In the grandeur of nature there are awful harmonies. When the storm agitates the ocean below, the heavens above hear the tumult and answer to the clamour. Down comes a deluge of sonorous hail or swift-descending rain, attended with peals of thunder and flashes of flame. Frequently the waterspout, of which David speaks in the next sentence, evidences the sympathy of the two great waters, above and beneath the firmament; the great deep above stretches out its hand to the great deep below, and in voice of thunder their old relationship is recognised; as though the twin seas remembered how once they lay together in the same cradle of confusion, till the decree of the Eternal appointed each his bounds and place. “Deep calleth unto deep”-one splendour of creation holds fellowship with another. Amazed and overwhelmed by the spectacle of some tremendous tempest upon land, you have yet been able to observe how the clouds appear to be emptying themselves each into each, and the successive volleys of heaven’s artillery are answered by rival clamours, the whole chorus of sublimities lifting up their voices. It has seemed to me that a strange wild joy was moving all the elements, and that the angels of wind and tempest were clapping their awful hands in glorious glee. Among the Alps, in the day of tempest, the solemnly silent peaks break through their sacred quiet, and speak to each other in that dread language which is echoing the voice of God-

“Far along,

From peak to peak the rattling crags among,

Leaps the live thunder! Not from one lone cloud,

But every mountain now hath found a tongue,

And Jura answers, through her misty shroud,

Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud.”

Height calleth unto height even as “deep calleth unto deep.” David perceiving these solemn harmonies, uses the metaphor to describe his own unhappy experience. I suppose that when he wrote this Psalm he was an exile from his throne and country, driven out by the rebellion of his favourite son. He crossed the brook Jabbok in fear, and hastened by night over Jordan, and withdrew to a dry and thirsty land where no water was; saddened most of all at the remembrance of the sacred shrine to which he had so often gone with the multitude that kept holy day, because he was now unable to join with that hallowed throng in worship aforetime so refreshing to his soul. Everything around the psalmist was like an ocean tossed with tempest; his outlook was unmingled trouble; his sorrows like Job’s messengers followed on one another’s heels; his griefs came wave upon wave. There was no intermission to his woe. At the same time his heart sank within him. The deep without called to the deep within. Conscience, as with a lightning flash, lit up the abyss of the sufferer’s inward depravity, made him see the darkness of the sin into which he had fallen with the wife of Uriah in days gone by, and filled him with despondences and sad forebodings. While outside everything was comfortless, within him there was nothing to cheer him. Bitterly did he enquire, “Why art thou cast down, O my soul? Why art thou disquieted within me?” Externally and internally rest was removed far from him. Without were fightings, within were fears. Deep called unto deep at the noise of God’s waterspouts; all the waves and billows of God’s providence had gone over him.

But now no longer confining so grand a thought to the mere manner in which David employed it, namely, to the double trouble of many of God’s saints when two seas meet, and when internal and external sorrows combine, I purpose to use the general principle in other directions, and to show that everywhere where there is one deep it calls to another, and that especially in the moral and spiritual world every vast and sublime truth has its correspondent, which, like another deep, calleth to it responsively.

First, we shall consider this fact in connection with the eternal purposes of God and their fulfilment in fact.

The eternal purpose-what a deep! He who pretends to understand predestination, misunderstands himself. We have no unit for measurement when we strive to fathom the decrees of God. We are like the astronomers in attempting to measure the distances of those stars which are as remote from the ordinary fixed stars as the fixed stars are from us; they fail from want of a measuring-line which may serve as a unit: scarcely does the diameter of the earth’s orbit suffice for a basis of numeration; they have no unit by which to estimate. What know you and I of infinity, omnipresence, and self-existence? We are far beyond our depth when we come to the ocean of divine purposes. We may gaze into the mystery with awe, but to profess to comprehend it is vanity itself.

What a depth! What an inscrutable mystery, that the infinitely pure and holy God should have determined to allow the intrusion of sin into his universe; that he should suffer evil to drag down an angel and debase him into a devil; that the adoring hosts of heaven should be thinned by sinful desertion from a loyalty so well deserved! How came it that moral evil was suffered to come into this fair world, to spoil Eden, to pollute mankind, to fill the grave, and populate hell? Why was it that after sin had broken out in the universe, it was permitted to remain in existence? Why not shut up the first devil as in a plague ward, build a lazar-house in Tophet, environ it with walls of flame, and never let the demon wander forth? Why should the evil one be permitted like a roaring lion to roam abroad seeking whom he may devour? When sin infected the race of men, why not destroy them all and stamp out the disease, as we did lately when the disease came among our cattle? Why not purge with fire till the last speck of the leprosy was burned out? What mattered the destruction of a race if sin were but destroyed with them? Strange decree that sin should be tolerated; permitted first to enter, and then allowed afterwards to spread its mischievous poison.

What a depth, my brethren, is revealed in the divine decree of election, that there should be vessels unto honour, fitted for the Master’s use, men chosen to show forth the riches of his grace, not for any good thing in them, but because the Lord will have mercy upon whom he will have mercy, and will have compassion on whom he will have compassion. And what a depth more solemn still, is revealed in those whom he passed by; that there should be vessels of wrath fitted to destruction, men permitted to continue in sin and to harden themselves against the gospel, and so to illustrate the awful wrath of God throughout eternity. Brethren, I cannot contemplate the doctrines connected with predestination, true as they are, without a shudder of reverential awe. Read that ninth chapter of the Romans, and while you are silenced by the voice of Paul, “Nay, but O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?” Yet, a thrill of awe passes through your souls, and you whisper-

“Great God, how infinite art thou,

What worthless worms are we!”

If we could turn over those awful pages in which every event has been recorded, if it were permitted to us to see that book of fate chained to the throne of God, in which every angel’s form and size is drawn by the eternal pen, in which everything is written down from the falling of a sere leaf from an oak to the tumbling of an avalanche from its Alp, in which God has as much arranged the course of yonder dust blown in the wind as of the planet which he steers in its mighty orbit; if we could see it all, we should exclaim, “O wondrous depth, how can I measure thee? My plummet utterly fails. I will adore, for I cannot comprehend.”

Beloved friends, we need not allow ourselves to be depressed by the mystery of the doctrine of eternal decrees, for even if these decrees were not in existence, there would still remain the other deep, the mystery of fact. It is a fact that sin is in the world; it is a fact that sorrow is there; it is a fact that death is there; and how can you understand these things? Shut your eye to the depth above the firmament if you will, but here is a depth nearer home which will still amaze you. Remember that all men are not saved. It is a dreadful truth that multitudes tread the broad road, and reach eternal destruction. Why is this when God is good and omnipotent? Can you understand providence? Is not providence, as we see it, quite as mysterious as predestination? Are not the mysteries rather in the facts themselves than in the purposes which ordained them? Are they not, both the facts and the decrees, mysteries and equal mysteries? But what a wonderful harmony there is between the two depths! and to this it is I call your attention. Observe how deep has called unto deep. Whatsoever God ordained has been accomplished; his will has been done. You will tell me that this is nothing wonderful, since God is omnipotent. I reply, yes; but you will remember that he was pleased to create beings who should be free agents, and to that extent actors independent of himself. Therefore, it is not to the solitary attribute of omnipotence that you can refer the fact that providence coincides with predestination. Here were angels free in their will, and yet they sinned. Here are men upon this stage of action wilful and resolute, and yet fulfilling the unknown fore-ordination. Herein lies the marvel, that with voluntary agents, who do as they will, yet the eternal purpose in every jot and tittle has to this moment been fulfilled; and as the impression answers to the die, so has the history of the universe answered to the eternal purpose, and to the solemn decree of the Most High. My brethren, in solemn awe listen to the voices of these twin depths as they call to one another. Famine, plague, pestilence, devastated nations, fallen empires, wars, and bloodsheds, who shall understand why these are permitted? How shall we reconcile our souls to them at all, until we look up to the great Father sitting on the throne of wisdom and love, and say, “Thou knowest what the end will be. Thou hast ordained all things, and from the seeming evil thou wilt bring forth good, and from the good a something better, and from the better something better still, in infinite progression, to the praise and glory of thy name”? “Deep calleth unto deep.” The deep of predestination answers to the deep of providence, and both together magnify the name of God.

Come we now to another case somewhat akin to this, more nearly concerning ourselves, and perhaps more practical. Brethren, some of you are enduring deep affliction. All are not tried alike. God has not been pleased to deal out the wormwood and the gall to all in a cup of the same fashion and the same measure. There are some whose pathway to the skies is comparatively smooth; others go through fire and through water-men do ride over their heads.

My brethren who have done business in the great waters, I speak to you; yours has been a stormy and tried life. Well, I can sympathise with you, for with all the mercy of God, the preacher has not been free from trials many and severe, and, oh! it is a deep indeed, when a depressed spirit unites with our outward afflictions, when church troubles, family troubles, personal troubles, and the world’s troubles, all aided and abetted by Satanic temptation, and by an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God. Do not, however, think yourselves hardly dealt with, my dear brethren, in being singled out as a special target for the arrows of grief. Do not wish that you could be the obscurest of all the saints, to find some quiet nook in which you might be let alone to rest in forgetfulness; the rather let me remind you that if in your experience there is a deep of extraordinary trial, there is most surely another deep answering to it. Open now your ears and your hearts, to hear the calling of this deep unto its brother deep. Hearken while I translate the echoes of truth. Inasmuch as you have many trials, remember the depth of the divine faithfulness. You have not been able to comprehend the reason of your trials, but I beseech you believe in the firmness and stability of the divine affection towards you. In proportion to your tribulations shall be your consolations. If you have shallow sorrows, you shall receive but shallow graces; but if you have deep afflictions, you shall obtain the deeper proofs of the faithfulness of God. I could fain lay me down and die when I think of the trials of this life, but I recover myself and laugh at them all, even as the daughter of Zion shook her head and laughed at her foes, when I remember that the mighty God of Jacob is our refuge, and that he will not fail us, nor take away his hand till he hath effected his purpose concerning us.

Great deeps of trial bring with them great deeps of promise. For you, much afflicted ones, there are great words and mighty, which are not meant for other saints of easier experience. You shall drink from deep golden goblets, reserved for those giants who can drink great potions of wormwood, and are men of capacity enough to quaff deep draughts of the wines on the lees well refined. Trials are mighty enlargers to the soul. We are contracted, narrowed, pent up, and we rightly pray, “Lord, enlarge my heart.” Ay, but the opening of capacious reservoirs within us can only be effected by the spade of daily tribulation, and then, being digged out by pain and trouble, there becomes room for the overflowing promise. A great adversity will to the believer bring with it great grace. Whenever the Lord sets his servants to do extraordinary work he always gives them extraordinary strength; or if he puts them to unusual suffering he will give them unusual patience. When we enter upon war with some petty New Zealand chief, our troops expect to have their charges defrayed, and accordingly we pay them gold by thousands, as their expenses may require; but when an army marches against a grim monarch, in an unknown country, who has insulted the British flag, we pay, as we know to our cost, not by thousands but by millions. There is a difference in the payment of an attack upon petty chieftains, and a war against an emperor. And so, my brethren, if God calls you to common and ordinary trials, he will pay the charges of your warfare by thousands, but if he commands you to an unusual struggle with some tremendous foe, he will discharge the liabilities of your war by millions, according to the riches of his grace in which he has abounded towards us through Christ Jesus. I would not then, in my better mind, if I could, escape great labours or great trials, since they involve great graces; if one deep calleth to the other deep, let the Lord lay on the strokes, and let him add to the burden. If as my days so shall my strength be, then let the days be long and dark, for so the strength shall be mighty, God shall be glorified, and his servants shall be blessed. I would earnestly urge every tried Christian to dwell upon this truth, for it may be of great comfort to him. You may perhaps have had a comparatively easy life until just lately, but you have reached a turning point where disaster has befallen you. You are fallen into poverty, or else that time for the break up of your family has lately come upon you. Your father is gone; your mother is on the verge of the grave; your friends have one by one been taken from you; you feel the loneliness of life. Here is a dreadful deep for you to sail on, and a tempestuous deep much to be feared, for your little bark may easily be wrecked; but forget not that there is another deep, whose remembrance will remove from you the bitterness of your present sorrow-there is love in heaven towards you which will never grow chill, immortal and unchanging love; and besides, there is a royal oath which never can be broken, a covenant ratified with blood that never can be dishonoured. You must be helped through; you cannot be left. God might sooner cease to be than cease to be faithful. You must be upborne amid the billows and safely landed. Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart this day.

We have not time to linger: we must pass on to a third point. “Deep calleth unto deep.” Human wretchedness is paralleled by divine grace.

Brethren, into what an awful state our race fell. We were attainted for high treason through the sin of our father Adam; the dignity and honour of our race were forfeited; we were each one of us born in sin and shapen in iniquity; with a natural tendency towards evil we came into this world, and since we have been in this world, we have wickedly and wilfully rebelled against God. We have rendered ourselves obnoxious to the divine justice, we deserve to be driven from the glory of his presence by the power of his wrath; and beside all this, we are desperately set upon rejecting any offers of mercy on the part of God. Our will has become stubborn, our heart is hard. There are no known human means which can bring a soul to God. Man is such an enemy to God that he will not be reconciled to him. Human eloquence and human sympathy are alike powerless against human depravity. This leviathan laughs at our sword and spear. Oh, sad, sad, sad case is that of fallen man! Sinner, sad, sad is your case-lost, utterly, hopelessly, everlastingly lost are you by nature! As in yourselves considered, there is no remedy for the disease which rages within you; there is no escape from that eternal fire which must consume you. I would never for a moment attempt to make out the abyss of the fall to be less deep than it is-it is bottomless. The miseries of mankind cannot be exaggerated. Could our tears for ever flow, could we be turned each one into a Jeremiah, yet could we never weep enough for the slain of the daughter of our people. Human misery is deep beyond expression. But what shall I say? How shall I speak? Where shall I find words to express the delight of my soul, that I have such a truth to tell you? There is a deep which answers to the deep of human ruin, and it is the deep of divine grace. There can be no evil in man which the infinite mercy of God cannot overcome. Behold God himself incarnate in the person of the Nazarene! Behold the Son of God spending on earth a life of service and of condescension! Behold him dying a death of ignominy and pain! The atonement of Christ is such a Red Sea that all the Egyptians of a believer’s sins shall be drowned therein. There is such virtue in the redemption offered up by Christ, that it meets the full extent of the guilt which any sinner who seeks him may have incurred. Moveover, to meet the obstinacy and depravity of our hearts, behold how deep calleth unto deep! God’s eternal Spirit has deigned to dwell in these hearts of ours. He quickens death into life; he fills the thirsty soul with rivers of divine grace; he turns the stone to flesh, and makes the adamant palpitate with tenderness. Blessed be his name, he has done wonders in our souls. He has brought Christ home to our hearts, and made us willing to rejoice in Christ, and to be saved by him. Myriads of spirits now before the throne attest the fact that the grace of God is deeper than the depths of our sin, higher than the heights of our rebellion, broader and longer than the breadths and lengths of our depravity. Oh, the exceeding riches of the grace of God! “Oh! the depth,” saith the apostle; and we may well say the same. My hearer, ought not this to encourage thee? Art thou, a burdened, conscience-stricken sinner, brought so low as to be all but a damned sinner? You are only just this side of hell-gate; you almost smoke like a brand in the fire, yet is there mercy enough to rescue you, and to give you a place among them that are glorified at the right hand of God. The deep of your misery calls to the deep of sacred mercy, and faith shall hear a favourable answer.

Fourthly, and with brevity, the depth of divine love to the saints calls for a deep of consecration in every believing heart.

Study, my dear brethren, for a minute quietly the depth of the love of God to you his people. He loved you without a cause.

“What was there in you that could merit esteem,

Or give the Creator delight?

‘’Twas even so, Father,’ you ever must sing,

‘For so it seemed good in thy sight.’ ”

He loved you without beginning. Before years, and centuries, and millenniums began to be counted, your name was on his heart. Eternal thoughts of love have been in God’s bosom towards you. He has loved you without a pause; there never was a minute in which he did not love you. Your name once engraved upon his hands has never been erased, nor has he ever blotted it out of the Book of Life. Since you have been in this world he has loved you most patiently. You have often provoked him; you have rebelled against him times without number, yet he has never stayed the outflow of his heart towards you; and, blessed be his name, he never will. You are his, and you always shall be his. Jesus saith, “Because I live, ye shall live also.” God’s love to you is without boundary. He could not love you more, for he loves you like a God; and he never will love you less. All his heart belongs to you. “As the Father hath loved me,” saith Jesus, “even so have I loved you.”

Contemplate for a moment what you have received as the result of this love. You have received, first of all, the gift of the only begotten Son. He left the throne of honour for the cross of shame, the brightness of glory for the darkness of the tomb. Oh, the depths of the love which is revealed in Calvary! You will never, never be able to fathom the depth of the love of God towards you in the gift of his dear Son to be your Redeemer. Bethink you, now, the Holy Spirit brought Jesus Christ to you. And what were you then? It is a shame to speak of some of the things which you then loved; but you are washed, you are cleansed and sanctified. Oh, that blessed bath filled with blood! Oh, the depth of love there is in the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace! What a work of grace was that which changed your nature, to make you love what once you hated! And what a work it has been to keep the helm of your vessel right; oftentimes the current would have drifted you back again to the old rock, and wrecked you; but a strong hand has kept the head of the vessel heavenward; a blessed wind has filled the sail; and though you have made but slow progress, still you are on the way to the fair haven. The love of God which has been manifested in you is a very heaven of love. I cannot measure the love which God has shown towards me, poor me, though I am only one of his family. I feel as if it were deeper than hell, and higher than heaven; long as eternity, and wide as immensity. I cannot understand it. But what does this love say to me and to you but this-it calleth to another deep; oh, how ought I to love my God who has so loved me! oh, how I ought to hate the sin which made my Saviour bleed! Deeps of the Saviour’s grief, ye call to deeps of spiritual repentance. The agonies of Christ call us to the slaughter of our sins. Brethren, if God so loved us, it calls to another deep-we ought also so to love one another. If God forgave us, behold another deep of obligation to forgive all those who have offended against us. How can I love the saints of God enough who are the brethren of him who loved me even to the death? As for poor sinners, if God saved me, how I ought to lay out my life to try and save them. If I have, indeed, found peace with God through the blood of the cross, how I ought to seek the lost sheep, still lost and wandering, as I also once was! If Jesus has so loved me, how I ought to love him! Brethren, I dare not, at this hour, say a word against other Christian people, though I might fairly do so; but I will accuse myself, and own that I have hardly caught so much as an idea of what a consecrated man ought to be. I have read the lives of those of God’s servants whose enthusiasm has been fervent, and whose consecration has been complete, and I have felt that they were like a huge Colossus, and I a dwarf walking under their huge legs. Oh, but to serve Christ as he ought to be served does not mean giving him a trifle now and then out of our estate, and never knowing that we have given it. It means pinching ourselves right cheerfully to serve his cause. It does not mean saying a good word sometimes for him when it would be shameful to be silent, but it means making our whole life a testimony to his dear love. It does not mean giving him the candle-ends and cheese-parings of our soul, niggardly doling out to him what we would give a beggar at the door; but it means the rendering up of body, soul, and spirit-the surrender of our entire nature to be offered in sacrifice. As the bullock was brought to the altar, bound to the horns thereof, killed, and offered up, with the fat thereof and the inwards, so must we be entirely given up to our Lord. O for more real consecration! Jesus has done so much for us, let us endeavour to do more for him; and this morning let the deeps of divine love call to the deeps within our grateful souls, and let those deeps cry to the deeps of the eternal Spirit, as we ask to be perfectly given up to the cause and honour of our Lord.

Time fails me, therefore I must notice another deep. There is a depth in this world, A depth of divine forbearance towards impenitent and graceless men, and depend upon it, it answers to another deep, a deep of immeasurable and never-ending wrath in the world to come.

It is a very solemn subject, and I desire to speak most solemnly; therefore, I entreat you to hear most earnestly, especially you unconverted ones. It is a very great mystery that God permits the ungodly to go on as they do. Walk down some of our streets, if you dare, at night, and mark what you shall see. You inwardly exclaim, “I wonder God permits it. Here is a reeking Sodom in the heart of a so-called Christian city.” Step into some of the dens of infamy, and you will feel, “God could, if he would, suppress this in a minute: why does he not?” Hearken for a moment to the talk of blasphemers: what atrocious insults they perpetrate upon the Majesty of Heaven! They go out of their way to imprecate curses upon themselves, their limbs, their eyes, their souls. What are they at? If they will not obey God, could they not at least let him alone, and not insult him to his face? We have heard in these days a blasphemer stand upon a public platform, and say, “There is no God, and if there be a God,” taking out his watch, “let him strike me dead in five minutes.” When he still found himself alive, he argued that there was no God. The fact was, God was much too great to be put out of patience by such an insignificant wretch as he. Had God been less than God he would have struck him dead, but being God he passed him by with sublime indifference, as a hero would pass by the chirping of a grasshopper. Yet the divine forbearance is certainly very wonderful, very marvellous. I have heard say that when Mr. John Ryland was present at a certain meeting when the slave-trade question was first agitated, a story was told in that meeting of atrocities perpetrated in the middle passage between Africa and the States, and those atrocities were so enormous that John Ryland in the exuberance of his wrath knelt down and said to God, “Lift up thy thunderbolt and damn these wretches, O righteous God.” I know that in sight of oppression and cruelty I have felt a longing for speedy vengeance on the tyrant, and have been very thankful to think that I had not the handling of the thunderbolts. But God has looked on, calmly looked on, and suffered infamies which were nothing less than infernal to be perpetrated again and again. He appears to wink at men’s sins. Ah! my brethren, can you think for a minute what you and I would do if some cruel wretches should take our children and torture them, and burn them alive; how would our wrath be up, and how would we strike in their defence! But remember that from the days of Christ until now the dear children of God, dearer to him than our children are to us, have been shut up in prison to rot, have been sawn asunder, have wandered about in sheep skins and goat skins, have been burned at Smithfield and a thousand other places, and have crimsoned the snows of the Alps with their blood; and yet God, in the great deeps of his forbearance, has been still. There has been, it is true, a vengeance in providence in the long run: the reader of history knows how God has avenged every persecution; still the recompense was slow. There were no fiery arrows to pierce Bishop Bonner, when he condemned Anne Askew; there were no immediate lightning flashes to wither Domitian or Nero when they insultingly put the people of God to death. No, the Lord bears long with them, and his longsuffering is a deep, a great deep.

In this house, to come back to ourselves, what deeps of forbearance have been shown in the cases of some of you! You have often heard of Jesus Christ, my dear hearers, but you have not received him. You have known the way of salvation, but you have not run in it. I have pleaded with you, I hope with all honesty and earnestness, and you have been awakened, too, and aroused, but you have stifled your convictions; you have deliberately elected your sins, and you have presumptuously turned away from the blood of Christ. O my unconverted hearers, those of you especially who still continue regularly to come to these seats, until I almost wonder to see you here, because I cannot imagine what pleasure you can derive from having your consciences continually whipped up. I beg you to consider. Men, and women too, among you have chosen the lusts of the flesh, and ungodly gain, or drunkenness, when you know better, know much better; when you have had a degree of divine light shed across your souls, and yet deliberately you have chosen to rebel against God. I fear you have some of you done so to the hardening of your hearts even to final impenitence. Listen, now, I pray you. As surely as God has shown towards you a great deep of forbearance, he will show an equal depth of justice. He may pay slowly, but he will pay in full. God’s mill grinds slowly, but it grinds most surely and thoroughly, even to powder. The feet of the avenging angels are shod with wool, but they never turn aside from their path. According to this Book there is a hell into which those who reject Christ will be cast, the misery of which is dimly to be guessed at, but can never be fully described; a misery of which it is said, “Their worm dieth not, and their fire is not quenched”-a misery which will last as long as the enjoyments of heaven shall last; for while the saints shall go away into everlasting joy, the punishment of the ungodly hath, according to the testimony of Jesus, the same eternal duration. Do not deceive yourselves by any dream of annihilation; do not imagine there shall come a period to your woe. If there were the shadow of a ground for that statement, hell would cease to be hell, for hopelessness is of the essence of hell. O, by the boundless love treasured up in Christ Jesus, remember there is equal terror in his wrath! The hand that is mighty to save is equally mighty to destroy. All omnipotence has been put out to save, but this rejected, an equal omnipotence shall be put out to crush. Tempt not the Lord. The deeps of your sin are already challenging the deeps of his justice. “Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?” Awaken not the fury which ye cannot endure, overcome, or avoid. Kindle not the fire which, like flame among stubble, will burn furiously, and cannot be stayed. O dash not your souls upon the bosses of Jehovah’s buckler; cast not yourselves upon the point of his glittering spear. God grant of his eternal mercy that you may not tempt those deeps.

Now to close with a more cheerful theme. There is, brethren, a blessed deep of holy happiness and bliss for the saints in heaven, and to-day it calls to the deep of joy and thankfulness within saintly hearts who are lingering here below.

Yes, the day is coming, and all the wings of time are bringing it nearer, when we shall be emancipated from the body of this death. We are not for ever to be sickly, sinful, and sorrowing. We shall soon be set free from everything that encumbers us. If Christ come not in our lifetime to take us to himself, we shall go to him to dwell with him where he is. And what are the delights of being in heaven! To be with Christ! The spouse for ever with the Bridegroom; the child for ever in his Father’s bosom! What must it be to dwell above! For ever pure! for ever beyond the danger of temptation! Safe and blessed! Shielded from all fear, enriched with all blessedness! Christian, you shall soon be like Jesus as well as with him. You shall be crowned as he is, and blessed as he is. Oh, how satisfied shall you be when you wake up in his likeness! I could not go further, for though I were to talk of the harps of gold, of the streets that shine with unearthly light, of gates of pearl, of the never-ending song, and of the gentle flowing river of the water of life amidst the trees that yield their twelve manner of fruits, yet all would be less than what I have said already. You shall be with Christ, and you shall be like him. Indeed, heaven is a great deep. The glorious history of the church of God in years to come is a great deep, too. That reigning of Christ on the earth, that judging of the angels, that being caught up together with the Lord in the air, that resurrection of the body in the likeness of his glorious body, that being for ever with the Lord, why, these are things which eye hath not seen, and ear hath not heard. Heaven is a blessed deep. I see it as a sea of glass mingled with fire, and almost hear the harpers who stand for ever harping on that glassy sea. O let the thought of it awaken the deeps of your souls! Heaven is yours, for he hath said, “I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.” “For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands.” I blush to think that I should ever be downcast; I am ashamed to think that I should dare to be sad. Oh! it is blessed work to anticipate that joy, yet it makes one ashamed of the depression which our present light afflictions so easily cause to our feeble minds. O ye mourning saints, ye have been putting on your sackcloth to-day, and you arranged it so carefully, for there is a kind of foppery about grief that makes it strew its ashes with deliberation. O sirs, could you not have spent some of your time at another wardrobe, and in putting on another dress? Come, thou afflicted one, array yourself for a minute with the robe of whiteness, without spot or blemish! How well it will become you! How soon you will wear it! Now, put that unfading crown upon your head. You are a poor servant or a working man; and, ah, that head has often ached with weariness and woe, but put on the crown now! How royally it adorns your brow! It would not fit any other head, it was made for you; and you will soon have it. In a few days, or a few months, you will go by the way of the sepulchre, or else by the way of the second coming, up to your throne and your kingdom. Now hold that palm-branch in your hand! How delightful it looks! How your eye gleams at the thought of the victory which it betokens! Arise, I say, and put the silver sandals upon those weary feet! Bedeck yourself with the jewels and ornaments prepared for your wedding. Take down the harp, and try your fingers amongst its celestial strings. “Wake up, my glory! wake, psaltery and harp! I myself will awake right early.” Blessed be the Lord who hath prepared for his people rivers of pleasure at his right hand for evermore. Our souls anticipate the day of enjoyment; and at this hour, by faith, we eat the fruit of the trees of life, and drink from the living fountains of waters. O clap your hands, ye righteous. Sound the cymbals, even the high-sounding cymbals, and give praise unto your God even for ever, who hath prepared for you the rest that knoweth no end. Thus “deep calleth unto deep.”

May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, abide with you for ever. Amen and Amen.

Portion of Scripture Read before Sermon.-Psalm 77.

REST

A Sermon

Delivered on Lord’s-day Morning, April 18th, 1869, by

C. H. SPURGEON,

at the metropolitan tabernacle, newington.

“For we which have believed do enter into rest.”-Hebrews 4:3.

Rest! A dainty word indeed! Too rich a syllable for this unstable earth! Is it not a stray word from the language of the celestials? Rest! Is it obtainable? Is it possible? Can there ever be rest for the race who were driven out of Paradise, to till the ground whence they were taken, and to eat bread in the sweat of their face? Rest! Is it possible, for a soul polluted with sin, tossed to and fro with inward lusts, and agitated with outward temptations? Is not man like the dove aforetime sent forth from the ark, when towards evening it longed for a rest for the sole of its feet, but found none? Is it not the fate of man’s soul to use her wings as long as they will last her; for ever flitting to and fro in vain pursuit of rest; seeing far and wide a mocking waste of disappointments, but never reaching a place of repose for her flagging pinions? How apt was the simile of the old Saxon chieftain, when he compared the unenlightened soul to the bird which flew in at the open windows of the banquet-hall, was scared by the uproarious shouts of boisterous warriors around the fire, and passed out again by another window into the cold and the darkness. Our spirit, attracted by the tempting glare, darts into the halls of pleasure, but anon is frightened and alarmed by the rough voice of conscience and the demands of insatiable passions, and away it flies from the momentary gleam of pleasure and dream of happiness, into the thick darkness of discontent, and the snow storm of remorse. Man, without God, is like the mariner in the story, condemned to sail on for ever, and never to find a haven. He is the real Wandering Jew, immortal in his restlessness. Like the evil spirit, man by nature walks through dry places, seeking rest, and finding none. Of our race by nature it might almost be said as of our Redeemer, varying but a little his words, “Foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the soul of man hath not where to lay its head.”

I speak to many this morning to whom this has been exceedingly true from their boyhood onward. They have been vainly hoping for enduring, contentment, and striving after solid satisfaction. Piloted first in one direction, and anon in the opposite, they have compassed the whole world, and investigated all pursuits, but as yet in vain. I see you to-day weary and disquieted, like galley-slaves chained to the oar, and I mark the fears which reveal themselves in your countenances, for the whip of the task-master is sounding in your ears. Long have you tugged the oar of ambition, or of the lust of pleasure, or of avarice, or of care; but rest a moment, I pray you, and listen to the witness of those who declare to you that escape from bondage is possible, and that rest is to be found even now. As your galley floats along on the stream of the Sabbath, and your toil is a little while suspended, hear ye the sweet song of those redeemed by the blood of Jesus; for they sing of rest, even of rest this side the grave. Listen for awhile, and mayhap you will discover how they found their rest, and learn how you may find it too. What if your chains should be broken to-day, and your labours should be ended, and you should enter into perfect peace! If so, it will be the gladdest Sabbath that your soul ever knew; and others shall share in the gladness, for we who may be privileged to help you shall participate in your joy, and even spirits before the throne shall rejoice when they hear that another weary one has found rest in Christ Jesus.

In handling our text, we shall first try to describe the rest of the Christian; we shall, secondly, mention how he obtained it; thirdly, we shall enumerate the grounds upon which that rest is settled; and then we shall say a few words by way of practical reflection.

First, it appears from the text, that even now persons of a certain character enjoy rest. Of the nature of this rest we are to speak.

It is not a rest merely to hear of, to speak of, and to desire; but a rest into which believers have entered; they have passed into it, and are in actual enjoyment of it to day. “We who have believed do enter into rest.” That rest is pictured in some degree by its types. Canaan was a representation of the rest of believers. By some it has been thought to picture heaven, and it may be so used without violence; but remember that in heaven there are no Hivites or Jebusites to be driven out, while in the rest which God gives to his people here on earth, there yet remain struggles with inbred sins, and uprising corruptions which must be dethroned and destroyed. Canaan is a fair type of the rest which belongs to the believer this side the grave. Now what a sweet rest Canaan must have been to the tribes after forty years’ pilgrimage! In the howling wilderness they wandered in a solitary way amid discomforts which only desert wanderers can imagine. For ever were they on the move; the tents which were pitched but yesterday must be struck to-day, for the trumpets are sounding, and the cloudy pillar is leading the way. What packing and unpacking, what harnessing and unharnessing; what marches through clouds of dust, and over yielding beds of sand; what variations of temperature, from the heat of the burning desert by day to its chilliness at night; what discomforts of constant travel and frequent warfare. In those forty years, with all the mercy which sustained them, with all the manna which dropped from heaven, and the crystal stream which followed them from the smitten rock, they were men of the weary foot, and they must have longed for green fields, and cities which have foundations. They must have pined for the time when they could, every man, sit under his own vine and under his own fig tree, and possess his lot in the land flowing with milk and honey. Such is the Christian’s rest. He was led out by Moses, the law, out of the Egypt of sin into the wilderness of conviction and seeking after God; and now Jesus, the true Joshua, has led him into perfect acceptance and peace; and since the discomforts of conviction, and the troubles of unpardoned sin are over, he sits down under the vine and fig tree of the gracious promise, and rejoices in Christ Jesus. Think, then, of Canaan as a type of the peace which God’s people at this present time by faith enjoy.

So also is the Sabbath. That is a blessed standing ordinance, reminding believers of their delightful privileges. Work during the six days, for it is your duty-“six days shalt thou labour;” but on the Sabbath enjoy perfect rest, both in body and in soul. Yet look to the higher meaning of the Sabbath, and learn to cease from your own works. If ye were to be saved by works, ye must work without a moment’s pause, for you could never complete the toil, since absolute perfection would be demanded. But when you come to Christ, your works are finished; there is no hewing of wood nor drawing of water; there is no keeping of commandments with a view to merit, no toilsome tugging at ceremonials and ordinances with a view to acceptance. “It is finished” is the silver bell that rings your soul into a marriage of peace and joy in Christ Jesus. Take care, believer, that you live in a perpetual Sabbath of rest in the finished work of your ascended Lord. Remember that your legal righteousness is complete; you have ceased from your own works as God did from his; and let none provoke you to go back to the old bondage of the law, but stand you fast in the blessed liberty of grace, rejoicing in the perfect work of your Substitute and Surety.

What a wonderful type of the Christian’s rest the Sabbatic year would have been if the Jews had possessed faith enough to keep it! Once in seven years they were not to plough the ground nor prune the vines, nor do aught of agricultural labour: they were to eat during the whole year that which grew of itself; and I suppose there would have been such an abundance on the sixth year that they would have been able to live on the seventh without toil. We have heard, and only heard, of a halcyon period in store for us in which we are to be untaxed by our Government. May we live to see it! But here was a period in which men were to live without toil during a whole twelve months, and so would be able to consecrate their entire time to the worship of their gracious God with joy and thankfulness. That year was the type of the Christian’s life in the matter of his salvation. So he ought to live, rejoicing in his God, resting from all servile labours, his soul fed upon the spontaneous bounty of heaven, and his heart rejoicing in the fulness which is treasured up in Christ Jesus.

If the types may help us to a guess at the peace of the Christian, we may, perhaps, come at it a little more clearly and practically by remembering the oppositions to peace which in the believer are removed. Can there ever be rest to a heart which has sinned? Answer, yes. The believer rests from the guilt of sin because he has seen his sins laid upon Christ, his scape-goat, and knowing well that nothing can be in two places at one time, he concludes that if sin were laid on Christ, it is not on him; and thus he rejoices in his own deliverance from sin, through its having been imputed to his glorious Substitute. The believer in Christ Jesus sees sin effectually punished in Christ Jesus, and knowing that justice can never demand two penalties for the same crime, or two payments for the same debt, he rests perfectly at peace with regard to his past sins. He has, in the person of his Surety, endured the hell that was due on the account of transgressions. Christ, by suffering in his stead, has answered all the demands of justice, and the believer’s heart is perfectly at rest. How deals he with his inbred sins, and tendencies to evil? Can a man rest while those are within him? Yes, he rests even though those be struggling within him for the mastery, because there is a new life within him which holds them by the throat, and keeps them under foot. Though his corruptions strive and wrestle, yet, while the saint firmly believes in Christ, he knows that the strugglings of his sins are but a gasp for life, and that the weapons of victorious grace will slay them all, and end the strife for ever. He is assured that Christ has broken the dragon’s head, and that sin was crucified with Christ, and, therefore, he regardeth his inward lusts as being dying malefactors; and though they may show some threatening signs of strength, yet he sees the nails in their hands and in their feet, and knows that ere long death will follow upon crucifixion.

But has the Christian no care? Other men are sorely beset with perplexing anxieties-have believers none of these? The rich find cares in their wealth: how they shall increase it! how they shall retain it! The poor have cares in their scant and poverty: how they shall make ends meet, and provide things honest in the sight of men! Ay, but in this matter, the believer has learned to cast his care on him who careth for him. He has heard the voice which saith, “Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication make known your requests unto God.” “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.” Oh! but what rest it gives to the soul when it feels that God appoints everything, and that providence is not for us to arrange, but is all settled and determined by infinite wisdom. I thank God that I am not the pilot of my own destiny, called to peer anxiously into the storm and murky darkness, and to thread with awful fear the narrow channel between rocks and quicksands; I have taken a pilot on board, whose infallible wisdom forbids an error. Let my soul go sweetly to her rest in full assurance that all is ordered rightly where God commandeth all things.

But has not the Christian his troubles and temptations? Is he not sometimes vexed with bodily pain? Does he not resort to the grave with many tears over departed ones? Has he not a chequered life like others? Ah! yes he has no exemption from the war of sorrow; but he knows that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them that are the called according to his purpose. He sees no divine anger in his losses, and fears no wrath from God in his chastisements: he believes that mercy mixes all his cups; that goodness and truth like a silver thread runs through the dark texture of his outer life. It is while he believes that he thus rests; and, mark you, it is only while he believes, and in proportion as he believes, that he enters into rest. If his faith be strong enough, not a wave of trouble shall roll across his spirit, though all God’s waves and billows may go over his head.

“Still,” saith one, “hath not the Christian service to perform? How then can it be said that he hath rest?” I know that he hath service, but in this service he doth rest, like birds of which I have heard that sleep upon the wing. It is rest to labour for the Lord Jesus. A believing soul is never more at ease than when she is putting forth her full strength in the service of God. I suppose it is no toil to larks to sing as they mount, and certainly it is no trouble to Christians to pour forth a holy life, which is their soul’s song. Christian service is so the outflow of the believer’s inner nature, the spontaneous outburst of indwelling grace, that though it may be toil to the lip and toil to the brain, it is perfect rest to the spirit. This I know-there is no unrest I feel more heavily than that of not being at work for my Lord; and if I am made to stay at home by sickness, or any other cause, and may not serve my Master, it is no rest to me. I gather, then, that it is possible to be still but not to rest; and certainly possible to be indefatigable in service and to be resting all the while.

“Still,” addeth one, “doth the Christian who believeth ever rest in the matter of the approach of death? He must die as other men, however favoured of heaven!” Yes, and this is one of the points in which his rest is exceedingly complete; for he cometh to look at death not only as no enemy, but as a friend, and he counteth on his departure even as a thing to be desired. What is there here that he should wait? What is there upon earth that should detain an immortal spirit? To depart and to be with Christ, is, to him, far better. Do not the groans and dying strife, the breaking up of the bodily system, and the pains and anguish which generally precede death-do not these break the Christian’s rest? I tell you no. When faith is steadfast, he looks at these discomforts connected with the removal of his earthly tabernacle, as being appointed of his Father, and he resigns himself to them, expecting to receive, with the increase of his bodily pain, an increase of inward consolation; reckoning that if he loseth the silver of bodily strength, and getteth the gold of heavenly experience, he shall be a great gainer. Boldly he laugheth at death, and rejoiceth in the thought of departure, that he may be with Christ eternally. In a word, brethren, the rest of the believer, while his faith is sustained by the Spirit of God, is such a one as no stranger intermeddleth with; such as the sinner can hear of with the ear, but cannot imagine in his heart. Sinner, you have had wealth lavished on you; you have enjoyed growing prosperity; you have been young and merry; you have mixed with company who laugh by day and dance far into the night, but you do not know, you cannot even guess, what our rest is who have taken Jesus Christ to be our Saviour, God to be our Father, and the Holy Ghost to be our Comforter. I wish you did know, for I wot that if you once understood the rest of the believer’s life, you would give up all that this world calls good and great without one lingering look, for the sake of the solid joy and lasting treasure which only Zion’s children know.

Still, to give you a complete idea, as far as possibly may be, of the rest which belongs to believers I would notice that some conception of this rest may be gathered from the graces which a true faith begets and fosters in the Christian mind. After all, a man makes his own condition. It is not the dungeon or the palace that can make misery or happiness. We carry palaces and dungeons within ourselves, according to the constitution of our natures. Now, faith makes a man heavenly in mind; it makes him care more for the world to come than for that which now is; it makes the invisible precious to him, and the visible comparatively contemptible. Do you not see, therefore, what rest a true faith gives us, amidst the distresses of this mortal life? You are very poor, but if you set small store by riches, poverty will not distress you. If you have learned to consider spiritual things as the better part, you will not pine because the waters of the nether springs are scant. Have you never heard of the Persian King who gave his various councillors different gifts: to one he gave a golden goblet, but to another a kiss; whereupon all the councillors of the court were envious of the man who had the kiss, and they counted the goblets of gold, and jewels and caskets of silver, to be less than nothing as compared with that familiar token of royal favour. O poor but favoured saints, you will never envy those who quaff golden cups of fortune if you obtain the kiss from Jesus’ mouth; for you know that his love is better than all the world beside, and the enjoyment of it will yield you richest rest. How can you feel the miseries of envy when you possess in Christ the best of all portions? Who wants cisterns by the river? Who cries for pebbles when he possesses pearls? The grace of faith, moreover, works in us resignation. He who fully trusts his God becomes perfectly resigned to his Father’s will; he knows that all God’s dealings must be right, since the Lord is much too wise to err, and much too full of lovingkindness to deal harshly with his people. This resignation is another source of rest to the spirit. The habit of resignation is the root of peace. A godly child had a ring given him by his mother, and he greatly prized it, but on a sudden he unhappily lost his ring, and he cried bitterly. Recollecting himself, he stepped aside and prayed; after which his sister laughingly said to him, “Brother, what is the good of praying about a ring? Will praying bring back your ring?” “No,” said he, “sister, perhaps not, but praying has done this for me, it has made me quite willing to do without the ring if it is God’s will; and is not that almost as good as having it?” Thus faith quiets us by resignation, as a babe is hushed in his mother’s bosom. Faith makes us quite willing to do without the mercy which once we prized; and when the heart is content to be without the outward blessing, it is as happy as it would be with it, for it is at rest. Besides, faith works humility. Dependence upon the merit of Christ, and a sense of pardoned sin, work in us a low esteem of our own merits and rights. Then we do not strive after mastery. If others think ill of us, it does not break our heart, for we say, “If they knew me, they might think still worse of me.” If some do not respect us as we deserve, we make small account of that, for we think it a little matter for such poor worms as we are to be respected, or the reverse; and if there be some who evil entreat us, we take it joyfully, because we never thought ourselves worthy to be exempted from reproach. Surely we were sent here on purpose that we might take part with the great Head of the church by suffering for the promotion of the divine purposes? A humble heart is fitted to be filled with rest. Faith furthermore promotes unselfishness by kindling worthier affections; and so much is this for our peace, that it is most true that were a man perfectly unselfish it would be impossible for him to be disturbed with discontent. All our unrest lies at the root of self. If a man could be perfectly content to be anything that God would have him be, and have no desires except for God’s glory, he could never be banished, for all places would be alike to him: he could never be poor, for in every condition he would have what his heart desired. Brethren and sisters, I cannot continue this long catalogue, but wherever faith rules it brings with it a refining fire which, as it burns up our corruptions, also stays the raging of our passions, and creates a peace of God which passeth all understanding, warranting the apostle’s declaration that “we who have believed do enter into rest.” Faith tones us down into little children; it casts our heart in a fresh mould; it brings us into harmony with the universe, and we who were out of tune with God and nature are once more reconciled to the Divine One, his purposes and providences. All goeth well with the man who trusts in God: the beasts of the field are at peace with him, and the stones of the field have made a league with him. All must be right when the heart is right; and the heart is right when faith rejoicingly reconciles the soul to God through the death of Jesus Christ. Thus I have, as best I am able, described the Christian’s rest. I only hope-to use John Bunyan’s language-that many of your mouths are a-watering to get a personal share in this rest.

The second point to consider is, how does the Christian obtain this rest?-“We which have believed.”

Do notice this, that the way in which the believer comes to his rest is entirely through belief or trust. How I love to think of this word! If the apostle had said, “We who have been eminently consecrated do enter into rest,” I could have wept over the text with shame and dismay. If he had said, “We that have been mightily useful and earnest and indefatigable in service-we do enter into rest,” I should have looked at it very wistfully, and have said, “I am afraid I shall never reach it.” But “we which have believed.” Why, that will suit thousands here. It will suit some of you who have been mourning all the week because you cannot be what you want to be, because you cannot serve God as you would like to do. “We which have believed.” So then the gate of the fold of rest, the pearly doorway into the New Jerusalem, is simply belief in the Lord Jesus. What, nothing else but believing? I see nothing else in the text-nothing but believing.

And what is this believing? Why it is a simple trust; it is a trusting upon Christ as God’s appointed Saviour; it is trusting the Father and believing in his infinite love to us; it is trusting the Holy Ghost, and giving up ourselves to the sway of his divine indwelling. Trusting brings rest. This is a simple truth, and yet it is a truth we need to remember, consider, and be assured upon. Peace does not come to the believer through his works. He ought to have works-he must have them if he hath the life of grace within his heart. He should attend to baptism, to the Lord’s-supper, and to all Christian ordinances, but he does not get rest through these. The rest cometh through his faith, not through the ordinances. “Means of grace,” men call those ordinances, and some have gone great lengths as to what cometh to us through sacraments; but I say most boldly, that the apostle goeth greater lengths in another direction, namely, in neglecting to say anything in such a case as this about baptism or the Lord’s-supper, and in laying all our rest at the door of believing. “We that have believed.” He is of the same mind as our Lord himself, when he declares that whosoever believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, as if the only essential thing were this believing, and where this was, all the privileges of the covenant were to be enjoyed. Dearly beloved, we ought to pant after sanctification; it should be the ambition of our spirits to be useful-we ought to be crying and sighing every day after conformity to Christ; but, recollect, it is neither in our sanctification, nor in our usefulness, nor in our conformity that we find our rest-our rest comes to us through believing in Jesus Christ. The apostle indirectly tells us in these words, that those who believe in Christ Jesus enter into rest, notwithstanding anything and everything beside. “We which have believed,” saith he, “do enter into rest.” What, Paul, hast thou no corruptions? “Alas!” crieth he, “Wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me?” Yet he entered into rest. “What, Paul, hast thou no doubts? Hear him: “I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means when I had preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.” Had he no vexing troubles? He answers, “Without were fightings, and within were fears.” And yet, O apostle, didst thou enter into rest? Ay, by believing. But hadst thou no sins, Paul? Yea, verily, he confesseth himself the chief of sinners, but, believing made him enter into rest. Mark you, the vicissitudes of the apostle’s experience were far greater than ours. As his mind was more capacious than ours, and his outward experience more varied, his trials were more and heavier than ordinary. A night and a day had he been in the deep, yet, believing, he did enter into rest. With his feet fast in the stocks in the jail of Phillipi, stoned by infuriated mobs, before Nero the lion at Rome, in all kinds of dangers and difficulties, surrounded by imminent perils by night and by day, he was ever in afflictions, and yet he declareth that, having believed, he did enter into rest, a rest which no outward circumstances could disturb. Oh, blessed lesson! My soul, ask grace to learn by experience the blessed fact that faith altogether by itself, and alone can give thee rest. When the pillars of heaven tremble, and the corner stone of the earth is removed, faith can make the soul steadfast, and keep it confident.

The apostle seems to intimate in the words before us, that the entering into rest, while it depends on nothing else but believing, does depend on that. It is “we which have believed do enter into rest.” Then why do not some professed Christians have rest? Why do not we ourselves have rest at all times? Answer: Because faith is not always in vigorous exercise; and though the possession of a weak, but genuine faith brings to a Christian unfailing and unchanging security, yet it brings not to him an abiding rest. Our faith must take God at his word, or it cannot taste the sweetness of his abounding peace. The child that cannot trust its parent, cannot expect to have the freedom from care which is childhood’s dear inheritance; but the more fully we can rest upon our Father’s promise, the more we can feel that it is not for us to enquire how he can do this, nor how he can do that, nor when he will deliver us, but can altogether leave everything with him, and lean on him alone without a second helper, then it is that our rest becomes profound and undisturbed. O you who are in the church, and yet cannot rest as you could wish, ask the Lord to increase your faith. O you who do trust him, but are often staggered, go again to the cross-foot and look to him who suffered there; look again to the precious sin-atoning blood; look up once more into the great Father’s face who accepts those that trust in Jesus, and you shall yet have the perfect rest which God gives only to believers.

I cannot readily tear myself away from this point. My soul hovers about it and lingers lovingly on it, because I am so anxious that you all should win this rest, and enjoy it to-day. I know that some of you are complaining of what you do or do not feel; but this is not to the point. My message, as contained in the text, proclaims no blessing to feeling, but to believing. Oh, can you not trust the Son of God to save you? Can you not believe the promise which is so freely given to all who will but trust in him? Have done, I pray you, with raking the kennel of thy heart in search of golden consolations. Go to Christ, thou shalt get all thy soul wants in him. Oh! it may be, you are saying “I have not the rest I used to have; I will read the Bible more, and I will pray more, and I will go to a place of worship oftener,” and so on; all which is right, but none of these things will bring you rest. Rest for a soul is found in Jesus. The dove never found rest till she came to the ark, nor will you till you come back again to Christ. O dear heart, all the sacraments in the world cannot give thee rest, nor can all the preachers that ever spoke, minister rest to thy weary spirit. Do thou come now with nought to trust in of thine own, come to the infinite mercy of God as treasured up in the once pierced heart of the Wellbeloved, and he will give thee rest. O come, poor fluttered dove, fly into Jesus’ bosom, because thou canst not help it. Driven by stress of weather, put in to this port of peace. Believe me, Jesus cannot reject thee; it is impossible. Believe me, if thou trust him thou shalt have rest to-day-shalt have the same rest as those who have been fifty years his servants, rest through the blood of the atonement, “which speaketh better things than that of Abel.”

So now the last point, which is this: what is the ground and reason of a Christian’s rest?

It is a dreadful thing to be at rest in extreme peril, lulled by false security. It is perilous to sleep in a house built on a foundation of sand, when the floods are out, and the winds are about, to sweep all away; it is horrible to be at peace in a condemned cell, when already the scaffold has been put up, and the hour of execution is hastening on! Such peace may God preserve us from. But the believer has good reason for being at peace, and why? He has these reasons, amongst others. He trusts to be saved by a way which God has appointed. It is God’s ordinance that Jesus Christ should be the propitiation for sin, and he has solemnly declared that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish. Now, whether or not a soul believing in Christ can perish, if the devil telleth me he can, I am prepared to risk it, for God’s way of appointment, if I accept it, taketh all responsibility off of me. If I perish, God’s honour is injured as well as my soul. But I know that God will stand to his appointment. He gave Christ for my salvation; I feel there is no risk in my resting on him; I do rest on him, and if God be true, my soul is safe; therefore I am perfectly at rest.

Next, the believer rests in the person of Jesus. “Why,” saith he, “he that I commend my soul unto is no other than God himself, and though born of a virgin as to his manhood, yet is he very God of very God, most certainly divine; therefore,

‘I know that safe with him remains,

Protected by his power,

What I’ve committed to his hands

Till the decisive hour.’ ”

Here is a firm rock to rest on. What better person can we depend upon than Jesus, the Son of God?

The believer, moreover, knows that all things which were necessary to save him and all the elect are already performed. The debts which were due on our account have been paid by our Surety. The believer is not afraid, then, of being sued in the Court of King’s Bench and cast into prison to pay the uttermost farthing, because every penny has been paid. The resurrection of Jesus Christ was God’s receipt for the sin which had been laid on the Surety. “He rose again for our justification,” and the Christian says, “Though my sins be as the sands on the sea-shore, yet all that was due for sin was laid on Christ, and, therefore, no penalty can be laid on me.” This is good ground for peace, is it not? Then, moreover, the believer saith, “He who died for me ever liveth. He rose again. The great One who undertook my cause is not dead and buried. I have not lost my Friend. He liveth at the right hand of God, and maketh intercession for me. Strong to deliver, and mighty to save, he is ever ready to manifest his power towards his people. Why, then, should I be disturbed? Since Christ liveth, I must live also.” The believer, moreover, knoweth that the Lord has entered into an everlasting covenant with him, and he rests upon the veracity and faithfulness of God that every covenant promise shall be fulfilled. Surely God’s truth is good ground for a soul to rest on. There can be no fear when here is our mainstay and refuge. Though the pillars of the earth be removed, and all the wheels of nature break, there can be no fear that the Eternal himself should lie. If the foundations of divine veracity were removed, indeed the righteous would be lost; but no such calamity can happen. Believers do well to rest on a ground so safe as this. “Ah, well,” saith one, “shall I ever have such ground for comfort as that?” Poor soul, thou mayst have. Thou canst have no ground for comfort at all until thou dost comply with the divine command to believe in Jesus. For you, as unbelievers, there is no rest; there cannot be any. You may be what you like, and do what you choose, and try what you please, but so long as you refuse the divine way of salvation, rest is not possible to you. If you will to-day throw down your self-will, and give up the obstinacy of your unbelief, and trust in the incarnate God who on the bloody tree poured out his heart’s blood, you shall have forgiveness and acceptance, and then the Holy Ghost shall come upon you, and your peace shall be deep and profound, the beginning of the peace of heaven; a peace which shall go on widening and deepening through this mortal life as you know more of Christ and become more like him-a peace which shall expand into the ocean of eternal joy. All through believing! All through trusting! Nothing is said of the sinnership of the truster, nothing about the greatness or littleness of his sins, nothing about the softness or tenderness of his heart, nothing about his fitness or unfitness, but it is said alone that he believeth! “We which have believed,” whoever we may be, if we have but trusted, if we have taken God at his word and rested on it-we do enter, we do now enter into and enjoy a most divine and blessed rest.

In conclusion, there are three practical words.

The first is to the man who never has rested. It is, try God’s way of rest. How I pity you who have not entered the rest of God! You are so morally good, so amiable, so truly lovable, you adorn the households in which you move; but for lack of one thing you are not happy, and you never can be till you get that one thing. Oh, I wish you had it! I wish you had it to-day! I do remember well when I first found rest, I did not think it was so simple a matter; I could not believe it, and I fear I should not have believed it till now if the Holy Ghost had not enlightened me. I could not believe that rest came simply by trusting. I used to say, “What! only believe!” but now I have found out that the only believing is one of the richest things in the world; for it brings ten thousand other things with it. It brings with it seven other spirits as blessed as itself when it enters in and dwells in the human heart. This morning the truth is certain, if thou canst believe, all things are possible to thee. If thou canst now trust in him who came to be a man to save men, and who suffered that men might not suffer, and who is risen and gone up to heaven, and is coming again a second time to judge the world, if thou canst put thy soul into his hands, it will be quite safe: he cannot lose it, and he will not. O that thou wouldst confide in Jesus this morning, for then thou wouldst become another witness to the rest which God’s people enjoy. O may it be so at once! We desire to see God’s kingdom come; we want Christ to see of the travail of his soul, and we hope that you are one of those who shall for ever illustrate his mighty love. Yield your heart now, yield to the sweet influences of the Holy Spirit who is breathing upon you now. Trust, and you shall rest.

The next word is to those of you who once did rest, but do not now. You backslider, this is your word, return unto thy rest. You never will find rest out of Christ-especially you. An ungodly man does, after a certain sort, rest in sin; for a time he is satisfied with its gaieties, and its frivolities appear to delight him, as husks satisfy swine, but you cannot ever have such rest as this. If you are a child of God, you will never be easy in sin. As Rutherford would say, “If you have once eaten the white bread of heaven, your mouth is out of taste for the brown bannocks of earth.” You cannot be content as a swine, after having once mated with angels. If Christ has given you heavenly emotions and desires, you must go back to him to have them satisfied, for away from him your state is present misery, and will wax worse and worse. Return, return, O backslider, at once! O that I could make my voice a silver trumpet to you this morning, and that you could hear it as the proclamation of jubilee, bidding you return to your inheritance. What fruit have you had in all your sins since you have wandered from your first husband? What joy, what happiness have you known? Oh, it has been all disappointment, vexation, delusion! Come back! Come back! Come back! The mercy-seat is open still; the heart of Jesus beats lovingly towards you still; the grace of God waits for you still. “Turn, O backsliding children, saith the Lord; for I am married unto you.” “I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from him.”

Lastly, to you who are at rest now. Endeavour to keep it; and the way to keep it is the way you first gained it. You obtained it by believing; keep it by believing. Believe in the promise of grace in the teeth of thy sins and corruptions. It is little or no faith to trust Christ when you feel your graces growing and your lusts weakening, but, oh! it is faith when you feel burdened and cast down with a sense of sin, still to say, “I know that Jesus came not to save the righteous but sinners; I know he came not to save men from some slight disease of sin, but he is a physician able to grapple with the most virulent and mortal of diseases: I, therefore, confide in him without a doubt, and if I were a bigger sinner than I am, I would still trust him; if my spots were more scarlet than they are, I would still believe that the crimson fount could make me white as snow. I will still come to him-not with a staggering faith which would try to make sin little in order to believe it possible that he could take it away, but with a faith which knows sin to be great beyond conception, and yet believes that the Saviour is greater still, and the merit of his blood more potent than the demerit of human transgression.” O abide, believer, always at the cross, and never go away from it. Let no advancements in grace make thee say, “Excelsior” to the cross, for there is no higher than Calvary. Your wisdom is to remain a sinner washed with blood at the cross-foot, for you build wretched rubbish when you build above the cross. If you have ever been on the top of Snowdon or the Righi, you will have seen little platforms and heaps piled up for tourists to stand on; now these may be blown over, but it is not the mountain that moves, it is only these trumpery platforms. So if you build up your little rickety experiences above the genuine work of Christ, and they come tumbling down, do not wonder at it; on the contrary, be rather glad of it than not. To lie down on what Christ has done is safest and best.

“I the chief of sinners am,

But Jesus died for me.”

“Having nothing, yet possessing all things.” Guilty in myself, but accepted in the Beloved; naked, poor, miserable, and wretched to the last degree, as I am in myself considered, yet in Christ Jesus I am dear to God, as dear as if I had never sinned; I am one with Jesus and heir with him to all the inheritance of God, and shortly I shall be with Jesus where he is at his right hand, where there are pleasures for evermore. The Lord bless you with such a faith, for Jesus’ sake, Amen.

Portions of Scripture Read before Sermon-Hebrews 3 and Psalm 62.