The Bride and Her Ornaments–the Sin of Forgetting God

DELIVERED ON THURSDAY EVENING, AUGUST 4, 1881,

BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

"Can a maid forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? Yet My people
have forgotten Me days without number." Jeremiah 2:32.

IT is a clear proof of the great love of God to His people that He will
not lose their love without earnest expostulation. When you do not care
at all for a person, he may love you or hate you, it is all the same to
you. But when you have great love for him, then you earnestly desire to
possess his heart in return. This, then, is clear proof that God
greatly loves His people, since, whenever their hearts wander from Him,
He is greatly grieved. And He rebukes them and earnestly pleads with
them, setting the coldness of their hearts in a true light and striving
to bring them back to warm affection towards Himself. Not only are
God's rebukes proofs of His love, but when He goes farther and deals
out blows as well as words, there is love in every stroke of His hand.
Most truly does He say, "As many as I love I rebuke and chasten," since
rebukes and chastening are proofs that He will not lose our hearts
without a struggle for them.

Do not look, therefore, upon a sermon that rebukes as something to be
avoided. Far from it! Hear it and accept it as a token of love from God
to your souls. That man is very foolish who will not hear the warning
of a friend. Few prize a friend's rebukes and yet a wise man knows that
there is no greater token of the affection of a friend than when he
will undertake the unpleasant duty of pointing out our faults. Many
parents are like Eli–they cannot endure the task of chastening their
children–and so, when their sons grow up to be their plague, they must
not wonder, for they have procured this evil to themselves by their
unworthy love of ease.

Our heavenly Father is never an Eli! He will not "spare the rod and
spoil the child." He loves us too well to suffer us to go on in our
iniquity. He will not stay His hand and leave us to perish. He will
scourge rather than abandon. He will chide rather than lose. Today He
speaks in tones of severity that He may not be compelled to utter,
tomorrow, words of doom. Accept, then, at this time, dear Friend,
whatever shall come to you out of this text. If it should be bitter in
your mouth, yet receive it thankfully from God as good medicine to your
spirit, and so may His Spirit cause it to be.

Coming to the text, in which God proves His love to His people because
He will not let their love readily go away from Himself, notice, first,
a grievous sin. "My people have forgotten Me." Secondly, a chiding
question about that sin. "Can a maid forget her ornaments, or a bride
her attire?" And then, thirdly, let us observe the call to repentance
which lies within the text, like perfume in a flower. If we have
forgotten God, let us grieve over such forgetfulness and turn to Him at
once with full purpose of heart–even unto God our exceeding joy!

First, then, here is A VERY GRIEVOUS SIN. "My people have forgotten Me
days without number." Observe whom they had forgotten–it will help us
to see the sin of it. The Lord says, "My people have forgotten Me." It
would not have mattered half as much if they had forgotten their
dearest friends–if the husband had forgotten his wife, or the mother
her child–but here are favored men and women who have forgotten their
God, their Father, their life, their All! "My people have forgotten Me,
their God. Other nations, having set up their false gods, did not
forget them, but, with blind pertinacity of devotion, they bowed before
them. But My people have forgotten their God, the only God, the living
and true God. My people have forgotten Me–the good God, whom it is
pleasure to remember."

"You are good and do good," said the Psalmist, and it is true. Yet too
often we forget the Source of all goodness. If we could forget the
evil, it were well, but to forget the only and essential Good is sad,
indeed. "My people have forgotten Me," whom they were bound in duty to
remember. God is our Creator–shall we not remember Him that made us?
God is our Preserver. Shall we not remember Him in whom "we live, and
move, and have our being"? God is our Father– shall children forget
the Father at whose table they feed and from whose lips they are
comforted! God is our All in All

and shall we yet forget Him? Surely, it were better to lose memory than
for memory to lose its hold upon God! My people have forgotten Me! God,
the good, the best, who has a chief right to be remembered!

Brethren, there is great evil in our hearts, or it would be so
difficult to forget God as to be impossible. A friend has gone away
from us and we do not see him, but he has left so many tokens of his
goodness that we are reminded of him every day. Is it not so with God?
Has He not left us innumerable tokens of His affection for us? Ought we
to forget when so many forget-me-nots are round about us? But,
supposing that friend has not gone away at all, but is living with us
in the house and enters, even, into our chamber–what shall we say if
we forget one who is constantly with us? No man is so present with his
friend as God is with His people! He is in us and round about us! Never
can we depart from Him, for we are not only in Him, but He is in us and
He sees all our ways.

Oh, strange sin that we should forget One who is everywhere present and
manifests that Presence in deeds of love! O forgetful creature, what do
you think of your Lord? What? Do you owe the breath in your nostrils to
God and yet can you forget? Is the bread upon your table put there by
the hand of a God whom you do not remember? Are the very clothes upon
your back the gift of His Divine charity and do you forget Him? You
would be in the grave–no, you would be in Hell–but for His mercy–and
yet is He not in all your thoughts? Oh, this wicked forgetfulness of
ours! Let us forget all else besides, but let it not be charged to us
that we have forgotten our God! Yet it is so written, "My people have
forgotten Me."

Who were they that forgot God? That casts a second light upon this sin.
"My people have forgotten Me. Not strangers, not heathen, not those who
have only heard of Me but have never known Me, but My people." It
signifies, "My chosen, My elect, a people whom I have taken out from
the midst of the earth that they may be a people unto Me forever. My
people have forgotten Me." Chosen of God and yet forget electing love?
"My people." It is a redeemed people who have become the Lord's because
they are not their own, but are bought with a price. He has redeemed
them unto Himself forever–redeemed them from among men by the
matchless price of His only-begotten Son's life! And shall it be that
those on whom there is the eternal blood–mark–who are set apart by
sacrifice to be God's own, that they shall forget Him?

Oh, sad ingratitude! "My people." That is to say, a people not only
chosen and redeemed, but brought to know Him, brought into fellowship
with Him, brought into relationship with Him, brought absolutely into
union with Him–they have forgotten Him. You that sat at Jesus' feet
and drank in His loving words! You that sat at His table and to whom He
was made known in the breaking of bread! You that have laid your head
upon the bosom of the Lord–can it, shall it be said of you, "My people
have forgotten Me"? Oh, but this is sad! "He that eats bread with Me
has forgotten Me. He that said He would die for My sake has forgotten
Me. He that sang just now–

'Have You a lamb in all Your flock

I would disdain to feed?

Have You a foe before whose face

I fear Your cause to plead?'"

"He has forgotten Me!" Alas, my Brothers and Sisters, that you and I
should have been upon the mount with Jesus. That we should have been in
the garden with Him. That we should have danced for very joy of heart
in His Presence and should have felt ourselves next door to the gates
of Heaven when He has laid bare His heart to us–and yet it should ever
be said of us that we have forgotten Him! This will be sad, indeed, if
ever it comes to this! And yet this is the crime that is laid at the
door of His own people. "My people have forgotten Me."

Observe sadly the space in which they had forgotten–in the case of
Israel, it is added, "days without number." Ah me! I hope it has not
come to that with any of us here present! And yet it may. It may. I may
be touching a chord, now, which shall awaken the saddest memories.
"Days without number." How long is it, Friend, since you were in the
habit of walking with God? How long is it since you have seen the face
of the Well-Beloved? I ventured to put that question once to a
professor and, shaking his head, he replied, "Don't ask me that. If you
will ask me whether I have been a drunk; whether I have been dishonest
in business; whether I have done any positive action by which I have
degraded the Christian name, I can answer you without fear. But if you
ask, How long since I have had fellowship with Christ, I cannot–I dare
not–answer you."

Yet I venture to press the question and I hope the answer will not be,
"I have forgotten Him days without number." I hope you will not sing,
as Cowper did–

"What peaceful hours I then enjoy'd!

How sweet their memory still! But now I find an aching void The world
can never fill."

On the contrary, may it be yours and mine to be kept from forgetting
God at all! And if there ever should be a moment in which we wander,
may it be a small moment, much lamented and never repeated! May our
soul soon come back as the needle of the compass returns to its pole.
Turn it awhile with your finger and you may move it east, west,
south–but take your finger away and back it comes to its pole–so may
it be with us! May we be like the birds of the air which at eventide
seek their nests. As the stone may be thrown aloft by force, but
naturally returns to the earth, so may we, if tossed about by Satan,
fall back upon our firm resting place in Jesus! May our forgetfulness
be for a small moment, but in life and death may we remember our
Well-Beloved.

You see, the sin lies in this, that we should forget God, that we
should do it and do it, "days without number." How is God forgotten?
What are the manifestations of this offense? Some professors evidently
forget God by their worldliness. When they were in a humbler condition
of society they were known to find great enjoyment at Prayer
Meetings–the assembling of the saints together was very joyful to
them. The reading and hearing of the Word of God were gracious
refreshments to them, but they are now too rich to care for this light
bread! They have prospered so much that if they prosper much more it
will be a thousand times worse than adversity, as in the case of the
celebrated captain who, when his soldiers said they had won a victory,
said, "One more such victory as this and we shall be defeated forever."

Such rising men, like the Israelites, have been filled with the quails,
but while the meat is yet in their mouths the wrath of God has come
upon them. They have been fattened with the treasures of the world, but
their souls have been starved to very skeletons, for they have not fed
upon the things of God! Some that were high professors now seem to have
no religion whatever–they mix with worldly people–and seem quite
happy with them. I have seen the hand of God go out against such
followers of Demas. They prospered and, as they prospered, they became
less and less attentive to Divine things. They turned aside from the
Truth of God and their children have grown up to be utter
worldlings–some of their sons to be debauched and depraved–till the
name that stood high in the Church of God is struck out of the roll of
Israel and their family is rather numbered among the sons of Belial
than among the saints of the Most High!

Such have forgotten God, "days without number." O my beloved comrades
in the army of Christ, may you all be preserved from such a curse! Some
have forgotten God by self-seeking. They live unto themselves. It is
clear that though once they seemed to have a zeal for God, now their
zeal is entirely to push their own way, to make their own fortunes to
plant out their children–anything and everything except the Glory of
God and the love of souls. And yet they profess to be God's people even
now! True is the lament, "My people have forgotten Me." It is well to
forget self to glorify God– but to make self our god is a thing
accursed in the highest degree. Some, too, show that they forget God by
the failure of their trust. They are in trouble and they are very
anxious. Why? Because they have forgotten God, though He has promised
to help them.

They are wondering what is to become of them, looking all about them
with the greatest amount of carking care that even a worldling might
feel. And if you say to them, "God will provide, God is your Helper,"
they have forgotten God, they have left Him out of their calculations.
They are fretting and worrying. They are troubled and cast down because
they have forgotten God. You can do this in your daily concerns until
you may act as if God, Himself, were dead! It is sad, indeed, when a
Christian acts upon atheistic principles and despairs as if he had no
God to succor him! Some people, when things run a little cross to them;
some working men when they are out of work; some men when they cannot
see God's work prospering just as they would have it, leave out of
their calculations the one great Worker, the one great Force–and soon
get troubled, cast down and go crawling about the world full of
distrust.

Ah me, what evils come to men when they have forgotten God! Alas, there
are some who add to this a forgetfulness of God through neglect of
private devotion. Prayers are slurred over. Drawing near to God becomes
a form and a pretense. The Word is read, but it is not read with the
view of finding God in the sacred Volume and having fellowship with Him
through His Word. Oh, it is sad when it can be said that God's people
are forgetting Him in the closet! "It was such a busy day," says one,
"I could not find time to pray." Remember how Martin Luther acted–he
said that He must have three hours prayer one day because it was such a
busy day that He should not have strength to get through it if he did
not have extra time for devotion!

It is foolish to say, "I have more to do and so I will take less time
in getting strength to do it." As well might the mower say, "It is a
bigger field to mow and so I will take less trouble in sharpening my
scythe." It is, depend upon it, a dead waste of time to be short in
drawing near to God! The Lord might well complain–"My people have
forgotten Me. They have not waited upon Me in wrestling prayer. They
have not cried to Me during the day. They have not lifted up their
hearts to Me in the moment of trouble. They have not consulted Me in
difficulty. They have not rejoiced in Me in the time of their joy. They
have forgotten Me."

And you and I can do it in a very high sense by a breach of communion,
by getting out of fellowship with God, by walking contrary to Him so
that He walks contrary to us. It is very bad walking and very bad
living when God and ourselves are at cross-purposes. It is a very sweet
thing, when you are conscious of having done wrong, to go back to your
heavenly Father at once and admit it and get right again. How willing
He is to receive us! How glad He is to blot out the past and let
bygones be bygones and to let us start anew with Him! He delights to
forgive! Sometimes we let the stones accumulate till there is quite a
heap and they are made into a wall which blocks our way. If every stone
had been flung away, one by one, how much easier it would have been!

There would not be clouds of dust if we kept our ways well watered with
daily repentance. There would not be a separation between God and our
soul in great things if we would not allow it in little things. But, I
fear too often it may be said of this high point of rapturous
fellowship with God, "My people have forgotten Me days without number."
I scarcely need, I think, to talk longer about this sin, except to
notice that if we ever do forget God, it leads to all sorts of
mischief. We lose our joy and our comfort–and then we lose our
strength and our watchfulness. And then we backslide by little and
little and then, probably, we fall into one sin and then into another,
if not into a third, more grievous still!

David had never sinned with Bathsheba if he had not forgotten his God.
By degrees we get hardened about our state and soon it comes to
this–that we have lost the Presence of God–and do not care whether we
have it or not. Oh, this is a sad, sad state of heart! God save us from
it! May it never be said of us, "My people have forgotten Me days
without number."

II. And now, dear Friends, I call your attention to THE CHIDING
QUESTION which is the very marrow of the text–"Can a maid forget her
ornaments, or a bride her attire?" And I suppose that question is put,
first, because there are many trivial things which occupy minds so that
they cannot forget them. How sad it is that the most grand things, the
best things, should not equally engross our thoughts! Now, I will not
say a word about you Western women that are here–of course, you do not
care about ornaments or dress–at least, you should not! But Eastern
women were very fond of ornaments and it was a question which every
Oriental could understand, "Can a maid forget her ornaments, or a bride
her attire?"

Of course such forgetfulness was impossible. The young woman's mind was
full of her jewels! Isaiah gives you a long list that seems to have
been cut out of the fashion-book of the day–a long list of various
things that ladies used to wear in those days–and these they never
forgot. Their minds doted upon them and when the marriage day came
round, that was the main thought–how they should be dressed, how they
should glitter before all onlookers! Forget her ornaments? The question
is absurd! The maid's mind was taken up with them. A bride forget her
attire? It could not be! And yet I venture to say that these things are
trifles–that the costliest jewels in the world are nothing but mere
stones–that the richest dress that ever was made is excelled by birds
and flies–and that the flowers of the field far surpass anything that
can be manufactured by the needle.

When the attire is all fitted and the ornaments are all in their
places, the whole matter is a trifle. We should have had no need of
either ornament or attire if it had not been for sin. Strange that the
insignia of our fall should become the ground of our boasting! Yet so
it is. But here is the point–do, then, these Eastern women value their
jewels and their dress so much that they cannot forget them? Are their
heads filled with these things so that they never slip out of their
memories? And do the people of God forget their God? I do not know a
stronger way of putting it. Can these trifles secure their places so
surely and shall the most supreme good so readily escape our thoughts?
Shame on us!

Every time we see one who, in dressing, has evidently paid the
daintiest attention to every pin, we ought to stand rebuked! When we
see a woman curling, plaiting or bedecking her hair, or putting on
jewels, let us think to ourselves, "Does she pay so much attention to
such a thing as that and do I think so little of my God? Have I so much
desire to be dressed in the rich things that the Divine Bridegroom has
provided for me that I take little notice of the treasures of His

Grace?" That is the first word of rebuke. It is a very powerful one to
those who think it over. Shall trifles be remembered and God be
forgotten?

The next is this–if a bride did forget her attire, or a maid did
forget her ornaments, it would be very unreasonable behavior. The thing
was so unreasonable that it was quite unknown! Suppose we found an
Eastern woman having no regard whatever, on her marriage day, to her
attire? She would be thought to be mad! They would say, "This is so
contrary to all women's ways in this part of the country that she must
have lost her reason." It is unreasonable that a bride should forget
her ornaments and her attire–but how infinitely more unreasonable it
is that you and I should forget God! He is our diadem of Glory–He is
our beauty of holiness! In Christ we are arrayed in raiment of
needlework and our garments are of worked gold! Can we, shall we forget
Him?

There may be a reason for forgetting to eat bread. There may be a
reason for forgetting to put on one's garments. Such neglects have been
reasonable in times of fire, or danger to life, but there never can be
a reason for forgetting God! A child of God is in the most unreasonable
condition in which a human being can be when he is living a single day
without remembering his God, his life, his Heaven, his All-in-All!
Next, it would have been a most unseasonable thing for a maid to forget
her attire at her wedding. If she forgot her dress on other days, it
might be well enough, but, when the marriage drew near, for the bride
to forget her attire would be thought a most unseasonable neglect.
Forget it tomorrow, if you will, but not when your marriage has come!

You may have forgotten it many days ago, but do not forget it, now,
that the happy day has arrived. A bride who forgets her attire would be
something like the foolish virgins who forgot to take oil in their
vessels with their lamps. And, certainly, it is a most unseasonable
thing for me and you to forget our God while we are here! Let the
soldier, when the arrow is flying from every bush, forget his armor,
but let us not forget our God! Let the hungry man, when famine rages
through the land, forget his supply of bread, but let us not forget the
Food of our souls, which is our Lord Jesus

Christ!

Now, when dangers assail you, temptations surround you, corruptions
rage within you and Satan molests you, forget not, now, your God. And I
will guarantee you, if you do not forget God on earth, you never will
in Heaven, for there we shall be all taken up with Him and never, for a
moment, shall our thoughts wander from our God, our Heaven, our
All-in-All. However, now, at any rate, it would be unseasonable in the
highest degree to forget your God. Notice the conduct of the maid or
the conduct of the bride with regard to her ornaments. What does the
maid do? Her conduct is the reverse of forgetfulness as to dress and
ornaments. She labors hard to obtain her ornaments and to gain her
attire.

Many women in the East give up every coin that they have and turn all
into silver. They do not care about storing up coins–they prefer the
precious metal in the form of rings for their ankles, arms, necks,
noses and ears. It is their life's work to provide themselves with
ornaments for the marriage day. While they do this, let us do
better–let us store up the thoughts of Christ, the Words of Christ and
the things of Christ–and let us labor, let us wear ourselves out–to
get more and more of Christ that we may be adorned with Him and made
comely in His comeliness!

When the Eastern woman has, with great difficulty, obtained her
ornaments and her attire, she then thinks a great deal of them. She
preserves them with much care. She will, if possible, prevent a thief
from taking away a ring or gem. She locks them up carefully. Oh, that
we did store up every bit we get of our Lord's love and put it by to
keep it, never losing any pearl that we find, or any ring that we
fashion by experience! I say that the Eastern woman thinks about her
bridal attire. Why, we hear of them dreaming about it–dreaming about
the next bracelet they will buy, the next jewel they will hang about
their necks! Would to God we were as much taken up with the
preciousness of Christ! I sometimes dream of Christ and when I do, I am
glad, for this is proof that my thoughts have been with Him when I was
awake, or they would not have been with Him when I was asleep. Oh, to
have our whole soul occupied with thoughts of Christ and Divine things!

How joyfully the Eastern woman puts on her jewels, puts on her attire.
She has these things to wear. I am ashamed of those Christians who are
ashamed of Christ. They have jewels–I hope they have–but they are
very wary of ever showing them. Perhaps they get some Christian friend
into a corner and they say, "I have a jewel that I mean to wear, but
not yet. I am afraid it should not be seen as yet, but I will show it
if you will not tell anybody else." If anybody comes round after a
sermon and gently enquires, "Have you any of the precious things of
Christ?" these timid ones blush and half deny their own joy! Some
people–yes, some of Christ's well-beloved ones–whisper, "I hardly
know." Is this after the right

manner? The Eastern woman puts everything upon her on her marriage–and
Eastern ladies at a banquet are all ablaze with diamonds and
jewels–gold and silver.

I wish you Christian people would publicly put on your priceless jewels
and never be ashamed of them! Do you know anything about Christ? Tell
it! Tell it and you will soon know more! Do you know anything about
Christ? Live it! Live it and you will soon have more! Put on your
jewels! I do not see, while the Bridegroom is about, why you should put
on your everyday rags. I have seen young folks smarten themselves up
when their beloved has come to see them and, oh, since our Beloved is
always coming to see us, we ought to keep ourselves in good trim, well
decked in the Graces of His Spirit! "Shall a maid forget her ornaments,
or a bride her attire?"

In the Presence of Christ let us glory in Him! Let us delight ourselves
in Him! Let us tell the world we never can have enough of Jesus, our
Lord! And when they ask, "What is your Beloved more than any other
beloved?" let us show how He has enriched us and blessed us with His
love and Grace–and let this be our happy answer to an unbelieving
generation!

III. Now I close with a few words of CALL TO REPENTANCE if we have, in
any measure or degree, forgotten our God. I am sure, first, that our
God does not deserve to be treated so. "You use no other friend so
ill." Such love, such love, such wondrous love, infinite, unending,
everlasting love to you! And can you forget? Can you forget? So
undeserving and yet so favored! Can you forget your Friend? Loved by
God as He loves His own Son! Can you forget? Have you forgotten? Will
not the time past suffice for that? A half a minute's forgetfulness of
God is half a minute too long! Let it not come to be "days without
number." But, if the number is ever so small, let us weep to think we
should have forgotten Him at all! Let our sorrows flow at the
recollection that He has never forgotten us–no, never for a
moment–and yet we have forgotten Him. Our names have been on Jesus'
breastplate and on His shoulders days without number–shall His name be
always out of our minds? "I have engraved you on the palms of My
hands," He says.

Let us engrave His name upon the tablets of our hearts! Think for a
minute, if He had forgotten you–forgotten you in your merriest moment,
yes, in your holiest moment–what would have been your portion? If God
had suspended the outflow of His Grace and left you to yourselves, what
had been your fate? Oh, my God, my God, if You had once forgotten me,
where had I been? But He never has forgotten us! He is not forgetting
us at this moment. He says to each one, however wandering, "I do
earnestly remember you." He will never forget us. The dying thief said,
"Lord, remember me," and Jesus did remember him!

He cries, "I remember you, the love of your betrothal." Lord, do you
remember me? Then would I smite my heart to think I ever should have
forgotten You! Oh, how can we forget when God is our diadem of Glory?
It is our highest privilege that He is ours and we are His. God is our
beauty, the honor and excellence of all His saints. It is this that
makes us illustrious in the eyes of cherubim and seraphim–that God is
ours and we are His! God is our joy, our only joy, our overflowing joy!
He that knows God has Heaven within His spirit even now. Come, let us
not forget again, but let us bind the glorious name of our Lord about
our heart. May the sweet Spirit do it now, for Jesus Christ's sweet
love's sake. Amen.
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Loved and Loving