did. He was a man whose prayers God heard and answered, but what
often were his prayers? I smile, sometimes, as I think of what he asked
of God–"Lord, give me a new pair of leather breeches," or, "Give me a
horse and carriage"–and he got them. William Carey cried, "India for
Christ," and his prayer has kept on ringing right down the ages! And
the Church of God is still praying, "India for Christ," and that prayer
will be heard and answered in God's good time. Little boats that carry
small cargoes come quickly home, but the big ships that do business in
great waters are much longer in reaching the home port. But they bring
back much more precious loads! Huntington's prayer was the little boat
that proved God's faithfulness, but Carey's prayer was the big ship
which will come home as surely as the other one did!

So, "open your mouth wide," Brothers, and ask something that will be
honoring to God to give. Did you ever think, dear Friends, how
wonderful is the condescension of God in listening to the voice of a
man? That He should hear our prayers at all shows that in His
condescension He is as Infinite as He is in His Glory. Do you know, in
your own soul, that God has ever heard your prayers? Then bless Him and
love Him all your days. You know how the writer of the 116th Psalm put
the matter–"I love the Lord because He has heard my voice and my
supplications. Because He has inclined His ear unto me, therefore will
I call upon Him as long as I live." It is truly marvelous that though
our prayer is so full of faults and has to do with such insignificant
worms as we are, yet that the Lord hears us and grants our requests.

There are some who talk as if prayer was a meaningless form to us. "It
is a beneficial thing, no doubt, for you to pray," they say. Surely,
Sirs, you must be measuring our corn with your bushel if you imagine
that we could do such an idiotic thing as pray to a god who cannot hear
us! That is an employment only fit for imbeciles and if you tell us
that no doubt it is a good thing for us to do, we reply that it would
probably be a good thing for you to do it, for it could only be
suitable to the imbecility which originated the charge brought against
us! We assert and rejoice to assert that without working miracles, God
still accomplishes His eternal purposes in answer to the supplications
of His people. In earlier days He worked miracles for the deliverance
of His servants. But today He does the same thing without the
miraculous process and as manifestly grants the requests of His
suppliants as if miracles were as plentiful as the leaves upon the
trees in summer.

II. Now, secondly, we turn to THE PROMISE–"I will fill it."

Great asking seems to me to be on a scale proportionate to the great
things that are according to the very Nature of God. I have never been
able to believe in a little Hell because I cannot find, in the Bible,
any trace of a little Heaven, or of a little Savior, or of a little
sin, or of a little God. I believe in a theology that is drawn to
scale. If it is on the scale of an inch all round, I can receive it,
but if it is on the scale of a foot in one place, I think it should be
on the same scale throughout. Look, Brothers, at the brightness of the
Shekinah Glory shining above the Mercy Seat–and that Mercy Seat red
with such blood as was never spilt but once! And the Eternal Spirit
leading us up to that Mercy Seat–can we go there to ask for a mere
trifle? That does not seem to me to be at all congruous. Far more
congruous does it seem that before the great God, with the great
Mediator and the great Spirit helping our infirmities, we should open
our mouth wide

and expect God to fill it! O Brethren, we may be quite sure that in
dealing with the Infinite Jehovah, if we can rise to His scale of
things, He will fill our mouths when we open them!

It is hard work to fill a hungry mouth, for the food disappears down
the throat in a moment. When once fed, it opens again and is as empty
as it was before. But God has the way of filling mouths that makes them
stay full. He gives us water to drink of so wondrous a kind that we do
not thirst again! Jesus said to the woman of Samaria, "Whoever drinks
of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water
that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into
everlasting life." And God says to each child of His, "'Open your mouth
wide,' and though it seems to be like a horse-leech crying, 'Give,
give,' 'I will fill it.' Though it seems as insatiable as the grave, 'I
will fill it.'" The great God Himself says it and, therefore, it must
be true. If He had not said it, I would not have believed it, but
having said it, He can do what seems impossible to us–He can satisfy
our most insatiable cravings and longings–and He bids us keep on
longing and craving that He may keep on satisfying us again and again!

This promise is given by One who knows what we are going to ask. The
Lord says, "Open your mouth wide," and He knows what we desire to
receive from Him–and He has it all ready to give to us. Did you ever
bring home a present for your children and ask them to wish for
something, although they did not know that, all the while, it was in
your pocket? You have brought them up to the point of asking for
something that they need–then they go to bed and when they wake in the
morning, they are surprised to see the very thing they longed for lying
on their pillow! In a similar manner, our Heavenly Father gives
additional sweetness to His mercies by tempting us to long for various
things that He has all ready to give to us. He may well say, "Open your
mouth wide," when He has so many good things ready to fill it!

What will He fill our mouths with? Sometimes He will fill them with
prayer. Do you not find, at times, that you cannot pray? Never mind,
Brother, if it is so with you–open your mouth wide, for He will fill
it. He will fill your mouth with arguments. Kneel down and groan
because you cannot pray, agonize because you cannot pray and the next
day you will say, "I wish I felt as I did yesterday, for I never prayed
with greater power than when I thought I was not praying at all." Open
your mouth with a sense of need, a sense of desire. Open your mouth
with the sensibility of insensibility. You can comprehend, by
experience, the paradox that I cannot explain. God knows how to fill
your mouth with prayer when you go to your pulpit. Perhaps before the
time for the service came, you thought you could not pray or preach at
all. You remember how the Lord said to Ezekiel, "Eat this roll and go
speak unto the house of Israel," and the Prophet said, "So I opened my
mouth, and He caused me to eat that roll." You also may be able to do
the same thing. Sitting in your study, you may be anxious because you
cannot get a subject to really lay hold of you. At any rate, Brother,
open your mouth with desire, eagerness and longing as you sit
there–and if the Lord sends a roll to you, and shows you how to eat
it– when you go to talk to your people, you shall get that promise to
Ezekiel fulfilled in your own experience, "I will open your mouth, and
you shall say unto them, Thus says the Lord God." When you open your
mouth in private and eat the roll that the Lord gives you, He will open
your mouth in public and you shall tell the people the Truth of God
upon which you have privately feasted.

Next, the lord will fill our mouth with all manner of spiritual
blessings. David says that the Lord "satisfies your mouth with good
things; so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's." Time fails me
to attempt any list of proof texts upon this point. I can only say that
when the Lord opens your mouth, you may be quite certain that anything
He puts into it is wholesome and good even though, sometimes, it is not
according to your own taste–though it will be if your spiritual palate
is in a healthy condition. If your taste is out of order, even sweet
things will seem bitter to you. If your heart is not right with God,
you will ask for that which would injure you if He granted your
request. When the Israelites craved for flesh in the wilderness, they
made a terrible mistake. It will be far wiser for you, when you open
your mouth in prayer, not so much to go into details as to say, "Lord,
I am a mass of needs. I hardly know what they really are and what I
think I need may be a mistake, but my mouth is open to receive whatever
You see to be best for me." Then you may expect that He will fill it
with all sorts of good things.

Further, the Lord will fill your mouth with sacred joy When the Lord
turned again the captivity of Zion, His people said, "Then was our
mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with singing." It is a
blessed mouthful when you get such an amazing mercy that you cannot
understand it! Have you not, sometimes, received a mercy that has been
like Isaac, the child of laughter? It has come to us as Isaac came to
Abraham and we have heard the sound of the mercy and have laughed for
very joy! God will also fill your mouth with His praise. That was a
wise prayer of the Psalmist, "Let my

mouth be filled with Your praise and with Your honor all the day." What
a blessed mouthful it would be to have your mouth so full of the praise
of God that you could not help letting it run out!

III. Now I must close by noticing THE ENCOURAGEMENT. "Open your mouth
wide, and I will fill it." Why?

"Because I am Jehovah, your God, which brought you out of the land of
Egypt."

Brother, it is Jehovah who says to you, "Open your mouth wide." It does
not always do to open your mouth wide to man, but the Lord says to you,
"I am Jehovah, your God; open your mouth wide, and I will fill it."
When you stand before men, ask little and expect less. But when you
stand before God, ask much and expect more–and believe that He is able
to do for you exceeding abundantly above all that you ask or think! "I
am Jehovah." That is a boundless name! We know that our asking can
never exceed His benevolence or His might. We are asking of a King,
yes, of Him who is King of kings, so let us open our mouths wide as we
approach Him. His very name prompts us to do so. Then He adds, "I am
Jehovah, your God." So, will you not ask great things of the One who
has given Himself to you? Is God, Himself, yours? Then, what is there
that you may not ask of Him?

There is great force in Paul's argument, "He that spared not His own
Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also
freely give us all things?" There is equal force in this other
argument–As He spared not His own Deity, but freely gave Himself up to
be the God of His chosen ones, saying, "I will be their God, and they
shall be My people," then He will not deny them anything that they ask
of Him if it is really for their good. Indeed, all things are yours
already! Since He is your God, you have only to ask Him to give you
that which is your own by His own gracious Covenant. I should not feel
afraid or ashamed to ask anyone to give me what really belonged to me,
however big it was. And, in prayer, you have to ask from God what He
has already given you in Christ Jesus, for "all things are yours,"
because "you are Christ's and Christ is God's."

Then He adds, "which brought you out of the land of Egypt" Notice this
argument, Brothers. Our own experience of deliverance from sin is a
wonderful reason for asking great things of God. I speak with the
utmost reverence, but it seems to me that God Himself cannot give me
anything more than He has already given me in the unspeakable gift of
His only-begotten and well-beloved Son. His blessed Spirit has given
unto us eternal life! All the embellishments and enrichments and
sustenance of that life are not equal to the life itself. The life of
God in the soul is the chief blessing–and that we have already
received. Well, then, as God has given us life, surely He will give us
all other great blessings that we need and will deny us nothing that is
for His own Glory and our present and future good. Paul often uses this
kind of argument. For instance, "While we were yet sinners, Christ died
for us. Much more, then, being now justified by His blood, we shall be
saved from wrath through Him. For if, when we were enemies, we were
reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled,
we shall be saved by His life." The greater mercy having come, the
lesser one will also surely come! So, ask God for large things, for you
have already received larger things than you are ever likely to ask
for! And so you may rest assured that you will receive, in the future,
whatever God sees that you really need.

God said to His ancient people, "I am the Lord your God, which brought
you out of the land of Egypt." Might they not well ask large things of
that God who smote Pharaoh with all those terrible plagues? Might they
not well ask great things of Him who darkened the sun at midday, who
brought up the locusts till they covered the land, who made the very
dust of Egypt to crawl with noxious life and who sent terrific
hailstorms, with fire mingled with the hail? Who would not ask great
things of such a great God as that? Then think of His slaying the
first-born of Egypt and dividing the sea, even the Red Sea, and leading
all the hosts of Israel through the deep and through the wilderness. He
that could do all that, could, in His Infinite might, do all else that
His people needed–so they might well ask great things at His hands!

Moses sang, on the borders of the Red Sea, "He is my God, and I will
prepare Him a habitation; my father's God, and I will exalt Him." The
Israelites might well ask great things of Him who had overthrown all
their adversaries! And you who have experienced such a marvelous
deliverance by the blood of Jesus Christ, ought surely to be bold when
you go to the Mercy Seat! The deliverance of Israel out of Egypt was by
blood. The paschal lamb was slain and its blood was sprinkled upon the
houses of the Israelites. But you have not been redeemed with the blood
of earthly lambs, "but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb
without blemish and without spot." Can it be possible, after such a
redemption, that anything that is needed to bring you into the promised
land and to enrich you with all temporal and spiritual blessings should
ever be withheld from you?

Let us, each one, go to the Mercy Seat with our mouths wide open and
then let us go to our pulpits and preach with our mouths wide open,
even as Paul wrote, "O you Corinthians, our mouth is open unto you, our
heart is enlarged." Your mouths may well be open to your hearers
because they have first been opened unto God!

I am thankful that throughout this Conference, I have seen no traces of
doubt and no signs of despondency. Every Brother has seemed to have
confidence in God and to have hope, like a bright light, guiding him on
his way. I have no doubt that some of you will see "greater things than
these" even here on earth, while others will see them from the heights
of Heaven. As surely as we have the Gospel with us and the Holy Spirit
with us–as surely as God has led us thus far through the wilderness,
as surely as He keeps us knit together in love and unity–so surely
will He lead us from strength to strength–and the Lord will be
magnified in our mortal bodies whether by life or by death! And we
shall, by His Grace, all appear before Him in Zion. God bless you,
Brothers! Amen.