Milo

May 6

“The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him.” (Psa. 25:14)

THERE are secrets of Providence which God’s dear children may learn. His dealings with them often seem, the outward eye, dark and terrible. Faith looks deeper and says, “This is God’s secret. You look only on the outside; I can look deeper and see the hidden meaning.”
Sometimes diamonds are done up in rough packages, so that their value cannot be seen. When the Tabernacle was built in the wilderness there was nothing rich in its outside appearance. The costly things were all within, and its outward covering of rough badger skin gave no hint of the valuable things which it contained.
God may send you, dear friends, some costly packages. Do not worry if they are done up in rough wrappings. You may be sure there are treasures of love, and kindness, and wisdom hidden within. If we take what He sends, and trust Him for the goodness in it, even in the dark, we shall learn the meaning of the secrets of Providence.—A. B. Simpson.

“Not until each loom is silent,
  And the shuttles cease to fly,
Will God unroll the pattern
  And explain the reason why
The dark threads are as needful
  In the Weaver’s skillful hand,
As the threads of gold and silver
  For the pattern which He planned.”

He that is mastered by Christ is the master of every circumstance. Does the circumstance press hard against you? Do not push it away. It is the Potter’s hand. Your mastery will come, not by arresting its progress, but by enduring its discipline, for it is not only shaping you into a vessel of beauty and honor, but it is making your resources available.

6 MAY (PREACHED 7 MAY 1775)

An everlasting covenant

‘Although my house be not so with God; yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure: for this is all my salvation, and all my desire, although he make it not to grow.’ 2 Samuel 23:5
SUGGESTED FURTHER READING: Revelation 1:12–18

Having spoken of the covenant in general, I now come to speak particularly of its properties. It is everlasting, ordered and sure. Each of these would bear a whole discourse but I shall endeavour to comprise them all in one.
Everlasting. This in two senses:
(i) From everlasting. It is not a new and hasty contrivance, but was established in the counsels of God from before the foundation of the world (Titus 1:2). Christ as the head of the covenant was set up from everlasting (Proverbs 8:23). And from hence we may prove that there never was but one true religion since the fall of Adam, though under various dispensations (see Hebrews 11), and that salvation is all of grace.
(ii) To everlasting. It is unchangeable. It is inexhaustible. It has been the refuge of the people of God in all ages. It is so to us, and thousands yet unborn shall rejoice in it when we are gone off the stage of this life. It is not the weaker for all the assaults that have been made against it, it is not the poorer for all the supplies that have been derived from it, but, like its great Author, is the same yesterday, today and for ever [Hebrews 13:8]. It will be still the same to eternity.
FOR MEDITATION:
The promised land of peace
Here griefs, and cares, and pains,
Faith keeps in constant view;
And fears, distress us sore;
How different from the wilderness
But there eternal pleasure reigns,
We now are passing through!
And we shall weep no more.

Here often from our eyes
LORD pardon our complaints,
Clouds hide the light divine;
We follow at thy call;
There we shall have unclouded skies,
The joy, prepared for suffering saints,
Our Sun will always shine.
Will make amends for all.

SERMON SERIES: 2 SAMUEL 23:5, NO. 3 [1/3]

May 5th

Judgment on the abyss of love

For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God. 1 Peter 4:17.

The Christian worker must never forget that salvation is God’s thought, not man’s; therefore it is an unfathomable abyss. Salvation is the great thought of God, not an experience. Experience is only a gateway by which salvation comes into our conscious life. Never preach the experience; preach the great thought of God behind. When we preach we are not proclaiming how man can be saved from hell and be made moral and pure; we are conveying good news about God.
In the teachings of Jesus Christ the element of judgment is always brought out, it is the sign of God’s love. Never sympathize with a soul who finds it difficult to get to God; God is not to blame. It is not for us to find out the reason why it is difficult, but so to present the truth of God that the Spirit of God will show what is wrong. The great sterling test in preaching is that it brings everyone to judgment. The Spirit of God locates each one to himself.
If Jesus ever gave us a command He could not enable us to fulfil, He would be a liar; and if we make our inability a barrier to obedience, it means we are telling God there is something He has not taken into account. Every element of self-reliance must be slain by the power of God. Complete weakness and dependence will always be the occasion for the Spirit of God to manifest His power.

May 5

“When they began to sing and praise, the Lord set ambushments … and they were smitten.” (2 Chron. 20:22)

OH, that we could reason less about our troubles, and sing and praise more! There are thousands of things that we wear as shackles which we might use as instruments with music in them, if we only knew how.
Those men that ponder, and meditate, and weigh the affairs of life, and study the mysterious developments of God’s providence, and wonder why they should be burdened and thwarted and hampered—how different and how much more joyful would be their lives, if, instead of forever indulging in self-revolving and inward thinking, they would take their experiences, day by day, and lift them up, and praise God for them.
We can sing our cares away easier than we can reason them away. Sing in the morning. The birds are the earliest to sing, and birds are more without care than anything else that I know of.
Sing at evening. Singing is the last thing that robins do. When they have done their daily work; when they have flown their last flight, and picked up their last morsel of food, then on a topmost twig, they sing one song of praise.
Oh, that we might sing morning and evening, and let song touch song all the way through.—Selected.

“Don’t let the song go out of your life
  Though it chance sometimes to flow
In a minor strain; it will blend again
  With the major tone you know.

“What though shadows rise to obscure life’s skies,
  And hide for a time the sun,
The sooner they’ll lift and reveal the rift,
  If you let the melody run.

“Don’t let the song go out of your life;
  Though the voice may have lost its trill,
Though the tremulous note may die in your throat,
  Let it sing in your spirit still.

“Don’t let the song go out of your life;
  Let it ring in the soul while here;
And when you go hence, ’twill follow you thence,
  And live on in another sphere.”

5 MAY

Black despair turned to hope

‘I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.’ Genesis 3:10
SUGGESTED FURTHER READING: Psalm 51:9–19

Observe that a sinner that feels the condemning power of the law would never expect or even ask for mercy, if the Lord did not first reveal that there is forgiveness with him. A true law work without any gospel light would shut the soul up in black despair.
Narrative, 10 March 1748:
… almost every passing wave breaking over my head.… Indeed I expected that every time the vessel descended in the sea, she would rise no more; and though I dreaded death now, and my heart foreboded the worst, if the Scriptures, which I had long since opposed, were indeed true; yet still I was but half-convinced, and remained for a space of time in a sullen frame, a mixture of despair and impatience. I thought if the Christian religion were true, I could not be forgiven; and was therefore expecting, and almost at times wishing, to know the worst of it.… Thus, as I have said, I waited with fear and impatience to receive my inevitable doom.

Therefore, we may be sure that those who venture upon general and unscriptural notions of mercy, never truly knew what the word sin means, considered as an offence against the majesty and holiness of God. When a soul has had such a conviction and yet, in the midst of many fears and faintings, continues waiting and hoping for salvation by Jesus, cannot seek it in any other, cannot give over seeking it in him, there is certainly a degree of faith.
Narrative, 10 March 1748:
I now began to think of that Jesus whom I had so often derided: I recollected the particulars of his life, and of his death—a death for sins not his own, but, as I remembered, for the sake of those who in their distress should put their trust in him.… He was pleased to show me at that time, the absolute necessity of some expedient to interpose between a righteous God and a sinful soul. Upon the gospel-scheme I saw at least a peradventure of hope, but on every other side I was surrounded with black unfathomable despair.

FOR MEDITATION: O bless him for Christ—that ever that precious name sounded in your ears.

SERMON SERIES: GENESIS, NO. 9 [3/3], GENESIS 3:8–13