C. H. SPURGEON,

at the metropolitan tabernacle, newington.

On Lord’s-day Evening, May 10th, 1874.

“O how love I thy law! it is my meditation all the day. Thou through thy commandments hast made me wiser than mine enemies: for they are ever with me. I have more understanding than all my teachers: for thy testimonies are my meditation. I understand more than the ancients, because I keep thy precepts.”-Psalm 119:97-100.

David had a very small Bible, but he thought it a very precious one. Our Bible is quite a large library compared with the one that David had, yet he read and re-read it, and exulted greatly in the treasure which he found in it. I have sometimes heard people say that they wished they had fuller records of the life of Christ; and when they find John writing that he supposed that even the world itself could not have contained all the books which might have been written about the Saviour, they ask, “Why have we not more of the interesting incidents of his career preserved?” Some of these very people do not read what is preserved, and they seem to forget that the Bible is exactly the right size, most portable and most useful, and that, if we had a larger one, some people might then have said, “It is too large a Book for us ever to read it through, and to have it at our fingers’ ends.” Let us be thankful that the Bible is so large that there is abundance of fresh reading for every day of the year, and let us prize it as David prized his much smaller portion.

David was one of those who helped to enlarge the Bible. The Spirit of God rested upon him in so large a degree that he has given us, in the Book of Psalms, a most precious part of Sacred Writ. Yet he did not despise the rest of the written Word that he possessed; and it is notable that those saints who had most of the Spirit of God were always those who most highly valued the Scriptures. When Peter, filled with the Spirit, stood up with the eleven, on the day of Pentecost, his sermon consisted mainly of quotations from the Old Testament. The Holy Ghost even quotes from writings which he inspired in order to show the value which all of us should attach to the written Word. Certain persons have said that they did not need what was written, for they had the Spirit within them to teach them all they needed to know; but such talk as that is not according to the Spirit of Christ. Neither is it according to the mind of the inspired psalmist, for although God spoke by him, yet he greatly valued that which God had spoken by others, and he searched the Scriptures which he possessed with much avidity and intense delight. Beloved, if the man who was inspired by the Spirit of God thought so much of the Word of the Lord, how highly ought we to value it, we who will never be inspired writers, and who cannot stand on the same platform with David in that respect! Our conscience ought to commend to us the infallible truth which God has presented for our use in the Sacred Scriptures.

Being desirous to press upon you, beloved, a sense of the value of Holy Scripture, I want you to learn from our text, first, David’s love to the Word; secondly, how he showed it; and, thirdly, what benefit came to him from it.

First, then, let us consider David’s love to the Word. He has tried to express the inexpressible by saying, “O how love I thy law!” He cannot tell the Lord how much he loves it. He had good reason for loving God’s law; his love was a reasonable one. Love is sometimes blind; but, in this case, David loved with his eyes open, and loved with good reason. We ought to love all that God gives to us, and especially all his blessed teaching. If you do not love the Bible, you certainly do not love the God who gave it to us; and if you do love God, I am certain that no other book in all the world will be comparable, in your mind, to God’s own Book. Where God’s handwriting is most plainly to be seen, there God’s servants will at once turn their eyes. When God speaks, it is the delight of our ears to hear what he says.

Further, David loved the law of the Lord, because, being God’s Word, it was solid truth. In other books, there is some truth and some error. Apart from the Bible, the best book that was ever written in this world has mistakes in it. It is not possible for fallible men to write infallible books. Somehow or other, we either say more than is true or less than is true; the most skilful writer does not always keep along that hair line of truth, which is more difficult to tread than a razor’s edge. But Scripture never errs. Here is the bullion gold without a single particle of alloy. Here is the living water leaping from the rock, and there is no defilement in it. David truly wrote, “The words of the Lord are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.” Such is the truth as we find it in Scripture. Now, a man of truth naturally loves the Book of Truth, and finding it to be so pure he cries, “O how love I thy law!”

In addition to this being God’s Book, and being therefore pure, David no doubt loved it because of the majestic goodness, the sublime grace, of its revelation. What has the Bible taught us? Some terrible things, certainly, for it has revealed the wrath to come. But glorious things, too, for it has revealed the great Substitute who took our sins upon himself and put that wrath away for all who trust him. How wondrous is the revelation of God in Christ Jesus! Well might the prophets long for it, and kings desire to see it. You have it in this blessed Book of God. You have far more of the revelation than David had; for, though he could see Christ in the types of the Old Testament, you can see him much more clearly in the Gospels and Epistles of the New Testament. How much, then, you ought to love that Word which so plainly shows you the way of salvation through the atoning sacrifice of God’s only-begotten and well-beloved Son! Clasp the Bible to your bosom, repentant, pardoned sinner, and say to the Lord, “O how I love thy law, for through this Word my chains have been broken, and I have been set free for ever!”

David also had good cause to love that law of the Lord, because it had been his comfort so often in the time of his sorrow, and many of us can say the same. How often have I, in times of frightful depression of spirit, reached down my Bible, and within a few minutes have been able to leap for joy of soul, and sing in the conscious realization of the comforting presence of my God! Get but the one text, suitable to the occasion, applied to the heart with power by the Holy Spirit, and it will not matter where you are, you will be sure to be glad. You might lie in a dungeon, as Paul and Silas did, scarred with the scourge, but you would sing as they did, and make your fellow-prisoners hear you. If you could but get the right text applied to your soul by the Holy Spirit, it would be precious to your soul in your times of deepest distress, and would be like a star lighting up your darkest night.

I might thus go on for a long while, showing you that David had good reason to love the law of the Lord, but you probably believe that as much as I do, so I will content myself by reminding you that he loved it all. He says, “O how love I thy law!” He means not only some of it, but all of it. Dear friend, if there is any text of Scripture that has a quarrel with you, you had better submit to it at once; if you are not in full agreement with the Word of God, you are wrong, but it is not. There are some passages of Scripture which certain brethren do not care to read, as they do not suit the views that they hold. There are some commentaries that seem to have been written on the principle of twisting the text into the shape that the commentator approved, and I am afraid we have all had a share in attempts to make the Word of God say what we think it ought to have said according to our system of divinity. That will not do, brethren; we must give up trying to mend the Scripture, and say to the Lord, “O how I love thy law! I love it too well to wish to alter a single letter of it.” One brother does not like the doctrine of election; another likes the doctrine of divine sovereignty, but he does not like the doctrine of human responsibility, and he cannot endure exhortations to sinners to repent and believe the gospel. Well, brethren, it does not matter what you like, or what you do not like, if those doctrines are in the Word, you had better make up your mind to like them, for they will not be taken away to please you. You cannot bend the Bible to your mind; how much better it would be for you to bend your mind to the Bible, and to say, “O how I love thy law,-the doctrines of it, the precepts of it, the promises of it, the ordinances it enjoins upon me, the warnings it sets before me, the exhortations it gives me!” Love the whole Bible from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Revelation, and be prepared even to die rather than to give up half a verse of it.

Further, David loved it always. I find that we might read his declaration in the past tense, and yet give the sense of the original: “O how I have loved thy law!” He is a saint who loves God’s Word always. We have heard of some who read their Bibles on Sunday, but put them by in a drawer with a sprig of lavender all the week. That was not David’s plan; he could say, “O how love I thy law! it is my meditation all the day;” and no doubt he meant every day of the week. We must love God’s Word when we are at business, and act upon it there; and love it in our families, and act upon it there. To love the Bible in the study as a book to search into is a good thing, but it is not a good thing if it ends there; we must love the Word so as to live upon it wherever we may be. In any company, if it is right for you to be there, you will feel, “I am not afraid to take God’s Word with me here, for I am doing now what is in accordance with it.” I have heard that “the Golden Rule” once went to a place where men were gathered together to make money,-I think it was the Stock Exchange,-and they called the beadle, and locked it up, for they said, “ ‘Do unto others as ye would that they should do unto you,’ is a rule that will never do here;” but the Christian man does not find it so, he can transact his business, and keep his Bible near his heart all the time. When the Bible and the ledger fall out, it is a bad business. Oh, that we might love God’s Book all the day, and make it the guide of our ordinary business transactions.

David not only loved God’s law always, but he was not ashamed to say that he loved it: “O how love I thy law!” Young man, were you not afraid, the other night, to confess that you were a Christian when your companions began chaffing you about your religion? I hear that they read a paper that was very critical and sarcastio, and that one of them turned round to you and said, “I think you are one of that sort;” and you blushed a good deal at the accusation. Well, blush now to think that you blushed then, for there was nothing to blush about. Ashamed of being a Christian! Be ashamed of ever having been ashamed. David said, “O how love I thy law!” He cared not who heard him; and if our hearts are right with God, we shall not be ashamed to stand up, even if we are alone, and confess Christ. Minorities have generally been in the right, and the multitude usually runs to do evil. Vox populi is not often vox Dei; it is more frequently the voice of the devil than the voice of God. That man is worthy of being called a man who dares to do right whatever others may do or say. “O how love I thy law!” said David, to let all men know that he was in love with the law of the Lord to the greatest conceivable extent.

Perhaps some thoughtless person says, “I suppose that David had nothing to do but sit down, and read his Bible.” He had to be fighting Philistines, and ruling a kingdom, and with so much to do that his hands were kept fully occupied. Someone asks, “How, then, did he meditate all the day?” Well, those who are the most busy are often the very men who do the most meditation, for idleness and meditation are not generally very close companions. An idle man usually has idle thoughts; but the busy man, when he is able to think, thinks busy thoughts that are worth thinking. Now, if we love God’s Word as David did, we shall meditate upon it all the day as he did. How are we to do that?

It is an admirable plan to fix your thoughts upon some text of Scripture before you leave your bedroom in the morning; it will sweeten your meditation all the day. Always look God in the face before you see the face of anyone else. Lock up your heart in the morning, and hand the key to God, and keep the world out of your heart. Take a text, and lay it on your tongue like a wafer made with honey, and let it melt in your mouth all the day. If you do this, and meditate upon it, you will be surprised to notice how the various events of life will help to open up that text. If that particular text does not seem suitable to some special occasion, steal away into a quiet place, and get another one; only let your soul be so full of the Word of God that, at all the intervals and interstices when you can think upon it, the Word of God dwelling in you richly may come welling up into your mind, and make your meditation to be sweet and profitable.

I am afraid there are not many Christians who meditate upon the Word nowadays, meditation seems to have gone out of fashion; but if you do not meditate upon what you read, you might as well read some ordinary book for all the good your reading will do you. It is no use to hurry through your reading of the Scriptures, like a man riding through a field of ripe corn; it is no use trying to reap a good harvest in that fashion. To get the goodness out of the Scriptures, you must meditate upon them, and so digest them, just as you have seen the cattle lie down to chew the cud after eating. To get the nourishment out of a text, turn it over and over in your mind, ruminate upon it, pull it to pieces word by word. It is a good thing sometimes not to be able to read fast, so that, like Mrs. Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom, one has to spell a text out letter by letter,-Let let-not not-your your-heart heart-let not your heart-be be-troubled troubled. That is the way to suck the sweetness out of the text. A text of Scripture is often like an apple tree, with abundance of ripe fruit on it, and we are underneath, the tree. Give it a shake, brethren; shake it till the ripe fruit drops down.

David proved his love to the law of the Lord by meditating upon it. Perhaps you think that would be very dull work, but I am sure it was not, nor will you think so if I tell you what it was upon which he meditated. The Word of God was a letter from his Father; and if ever your father has been away in a far country, you know how you have prized a letter from him. Good wife, if your husband has gone for a long sea voyage, and he has written home to you, how many times you have read his letter! Did I not see it, the other day, almost worn to pieces, because you have carried it in your pocket ever since you received it? Nobody else knows how precious it is to you because nobody else is as nearly related to the writer as you are.

The Bible also contains the portrait of our truest and best Friend. I have seen you look at a photograph, the likeness of your dear mother who is in heaven, or of a dear child, or of someone dearer still, for you like to look at that face; and one reason why we love to read the Bible, and meditate upon it, is that it contains such a lifelike portrait of Christ. The Bible is also the charter of the Christian’s liberty. He was a slave once, but he is free now through the blessed Emancipator who is revealed in this Book. The Bible is the title-deed to our heavenly inheritance. The Bible is our patent of nobility, for here we read that we are made kings and priests unto God. The Bible is our chart, by which we steer safely across the watery wastes of life. The Bible is our cheque-book. We come to it, and take out the promises upon the Bank of Heaven, we fill them, up, and present them before God in prayer, and we have what we will of him when we ask in the name of Jesus. The Bible is to us the telescope through which we look forward to the celestial city whither we are journeying.

I might keep on thus, by the hour together, singing the praises of this blessed Book, but I have, surely, given you reasons enough for our making it the theme of our meditation all the day. I wonder how many of us do this. If I were to say, “Hands up, everyone who has a Bible,” everybody’s bands here would go up. I suppose that nobody here is without a Bible; but if I were to ask, “How many here, constantly, as a habit and a delight, meditate upon the Scriptures?”-I wonder what answers I should receive. Well, I will not ask you that question, but let everybody ask it for himself, and judge himself concerning it in the sight of God.

Thirdly, we have to enquire, What benefit came to David through loving the law of the Lord? He was such a Bible-reader, and Bible-lover, that he gained some benefit from it; what was that benefit? He tells us that he grew wiser than three different sorts of people. First, he was made wiser than his enemies; secondly, he had more understanding than all his teachers, and, thirdly, he understood more than the ancients. These are three of the blessings which meditation upon the Bible will give to us.

First, we shall be wiser than our enemies. God had taught David the meaning of the Scriptures, and by his daily meditation upon them he had become wiser than his enemies. Some of you, young Christians, have to live from day to day amongst those who would like to pick holes in your coat if they could. They are watching you, to try to bring an accusation against you, and they are very subtle and crafty; how shall you be able to guard yourselves against them? This is the best way. Get the Bible wrought into your soul, and act according to its teachings, and then your enemies will not be able to bring a true accusation against you; or, if they do, they will be like the men who watched Daniel, who could find nothing to bring against him except his religion. If you want to baffle all those who would bring a charge against you, do not trouble about them in the least. Care only to walk according to God’s Word, for so you will defeat them.

In addition to trying to bring accusations against you, they will also seek to lay traps for you. Many a young man has had a hard time of it through the traps that have been laid for him; all sorts of schemes and plots have been devised to try to draw him aside from the right path; but the craftiest man in the world will not be able to overthrow the man who simply follows the directions given to him in the Word of God. Keep you to that course, and you must win in the long run. Although I do not like our common proverb, “Honesty is the best policy,” yet there is a measure of truth in it,-that, even as a matter of policy, to do right is the best plan. I have often seen very cunning men quite puzzled by a simple-minded, straightforward, honest Christian.

David says that he was able to defeat all his enemies because God’s Word was always with him, and he followed the directions that he found there; and, dear friends, whether you are young or old, if you love the law of the Lord, and put your trust in Jesus, and then obey the teachings of your Divine Master, you will certainly be able to defeat all the subtlety and all the malice of hell. You may, like Joseph, be put in prison without being guilty of the crime laid to your charge, but it will be the straightest way to a throne. You may be persecuted for righteousness’ sake, but if it came to the very worst, and you were to be a martyr for the truth, that would be the straightest way to heaven. Therefore, be just and fear not. Obey your God. Let the dogs of hell howl at you as they may, you shall be more than conqueror at the last.

Next, David had more understanding than all his teachers. He went into the schools as well as into the camp; and after his mental battles with the leaders there, he says, “I have more understanding than all my teachers: for thy testimonies are my meditation.” I do not think he means that he had more understanding than the wise, good, pious teachers, but that he had more understanding than those who vainly set up to be teachers. There are still some of that kind left to plague us, the dry-as-dust teachers, who would fain teach us the letter of the Word, but ignore its true spirit. If there were any teachers, in David’s days, like the Jewish Rabbis who have left us the Talmud, the Mishna, and the Gemara, he might well say that he knew more than they did. They knew so much that they muddled everything. They went down so deep that they stirred up the mud at the bottom, and then neither themselves nor anybody else could see. David meditated upon the law of the Lord, and, therefore, he knew a great deal more than those learned Rabbis knew.

But, surely, I may use the text with reference to sceptical learned men. Every now and then there is a great eruption; a volcano bursts up just under the foundations of the temple of truth as if it were going to blow it all up; and the lava of scepticism begins running down our streets as if everything were about to be destroyed. At one time, it is a bishop who has been figuring on a slate, and found out that Genesis is wrong. At another time, we are told to give up some other portion of Scripture as being incorrect. Well, what do we say to all this? Why, that we have more understanding than all these sceptical teachers if we meditate in God’s statutes. We may not know how to answer all their questions, but we know how to ask them questions which they cannot answer. We may not be able to confute them in argument, but we shall still believe the law of the Lord. Many a poor Christian man has been baffled by some clever infidel, but he has said to himself, “If that gentleman had tried to prove that I do not exist, I daresay he could have proved it in the same fashion as he has proved this point, which I could not answer; but I know what I do know, and I do know that Christ is a precious Saviour; and as I have read of him in his Word, so have I found it in my own experience. The Word of the Lord and my experience tally, so I am satisfied.” If you come straight from searching the Scriptures, you need not mind who attacks you; the Scriptures will be like a coat of mail to repel all the darts of those who assail you, and you shall be able to stand up against those who are far more learned than you are. It is well if you can cope with all the arguments of the sceptio, and meet him and master him on his own ground; but the most of believing men and women are not able to do so. If you cannot argue thus, be content if you are like Cowper’s poor woman who knows no more than that her Bible is true, for you may, like David, still be more than a match for the sceptio, and understand more than all your teachers, because you meditate upon God’s statutes.

Last of all, David says that he had more understanding than the ancients, because he kept God’s precepts. Oh, those ancients, they have a great deal to answer for! Some people seem to think that, if anything is ancient, it must be right. If you look (I hope you will not care to do so) into some of our parish churches, you must say that no human being could see any difference between them and the Roman Catholic places. If you do go in, ask the Ritualistic “priest” why he wears all that finery, why he burns stuff that has such a nasty smell, and what he means by all the mummeries and incantations that are such a mystery to you. He says, “This is what the ancient church did.” If he could quote the really ancient Church of the New Testament, you might agree with him; but he refers you to St. Honorius, St. Veronica, or some other ancients, either real or legendary. Does this “priest” succeed in getting people to believe in his ancient nonsense? Yes, he gets his converts amongst those silly women, and sillier men, who read novels, but never read their Bibles. But they never do, and never will, pervert a true Bible-reader and Bible-lover. If they ever do get hold of a nominal Baptist, they make a great boast of it, because we are so accustomed to go to the Bible for everything we teach, and to test everything by the Bible, that I have known a Romanist say, “I can’t make any headway with you. You don’t believe in any traditions, not even in infant baptism. You will have a Bible proof for everything, or else you will not accept it.” Yes, and if all professing Christians would but keep to that principle, Romanism and Ritualism would make far less headway than they do. We say, with Isaiah, “To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.” Give us a Bible-reading, Bible-loving people, and all the “priests” in the world, with all their finery, will never make any headway. An open Bible is death to their follies and falsehoods, if there be but people with open eyes to read it. The worst of it is that, although we have the open Bible, we have not as many Bible-readers and Bible-lovers as we wish to see. May the Lord graciously increase the number the wide world over!

There is another kind of ancients that we have to guard against, and that is, very old sinners. There are old sinners who will say to you young men and young women who have lately been converted, “Ah! we have seem a good many people just as earnest as you are now, but you will soon grow as cold as they did.” Some of them will shake their heads, and say, “We know your religious people, they are all a set of hypocrites.” A wicked old sinner will tell you that, when you are as old as he is, you won’t be led astray in this way; yet he is himself going to hell as fast as ever he can! He says, “Don’t you, young man, imagine that you know everything. I have had more experience than you have had, and I know a thing or two that is worth knowing.” I used to have an old man of that kind in my congregation at Waterbeach,-a man pretty nearly seventy years of age, whose whole life had been one of wickedness and sin. He came to the place where I preached on purpose to pick up young men to lead them astray if he could. He was nothing better than a walking beer-barrel, and his mouth poured out little but filth. I had some sharp brushes with him, and I could not help feeling a holy indignation against him whenever I saw him. There are some such old sinners still about; beware of them! Their hoary hairs are no crown of glory to them, but a crown of shame. A hoary head, where there is no grace, is worse than a fool’s cap; and there is no fool in the world like an old fool, and no other fool that can equal a grey-headed sinner who has for seventy years rejected Christ, and, in spite of a thousand warnings and invitations, has deliberately made his own damnation sure. Take no notice of him, I pray you. If it is an old woman who has lived in the ways of sin, and tries to allure you to evil, O young man, flee from her,-young woman, escape from her at all costs! There are none whom Satan uses so much as he does these ancients, because they can talk so glibly, and look so sweetly at you all the while that they are deceiving you, and trying to ruin your immortal soul. If you cling to the Bible, they can do nothing with you. When there is a great parade of age and authority, yet the advice given is backed up by experience that is vicious, turn at once to your Bibles, and say to the old man, or to the old woman, respectfully, yet firmly, “That is what you say, but this is what God says;” and then turn to your God, and say, with David, “I understand more than the ancients, because I keep thy precepts.”

To sum up all, the heart must be right with God, and it can only be so as the result of simple faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and when the heart is right, and you are saved, I beseech you to let your Bibles be everything to you. Carry this matchless treasure with you continually, and read it, and read it, and read it again and again. Turn to its pages by day and by night. Let its narratives mingle with your dreams; let its precepts colour your lives; let its promises cheer your darkness; let its divine illumination make glad your life. As you love God, love this Book, which is the Book of God, and the God of books, as it has rightly been called; and may God make this Book to be your comfort when you pass through the valley of death-shade, and may you in heaven have for ever to praise him who revealed himself to you through the pages of this blessed Book! Amen and amen.

Exposition by C. H. Spurgeon

PSALM 119:113-128

Verse 113. I hate vain thoughts: but thy law do I love.

Presumptuous thoughts, erroneous thoughts, wicked thoughts, foolish thoughts,-all these David hated. A good man ought to be a good hater, as well as a good lover. What should he hate? He should hate vain thoughts. What should he love? He should love the law of the Lord. If we do not hate sin in the very egg, we shall not be likely to hate it in its fuller development. The very thought of sin must be detestable to us; and if we do not think of evil, we shall not speak evil, nor do evil. We ought to begin with David at the beginning, and say, “I hate vain thoughts;” yet negative religion is not sufficient, so we should go on to the positive form: “ ‘Thy law do I love;’ and I love it so much that I wish I could always keep it, and never transgress it, and never forget it.”

114. Thou art my hiding place and my shield: I hope in thy word.

“Thou art my protection against every kind of danger.” David had been accustomed to hide in the caves of the mountains, but now he says that he hid himself in his God. When he did not hide, but stood out bravely against the serried ranks of his foes, then God was his shield to cover him in the day of battle.

115. Depart from me, ye evil-doers: for I will keep the commandments of my God.

If, by your evil example, you would take me off from serving my God, I will make you take yourselves off so that I may neither see nor follow your ill example: “Depart from me, ye evil-doers: for I will keep the commandments of my God.” David puts his foot down firmly, and says, “I will keep the commandments of my God.” It is a grand thing to be able to speak of “my God.” Another man’s God would be of little use to me, but when he is my own God, my God in covenant relationship, then I may well say, “I will keep the commandments of my God.”

116. Uphold me according unto thy word, that I may live:

“Lord, I cannot even live unless thou dost uphold me according to thy promise.” The Christian man is so dependent upon God that he owes his life and the continuance of it to upholding grace.

116. And let me not be ashamed of my hope.

“If thy promise could fail me, then I should have cause to be ashamed of my hope. Therefore, O Lord, let me never at any time have the shadow of a doubt concerning the truthfulness of thy promises, lest I should begin to be ashamed of my hope!”

117, 118. Hold thou me up, and I shall be safe: and I will have respect unto thy statutes continually. Thou hast trodden down all them that err from thy statutes: for their deceit is falsehood.

“They are like salt that has lost its savour, which is neither fit for the land nor yet for the dunghill, but men cast it out, and tread it under their feet; and this is what thou doest with ungodly men, especially with those ‘that err from thy statutes.’ Thou treadest them beneath thy feet, ‘for their deceit is falsehood.’ They try to make it look like truth, but it is falsehood all the while.” How much of deceit there is in this world which men gloss and varnish so that the thing looks right enough though all the while it is a deception and a sham! May God keep us from all the trickeries and falsehoods and errors of the age!

119. Thou puttest away all the wicked of the earth like dross:

“As the dross is thrown away when the useful metal has been extracted from it, so, O Lord, when thou hast taken all thy saints out of the world, thou will put the wicked of the earth away like dross.”

119. Therefore I love thy testimonies.

What? Does David love God’s testimonies because they are thus severe? Yes, for it is the mark of a true believer that he does not kick against the severities of his God. Worldlings can rejoice in the god of this age, who is said to be nothing but effeminate benevolence; but the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob is the God of justice, who will by no means spare iniquity; and for that very reason a true believer says, with David, “I love thy testimonies.”

120. My flesh trembleth for fear of thee; and I am afraid of thy judgments.

This is the man who truly loves God, and this is the kind of fear that perfect love does not cast out. Though we love God supremely, we become for that very reason God-fearing men, and dread to do anything that would cause him anger or sorrow.

121. I have done judgment and justice: leave me not to mine oppressors.

When a man is conscious of doing right, he has a good ground of appeal to God. If, when it was in your power, you did not oppress others, you may plead with God that he will not let others oppress you. If it has been your habit to act with judgment and justice towards others, you may expect that God will defend you against all your oppressors.

122, 123. Be surety for thy servant for good: let not the proud oppress me. Mine eyes fail for thy salvation,-

“I have looked for it so long, I have longed for it so eagerly, that my eyes seem to grow inflamed with watching, a film seems to come over them so that I cannot see out of them: ‘Mine eyes fail for thy salvation.’ ”

123. And for the word of thy righteousness.

“I look for no salvation except in the way revealed in thy Word, and I do not wish thee to do an unrighteous thing even to save me from my oppressors.”

124. Deal with thy servant according unto thy mercy,-

He dare not ask to be dealt with by God on any other ground than that of mercy. Though he is innocent of that which the ungodly laid to his charge, he is not innocent before God, and therefore he pleads for mercy. He owns that God is his Lord and Master, and that he is God’s servant; and as a man should deal mercifully with his servant, he pleads that God will so deal with him: “Deal with thy servant according unto thy mercy,”-

124. And teach me thy statutes.

He had kept God’s statutes so far as the eyes of men could see; but, before God, he takes a humbler position, and begs to be taught what he is to do, asks to be instructed, like a child, in the statutes of his God.

125. I am thy servant;-

This is the third time in four verses that David mentions this relationship; he seems proud of being God’s servant. Though he were but as a menial yet would he glory in it: “I am thy servant;”-

125. Give me understanding, that I may know thy testimonies.

“Lord, do not merely teach me, but give me understanding.” That is what our teachers cannot do. They may put the truth before us so plainly that we ought to understand it, but they cannot give us understanding.

126. It is time for thee, Lord, to work: for they have made void thy law.

And surely this is an age in which this prayer is very suitable. On all hands we see God’s law ridiculed, or denied, or travestied, or else hidden under tradition or under the dicta of so-called scientific men, or in some way or other “made void.” Oh, that God’s right hand of grace might be stretched out to do some miracle of mercy in the land at this very time!

127. Therefore I love thy commandments above gold; yea, above fine gold.

“Therefore”-because the wicked hated God’s law, and made it void, David loved it all the more. It is a live fish that swims against the stream, it is a live man of God who can say, “They have made void thy law, Therefore I love thy commandments above gold; yea, above fine gold.”

128. Therefore I esteem all thy precepts concerning all things to be right;-

“Ungodly men think they are wrong; that is an additional proof to me that they are right.” When a certain old philosopher had been praised by a bad man, he asked, “What have I done amiss that he should speak well of me?” And there are some men’s mouths out of which the praise of Christ or the praise of the Scriptures would be to God’s dishonour. They tell me that So-and-so spoke blasphemously against Christ; but why should he not do so? It is natural for him to be a blasphemer. When serpents hiss, do they not act according to their nature? I do not read that Christ stopped men’s mouths when they blasphemed him; but I do know that, when the demons bore witness to him, he silenced them, for he liked not to be praised by diabolical mouths. Let ungodly men say what they may, we know the value of their speeches, and we are not troubled by them.

128. And I hate every false way.

Again David mentions his hatred of all falseness. Some men are such “chips in the porridge” that they neither love nor hate; but the believer is a man who has both loves and aversions. He loves the truth, and therefore he hates every false way.

PEDIGREE

A Sermon

Published on Thursday, May 7th, 1908,

delivered by

C. H. SPURGEON,

at the metropolitan tabernacle, newington.

“Are they Israelites? so am I.”-2 Cor. 11:22.

Paul was proud of his extraction as a Jew. Taking this expression in its literal sense, I feel that he had much to be proud of Judah’s banner must not rank second among the nations. The nation of Israel is most ancient and most honourable. When as yet Greece and Rome were not known, God had brought forth his people out of Egypt “with a mighty hand and with an outstretched arm,” and had cast out Amorite and Perizzite, to make room for the vine which he had brought out of Egypt. Poets, statesmen, philosophers, divines, had all come to ripeness and the fulness of strength in Judah’s land, while as yet the other nations were sunken in barbarism. When our little island of the sea was just a mass of forests, with here and there perhaps a naked savage wandering through it, David was praising God on a ten-stringed instrument. We talk of Norman blood, but what is it compared with Jewish blood? We speak of the dignity of peers and nobles of our infant monarchy; but this ancient nation stretches far back its patents of nobility, right up to the days of “the friend of God,” when he stood under the oak at Mamre.

The people of Israel were famous because of God’s election. As a nation they deserve honour, but as the elect of God they must stand high in our esteem. One little stream of pure love and truth went wandering amidst the arid wastes of human depravity. The election of grace fell mainly, I might almost say entirely, within the twelve tribes that sprang from the loins of Jacob in those early days. They were the conservators of the lamp of truth. Theirs were the oracles, and grandest and best of all, of them, “as concerning the flesh, Christ came.” Never despise the Jew when you remember that, while our Saviour was a man, yet he was a man of that peculiar type. Let us think of the Jew, Jehovah-Tsidkenu, the Son of Mary, and feel a sympathy for ever with his flesh and blood.

Besides, the Jewish race has a history yet to come, marvellous and strange,-a history whose lines intertwist with all the threads of the history of other nations. I am not about to amuse you by any prophesyings. This is not the place to desecrate the Sabbath-day with whimsical interpretations of Daniel, Ezekiel, and the Revelation; but, still, it is plain, upon the very surface of Scripture, that Israel shall yet be restored to grandeur as a nation, that tine King of the Jews shall reign, and that, in all the splendours of the millenn at age, the Jew, ingathered with the fulness of the Gentile, shall have his full share. This much we know, and in this much even we, the Gentiles, do unfeignedly rejoice. For the Son of David is he who hath made both one, and broken down the middle wall of separation between us, and henceforth there is neither Jew nor Gentile, bond nor free, but we are all one in Christ Jesus. However, were I here to-night as a convert to the Christian faith with Jewish blood within my veins, I would speak with no bated breath concerning it, nor wish to hide my pedigree, but count it the highest of all honours which could come to me after the flesh, that I sprang from the loins of Abraham, “the friend of God.” I do not marvel that Paul was so jealous of it, or that he says, “Are they Israelites? so am I.” He was no bigot; remember, he was the apostle of the Gentiles; it was he who constantly disclaimed all confidence in circumcision; it was he who withstood Peter to the face because he was to be blamed in this matter; it was he who, as with a battle-axe, was continually breaking down the barriers which divided Jew and Gentile. But yet, for all that, as a man, he was not ashamed to say, “Are they Hebrews? so am I. Are they Israelites? so am I. Are they the seed of Abraham? so am I.”

I propose now, however, to take the text in another light. In a spiritual sense, all the Lord’s people are Israelites. “They are not all Israel, which are of Israel” after a carnal lineage; but all God’s people are the true Israel, the spiritual seed, in whom the promises made to Abraham are this day fulfilled. I hope we can say, some of us, with a loud and emphatic utterance, and others with a humble whisper, “Are they Israelites? so am I,” thus putting in our claim to the privileges which belong to the people of God.

Let us accordingly spend a few minutes, first, in describing a peculiar people: Israelites; and then, secondly, in asserting a personal claim, saying, “So am I.”

This peculiar people, called Israelites, I will describe in two ways. The Israelites of God are like their father, like Israel; and they are like their ancestors, like Israel.

First of all, they are like their father. All the Israel of God are in some respects like Jacob, who was surnamed Israel.*

They are so, for one reason, because of their election. What saith the Scripture? “Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.” “The children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand,” it was said, “The elder shall serve the younger.” Jacob was God’s chosen one; he had set his love upon him, and, ere he was born, he had distinguished him as his elect one. Now this is a great deep, and there are many who cavil at and question it; I am not here to answer them. The Book says so; let them cavil with the Book, not with me. That doctrine, I know, is often used to discourage seeking souls, and the great truth of predestination is set in contrast with the other truth of free agency, as though the one contradicted the other. But, believe me, it is only our ignorance that makes us think the two things contradictory. “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out” is just as true as Christ’s later declaration, “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him.” It still stands true that “whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved,” though it is written, “I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion,” and “It is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy.” Let this be recognized as a truth, then, by every true Israelite, that he is so by reason of the choice of God. We cannot say it was our choice; we dare not attribute our separation from the rest of mankind to anything in us by nature. We must lay our crown at the feet of divine sovereignty, and bless that distinguishing, discriminating grace which has made us differ from the rest of mankind. We are Israelites by election.

And you will observe that, very early in Jacob’s life, he, too, made an election. “Chosen of God, ere time began,” he chose his God’s inheritance in return. There stood the mess of pottage, and there, unseen, was the birthright, the inheritance according to promise. Esau, hungry and profane, said, “I shall die of hunger, and then what good will this birthright do unto me?” and for a mess of pottage, which he chose, he rejects the heavenly heritage. Not so Jacob; what Esau sold, Jacob bought. He bought at a dearer price, however. Think, oh, think of that greater inheritance than a mere mess of lentils! At any rate, you have now before you a picture of what every true Israelite becomes by the work of God’s grace in the heart. If thou choosest this world, and neglectest the world to come, thou art Esau. Thou mayest be a child according to the flesh, but thou art not a child according to promise. But if thou from thy heart canst say, “I count the reproach of Christ greater riches than all the treasures of Egypt, and for the love I bear his name, what was my gain I count my loss;” them dear friend, this election, which thou makest, is a proof that God has made an election of thee, and that thou art of the seed of Israel whom God hath blessed. They turn from the pottage to take the portion; they leave earth to seek heaven.

Then comes one feature in Jacob’s history which is common to all true Israelites. No sooner had Esau got his pottage, and Jacob the blessing, than Esau sought to slay Jacob. There must be a hatred between the child of the flesh and the child of the Spirit. They slept together in the same womb, but they could not live together on the same earth without animosity against each other. Jacob must flee; he must leave his father’s house; he must go without the camp. And this is your lot if you are an Israelite. The world will soon find you out, and you will be a speckled bird, and the birds round about you will be against you. If any man suffer as a Christian, let him rejoice; and if you are a Christian, you will have to suffer as a Christian for Christ’s sake. You must bear reproach; and in obeying your Master’s laws, you will come into conflict with the world’s customs, and consequently will lose the world’s favour. So there are Israelites, and you are among them; and for the truth’s sake you become an alien to your mother’s brethren.

Jacob, in leaving his father’s house, however, received a great blessing, in which he is typical of all Israelites,-namely, the manifested covenant made with himself personally. He slept with a stone for his pillow, the hedges for his curtains, the heavens for his canopy; and as he slept, he dreamed that he saw a ladder, the foot thereof stood on the earth, but the top reached to heaven; and at the top of it was the God of the covenant, who made a covenant with his servant which he established and made fast for ever. Beloved, if you are of God’s Israel, you have had some insight into the covenant of grace; you have seen it in the person of Jesus Christ, whose humanity, like the ladder’s foot, stands here on earth, but whose Deity, like the ladder’s top, is lost amidst the blaze of God. You have seen, by the eye of faith, the God who makes and keeps the promise, in the person of Jesus Christ, speaking to you, and saying, “Certainly I will be with thee, and I will bless thee.” You must have had some such revelation of God in Christ Jesus, or else I should have to question whether you are one of the Israelites at all; for they who know the Lord, know him as their covenant God, and know him as David did when he said, “Although my house be not so with God; yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure.”

To complete our little outline of Jacob’s history, in which all the Israelites must follow him, I introduce you to Jacob at the brook of Jabbok. It was there that Jacob became Israel; the supplanter became a prevailing prince. Oh, it was a noble sight, which the stars alone saw, when Jacob grasped the angel! Bold hand that of mortal that can grasp the angel of God! And oh, it was nobler still when, having grasped him, he was not content with using hands alone in that blessed struggle, but came to use foot and knees, and every bone, and nerve, and muscle. It was a matchless wrestling then, when the angel would have thrown the man, but the man would fain throw the angel. He played the man indeed then, when he said unto God, “I will not let thee go, except thou bless me.” “I will not.” O God, can thy creature thus address thee? Yes, when thou hast given us faith enough to utter such a word as that, thou hast given us full permission to speak even as we will unto thee, and each one of us to say, “I will not let thee go, except thou bless me.”

Now, if we are Israelites, we know something of wrestling and prevailing prayer. You are no Christian if you do not pray. A prayerless soul is a Christless soul. You have no inheritance among the people of God if you have never struggled with that covenant angel, and come off the conqueror. Prayer is the indispensable mark of the true child of God. I know what you will tell me; you will tell me that you are so weak and feeble. Ah, brother, in this thou art like Jacob, who went from Peniel, halting on his thigh. It is not given to mortals to be altogether strong. You must feel your weakness. You may be mighty with God, and yet he may make you weak with men. You may be too strong for the angel, and yet one touch of that angel’s finger may cause your sinew to shrink, so that you go halting to your grave. Ah, some of us have not merely had one sinew shrunk, but very many; and whenever we try to run the heavenly race, we feel these shrunken sinews much injure our running; but still, though halt, we are pursuing, and though lame, we shall yet take the prey.

So, you see, in election, in the choosing of the inheritance rather than the pottage, in being hated by his brother, in being separated from his father’s house, in entering into covenant with God, in wrestling, and even in weakness, Israel becomes the type of the true Israelite. And I hope, as I have been going over the history, some of you have said, “Are there any such persons in the world that are Israelites? Even so am I.” I hope you have seen your own portrait here, and have said, “The preacher has photographed my history: so am I.”

Now we are going to give you another portrait of the Israelite, this time not taking the single man Israel, but taking the race Israel in their early history. When Israel ceases to be a family, and becomes a nation, we find it in the house of bondage, in what is very significantly called “the iron furnace”-iron for strength, and a furnace for heat. So is it with every Israelite. Every child of God is originally found in the bondage of sin. It gives us no effort to remember when we were the slaves of Satan. The scars of his whip are scarcely healed yet. When we see others sinning, we are fain to say, “Such were some of us, but we are washed. Oh, how lately did these arms wear the fetters, and were these feet hampered with the chain! We are free now, but once we were slaves!”

Israel in due time was delivered,-delivered in two ways,-delivered by blood and by power. So is it with every child of God,-delivered by blood. The blood of the lamb was sprinkled on the lintel and on the side posts, and while the destroying angel, swift to slay, went through the whole of Egypt, and slew the firstborn, he spared the firstborn of Israel, not one of them fell dead. Oh, yes; and we, too, through the precious blood of Jesus, which hath been sprinkled upon us, we too are saved! Our Passover Lamb is slain for us; the sprinkling of his blood has made us safe; it speaketh better things than the blood of Abel, for it speaks peace to us, and gives us safety and deliverance. And, my brethren, we have been brought out with power too; power as great as that which wrought plagues on the fields of Egypt, and made Pharaoh’s haughty heart to yield. The might of the Holy Spirit, which has set us free, is as great as that which divided the Red Sea, and made its waters stand “upright as an heap.” Let Moses sing, but we will sing too. Let Miriam dash her joyous fingers against the timbrel, and we will emulate her. We will sing the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, “for he hath triumphed gloriously in our cause; he hath set us free, and brought us up out of the house of bondage, breaking the iron yoke from our necks.” Thus we are like Israel.

Israel went into the wilderness, and I suppose we have all been there, at least all of us who are God’s people find this world to be a wilderness to us. In the wilderness they were all covered by the pillar of cloud by day, and they were enlightened by the pillar of fire by night; and divine providence is our daily protection and our constant comfort. They went out daily to gather manna. Brethren, I suppose you find that you have need of daily grace, and that you cannot live upon bread alone, but you must have the Word which proceedeth out of the mouth of God. You have learned to eat angels’ food. The meat that drops from the skies is necessary to your life. The corn that groweth in the furrow cannot feed your soul. Your body leaneth on that staff of life, but your soul wanteth more spiritual food, such as Jesus Christ alone can give. Beloved, the children of Israel in the wilderness all looked to the same tabernacle, and there they saw one ministering priest offering incense and sacrifice by blood. And we stand to-night all looking to the same Saviour, hoping-nay, knowing-that we are all washed in the same precious blood; and as we see the smoke of his sacrifice going up to God, we, as one undivided Israel, praise and bless his name.

You remember, too, that all Israel under Joshua crossed the Jordan to the land of Canaan, and won their heritage. Each tribe had its portion, and every one was settled in his proper place. We are, as it were, standing upon Jordan’s brink. Since last we met, some of our beloved ones have crossed the stream, “and we are to the margin come.” Nor does it trouble us, for Jordan is dry. The ark of the covenant stands in the middle of that river, and makes it so dry that every child of God shall go through it dry-shod. The trumpet sounds, which bids us march to victory. The land that floweth with milk and honey is before us; we have a portion fair in that blessed land. Let us go to Pisgah’s top to-night if we cannot cross the Jordan just yet, and with Moses “view the landscape o’er.” There are the glittering fanes of the habitations of the blessed; there are the groves of immortality where they wander; there are the rivers of joy at which they sit, and the oceans of glory in which they bathe. Hark to their songs! Catch ye not the strains that come from the celestial harps? Know ye nothing of the harmonies? Have ye never perceived their gracious melodies? Here is your portion, beloved. All Israel came to the promised land, and so shall we; and we shall then for ever reign with Jesus, our blessed Jesus, who leads us in to possess the land.

So much, then, concerning Israel from the second picture. I trust some of us have been saying, while we have seen the picture, and heard the history of Israel described, “ ‘Are they Israelites? so am I.’ I too was in Egypt; I too have had the blood sprinkled on me; I too have eaten of the Paschal Lamb; with loins girt about I have passed into the wilderness of separation, wandering my forty years up and down these arid plains of earth; I am looking for my heritage; I look to my great Leader, and I follow him to victory and to peace!”

Having thus described the peculiar people, we stop a moment, and them notice a personal claim: “So am I.”

This is a claim that needs proof. The apostle knew that his claim was indisputable, but there are a great many persons who say, “So am I,” when they have, no right to say it. When others come to the Lord’s table, they come there; when believers in Christ are baptized, they are baptized too; and they virtually say, “Whatever saints may be, such are we.” Ah! it is one thing to pretend to be a noble in Christ’s court, and another thing really to be a peer in heaven’s realm. Your patent of spiritual nobility will serve your turn here among poor men, who cannot investigate it; but remember! remember! you will all be tried before you will be permitted to enter heaven. See you not those scales in mysterious vision? I see them before my eyes,-massive scales,-and the weights of the sanctuary are put into one scale, and each one of us must, ere long, take our place in the other scale. Will it turn with us? Shall we be found good weight, or shall we leap into the air while the voice shall say, “Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin,-thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting; thy claims are disproved, and thy hopes destroyed for ever”?

Beloved, let us not claim to be Christians if we are not. I do conjure any of you who make a profession of religion, especially if you are members of this church, if your hearts are not right with God, shake off your profession as Paul shook off the viper from his hand. Nothing can be more detrimental to you, at the last, than to have had a name to live while ye have been dead. Better far honestly to confess yourself a stranger from the commonwealth of Israel than to be an interloper among the saints of God, partaking of the children’s bread while you are not a child, and entering into the sanctuary of God where you have no right to stand. If we do dare to say, “So am I,” let us only say it after having searched ourselves as in the presence of the great God, and having said to him, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”

Supposing that we have given good proof, I can only say that the claim in the text is one which will yield us great joy. When God’s people are rejoicing most, what a satisfaction it is to me if I can say, “So am I!” Here stands one of the Lord’s people, and he cries, “My sins are forgiven through his precious blood; I am a pardoned sinner.” “So am I.” “I am covered with Christ’s righteousness, a garment all divine bedecks me, and I am accepted in the Beloved.” “So am I.” “He has taken me into union with himself, and made me a member of his body. I am a member of Christ’s mystical body.” Oh, can you say, “So am I”? Surely these three words will be enough to make heaven begin below if, when the saints rejoice most in their standing and position before the Lord, you can say, “So am I.” And you can certainly do so, dear friend, in all the fulness of joy, if you can say with me,-

“ ‘A debtor to mercy alone,

Of covenant mercy I sing;

Nor fear, with Christ’s righteousness on,

My person and offering to bring.

The terrors of law, and of God,

With me can have nothing to do;

My Saviour’s obedience and blood

Hide all my transgressions from view;’-

“this is the reason I trust him wholly, trust him only, trust him simply, trust him now, and trust him ever.” Oh, if you can say, “So do I,” then all the position which the saints of God hold belongs to you; all their enjoyments are your possessions; you may say, “Such am I.”

Now I want to introduce you to a few little scenes, one after the other. I will suppose that we are all talking together about the happiness of God’s people. One quotes the text, “Happy art thou, O Israel, who is like unto thee, O people saved by the Lord?” and he expatiates thus, “God’s people are a happy people, they find that godliness hath the blessing of this life and of that which is to come. We can praise God all day, and even in the night he is still with us, and we make the night watches vocal with his praise. We are a happy people.” I hear a voice up in the corner of the room where we are sitting; someone says faintly, “And so am I.” Let us go and look. Why, here is a poor old woman who has been bed-ridden. “How long, sister?” “Thirteen years.” “Have you much to comfort you?” “Oh, very much! I have my Saviour’s presence.” “Have you had a good nurse and kind attendants, with plenty of temporal comforts?” “No, I have had none of these things; I am a poor pensioner on the parish. I have sometimes scarcely enough bread to eat.” “Have you many pains?” “Yes, I am full of disease, racked from head to foot with sickness.” “I thought you said just now, ‘So am I! I am happy.’ ” “Oh, yes! I did say that, and I will say it again, for, notwithstanding all my tribulations, my consolations abound through Jesus Christ, and I can say,-

“ ‘Sweet affliction, sweet affliction,

For it brings my Saviour near;’-

“notwithstanding all my sufferings and my pains, and my having tossed to and fro till my bones have come through my skin, yet if you say you are happy, ‘So am I.’ ”

We are talking together again about the riches of God’s people. I have been giving out a hymn in the little parlour, and we have been singing,-

“How vast the treasure we possess!

How rich thy bounty, King of grace!

This world is ours, and worlds to come:

Earth is our lodge, and heaven our home.

I would not change my blest estate

For all that earth calls good or great;

And while my faith can keep her hold,

I envy not the sinner’s gold;”-

and I say, “We are rich and increased in goods, we have all we want, and we are thankful for it,” and I hear a voice say, “So am I.” Come here, and show yourself! “I don’t like to show myself in such respectable company as this.” “Never mind, come here.” “No,” he says, “my clothes are too much out of repair for me to come before this present company. I have toiled and wrought very hard, but now in my old age I cannot work much, and the garb of poverty is the only one that I can wear. I eat my bread with my own tears and with much of the sweat of my brow, and I have nothing in the world I can call my own, and I never expect to own anything except that spot of ground in which my ashes shall be buried by charity. But if you say God’s people are rich, so am I. I have got in here the title-deeds of a mansion fair, and of a heritage so rich that I would not barter it for the throne of the Cæsars or all the kingdoms of the earth.”

While we are thus communing with one another, we turn from the happiness and the riches of God’s people to speak about their safety. “All those who trust in Jesus Christ are saved; their sins are all forgiven. They can never be condemned. Their feet are upon the rock. They shall be with Christ in glory,-they are saved.” And I hear a voice come from somewhere up there, “So am I.” Now, whose voice is it? I think I remember hearing it before. It sounds like the voice of a dying man, like the voice of a man in pain; a rough voice too, as if it belonged to some very uncouth body; who is it? It is the dying thief, and he says, “You were singing about me just now,-

“ ‘The dying thief rejoiced to see

That fountain in his day;

And there have I, though vile as he,

Washed all my sins away.’

“I am a dying thief, but I am saved. It is only a few minutes ago since I believed in Jesus, but I am saved. He who has served the Lord for seventy years cannot say more than that; he can say, after seventy years of service, ‘I am a saved man,’ and I can say, though Jesus only now turned his eye upon me, and said that he would remember me, I am a saved man too.” So, you see, there are some things in which the very youngest believer is placed on an equality with the very oldest; they are alike saved if they can each say, “So am I.”

There may be somebody in this chapel, perhaps, who cannot read. Such people are getting scarce in London; and if we use a long Latinized word in the sermon, that poor body says, “I cannot make out whatever he is talking about.” But if I begin to talk about Jesus Christ, and say, “All thy children shall be taught of the Lord;” if I begin to speak about experimental vital godliness within the heart, and about union to Jesus Christ; if I say that all the Lord’s people know something about his love, they are all taught in his grace, I know you, my friend, would say, “So am I; so am I. If there be any man here who says that he is a debtor to God’s grace, so am I. If there is any man who says that he owes more than others, so do I. If there is anyone here who claims to have had much sin forgiven, and therefore to be much in debt to God’s grace, so am I. And if there is any man here who vows, when he gets to heaven, that he will sing the Lord’s praises with all his might, for he feels himself to be a debtor to God very deeply, so am I. Dear friend, I am not inclined to yield to you when it comes to the question of claiming the privilege of God’s Israel, the privilege of nearness to his heart, of access with boldness in Christ Jesus, the privilege of prayer, the privilege of suffering, the privilege of service. If you say, ‘I am entitled to these things, I will put in my claim, and say, ‘So am I.’ ” And I do hope there are some poor trembling saints here, who will be so tenacious of their privileges that-though they are the very least in Israel, “less than the least of all saints,” yet, since the mercies of God belong to the saints, as saints, and not as full-grown saints, or advanced saints, or well-taught saints, they will put in their plea, and each one say, “So am I; so am I.”

I was thinking, as I came here to-night, whether I would not even defy the very angels of God about this matter. There are spirits before the throne of God,-bright spirits that walk in white, and sing his praises,-and they are very happy, and they are full of joy; so am I! They wear white robes, they are clad in pure white linen; so am I! They stand secure in Jesus’ love; and so am I! They sing of their election by his grace; and so will I! They are there, and they see his face, and sing his praise; and so will I! They know themselves to be loved by him; so do I! And they drink of the river of his pleasures as they think of him; so will I! Beloved Christian, in some respects you are on a par with the glorified spirits. You are as much pardoned as they are; you are as much justified as they are; you are as much one with Christ as they are; you are as much chosen of God as they are; and you are, in one respect’, as safe as they are,-nay, in some things you have the advantage! There are works which perfect saints above and holy angels cannot do, so let no one stop you of your glorying in Christ Jesus; but when they speak the most, say of yourselves through grace, “So am I.”

Oh, what a different tale we might have told to-night! Think of what a different story the preacher might have had to tell to-night. Oh, think-think-think,-dear hearer! There might have been heard the wailing of lost souls, gnashing their teeth, and crying, “We are lost-lost-lost for ever,” and you and I might have been saying, “And so am I.” There might have come up a dolorous cry from the depths of perdition, “We are banished from God’s presence! The light of his love shines not on us! We are in the blackness of darkness for ever!” You and I might have said, “So am I.” But instead of that, he from the miry pit hath plucked us, and set our feet upon a rock, and made us sing his praise to-night, and with the brightest spirits say, “So am I.” Oh, how we ought to love him! Now, to-morrow, if you go out into the world, and you see a Christian badly treated, and hear men jeeringly say, “There is a Christian,” step forward, and say, “So am I.” To-morrow the devil will be tempting some of the Lord’s people, and you may, if you like, turn tail, and run away; but come boldly forward and say, “So am I.” Take your share with them. Some of us are workers for Christ. I wish you could each one say, “So am I.” There are some who give their talent, their time, their substance, their whole heart to Jesus. I wish we could each one say, “So do I.” Standing here, we have sometimes said that if Jesus Christ would tread on us, if he could make himself one inch more lofty, we would be glad to be trodden as the mire in the street, for we have given ourselves unto him as a burnt-offering, living and dying. May every Christian here feel, “So am I.” Oh, prove your gratitude by your devotion, and live as those who, having claimed a privilege, are willing to take the responsibility connected with it!

Is there a lost and ruined sinner here? “Ay,” says one, “I am.” Jesus Christ came to save sinners; I am hanging on him, and trusting to him. I would that each one of you could say, “So am I.” Sinner, thou hast no hope but in Jesus. Trusting him, his saints are safe. Wilt thou trust him? God help thee to trust him at this very moment! Cast thyself where millions have cast themselves before, upon the covenanted mercy of God in Christ, and as they leap up and cry, “We are saved,” you too may stand up and say, “So am I.” May the Lord bless us! May we be numbered with his Israel in the day when he comes to make up his jewels, for his name’s sake! Amen.

Exposition by C. H. Spurgeon

PSALM 81

Verse 1. Sing aloud unto God our strength: make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.

In these days, the Psalms would have to be altered if they are to suit the dogmas of modern thought, for “the God of Jacob” is altogether rejected by those wondrous thinkers who think they know so much. The God of the New Testament, they say, is a very different Being from the God of the Old Testament. According to them, the Old Testament God is too stern; but the New Testament God is far softer, quite effeminate, indeed, if they rightly describe him. But we do not hesitate to say, over and over again, that the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob,-the immutable and unchangeable One,-the God of Sinai, is as much our God as the God of Calvary, so we delight “to make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.”

2-6. Take a psalm, and bring hither the timbrel, the pleasant harp with the psaltery. Blow up the trumpet in the new moon, in the time appointed, on our solemn feast day. For this was a statute for Israel, and a law of the God of Jacob. This he ordained in Joseph for a testimony, when he went out through the land of Egypt: where I heard a language that I understood not. I removed his shoulder from the burden: his hands were delivered from the pots.

Child of God, have you forgotten the time of your deliverance? God has not; and here he reminds his people Israel of their deliverance out of Egypt. So he says concerning you, “I removed his shoulder from the burden: his hands were delivered from the pots.” Do you not remember the joy of that glad moment when the burden of sin was taken away from you, and the pots of your own self-salvation lay broken at your feet? Glory be to him who brought us out from that terrible house of bondage!

7. Thou calledst in trouble, and I delivered thee; I answered thee in the secret place of thunder: I proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Selah.

But how sadly did they stand the test! You and I, too, have not only received much mercy at the hand of God, but we also have had our testing-times. We can look back to the waters of strife with deep regret that there we failed so sadly.

8-10. Hear, O my people, and I will testify unto thee: O Israel, if thou wilt hearken unto me; there shall no strange god be in thee; neither shalt thou worship any strange god. I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt: open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.

What a wonderful verse this is! We have been so accustomed to hear the expression, “I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt,” followed by the law; but here it is followed by a gracious encouragement to us to pray: “Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.” Whatever force the law derived from that preface, this exhortation derives the same force, and no child of God ought to forget that. He who delivered you from the burden of sin bids you open your mouth wide, and he will fill it; and after your deliverance from guilt, do you not feel that you may well ask great things of such a gracious God?

11-15. But my people would not hearken to my voice; and Israel would none of me. So I gave them up unto their own hearts’ lust: and they walked in their own counsels. Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways! I should soon have subdued their enemies, and turned my hand against their adversaries. The haters of the Lord should have submitted themselves unto him: but their time should have endured for ever.

Alas, poor Israel! Through what sufferings and captivities didst thou go because thou wouldst not trust in the Lord, and how often some of God’s children have had to go through years of sorrow and spiritual captivity because of their lack of close walking with their God, and complete obedience to him! May we learn from the sins of others, and be helped to walk closely with our Master!

16. He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat: and with honey out of the rock should I have satisfied thee.

If the Word of God does not seem to feed us as once it did, it will surely be because we have not hearkened to our Lord, or walked in his ways. May he give us grace to render complete obedience to his holy will!

“So shall thy choicest gifts, O Lord,

Thy faithful people bless,

For them shall earth its stores afford

And heaven its happiness.”