Heart-Knowledge of God

A SERMON DELIVERED ON LORD'S-DAY MORNING, DECEMBER 6, 1874,

BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

"I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am the Lord." Jeremiah
24:7.

WITH what blindness has sin struck the heart of man, for man does not
know his own Maker! It is implied in the text that in his heart he is
ignorant of Jehovah, though in Him he lives, and moves, and has his
being. What an impotence has sin brought upon the mind of man, since
being ignorant of God he is also incapable of finding Him out! This,
also, may be most readily gathered from the text. The fact that a
promise is made in the Covenant that to the chosen shall be given
hearts to know the Lord is a clear proof that without the Divine
teaching and without the reception of a new heart from the Lord, man
not only does not know, but cannot find out his God!

You boast of your intellect, O vain Man, but your foolish heart is
darkened so that you stumble in the noonday as at midnight. You have
eyes, and you say, "I see," but your eyes are closed, your ears are
dull of hearing and your heart has waxed gross. And your soul has
become so dull that only He who formed the ear can make you hear. And
only He who fashioned the eye can give you sight.

How can we sufficiently admire the condescension of God, that He should
stoop to instruct the heart of man? Man forgets his God, but God does
not forget him. Though man knows not God, yet God knows him and, seeing
that his powerlessness to grasp Divine knowledge lies in his heart, He
visits him in Grace and renews the fountain of his strength and the
center of his nature by giving him a new heart and a right spirit.

The infinitely glorious God might have regarded it as a matter of
indifference whether such an insignificant creature as man knew Him or
not. He might well have said, and it had been consistent with the
majesty of His justice to say it, "Seeing that you do not desire to
know Me, you shall not perceive Me. And inasmuch as you close your eyes
to Me, you shall continue in outer darkness. Because you will not
glorify Me as God, your hearts shall abide in midnight, I will leave
you to your own devices."

But the Lord of Love said not so to the sons of men, upon whom His
heart was set! On the contrary, He has made a Covenant of Mercy on our
behalf and His speech is the reverse of what we might have expected. He
declares in the words of the text, "I will give them a heart to know
Me, that I am Jehovah." What is meant by this great promise of the text
is not merely that God will lead the converted to know that there is a
God, because that may be known without a new heart. Any man possessed
of reason may know that there is a Supreme Being who created all things
and preserves the universe in existence.

The heavens declare the Glory of God and the firmament show His
handiwork. The tokens of Divine skill and power are so abundant that,
"The invisible things of God from the creation of the world are already
seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal
power and Godhead." The knowledge intended here is much deeper than
that which comes from observation–and only affects the intellect. To
know that there is a God is a lower step which every man takes except
the fool who has said in his heart, "There is no God." The text
promises that the favored ones shall know that God is Jehovah! So the
original text has it, "I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am
Jehovah."

God leads men to see that the God revealed in Scripture and manifested
in the Person of the Lord Jesus, is the God who made Heaven and earth.
Man fashions for himself a god after his own liking. He makes to
himself, if not out of wood or stone, yet out of what he calls his own
consciousness, or his cultured thought, a deity to his taste who will
not be too severe with his iniquities or deal out strict justice to the
impenitent. He rejects God as He is and makes other gods such as he
thinks the Divine One ought to be. And he says concerning these works
of his own imagination, "These are your gods, O Israel."

The Holy Spirit, however, when He illuminates our minds, leads us to
see that Jehovah is God and beside Him there is none else. He teaches
His people to know that the God of Heaven and earth is the God of the
Bible, a God whose attributes are completely balanced, Mercy attended
by Justice, Love accompanied by Holiness, Grace arrayed in Truth and
Power linked with Tenderness. He is not a God who winks at sin, much
less is pleased with it, as the gods of the heathen are supposed to be.
No, He is a God who cannot look upon iniquity and will, by no means,
spare the guilty.

This is the great quarrel of the present day between the philosopher
and the Christian. The philosopher says, "Yes, a god if you will, but
he must be of such a character as I now dogmatically set before you."
But the Christian replies, "Our business is not to invent a god, but to
obey the one Lord who is revealed in the Scriptures of Truth." The God
of Holy Scripture is Love, but He is also possessed of justice and
severity. He is merciful and gracious, but He is also stern and
terrible towards evil. Therefore unregenerate hearts say, "We cannot
accept such a God as this," and they call Him cruel and I know not what
besides.

Herein they are idolaters–they set up another god and forsake the true
God–and it does not alter the case if they plead that they make no
graven image, for the First Commandment says, "You shall have no other
gods before Me." The Lord teaches His people that He is Jehovah, who
brought Israel up out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of
bondage. He teaches them He is the Jehovah who smote Pharaoh with
plagues and drowned his hosts in the Red Sea. The Jehovah who led His
people through the wilderness, but cast out their enemies from before
them with a strong hand and an outstretched arm. The Jehovah that
redeemed His people, but chastened them for their iniquities and took
vengeance upon their inventions.

The God of Sinai is the same God as the God of Calvary. "I am Jehovah
your God," is His solemn proclamation, and it is well for the soul when
it understands and knows that Jehovah, He is God, yes, Jehovah, He is
God alone. When the heart is content to believe in God as He is
revealed and no longer goes about to fashion a deity for itself
according to its own fancies and notions, it is a hopeful sign. The
main stress of the promise lies, however, in this–"I will give them a
heart to know ME." That is, not merely to know that I am and that I am
Jehovah, but to have a personal knowledge of Myself. I can scarcely
express the idea which I wish to convey to you, but you all know the
difference between knowing who a man is–what his character is and all
about him–and knowing the man himself.

There are hundreds of people of whom we know a great deal. We are
favored by some prying gentleman or other with stories of how our great
men dress, what they say, what they eat, when they eat and all sorts of
minute details of their personal habits. Still, despite all this
information, we do not know these people–we should speak falsely if we
said we did. To know them we must be on speaking terms with them. There
must be a mutual recognition. There must be dealings of some kind
between us.

Now, it is so in the far higher matter of which we now speak. It is not
enough to know that our Creator is the Jehovah of the Bible and that He
is perfect in Character and glorious beyond thought–to know God we
must have perceived Him–we must have spoken to Him! We must have been
made at peace with Him. We must have lifted up our heart to Him and
received communications from Him. If you know the Lord, your secret is
with Him and His secret is with you. He has manifested Himself unto you
as He does not unto the world. He has made Himself known unto you by
the mysterious influences of His Spirit–because of this you know Him.

I cannot explain this knowledge, but it is delightful to remember that
many of you understand what it means by experience. Is it not sweet to
traverse the world discerning God on every side? Your Father ever near!
Is it not a blessing to be in trouble and find Him helping us? To be in
a dilemma and to hear His voice saying, "This is the way, walk you in
it"? To be depressed in spirit and to feel that His comforts rejoice
our souls? To be exulting in joy and to feel that His Presence calms
and sobers us and keeps us from undue delight in created things? It is
inexpressibly honorable and joyful to walk with God as Enoch did, to
speak with Him as Abraham did of old, as a man speaks with his friend,
or to be hidden in the hollow of His hand, as Moses was in Horeb! This
is to know God after the manner of the text.

My Hearer, do you know God? Have you beheld the Glory of God in the
face of Jesus Christ? Have you discerned the Father in the Son? Do you
see all the attributes of God shining mildly through the Mediator,
toned down to our capacity, lest the effulgence of the Deity should
blind our finite sense? Do you know God by going to Jesus as your
Savior? He that has seen Christ has seen the Father! "No man knows the
Father save the Son and he to whom the Son will

reveal Him." If you know Christ and are found in Him, then, Beloved,
you know the Lord and are among the blessed company who are taught of
the Spirit, for flesh and blood have not revealed the Lord unto you!

We will consider our text in the following manner. We will first of all
describe the seat of this knowledge–"I will give them a heart to know
Me." Then the necessity of this knowledge. Then the excellency of this
knowledge and, lastly the source of this knowledge. May the Holy Spirit
aid us in speaking upon each topic.

I. THE SEAT OF THIS KNOWLEDGE–"I will give them a heart to know Me."
Observe that it is not said, "I will give them a head to know Me." As I
have already said, man's great stumbling block in coming to God does
not lie in his reason–there is a difficulty in his reason, but not the
major one. The first and primary impediment to his knowledge of God
lies in the affections. Man's heart is set upon that which is
evil–consequently he wants a God after his own fashion–who will smile
upon sin, or at least tolerate it.

The Lord complains in the Psalm, "You thought that I was altogether
such an One as yourself"–it is the tendency of man to think that God
is like himself. The impure in heart cannot conceive of a pure God! If
he could conceive Him, he would detest, rather than worship Him. "The
pure in heart shall see God," is one of the opening benedictions of the
Savior's ministry. But the impure in heart cannot see God and cannot,
therefore, know Him! The heart is the seat of the blindness–there lies
the darkness which beclouds the whole mind. Hence to the heart the
light must come and to the heart that light is promised.

I understand by the fact that the knowledge of God here promised lies
in the heart, first, that God renews the heart so that it admires the
Character of God. The understanding perceives that God is just,
powerful, faithful, wise, true, gracious, long-suffering and the like.
Then the heart, being purified, admires all these glorious attributes
and adores Him because of them. You can in a measure test your
knowledge of the Lord by the enquiry–Do you approve the Character of
God? Perceiving the God of the Scriptures to be the true God, do you
admire Him as He reveals Himself? I must repeat what I have already
said. There are many who have imagined God to be what they would like
Him to be and then, of course, they admire the image which they have
set up.

But to see God as the Scripture reveals Him, especially in His
holiness, is a gift of His Divine Grace! Have you noted how David sings
in the 103rd Psalm, "Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within
me, bless His holy name"? It would have sounded more in accordance with
the context to have said His gracious name, for he goes on to speak of
the Lord's deeds of Grace–"who forgives all your iniquities, who heals
all your diseases." But that which the Psalmist most admired was the
Lord's holiness in all this–the way in which He could deal mercifully
with the guilty and yet retain His spotless holiness. Holiness is the
great terror of the ungodly and, therefore, it is a token of our
knowing God in our hearts when we can bless His holy name.

How do the angels praise Him? Do they sing, "Mighty, mighty, mighty,
Lord God of Hosts"? Or, "Bounteous, bounteous, bounteous Creator of the
universe"? No, but, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth." They adore
the whole of God and God as a whole–holiness means completeness of
character, the absence of everything like excess, the presence of
everything that is perfection. O my Soul, can you, in some measure, see
the infinite perfection of the Lord in all points? And seeing, do you
admire? Do you see Him as a consuming fire, burning up evil? And do you
approve Him as such? Do you see His sovereignty, His hatred of sin, His
immutability, His jealousy and yet admire Him? Do you, indeed, delight
in even the sterner traits of the Divine Character, knowing that under
all aspects the Lord is good?

Then in you is fulfilled the promise, "I will give them a heart to know
Me"! The heart-knowledge promised in the Covenant of Grace means,
however, much more than approval. Grace enables the renewed heart to
take another step and appropriate the Lord, saying, "O God, You are my
God, early will I seek You." All the saved ones cry, "This God is our
God forever and ever. He shall be our God even unto death." The man who
only knows the Lord with his head regards Him as anybody's God, or
another man's God. But the man who knows the Lord with his heart
exclaims with Thomas, "My Lord and my God."

By an act of appropriating faith the gracious man cries out, "The Lord
is my Portion says my soul," and then in return he dedicates himself to
the service of his God. And there is fulfilled in him that other
promise of His, "I will be to them a God, and they shall be to Me a
people." Admiration of God leads on to appropriation and this to
something higher, still. All true knowledge of God is attended by
affection for Him. In spiritual language, to know God is to love Him.
"He that loves not, knows not God, for God is Love." "I love the Lord,"
says David, "because He has heard my

voice and my supplication." He had been no stranger to the Lord, but
had conversed with Him in prayer and received tokens of favor and,
therefore, his love overflowed.

He cries out in another Psalm, "I will love You, O Lord, my Strength,"
and then he goes on to heap up and pack together a host of words of
love and praise–"The Lord is my rock and my fortress, my deliverer; my
God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my
salvation, and my high tower." Where the Lord is fully known, He is
intensely loved. The spouse first described her Beloved as the apple
tree among the trees of the woods, and then she cried out, "I am sick
of love." At another time, after drawing a full-length portrait of her
Lord, she could not refrain from exclaiming, "His mouth is most sweet,
yes, He is altogether lovely." Such is our love of God when we know
Him– that we feel bound to glory in Him before others.

"My soul shall make her boast in the Lord; the humble shall hear
thereof and be glad." It is the great passion of the renewed soul to
glorify God, whom He knows and loves. Knowledge without love would be a
powerless thing, but God has joined this knowledge and love together in
a sacred wedlock–and they can never be put asunder. As we love God we
know Him–and as we know Him we love Him. Admiration, appropriation,
affection are crowned with adhesion. To know a thing by heart is, in
our common talk, to know it thoroughly. When a child knows his lesson
by heart, we hope that he will not forget it.

That which is learned in the head may be unlearned, for our
understanding is very fickle and our memory frail, but that which is
written upon the heart cannot be erased. Holy Scripture asks, "Can a
maid forget her ornaments or a bride her attire?" These she dotes upon
and, therefore, she will not forget them. Can a woman forget her
sucking child? No, she cannot, because her knowledge of her child is
heart knowledge. Memories of the heart abide when all others depart. A
mother's love, a wife's fondness, a sweet child's affection will come
before us even in the last hours of life. When the mind will lose its
learning and the hand forget its cunning, the dear names of our beloved
ones will linger on our lips. And their sweet faces will be before us
even when our eyes are dim with the shadow of approaching death.

If we can sing, "O God, my heart is fixed, O my heart is fixed," then
the knowledge which it possesses will never be taken away from it. To
know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge, is not a fleeting
attainment, but shall abide with us and increase until we know even as
we are known. This is not the knowledge which shall vanish away, but
that which shall be perfected when the day breaks and the shadows flee
away.

Now, beloved Friend, have you such a knowledge of God? Do you admire,
appropriate, love and cleave to the Lord, your God? Can you hope that
you have been taught of the Lord according to that promise, "They shall
know Me from the least even unto the greatest." Do not say, "I am so
little in Israel that I cannot be expected to know." Does not the
Covenant promise imply that the least must know the Lord as well as the
greatest? This blessed knowledge is essential to every Christian! Do
you possess it? If not, do you desire it? If so, plead for it, and say,
"I beseech You show me Your Glory. Let me know You as the Lord God,
merciful and gracious, passing by transgression, iniquity and sin." He
will hear you if you plead for Jesus' sake.

II. This brings us at once to the second point, namely, THE NECESSITY
OF THIS KNOWLEDGE. If we think a minute we shall see how necessary it
is. To know God is a necessary preparation for every other true
knowledge because the Lord is the center of the universe, the basis,
the pillar, the essential force, the All in All, the fullness of all
things. Not to know God is as if a student should attempt to construct
a system of astronomy and be altogether ignorant of the sun! Or a
mariner should be a stranger to the sea! Or a farmer should not know
the existence of seeds! The place which God occupies must be settled in
our minds or we shall have no arrangement in our knowledge–and our
science will be nothing but a conglomeration of truth and error.

You may learn the doctrines of the Bible, but you do not know them
truly till you know the God of the doctrines. You may understand the
precepts in the letter of them and the promises in their outward
wording, but neither precept nor promise do you truly know until you
know the God from whose lips they fell. The knowledge of God is, at
once, the beginning and the end of wisdom. The ancient sage said, "Man,
know yourself." He spoke well, but even for this, man must first know
his God. I venture to say that no man rightly knows himself till he
knows his God–because it is by the light and purity of God that we see
our own darkness and sinfulness.

There must be a perfect model before us before we can discern our own
departures from perfection. You must have a standard by which to weigh
yourself or you cannot tell whether you are lacking or not. God is the
Standard and until a

man knows the Standard he does not know how far he has fallen short of
it. The proper study of mankind is God. And that attended to, the next
appropriate subject of study is man. We must know God, or our other
knowledge may be dangerous to others and certainly will be hurtful to
ourselves. It will puff us up or load us with responsibilities which we
shall not be able to meet. For the highest and most practical purposes,
without the knowledge of God, we abide in utter ignorance.

The knowledge of God is necessary to any real peace of mind. Suppose a
man is in the world and feels that he is right in every way except with
regard to God, and as to Him he knows nothing? Hear him say, "I go
about the world and see many faces which I can recognize and I perceive
many friends upon whom I can trust, but there is a God somewhere, and I
know nothing at all about Him. Whether He is my friend or my foe I know
not." If that individual is thoughtful and intelligent he must suffer
unrest in his spirit, because he will say to himself, "Suppose this God
should turn out to be a just God and I should be a breaker of His Laws?
What a peril hangs over me. How is it possible for me to be at peace
till this dreadful ignorance is removed?"

The Old Testament Scripture says, "Acquaint now yourself with God and
be at peace." There is no peace to the heart while God is unknown. He
is the God of peace and there can be no peace till the soul knows Him.
Does it not strike you as being most certainly so? To leave this point
unknown would be to leave in jeopardy the most vital part of happiness,
the hinge upon which our eternal destiny must turn. Are you doing this?
Or is the Lord known to you? That this knowledge of God is necessary is
clear, for how could it be possible for a man to have spiritual life
and yet not know God? The very first being which a man discerns when he
is quickened into spiritual life is the Father of Spirits. His first
cry is, "Father, I have sinned," and all his life he cries, "Abba
Father."

Prayer is his breath, but he cannot truly pray to an unknown God. Faith
is his life, but how shall he believe in Him whom he does not know? I
cannot imagine such a being as a spiritual man who knows not God. It is
a self-evident impossibility–to be of the sons of God and not yet know
the Father! To be pressed upon the Father's bosom. To receive the
Father's forgiveness and yet to be an utter stranger to that forgiving
God is impossible–it is utterly inconceivable! The knowledge of God is
an absolute necessity of the spiritual life, without which we cannot
see or enter into the kingdom of Heaven.

Certainly it is necessary for the spiritual life when fully developed
above. In Heaven and not know the King who reigns there? The golden
harp in your hand and not know for whom to sweep its melodious strings?
White-robed in Glory and not know the Redeemer in whose blood our robes
were washed? Absurd supposition! It cannot be endured for a moment!
Sinner, you must know the Lord! If you do not know Him you are not a
partaker of His Grace, but you abide in darkness. Into His Heaven you
can never enter till He has given you a heart to know Him! Do not
forget this warning, or trifle with it.

III. Our third theme is THE EXCELLENCY OF THIS KNOWLEDGE. And here I
shall spend a little longer time and I hope I shall not tire you. I
shall not weary those who care more for sense than sound. One of the
first effects of knowing God in the soul is that it turns out our
idols. Paul tells the Galatians in the 4th chapter and 8th verse of his
Epistle, that it was when they knew not God that they did service unto
them which by nature are not gods. But when they knew God, or rather
were known of Him, they turned from their idols at once.

A knowledge of God! O my Brothers and Sisters, it creates an abhorrence
of idols–especially of those which have enslaved our own hearts. It
seems to us most monstrous that the ancient Greeks and Romans could
have worshipped the deities which their poets fabled for them. And yet,
at this very time, as I have said, men imagine for themselves a god
such as they would choose and then they worship this god of their own
fabrication. Only let the Lord reveal Himself to the soul. Let the
heart know the true God and away these idols go! With loathing are they
cast to the moles and to the bats. Get a view of the Jehovah of
Revelation–shining through the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ, and
you say–"What have I to do, anymore, with idols?"

With holy scorn you pour contempt upon the gods of man's invention and
glory, instead, in the living God, the God of Israel! Your hearts burn
with the jealousy of Elijah and flames with indignation against the
rivals of the Lord of Hosts! You would take the prophets of Baal and
let not one escape, because they have dared to set up "the image of
jealousy" in the temple of the Most High and have seduced the minds of
men to pay their worship to the gods that are not God! Beloved, God so
enamors the soul of the converted man, so engrosses every spiritual
faculty, that he cannot endure

an idol, however dear in former times! And if, perhaps, in some
backsliding moment an earthly love intrudes, it is because the man has
withdrawn his eyes from the splendor of the Deity. When once he gets
his eyes back, again, to the God of Love, then does Dagon fall before
the Ark of the Lord and not so much as the stump is left! Blessed Lord,
let us know You, for then we shall know our idols no more.

The second good effect of the knowledge of God is that it creates faith
in the soul. To prove this I might give a great many texts, but one
will suffice. From Psalm 9:10, "they that know Your name will put their
trust in You." We cannot trust an unknown God. But when God reveals
Himself to us by His Spirit, then to trust Him is no longer difficult.
It is, indeed, inevitable! Whenever a man does not believe God, it is
because he does not know Him. If you doubt His willingness to pardon
sin, you do not know the abundance of His mercy. If you doubt His skill
to bring you through your present difficulties, you do not know the
infinite resources of His wisdom. If you dream that He cannot deliver
you in this, your time of need, you have closed your eyes to the
unlimitedness of His power. If you think He has forsaken you, you have
failed to know His immutability. Know Him and you must trust Him!

Thirdly, this knowledge of God not only creates faith, but creates good
works, also. Turn to 1 John 2:3 and you read, "Hereby we do know that
we know Him, if we keep His commandments"–meaning it is absolutely
certain that wherever there is a knowledge of God there must follow the
keeping of His commandments. And it is certainly so–know the Lord and
with holy reverence you will obey Him. See what a great deal the
Apostle ascribes to the knowledge of God in Colossians 1:9–"For this
cause we, also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for
you, and to desire that you might be filled with the knowledge of His
will, in all wisdom and spiritual understanding." What was to be the
benefit of this? Let us read on–"That you might walk worthy of the
Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work and
increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all might,
according to His glorious power, unto all patience and long-suffering
with joyfulness."

See what a string of excellent Graces spring out of our being filled
with the knowledge of God?! It is a tree which bears 12 manner of
fruits! The soul that knows the Lord is like a tree planted by the
rivers of water, which brings forth its fruit in its season. Daniel
says (11:32), that "The people who do know their God shall be strong
and do great exploits," so that courage, valor and prowess are learned
in this sacred school! A heart to know the Lord begets and nurtures
every virtue and every Grace–and is the basis of the noblest
character–the very food which feeds Divine Grace till it matures into
Glory!

Brothers and Sisters, to know God has over us a transforming power.
Remember how the Apostle writes (in 2 Cor. 3:18), "We all, with open
face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into
the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord."
The knowledge of God is the most effectual influence under Heaven, for
the Spirit works thereby, and by its means we are renewed in knowledge
after the image of Him that created us. Everything that we learn and
know affects our character in some measure, even as the flesh of an
animal tastes of its food. A constant sight of any object, good or bad,
tells upon us.

We heard a German missionary say, last Monday night, that when he was
in Coomassie, the sight of dead bodies and of mangled corpses from week
to week so hardened him to it that the horror was almost gone. Every
thought which crosses the mind affects it for the better or the worse.
Every glance is molding us, every wish fashions the character. A sight
of God is the most wonderfully sanctifying influence that can be
conceived of! Know God and you will grow to be like He. Dear Hearer,
have you beheld this marvelous vision?

The knowledge of God has a further effect. It causes us to praise Him.
Here is a proof text–"In Judah is God known; His name is great in
Israel." Wherever the Lord is known He must be magnified! It is not
possible for us to have low thoughts of Him, or to give forth mean
utterances concerning Him, or to act in a miserly way towards His cause
when we know Him practically. There are some men whom we know whose
presence renders paltry actions impossible– you feel that you could
not act towards them in any but a generous manner. To know them
elevates you! You must do the good and the great and the generous thing
when they are concerned.

So, when once we know God it is much more so, for to know Him
constrains us to praise Him, not only with our lips, but with our
lives! It makes us feel that nothing is good enough for Him and we
would even die for His name's sake. We wish for a glorious high throne
on which He may be exalted above the highest heavens, King of kings and
Lord of lords. The knowledge of God brings comfort and that is a very
desirable thing in a world of trouble. What does the

Psalmist say? "God is known in her palaces for a refuge." Do you know
Him? Then He is your refuge. Blessed be God, in days of storm we put
into this harbor and in days of battle we fly to this castle and dwell
in this high tower. If you know God you will not be ruffled, or if for
a little while you are disturbed, your heart will soon come back to its
rest. You will cast your cares on Him, wait patiently for Him and
rejoice in Him at all times–and surely it shall be well with you.

To know God also brings a man great honor. I cannot attempt, at this
time, to explain the noble text which I am about to quote. I throw it
out as a pleasing theme for meditation. It is the 14th verse of the
91st Psalm. "Because he has set his love upon Me, therefore will I
deliver him: I will set him on high, because he has known My name."
Think of it–"set on high"–and set on high by the Lord Himself! And
all as the result of knowing the name of the Lord! There is no getting
on high and staying there, no dwelling above the world and sin, no
sitting in the heavenlies, no triumphing over death and Hell except by
knowing God! When we do know Him, our meditation of Him shall be sweet.
Then shall our head be lifted up above our enemies round about us. Then
our heart shall mount above the cares and sorrows of the world and our
soul shall dwell on high, where our place of defense shall be the
munitions of rocks.

One thing more, and that is, the man who knows the Lord will have
usefulness given him. And to prove that I will quote a passage in 2
Corinthians 2:14–"Now thanks be unto God which always causes us to
triumph in Christ, and makes manifest the savor of His knowledge by us
in every place. For we are unto God a sweet savor of Christ, in them
that are saved and in them that perish." Do you not see that the
Apostle knew Christ and Christ's name was in him as ointment poured
forth? The man who knows God has a savor about him and wherever he goes
he will be a power among men! The savor of Christ will come streaming
out of him, as incense from a censor filled with glowing coals!

Our usefulness very much depends upon our knowledge of God. We cannot
teach others of things that we do not know ourselves. If we have no
savor in us there cannot be a savor coming out of us. We shall only be
a drag upon the Church in any position if we are destitute of the
knowledge of God in Christ Jesus. But if we are filled with a knowledge
of Christ, then the sweet savor of His name will pour forth from us as
perfume from the flowers!

Thus I have put together many things upon which we cannot expatiate,
but they will make you see how excellent a thing it is to know the Lord
in the heart.

IV. Our fourth point is, THE SOURCE OF THIS KNOWLEDGE. Upon this I will
dwell but briefly. We are clearly taught in the text that it is a
Divine work–"I will give them a heart to know Me." None but the
Creator can give a man a new heart. The change is too radical for any
other hand. It would be hard to give a new eye, or a new arm, but a new
heart [intellect] is still more out of the question! All the preaching,
teaching and reforming in the world cannot do it. The Lord Himself must
do it!

As surely as God made you, God must make you new or you will never know
Him. It is evidently a work of pure Grace. "I will give them a heart,"
not, "They shall grow into it, or purchase it," but, "I will give it to
them." He freely gives to whomever He wills, according to His own
declaration, "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy." It is
evidently a work which is possible. All things are possible to God and
He says, "I will give it to them." He does not speak of it as a
desirable blessing, but unattainable. On the contrary, He says, "I will
give them a heart to know Me."

It is a work which the Lord has promised to do. How many precious
passages there are in Holy Writ in which the Lord declares that this
shall be done? I have lately read them with much sweetness to my own
heart. Here are some of them. In Hosea 2:19, "I will betroth you unto
Me forever; yes, I will betroth you unto Me in righteousness and in
judgment, and in lovingkindness and in mercies, I will even betroth you
unto Me in faithfulness, and you shall know the Lord." Then in the 8th
chapter of the prophecy of Hosea, in the 2nd verse we read, "Israel
shall cry unto Me, my God, we know You."

That wonderful passage in Jeremiah 31:33-34, is so nearly reproduced by
the Apostle in the 8th of Hebrews that I need only read the New
Testament version (Heb. 8:10-12). "This is the covenant that I will
make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord; I will
put My laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will
be to them a God, and they shall be to Me a people: and they shall not
teach every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know
the Lord: for all shall know Me, from the least to the greatest. For I
will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their
iniquities will I remember no more." So then it is a promised blessing!
A blessing all Divine and Divinely guaranteed to those with whom
Jehovah has entered into Covenant.

The sum of my discourse is this. If you have received this heart to
know the Lord, bless Him every minute of your existence for this
choicest of all blessings without which you could not enjoy any other
Covenant blessing! Never cease to

praise the Lord, for He has favored you above measure in giving you so
priceless a blessing. But suppose you stand in doubt as to whether you
know God? How should you act? Listen to good counsel–consider your
ways and turn unto the Lord your God, even now. Confess your ignorance,
dear Friend. A sense of ignorance is the very vestibule of knowledge.

Go before God this very day with an acknowledgment that you know
nothing. Tell Him how ignorant, blind and stupid you are. Confess it
all before Him. That being done, remember that it is by the knowledge
of Christ that you are to be justified–"By His knowledge shall my
righteous Servant justify many" (Isa. 53:11). Study the Character of
Christ. Contemplate, with eager attention, His work and Person. See God
in Christ Jesus and when you have done so, cry mightily unto the Lord,
saying, "You have given this promise in Your Covenant! Lord, let it be
a promise unto me and do You fulfill it. You have said, 'I will give
them a heart to know Me.' Lord, give me a heart to know You!"

"For this," He says, "I will be inquired of by the house of Israel to
do it for them." Go and inquire of Him concerning it. He will give you
that heart! He will reveal Himself to you and you shall yet have to
bless and praise His holy name, that He has turned you from darkness to
light, and from the ignorance of your natural estate unto the true
knowledge of His name. God grant it may be so with you this very day!

Time flies, we are almost at the end of the year and some of you still
remain ignorant of God! Shall the year return to Heaven to accuse you?
Let not this blessed Sabbath go until you have thought upon your ways
and turned your steps unto His testimonies! May His Spirit sweetly
incline you to seek His face and He will be known of you. God grant His
blessing, for Jesus' sake. Amen.

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON–Jeremiah 31:18-37. HYMNS FROM
"OUR OWN HYMN BOOK"–908, 231, 489.
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