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December 15

“Trust also in him.” (Psalm 37:5.)

THE word trust is the heart word of faith. It is the Old Testament word, the word given to the early and infant stage of faith. The word faith expresses more the act of the will, the word belief the act of the mind or intellect, but trust is the language of the heart. The other has reference more to a truth believed or a thing expected.
Trust implies more than this, it sees and feels, and leans upon a person, a great, true, living heart of love. So let us “trust also in him,” through all the delays, in spite of all the difficulties, in the face of all the denials, notwithstanding all the seemings, even when we cannot understand the way, and know not the issue; still “trust also in him, and he will bring it to pass.” The way will open, the right issue will come, the end will be peace, the cloud will be lifted, and the light of an eternal noonday shall shine at last.

“Trust and rest when all around thee
  Puts thy faith to sorest test;
Let no fear or foe confound thee,
  Wait for God and trust and rest.

“Trust and rest with heart abiding,
  Like a birdling in its nest,
Underneath His feathers hiding,
  Fold thy wings and trust and, rest.”

15 DECEMBER (PREACHED 13 DECEMBER 1767)

A refuge from the floods of temptation

‘And a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.’ Isaiah 32:2
SUGGESTED FURTHER READING: 2 Corinthians 4:1–18

Temptation may be compared to a flood—so it is expressed in Isaiah 57 and 59:19 [When the enemy shall come in like a flood …]. Indeed it is by this influence the other flood rises so high. I shall not say much of this. It is not needful to those who have felt it, and would not be well understood by those who do not. But, as by all temptations Satan’s aim is to overturn the foundation of faith, they may be compared to a flood. Now in these floods or storms Jesus is a covert or refuge.
With regard to sin: his atonement—there is forgiveness; his intercession (Luke 22:32); his power and promise (Isaiah 41:10).
So against temptation: his experimental sympathy (Hebrews 2:18 and 4:15); his gracious promise (Isaiah 43:2); his engagement to interpose, as set forth (Zechariah 3:2).
You that are setting out—be not secure, be not discouraged. You that have found him faithful—go on trusting him. You shall soon be out of reach of storms and floods. You that know him not are exposed to a flood of wrath.
FOR MEDITATION:
Unless the LORD had been my stay
Loud in my ears a charge he read,
(With trembling joy my soul may say)
(My conscience witnessed all he said)
My cruel foe had gained his end:
My long black list of outward sin;
But he appeared for my relief,
Then bringing forth my heart to view,
And Satan sees, with shame and grief,
Too well what’s hidden there he knew,
That I have an almighty Friend.
He showed me ten-times worse within.

O, ’twas a dark and trying hour,
’Tis all too true, my soul replied,
When harassed by the tempter’s power,
But I remember JESUS died,
I felt my strongest hopes decline!
And now he fills a throne of grace;
You only who have known his arts,
I’ll go, as I have done before,
You only who have felt his darts,
His mercy I may still implore,
Can pity such a case as mine.
I have his promise, ‘Seek my face.’

SERMON SERIES: ISAIAH 32:2, NO. 2 [3/3]

December 14th

The great life

Peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you.… Let not your heart be troubled. John 14:27.

Whenever a thing becomes difficult in personal experience, we are in danger of blaming God, but it is we who are in the wrong, not God, there is some perversity somewhere that we will not let go. Immediately we do, everything becomes as clear as daylight. As long as we try to serve two ends, ourselves and God, there is perplexity. The attitude must be one of complete reliance on God. When once we get there, there is nothing easier than living the saintly life; difficulty comes in when we want to usurp the authority of the Holy Spirit for our own ends.
Whenever you obey God, His seal is always that of peace, the witness of an unfathomable peace, which is not natural, but the peace of Jesus. Whenever peace does not come, tarry till it does or find out the reason why it does not. If you are acting on an impulse, or from a sense of the heroic, the peace of Jesus will not witness; there is no simplicity or confidence in God, because the spirit of simplicity is born of the Holy Ghost, not of your decisions. Every decision brings a reaction of simplicity.
My questions come whenever I cease to obey. When I have obeyed God, the problems never come between me and God, they come as probes to keep the mind awake and amazed at the revelation of God. Any problem that comes between God and myself springs out of disobedience; any problem, and there are many, that is alongside me while I obey God, increases my ecstatic delight, because I know that my Father knows, and I am going to watch and see how He unravels this thing.

December 14

“His disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray … and he said unto them, When ye pray, say, … Thy kingdom come.” (Luke 11:1, 2.)

WHEN they said, “Teach us to pray,” the Master lifted His eyes and swept the far horizon of God. He gathered up the ultimate dream of the Eternal, and, rounding the sum of everything God intends to do in the life of man, He packed it all into these three terse pregnant phrases and said, “When you pray, pray after this manner.”
What a contrast between this and much praying we have heard. When we follow the devices of our own hearts, how runs it? “O Lord bless me, then My family, My church, My city, My country,” and away on the far fringe as we close up, there is a prayer for the extension of His Kingdom throughout the wide parish of the world.
The Master begins where we leave off. The world first, my personal needs second, is the order of this prayer. Only after my prayer has crossed every continent and every far-flung island of the sea, after it has taken in the last man in the last backward race, after it has covered the entire wish and purpose of God for the world, only then am I taught to ask for a piece of bread for myself.
When Jesus gave His all, Himself for us and to us in the holy extravagance of the Cross, is it too much if He asks us to do the same thing? No man or woman amounts to anything in the kingdom, no soul ever touches even the edge of the zone of power, until this lesson is learned that Christ’s business is the supreme concern of life and that all personal considerations, however dear or important, are tributary thereto.—Dr. Francis.
When Robert Moffat, the veteran African missionary and explorer, was asked once to write in a young lady’s album, he penned these lines:

  “My album is a savage breast,
  Where tempests brood and shadows rest,
  Without one ray of light;
  To write the name of Jesus there,
  And see that savage bow in prayer,
  And point to worlds more bright and fair,
  This is my soul’s delight.”

“And His Kingdom shall have no frontier.” (Luke 1:33, the old Moravian version.)

The missionary enterprise is not the Church’s afterthought; it is Christ’s forethought.—Henry van Dyke.

14 DECEMBER (PREACHED 13 DECEMBER 1767)

A refuge from the floods of sin

‘And a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.’ Isaiah 32:2
SUGGESTED FURTHER READING: Nahum 1:1–15

The workings and overflowings of indwelling sin may be compared to a flood.
(i) A flood comes upon places that had been dry—where a stranger would not expect it. Frequently the power of divine things is so strong at first that corruption seems dried up—but sin, though kept down, is not slain. When these views abate, it will show itself again.
(ii) A flood is a great quantity. Sin is a great flood. The soul can say as Psalm 40:12 [For innumerable evils have compassed me about: mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up; they are more than the hairs of mine head: therefore my heart faileth me].
(iii) A flood is violent. Many know the resemblance here—how long and sore the conflict, and how carried quite off their feet.
FOR MEDITATION:
Though small the drops of falling rain,
Thus sinners think their evil deeds,
If one be singly viewed;
Like drops of rain, are small;
Collected, they o’erspread the plain,
But it the power of thought exceeds,
And form a mighty flood.
To count the sum of all.

The house it meets with in its course,
One sin can raise, though small it seems,
Should not be built on clay;
A flood to drown the soul;
Lest, with a resistless force,
What then, when countless million streams
It sweep the whole away.
Shall join, to swell the whole!

Though for awhile it seemed secure,
Yet, while they think the weather fair,
It will not bear the shock;
If warned, they smile or frown;
Unless it has foundations sure,
But they will tremble and despair,
And stands upon a rock.
When the fierce flood comes down!

  Oh! then on JESUS ground your hope, That stone in Zion laid;
  Lest your poor building quickly drop, With ruin, on your head.

SERMON SERIES: ISAIAH 32:2, NO. 2 [2/3]