The Talking Book

Delivered on Lord's-day Morning, October 22nd, 1871 by

C. H. SPURGEON,

At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington

"When thou awakest, it shall talk with thee"–Proverbs 6:22.

IT IS A VERY HAPPY CIRCUMSTANCE when the commandment of our father and
the law of our mother are also the commandment of God and the law of
the Lord. Happy are they who have a double force to draw them to the
right–the bonds of nature, and the cords of grace. They sin with a
vengeance who sin both against a father on earth and the great Father
in heaven, and they exhibit a virulence and a violence of sin who do
despite to the tender obligations of childhood, as well as to the
demands of conscience and God. Solomon, in the passage before us,
evidently speaks of those who find in the parents' law and in God's law
the same thing, and he admonishes such to bind the law of God about
their heart, and to tie it about their neck; by which he intends inward
affection and open avowal. The law of God should be so dear to us, that
is should be bound about the most vital organ of our being, braided
about our heart. That which a man carries in his hand he may forget and
lose, that which he wears upon his person may be torn from him, but
that which is bound about his heart will remain there as long as life
remains. We are to love the Word of God with all our heart, and mind,
and soul, and strength; with the full force of our nature we are to
embrace it; all our warmest affections are to be bound up with it. When
the wise man tells us, also, to wear it about our necks, he means that
we are never to be ashamed of it. No blush is to mantle our cheek when
we are called Christians; we are never to speak with bated breath in
any company concerning the things of God. Manfully must we take up the
cross of Christ; cheerfully must we avow ourselves to belong to those
who have respect unto the divine testimonies. Let us count true
religion to be our highest ornament; and, as magistrates put upon them
their gold chains, and think themselves adorned thereby, so let us tie
about our neck the commands and the gospel of the Lord our God.

In order that we may be persuaded so to do, Solomon gives us three
telling reasons. He says that God's law, by which I understand the
whole run of Scripture, and, especially the gospel of Jesus Christ,
will be a guide to us:–"When thou goest, it shall lead thee." It will
be a guardian to us: "When thou sleepest"–when thou art defenceless
and off thy guard–"it shall keep thee." And it shall also be a dear
companion to us: "When thou awakest, it shall talk with thee." Any one
of these three arguments might surely suffice to make us seek a nearer
acquaintance with the sacred word. We all need a guide, for "it is not
in man that walketh to direct his steps." Left to our own way, we soon
excel in folly. There are dilemmas in all lives where a guide is more
precious than a wedge of gold. The Word of God, as an infallible
director for human life, should be sought unto by us, and it will lead
us in the highway of safety. Equally powerful is the second reason: the
Word of God will become the guardian of our days; whoso hearkeneth unto
it shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet from fear of evil. Unguarded
moments there may be; times, inevitable to our imperfection, there will
be, when, unless some other power protect us, we shall fall into the
hands of the foe. Blessed is he who has God's law so written on his
heart, and wears it about his neck as armour of proof, that at all
times he is invulnerable, kept by the power of God through faith unto
salvation.

But I prefer, this morning, to keep to the third reason for loving
God's word. It is this, that is becomes our sweet companion: "When thou
awakest, it shall talk with thee." The inspired law of God, which David
in the hundred and nineteenth Psalm calls God's testimonies, precepts,
statutes, and the like, is the friend of the righteous. Its essence and
marrow is the gospel of Jesus, the law-fulfiller, and this also is the
special solace of believers. Of the whole sacred volume it may be said,
"When thou awakest, it shall talk with thee." I gather four or five
thoughts from this expression, and upon these we will speak.

I. We perceive here that THE WORD IS LIVING. How else could it be said:
"It shall talk with thee"? A dead book cannot talk, nor can a dumb book
speak. It is clearly a living book, then, and a speaking book: "The
word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever." How many of us have
found this to be most certainly true! A large proportion of human books
are long ago dead, and even shrivelled like Egyptian mummies; the mere
course of years has rendered them worthless, their teaching is
disproved, and they have no life for us. Entomb them in your public
libraries if you will, but, henceforth, they will stir no man's pulse
and warm no man's heart. But this thrice blessed book of God, though it
has been extant among us these many hundreds of years, is immortal in
its life, unwithering in its strength: the dew of its youth is still
upon it; its speech still drops as the rain fresh from heaven; its
truths are overflowing founts of ever fresh consolation. Never book
spake like this book; its voice, like the voice of God, is powerful and
full of majesty.

Whence comes it that the word of God is living? Is it not, first,
because it is pure truth? Error is death, truth is life. No matter how
well established an error may be by philosophy, or by force of arms, or
the current of human thought, the day cometh that shall burn as an
oven, and all untruth shall be as stubble before the fire. The tooth of
time devours all lies. Falsehoods are soon cut down, and they wither as
the green herb. Truth never dies, it dates its origin from the
immortals. Kindled at the source of light, its fame cannot be quenched;
if by persecution it be for a time covered, it shall blaze forth anew
to take reprisals upon its adversaries. Many a once venerated system of
error now rots in the dead past among the tombs of the forgotten; but
the truth as it is in Jesus knows no sepulchre, and fears no funeral;
it lives on, and must live while the Eternal fills His throne.

The word of God is living, because it is the utterance of an immutable,
self-existing God. God doth not speak to-day what He meant not
yesterday, neither will He to-morrow blot out what He records to-day.
When I read a promise spoken three thousand years ago, it is as fresh
as though it fell from the eternal lips to-day. There are, indeed, no
dates to the Divine promises; they are not of private interpretation,
nor to be monopolised by any generation. I say again, as fresh to-day
the eternal word drops from the Almighty's lips as when He uttered it
to Moses, or to Elias, or spake it by the tongue of Esaias or Jeremiah.
The word is always sure, steadfast, and full of power. It is never out
of date. Scripture bubbles up evermore with good matters, it is an
eternal Geyser, a spiritual Niagara of grace, for ever falling,
flashing, and flowing on; it is never stagnant, never brackish or
defiled, but always clear, crystal, fresh, and refreshing; so,
therefore, ever living.

The word lives, again, because it enshrines the living heart of Christ.
The heart of Christ is the most living of all existences. It was once
pierced with a spear, but it lives on, and yearns towards sinners, and
is as tender and compassionate as in the days of the Redeemer's flesh.
Jesus, the Sinner's Friend, walks in the avenues of Scripture as once
He traversed the plains and hills of Palestine: you can see Him still,
if you have opened eyes, in the ancient prophecies; you can behold Him
more clearly in the devout evangelists; He opens and lays bare His
inmost soul to you in the epistles, and makes you hear the footsteps of
His approaching advent in the symbols of the Apocalypse. The living
Christ is in the book; you behold His face almost in every page; and,
consequently, it is a book that can talk. The Christ of the mount of
benedictions speaks in it still; the God who said, "Let there be
light," gives forth from its pages the same divine fiat; while the
incorruptible truth, which saturated every line and syllable of it when
first it was penned, abides therein in full force, and preserves it
from the finger of decay. "The grass withereth, and the flower thereof
falleth away: but the word of the Lord endureth for ever."

Over and above all this, the Holy Spirit has a peculiar connection with
the word of God. I know that He works in the ministries of all His
servants whom He hath ordained to preach; but for the most part, I have
remarked that the work of the Spirit of God in men's hearts is rather
in connection with the texts we quote than with our explanations of
them. "Depend upon it," says a deeply spiritual writer, "it is God's
word, not man's comment on it, which saves souls." God does save souls
by our comment, by still it is true that the majority of conversions
have been wrought by the agency of a text of Scripture. It is the word
of God that is living, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged
sword. There must be life in it, for by it men are born again. As for
believers, the Holy Spirit often sets the word on a blaze while they
are studying it. The letters were at one time before us as mere
letters, but the Holy Ghost suddenly came upon them, and they spake
with tongues. The chapter is lowly as the bush at Horeb, but the Spirit
descends upon it, and lo! it glows with celestial splendour, God
appearing in the words, so that we feel like Moses when he put off his
shoes from his feet, because the place whereon he stood was holy
ground. It is true, the mass of readers understand not this, and look
upon the Bible as a common book; but if they understand it not, as
least let them allow the truthfulness of our assertion, when we declare
that hundreds of times we have as surely felt the presence of God in
the page of Scripture as ever Elijah did when he heard the Lord
speaking in a still small voice. The Bible has often appeared to us as
a temple God, and the posts of its doors have moved at the voice of Him
that cried, whose train also has filled the temple. We have been
constrained adoringly to cry, with the seraphim. "Holy, holy, holy, is
the Lord God of Hosts." God the Holy Spirit vivifies the letter with
His presence, and then it is to us a living word indeed.

And now, dear brethren, if these things be so–and our experience
certifies them–let us take care how we trifle with a book which is so
instinct with life. Might not many of you remember your faults this day
were we to ask you whether you are habitual students of holy writ?
Readers of it I believe you are; but are you searchers; for the promise
is not to those who merely read, but to those who delight in the law of
the Lord, and meditate therein both day and night. Are you sitting at
the feet of Jesus, with His word as your school-book? If not, remember,
though you may be saved, you lacked very much of the blessing which
otherwise you might enjoy. Have you been backsliding? Refresh your soul
by meditating in the divine statues, and you will say, with David, "Thy
word hath quickened me." Are you faint and weary? Go and talk with this
living book: it will give you back your energy, and you shall mount
again as with the wings of eagles. But are you unconverted altogether?
Then I cannot direct you to Bible-reading as being the way of
salvation, nor speak of it as though it had any merit in it; but I
would, nevertheless, urge upon you unconverted people great reverence
for Scripture, an intimate acquaintance with its contents, and a
frequent perusal of its pages, for it has occurred ten thousand times
over that when men have been studying the word of life, the word has
brought life to them. "The entrance of thy word giveth light." Like
Elijah and the dead child, the word has stretched itself upon them, and
their dead souls have been made to live. One of the likeliest places in
which to find Christ is in the garden of the Scriptures, for there He
delights to walk. As of old, the blind men were wont to sit by the
wayside begging, so that, if Jesus passed by, they might cry to Him, so
would I have you sit down by the wayside of the Holy Scriptures. Hear
the promises, listen to their gracious words; they are the footsteps of
the Saviour; and, as you hear them, may you be led to cry, "Thou Son of
David, have mercy upon me!" Attend most those ministries which preach
God's Word most. Do not select those that are fullest of fine speaking,
and that dazzle you with expressions which are ornamental rather than
edifying; but get to a ministry that is full of God's own Word, and,
above all, learn God's Word itself. Read it with a desire to know its
meaning, and I am persuaded that, thereby, many of you who are now far
from God will be brought near to him, and led to a saving faith in
Jesus, for "the Word of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul."
"Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God."

II. If the text says, "When thou awakest, it shall talk with thee,"
then it is clear THE WORD IS PERSONAL. "It shall talk with thee." It is
not written, "It shall speak to the air, and thou shalt hear its
voice," but, "It shall talk with thee." You know exactly what the
expression means. I am not exactly talking with any one of you this
morning; there are too many of you, and I am but one; but, when you are
on the road home, each one will talk with his fellow: then it is truly
talk when man speaks to man. Now, the word of God has the condescending
habit of talking to men, speaking personally to them; and, herein, I
desire to commend the word of God to your love. Oh! that you might
esteem it very precious for this reason!

"It shall talk with thee," that is to say, God's word talks about men,
and about modern men; it speaks of ourselves, and of these latter days,
as precisely as if it had only appeared this last week. Some go to the
word of God with the idea that they shall find historical information
about the ancient ages, and so they will, but that is not the object of
the Word. Others look for facts upon geology, and great attempts have
been made either to bring geology round to Scripture, or Scripture to
geology. We may always rest assured that truth never contradicts
itself; but, as nobody knows anything yet about geology–for its theory
is a dream and an imagination altogether–we will wait till the
philosophers settle their own private matters, being confident that
when they find out the truth, it will be quite consistent with what God
has revealed. At any rate, we may leave that. The main teachings of
Holy Scripture are about men, about the Paradise of unfallen manhood,
the fall, the degeneracy of the race, and the means of its redemption.
The book speaks of victims and sacrifices, priests and washings, and so
points us to the divine plan by which man can be elevated from the fall
and be reconciled to God. Read Scripture through, and you shall find
that its great subject is that which concerns the race as to their most
important interests. It is a book that talks, talks personally, for it
deals with things not in the moon, nor in the planet Jupiter, nor in
the distant ages long gone by, nor does it say much of the periods yet
to come, but it deals with us, with the business of to-day; how sin may
be to-day forgiven, and our souls brought at once into union with
Christ.

Moreover, this book is so personal, that it speaks to men in all states
and conditions before God. How it talks to sinners–talks, I say, for
its puts it thus: "Come, now, and let us reason together; though your
sins be as scarlet, they shall be as wool; though they be red like
crimson, they shall be as snow." It has many very tender expostulations
for sinners. It stoops to their condition and position. If they will
not stoop to God, it makes, as it were, eternal mercy stoop to them. It
talks of feasts of fat things, of fat things full of marrow; and the
book, as it talks, reasons with men's hunger, and bids them eat and be
satisfied. In all conditions into which the sinner can be cast, there
is a word that precisely meets his condition.

And, certainly, when we become the children of God the book talks with
us wondrously. In the family of heaven it is the child's own book. We
no sooner know our Father than this dear book comes at once as a love
letter from the far-off country, signed with our own Father's hand, and
perfumed with our Father's love. If we grow in grace, or if we
backslide, in either case Scripture still talks with us. Whatever our
position before the eternal God, the book seems to be written on
purpose to meet that position. It talks to you as you are, not only as
you should be, or as others have been, but with you, with you
personally, about your present condition.

Have you never noticed how personal the book is as to all your states
of mind, in reference to sadness or to joy? There was a time with some
of us when we were very gloomy and sore depressed, and then the book of
Job mourned to the same dolorous tune. I have turned over the
Lamentations of Jeremiah wrote. It mourns unto us when we lament. On
the other hand, when the soul gets up to the exceeding high mountains,
to the top of Amana and Lebanon, when we behold visions of glory, and
see our Beloved face to face, lo! The word is at our side, and in the
delightful language of the Psalms, or in the yet sweeter expressions of
the Song of Solomon, it tells us all that is in our heart, and talks to
us as a living thing that has been in the deeps, and has been on the
heights, that has known the overwhelmings of affliction, and has
rejoiced in the triumphs of delight. The word of God is to me my own
book: I have no doubt, brother, it is the same to you. There could not
be a Bible that suited me better: it seems written on purpose for me.
Dear sister, have not you often felt as you have put your finger on a
promise, "Ah, that is my promise; if there be no other soul whose
tearful eyes can bedew that page and say, It is mine,' yet I, a poor
afflicted one, can do so!" Oh, yes; the book is very personal, for it
goes into all the details of our case, let our state be what it may.

And, how very faithful it always is. You never find the word of God
keeping back that which is profitable to you. Like Nathan it cries,
"Thou art the man." It never allows our sins to go unrebuked, nor our
backslidings to escape notice till they grow into overt sin. It gives
us timely notice; it cries to us as soon as we begin to go aside,
"Awake thou that sleepest," "Watch and pray," "Keep thine heart with
all diligence," and a thousand other words of warning does it address
personally to each one of us.

Now I would suggest, before I leave this point, a little
self-examination as healthful for each of us. Does the word of God
after this fashion speak to my soul? Then it is a gross folly to lose
by generalisations that precious thing which can only be realised by a
personal grasp. How sayest thou, dear hearer? Dost thou read the book
for thyself, and does the book speak to thee? Has it ever condemned
thee, and has thou trembled before the word of God? Has it ever pointed
thee to Christ, and has thou looked to Jesus the incarnate Saviour?
Does the book now seal, as with the witness of the Spirit, the witness
of thine own spirit that thou art born of God? Art thou in the habit of
going to the book to know thine own condition, to see thine own face as
in a glass? Is it thy family medicine? Is it thy test and tell-tale to
let thee know thy spiritual condition? Oh, do not treat the book
otherwise than this, for if thou dost thus unto it, and takest it to be
thy personal friend, happy art thou, since God will dwell with the man
that trembles at His word; but, if you treat it as anybody's book
rather than your own, then beware, lest you be numbered with the wicked
who despise God's statutes.

III. From the text we learn that HOLY SCRIPTURE IS VERY FAMILIAR. "When
thou awakest, it shall talk with thee. To talk signifies fellowship,
communion, familiarity. It does not say, "It shall preach to thee."
Many persons have a high esteem for the book, but they look upon it as
though it were some very elevated teacher speaking to them from a lofty
tribunal, while they stand far below. I will not altogether condemn
that reverence, but it were far better if they would understand the
familiarity of God's word; it does not so much preach to us as talk to
us. It is not, "When thou awakest, it shall lecture thee," or, it shall
scold thee;" no, no, "it shall talk with thee." We sit at its feet, or
rather at the feet of Jesus, in the Word, and it comes down to us; it
is familiar with us, as a man talketh to his friend. And here let me
remind you of the delightful familiarity of Scripture in this respect
that it speaks the language of men. If God had written us a book in His
own language, we could not have comprehended it, or what little we
understood would have so alarmed us, that we should have besought that
those words should not be spoken to us any more; but the Lord, in His
Word, often uses language which, though it be infallibly true in its
meaning, is not after the knowledge of God, but according to the manner
of man. I mean this, that the word uses similes and analogies of which
we may say that they speak humanly, and not according to the absolute
truth as God Himself sees it. As men conversing with babes use their
broken speech, so doth the condescending word. It is not written in the
celestial tongue, but in the patois of this lowland country,
condescending to men of low estate. It feeds us on bread broken down to
our capacity, "food convenient for us". It speaks of God's arm, His
hand, His finger, His wings, and even of His feathers. Now, all this is
familiar picturing, to meet our childish capacities; for the Infinite
One is not to be conceived of as though such similitudes were literal
facts. It is an amazing instance of divine love, that He puts those
things so that we may be helped to grasp sublime truths. Let us thank
the Lord of the word for this.

How tenderly Scripture comes down to simplicity. Suppose the sacred
volume had all been like the book of the prophet Ezekiel, small would
have been its service to the generality of mankind. Imagine that the
entire volume had been as mysterious as the Book of Revelation: it
might have been our duty to study it, but if its benefit depended upon
our understanding it, wew should have failed to attain it. But how
simple are the gospels, how plain these words, "He that believeth and
is baptised shall be saved"; how deliciously clear those parables about
the lost piece of money, the lost sheep, and the prodigal son. Wherever
the word touches upon vital points, it is as bright as a sunbeam.
Mysteries there are, and profound doctrines, deeps where Leviathan can
swim; but, where it has to do immediately with what concerns us for
eternity, it is so plain that the babe in grace may safely wade in its
refreshing streams. In the gospel narrative the wayfaring man, though a
fool, need not err. It is familiar talk; it is God's great mind brought
down to our littleness, that it may lift us up.

How familiar the book is too–I speak now as to my own feelings–as to
all that concerns us. It talks about my flesh, and my corruptions, and
my sins, as only one that knew me could speak. It talks of my trials in
the wisest way; some, I dare not tell, it knows all about. It talks
about my difficulties; some would sneer at them and laugh, but this
book sympathises with them, knows my tremblings, and my fears, and my
doubts, and all the storm that rages within the little world of my
nature. The book has been through all my experience; somehow or other
it maps it all out, and talks with me as if it were a fellow-pilgrim.
It does not speak to me unpractically, and scold me, and look down on
me from an awful height of stern perfection, as if it were an angel,
and could no sympathise with fallen men; but like the Lord whom it
reveals, the book seems as if it were touched with a feeling of my
infirmities, and had been tempted in all points like as I am. Have you
not often wondered at the human utterances of the divine word: it
thunders like God and yet weeps like man. It seems impossible that
anything should be too little for the word of God to notice, or too
bitter, or even too sinful for that book to overlook. It touches
humanity at all points. Everywhere it is a personal, familiar
acquaintance, and seems to say to itself, "Shall I hide this thing from
Abraham my friend?"

And, how often the book has answered enquiries! I have been amazed in
times of difficulties to see how plain the oracle is. You have asked
friends, and they could not advise you; but you have gone to your
knees, and God has told you. You have questioned, and you have puzzled,
and you have tried to elucidate the problem, and lo! In the chapter
read at morning prayer, or in a passage of Scripture that lay open
before you, the direction has been given. Have we not seen a text, as
it were, plume its wings, and fly from the word like a seraph, and
touch our lips with a live altar coal? It lay like a slumbering angel
amidst the beds of spices of the sacred word, but it received a divine
mission, and brought consolation and instruction to your heart.

The word of God, then, talks with us in the sense of being familiar
with us. Do we understand this? I will close this point by another word
of application. Who, then, that finds God's word so dear and kind a
friend would spurn or neglect it? If any of you have despised it, what
shall I say to you? If it were a dreary book, written within and
without with curses and lamentations, whose every letter flashed with
declarations of vengeance, I might see some reason why we should not
read it; but, O precious, priceless companion, dear friend of all my
sorrows, making my bed in my sickness, the light of my darkness, and
the joy of my soul, how can I forget thee–how can I forsake thee? I
have heard of one who said that the dust on some men's Bibles lay there
so thick and long that you might write "Damnation" on it. I am afraid
that such is that case with some of you. Mr. Rogers, of Dedham, on one
occasion, after preaching about the preciousness of the Bible, took it
away from the front of the pulpit, and, putting it down behind him,
pictured God as saying, "You do not read the book: you do not care
about it; I will take it back–you shall not be wearied with it any
more." And then he portrayed the grief of wise men's hearts when they
found the blessed revelation withdrawn from men; and how they would
besiege the throne of grace, day and night, to ask it back. I am sure
he spoke the truth. Though we too much neglect it, yet ought we to
prize it beyond all price, for, if it were taken from us, we should
have lost our kindest comforter in the hour of need. God grant us to
love the Scriptures more!

IV. Fourthly, and with brevity, our text evidently shows that THE WORD
IS RESPONSIVE. "When thou awakest, it shall talk with thee," not to
thee. Now, talk with a man is not all on one side. To talk with a man
needs answering talk from him. You have both of you something to say
when you talk together. It is a conversation to which each one
contributes his part. Now, Scripture is a marvellously conversational
book; it talks, and makes men talk. It is ever ready to respond to us.
Suppose you go to the Scriptures in a certain state of spiritual life:
you must have noticed, I think, that the word answer to that state. If
you are dark and gloomy, it will appear as though it had put itself in
mourning, so that it might lament with you. When you are on the
dunghill, there sits Scripture, with dust and ashes on its head,
weeping side by side with you, and not upbraiding like Job's miserable
comforters. But suppose you come to the book with gleaming eyes of joy,
you will hear it laugh; it will sing and play to you as with psaltery
and harp, it will bring forth the high-sounding cymbals. Enter its
goodly land in a happy state, and you shall go forth with you and be
led forth with peace, its mountains and its hills shall break before
you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their
hands. As in water the face is reflected, so in the living stream of
revealed truth a man sees his own image.

If you come to Holy Scripture with growth in grace, and with
aspirations for yet higher attainments, the book grows with you, grows
upon you. It is ever beyond you, and cheerily cries, "Higher yet;
Excelsior!" Many books in my library are now behind and beneath me; I
read them years ago, with considerable pleasure; I have read them
since, with disappointment; I shall never read them again, for they are
of no service to me. They were good in their way once, and so were the
clothes I wore when I was ten years old; but I have outgrown them I
know more than these books know, and know wherein they are faulty.
Nobody ever outgrows Scripture; the book widens and deepens with our
years. It is true, it cannot really grow, for it is perfect; but it
does so to our apprehension. The deeper you dig into Scripture, the
more you find that it is a great abyss of truth. The beginner learns
four or five points of orthodoxy, and says, "I understand the gospel, I
have grasped all the Bible." Wait a bit, and when his soul grows and
knows more of Christ, he will confess, "Thy commandment is exceeding
broad, I have only begun to understand it."

There is one thing about God's word which shows its responsiveness to
us, and that is when you reveal your heart to it, it reveals its heart
to you. If, as you read the word, you say, "O blessed truth, thou art
indeed realised in my experience; come thou still further into my
heart. I give up my prejudices, I assign myself, like the wax, to be
stamped with thy seal,"–when you do that, and open your heart to
Scripture, Scripture will open its heart to you; for it has secrets
which it does not tell to the casual reader, it has precious things of
the everlasting hills which can only be discovered by miners who know
how to dig and open the secret places, and penetrate great veins of
everlasting riches. Give thyself up to the Bible, and the Bible will
give itself up to thee. Be candid with it, and honest with thy soul,
and the Scripture will take down its golden key, and open one door
after another, and show to thy astonished gaze ingots of silver which
thou couldst not weigh, and heaps of gold which thou couldst not
measure. Happy is that man who, in talking with the Bible, tells it all
his heart, and learns the secret of the Lord which is with them that
fear Him.

And how, too, if you love the bible and talk out your love to it, the
Bible will love you! Its wisdom says, "I love them that love me."
Embrace the word of God, and the word of God embraces you at once. When
you prize its every letter, then it smiles upon you graciously, greets
you with many welcomes, and treats you as an honoured guest. I am
always sorry to be on bad terms with the Bible, for then I must be on
bad terms with God. Whenever my creed does not square with God's word,
I think it is time to mould my creed into another form. As for God's
words, they must not be touched with hammer or axe. Oh, the chiselling,
and cutting, and hammering in certain commentaries to make God's Bible
orthodox and systematic! How much better to leave it alone! The word is
right, and we are wrong, wherein we agree not with it. The teachings of
God's word are infallible, and must be reverenced as such. Now, when
you love it so well that you would not touch a single line of it, and
prize it so much that you would even die for the defence of one of its
truths, then, as it is dear to you, you will be dear to it, and it will
grasp you and unfold itself to you as it does not to the world.

Dear brethren and sisters, I must leave this point, but it shall be
with this remark–Do you talk to God? Does God talk to you? Does your
heart go up to heaven, and does His Word come fresh from heaven to your
soul? If not, you do not know the experience of the living child of
God, and I can earnestly pray you may. May you this day be brought to
see Christ Jesus in the word, to see a crucified Saviour there, and to
put your trust in Him, and then, from this day forward, the word will
echo to your heart–it will respond to your emotions.

V. Lastly, SCRIPTURE IS INFLUENTIAL. That I gather from the fact that
Solomon says, "When thou wakest, it shall talk with thee"; and follows
it up with the remark that it keeps man from the strange woman, and
from other sins which he goes on to mention. When the word of God talks
with us, it influences us. All talk influences more or less. I believe
there more done in this world for good or bad by talk than there is by
preaching; indeed, the preacher preaches best when he talks; there is
no oratory in the world that is equal to simple talk; it is the model
of eloquence; and all your rhetorician's action and verbiage are so
much rubbish. The most efficient way of preaching is simply talking;
the man permitting his heart to run over at his lips into other men's
hearts. Now, this book, as it talks with us, influences us, and it does
so in many ways.

It soothes our sorrows, and encourages us. Many a warrior has been
ready to steal away from God's battle, but the word has laid its hand
on him, and said, "Stand on thy feet, be not discouraged, be of good
cheer, I will strengthen thee, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold
thee with the right hand of my righteousness." Brave saints we have
read of, but we little know how often they would have been arrant
cowards only the good word came and strengthened them, and they went
back to be stronger than lions and swifter than eagles.

While the book thus soothes and cheers, it has a wonderfully elevating
power. How you never felt it put fresh life-blood into you? You have
thought, "How can I continue to live at such a dying rate as I have
lived, something nobler must I gain?" Read that part of the word which
tells of the agonies of your Master, and you will feel–

"Now for the love I bear His name,

What was my gain I count my loss;

My former pride I call my shame,

And nail my glory to His cross."

Read of the glories of heaven which this book reveals, and you will
feel that you can run the race with quickened speed, because a crown so
bright is glittering in your view. Nothing can so lift a man above the
gross considerations of carnal gain or human applause as to have his
soul saturated with the spirit of truth. It elevates as well as cheers.

Then, too, how often it warns and restrains. I had gone to the right or
to the left if the law of the Lord had not said, "Let thine eyes look
right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee."

This book's consecrated talk sanctifies and moulds the mind into the
image of Christ. You cannot expect to grow in grace if you do not read
the Scriptures. If you are not familiar with the word, you cannot
expect to become like Him that spake it. Our experience is, as it were,
the potter's wheel on which we revolve; and the hand of God is in the
Scriptures to mould us after the fashion and image which He intends to
bring us to. Oh, be much with the holy word of God, and you will be
holy. Be much with the silly novels of the day, and the foolish trifles
of the hour, and you will degenerate into vapid wasters of your time;
but be much with the solid teaching of God's word, and you will become
solid and substantial men and women: drink them in, and feed upon them,
and they shall produce in you a Christ-likeness, at which the world
shall stand astonished.

Lastly, let the Scripture talk with you, and it will confirm and settle
you. We hear every now and then of apostates from the gospel. hey must
have been little taught in the truth as it is in Jesus. A great outcry
is made, every now and then, about our all being perverted to Rome. I
was assured the other day by a good man with a great deal of alarm,
that all England was going over to Popery. I told him I did not know
what kind of God he worshipped, but my God was a good deal bigger than
the devil, and did not intend to let the devil have his way after all,
and that I was not half as much afraid of the Pope at Rome as of the
Ritualists at home. But mark it, there is some truth in these fears.
There will be a going over to one form of error or another unless there
be in the Christian church a more honest, industrious, and general
reading of Holy Scripture. What if I were to say most of you church
members do not read your Bibles, should I be slandering you? You hear
on Sabbath day a chapter read, and you perhaps read a passage at family
prayer, but a very large number never read the Bible privately for
themselves, they take their religion out of the monthly magazine, or
accept it from the minister's lips. Oh, for the Berean spirit back
again, to search the Scriptures whether these things be so. I would
like to see a huge pile of all the book, good and bad that were ever
written, prayer-books, and sermons, and hymn-books, and all, smoking
like Sodom of old, if the reading of those books keeps you away from
the reading of the Bible; for a ton weight of human literature is not
worth an ounce of Scripture; one single drop of the essential tincture
of the word of God is better than a sea full of our commenting and
sermonisings, and the like. The word, the simple, pure, infallible word
of God, we must live upon if we are to become strong against error, and
tenacious of truth. Brethren, may you be estalished in the faith
rooted, grounded, built up; but I know you cannot be except ye search
the Scriptures continually.

The time is coming when we shall all fall asleep in death. Oh, how
blessed it will be to find when we awake that the word of God will talk
with us then, and remember its ancient friendship. Then the promise
which we loved before shall be fulfilled; the charming intimations of a
blessed future shall be all realised, and the face of Christ, whom we
saw as through a glass darkly, shall be all uncovered, and He shall
shine upon us as the sun in its strength. God grant us to love the
word, and feed thereon, and the Lord shall have the glory for ever and
ever. Amen and amen.

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON–Psalm 119:161-179; Proverbs
6:1-23.