14 AUGUST
Send forth thy light and thy truth
‘O send out thy light and thy truth: let them lead me; let them bring me unto thy holy hill, and to thy tabernacles.’ Psalm 43:3
SUGGESTED FURTHER READING: John 7:37–44
What is expressed: every word is emphatical and full of meaning.
Send forth. From whence? From Jesus. He is the Fountain, the Sun, the Treasury of all grace. This sending forth is the fruit of his intercession. He has received gifts, even the Holy Spirit, to teach, comfort and seal every seeking soul.
Thy light. All light and knowledge is from God, but natural and common light, the light of reason, books, or education, will not do—therefore the soul prays thy light, that which is peculiarly thine, and which none partake of but by special favour. Light signifies knowledge, as in Psalm 119:130, and comfort, as in Micah 7:9. Both these, the heart which God has touched seeks from him alone.
And thy truth. This is already revealed or sent forth in the Word, but the meaning of the prayer is that the promises, which are true in themselves, may be sent forth in their power and sweetness and applied to the heart. Two things the soul wants to know of God’s truths: their extensive meaning and fullness and its own interest in them.
FOR MEDITATION: I labour under a thousand difficulties in my ways to goodness, my heart is wicked and deceitful, my affections corrupted, my hopes and fears misplaced, and all my faculties unhappily bent toward evil; the world, the flesh and the devil in many different forms and circumstances strive to draw me from my duty. These things are to me insuperable but they are not so to thee. If thou but speak the word, all obstacles shall vanish. That powerful word which cleansed the lepers and raised the dead can in one moment purge my soul from all the defilements it has contracted and raise me up to newness of life. Lord I believe, help thou mine unbelief, for thy name’s sake, for thy promise’ sake, for the sake of that precious sacrifice thou didst once offer up for all.
Diary, 1 July 1752
SERMON: PSALM 43:3 [4/5]
Milo 