2543. Good Reasons For A Good Resolution

No. 2543-43:541. A Sermon Delivered On Lord’s Day Evening, July 20, 1884, By C. H. Spurgeon, At The Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington.

A Sermon Intended For Reading On Lord’s Day, November 14, 1897.

I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation, he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. {Isa 61:10}

1. Without any preface, we will go straight to our text, at once. In the words of the prophet, we have two things brought before us, — first, a resolution to be glad; and, secondly, the reasons for being glad. Whenever a man makes a resolution, it should be because he has a good reason for doing so; and when he has a good reason for it, he ought to adhere to his resolution, and carry it out to the fullest possible extent. I want you, dear friends, because there are good reasons for it, to resolve that you will be glad in the Lord. Perhaps you are of a mournful spirit; it may be that you have particular trials just now; possibly, the very heaviness of the atmosphere makes you feel dull and sad. Never mind those things which would drag your spirit down; at least for tonight, let us be glad, and if we can make that gladness overlap tomorrow, and if the stream should be sufficiently strong to flow right through the week to another Sabbath, and if the torrent should be vigorous enough to run right to the end of the year, and if the mighty flood should be broad enough to cover all the rest of our lives, it will not be even then an unreasonable thing. I wish each one of us could, with such a divine inspiration as would enable us to continue it throughout eternity, say, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God.” But if we cannot reach to such a full attainment of joy all at once, let us at least take a good mouthful of it even now; let us kneel down against the well-head of heavenly bliss, and drink a deep draught of holy joy at this glad hour.

2. I. First, we are to think about A RESOLUTION TO BE GLAD.

3. Notice, first, that the prophet’s determination to be glad in the Lord is made without any reserve whatever: “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God.” He says, “I will,” and then he says, “my soul shall.” He makes quite sure of it with his “will” and his “shall.” It is with him a firm, fixed, steadfast, unquestioned resolve that his soul shall be full of delight in the Lord. Come, dear friends, and let us make the same resolve by the help of God’s Spirit. “I have a bad headache,” one says, “but I will rejoice in the Lord all the same for that.” “I have only very little at home, I am very poor,” I think I hear another say; but I trust you, too, will be able to add, “yet my soul shall be joyful in my God. If I cannot rejoice in earthly good things, I will rejoice in the highest good, even in God, who is goodness itself.” “I fear,” says another friend, “that I shall have trouble as soon as I reach home; I am afraid I shall hear some very bad news.” Let this message of the psalmist comfort your spirit: “He shall not be afraid of bad news: his heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord.” Do not keep any portion of your heart so as to leave room for grief or fear; but, if you are a true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, surrender yourself completely to the highest form of enjoyment, and say here and now, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God.”

4. While the prophet’s resolution is wisely unreserved, notice how hearty it is. He says not merely, “I will rejoice in the Lord”; he is not going to be content with a cup full of joy, he intends to have a well full of it; so he says, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord.” The Lord is such a great God that, if we rejoice in him at all, we ought to greatly rejoice in him. Little sources of blessing may well produce little joy; but when we think of the great goodness of the great God to such great sinners as we have been, each one of us who has been greatly pardoned through the great sacrifice of Jesus may well say, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord.” Then the prophet adds, “My soul shall be joyful in my God.” “My very soul, my truest and best self, shall be joyful in my God; not my lips only, or the jubilant psalms which I shall sing, but my very soul shall be joyful in my God. I will sing as much as I can; but what I cannot sing, my soul shall feel. There shall be great waves of expressed joy, but there shall be vast unstirred depths of heavenly calm within my innermost nature: ‘My soul shall be joyful in my God.’ ” We have sometimes seen people joyful just as far as the surface of their face; they tried to look glad, but underneath the smiling countenance there lurked a cruel grief. Have I not seen sparkling eyes which could not help betraying the inward fires of sorrow that burned in the heart’s innermost depths? Have I not heard men sing when their singing was almost a mockery, for had they expressed themselves as they felt, they would have groaned rather than have sung? But, oh my God, there shall be with me no mere semblance of joy, no feigning praise, no misrepresentation of the real feeling of my heart; but “my soul shall be joyful in my God.”

5. I invite you, dear Christian friends, — and I pray the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, to enable you, — to be as full of holy joy as you ever can be, for there is good reason for it, and no harm can come of it. It is perfectly safe to take the deepest possible draughts of spiritual joy; this is a wine from which a man may drink to the full, but he shall never be intoxicated. You may be so enamoured by earthly things as to perish through that love; but if you are so enraptured with your Lord that you find your whole delight in him, you cannot possibly go to an excess in that direction. I am sure some of you have tried to sing the bass notes long enough; I want to get you to run up the scale until you reach the very highest notes that can be sung on earth. You have sat down and groaned together in uncomfortable misery for quite long enough; now rouse yourselves from your sadness, shake off the dust of discontentment and sorrow, and let us sing together to God, our very great joy, in whom there are fathomless depths of infinite delight.

6. So we have seen that this resolution to be glad is unreserved, and very hearty, — all the more hearty because it is double. “I will greatly rejoice,” says the prophet; and then he adds, “my soul shall be joyful.” You may say the same, dear friend: “I will be glad, and then I will be glad again. I will be glad, and then I will rejoice. I will have a duplicate of it; I will repeat my delights, and heap them up one on top of another, as though by this Pelion upon Ossa {a} I should climb to the very heavens, and sit down in the full joy of my God.” Oh, what a blessing it will be if many of you are helped to do this even now, and to continue doing it!

7. Further, notice that this unreserved and hearty resolution is altogether spiritual: “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God.” Joy in the creature must necessarily be limited, for the creature is limited. Joy in the creature may be harmful, for the creature may beguile you, and allure you away from the Creator. Joy in yourself is a fiction; there can be no true satisfaction in it. Joy even in the work of God in your soul may sometimes be questionable, for you may not be sure that it is God’s work in which you are rejoicing; but when you can say, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God”; you have a subject for joy and an object of joy higher than I can ever describe. I thought, last night, as I went this text over, the best thing that ever could have happened for me is that God is what he is. I could not wish him to be other than he is, — not even when he frowns on me. Blessed be his name, he never frowns on his children except in love. He never strikes them except in greater mercy than he could show by not striking them. He is altogether the best conceivable God; indeed, he is inconceivably, unutterably, boundlessly good; and let his name be praised and magnified for ever. You may say to yourself, “I am a great many things that I ought not to be, but I have my God, and he is my father, and I am his child; and though he made the heavens and the earth, yet he loves me with an everlasting love, and he has set all of his heart’s affection on me. Even worthless me, he loves with all the infinity of his divine nature.”

8. Oh friends, the thought of God should bring to our souls incessant pleasure! Think of any one person of the blessed Trinity in Unity, — think of the Father, and then see how you ought to rejoice that he is your Father, and such a Father, then think of the Son of God, our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. His very name is honey in the mouth, and music in the ear, and light in the life, and heaven on earth. Then think of the Holy Spirit, that Divine Person who condescends to take on himself the office of Comforter, so that we may not know a sorrow which shall not be assuaged, that we may not bear a burden out of which he will not take all the heaviness and woe. Blessed Father, blessed Son, and blessed Holy Spirit, blessed be the Triune God for ever and ever! “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God.” This joy in the Lord is all spiritual, and in that kind of rejoicing you can never run to excess.

9. Let me drop into your mouth this piece of heavenly delicacy: “The Father himself loves you.” Try to get the flavour of that precious word, “loves you.” I have often said that, if God is kind to you, it is a great thing; if God thinks of you, that is a great thing; if God blesses you, that is a great thing; but if he loves you, — ah! that is an almost unspeakable honour and joy, yet it is true. You knew once what it was to be loved by an affectionate mother, you know now what it is to love your child; but God loves you in a more intense way even than that, for all the loves of men and women are only the spray of the great ocean of his everlasting love. “Oh, but!” you say, “there are so many for God to love.” That is true, yet he loves you as much as if there were no other person in the whole universe, as if you stood alone with the eye of Jehovah fixed on you, and the whole heart of Jehovah wrapping you all around in its divine folds of affection, “The Father himself loves you.” May the Holy Spirit teach you to draw the sweetness of those words into your soul! “The Father himself loves you”; yes, more, if he loves you now, he always did love you; he has loved you with an everlasting love, — loved you before those stars began to let their light shine down on the sons of men. Before he had fixed the universe on the huge pillars of his almighty power, he loved you, and your names were inscribed on the palms of his hands, yes, on his heart; and he will love you when this great earth and sun and moon and stars shall have passed away. As a moment’s foam dissolves into the wave that bears it, and is lost for ever, so the material creation shall pass away; but God shall still love you even as he loves his only-begotten Son, for ever and for ever.

10. Please observe also that the prophet’s resolution related to immediate joy, though there is also a future meaning in his words. “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord,” expresses a present determination as well as a resolve concerning the future. I hope greatly to rejoice in God if I should live to be grey-headed, and to be bent double with infirmities; but I will greatly rejoice in the Lord at this moment. It is true that you or I may lie on the bed of sickness, and draw near to the gates of death, and I trust that, even then, we shall greatly rejoice in the Lord, and be joyful in our God; but our text really means that, even now, we will be glad in him. Come, dear friends, let each one of us say, “I will now, at this very moment, greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God. Away, you cares, begone from me, for HE cares for me. Away all thoughts of sin, for Christ has cast my sins behind his back into the depths of the sea. Away all fear of the future, for my times are in his hand. Away all murmuring, all complaining at the providence of God; my soul cries, ‘Your will be done, oh Lord! not as I will, but as you will.’ ” When you reach that point, you may well say, “Now I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God.”

11. I think, if I stopped now, and said nothing more, you might say to me, “You have given us enough reasons to make us full of joy, and to cause each one of us to gladly cry, ‘I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God.’ ”

12. II. But now, in the second place, I am going to give you, from the text, other GOOD REASONS FOR BEING GLAD.

13. The first is found in the divine clothing mentioned here: “He has clothed me with the garments of salvation.” Did you ever behold your soul naked to its shame in the sight of the all-seeing Jehovah? Did you ever try to hide yourself from God because you were under a deep sense of sin? And did you hear his penetrating voice calling you, as he called Adam in the garden, “Where are you? Where are you? Where are you?” Did you stay away from divine service, and did you still hear in your soul the Lord’s question, “Where are you?” Did you try to bury yourself in your business, so as to forget that urgent enquiry, and did it still ring in your ears, “Where are you?” Did you rush off to some place of amusement, and try amid worldly companions to forget yourself and your God, and did the voice still follow you, always calling, “Where are you? Where are you?” And were you obliged, at last, to stand shivering before the Lord, without a rag to cover you, your fig leaves all withered with a glance of his eye of fire; and did he then cover you with the garments of salvation? Oh, then, you knew the meaning of my text, when you were no longer ashamed, for you were covered with the robe of Christ’s righteousness, you were clothed with the garments of salvation; and you could say, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God.”

14. Let every child of God here rejoice that he is clothed with the garments of salvation. From head to foot you are arrayed in salvation. “Oh!” one says, “I have been such a great sinner.” Yes; but if you are trusting in Christ, he has saved you. He has put away your sin, you shall not be lost, for you are clothed with salvation. “But I am such a poor feeble creature, liable to be attacked and tempted by Satan.” Yet God has so clothed you that no cold nor heat of temptation shall harm you. You are clothed from head to foot with the garments that will save you, — the garments of salvation, — yes, you are even now a saved man, woman, or child.

15. What a wonderful dress this is, — the garments of salvation! A helmet of salvation and the shoes of the preparation of the gospel of peace, and all between the head and the feet — the entire person of the man, — is covered with salvation. Think of this, dear friend. Wherever you go, you have God’s livery on you. Some princes clothe their courtiers in silk; but God has clothed you in salvation. Was there ever such another dress as this? Now will you not sing? Why, when you are clad in such a robe as this, if you do not sing, you ought to be ashamed of yourself; surely you must praise the Lord. While clothed in that marvellous attire which only the Sacred Trinity could have made for you, — “garments of salvation,” — you must be joyful in your God. Come, my good brother, join the rejoicing band. Is that Mr. Ready-to-Halt over there? Do you remember what happened when Mr. Great-Heart cut off the head of Giant Despair? When the leader of the pilgrims came back to the road where he had left Feeble-Mind and Ready-to-Halt to guard the women of the company, as soon as these poor men saw that it was really the giant’s head, “they were very glad and merry, and Ready-to-Halt would dance. True,” says Mr. Bunyan, “he could not dance without one crutch in his hand; but I promise you he one-footed it well.” So, some of the timid, feeble ones do manage to get extraordinary joy when their spirits are revived by some special display of the lovingkindness of the Lord.

16. Then, besides this divine clothing, there is sacred covering. The prophet adds, “He has covered me with the robe of righteousness.” That is the great mantle that goes over all the rest of the garments. We are first clothed with the garments of salvation, and then there comes an outer covering to envelop us in the robe of righteousness. When God looks on a justified sinner, he sees nothing in him but righteousness, for he is covered with the robe of righteousness. That word “cover” is one of the sacred words of the Hebrew language, as well as of our own English tongue; it seems to go everywhere, into all languages. The atonement of Christ and the righteousness of Christ make up the great and perfect covering of a sinner. “Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.” The mercy seat of old was a great cover or coffer that went over the ark of the covenant; and God has covered up his people in Christ, as we express it in the prayer we sometimes sing, —

    Him and then the sinner see,
    Look through Jesus’ wounds on me.

17. When God looks at his people, he does not see them first, but he sees his Son; and then he looks through that heavenly medium, and sees them in his Son. Then it is indeed true that he has covered them with the robe of righteousness. Therefore, poor sinful child of God, crying out because of your sin, cease that moaning and groaning for a little while, indeed, be done with it altogether, and let your soul be joyful in the Lord. One of his names is, “The Lord our righteousness”; and Christ “is made to us righteousness.” We are righteous in the righteousness of Christ, which is imputed to us. In the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah we read, “By his knowledge,” that is, “by the knowledge of him, my righteous servant shall justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities.” I wish I knew how to speak of these glorious truths as I feel them in my own soul, but I cannot find words worthy of the wondrous theme. I have this holy joy in my own heart, and it makes my spirit to burn with a divine delight. Oh, that I could share that delight with others, even without any words. But God the Holy Spirit can make this joy flash from heart to heart, until we all feel as if we could —

    Sit and sing ourselves away
       To everlasting bliss, —

clothed with the garments of salvation, and covered with the robe of righteousness.

18. You will have to look at the margin of your Bible to get the next reason for being glad, which is, hallowed service. Our text says, “He has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments.” The marginal reading is, “as a bridegroom decks himself as a priest”; our text must mean that, because in the sixth verse it is written, “you shall be named the Priests of the Lord.” So, when God comes to clothe his people, he clothes them with such robes that they are prepared to execute their priestly office. I think there is nothing that I detest more than the idea of priestcraft, and I hope that you do the same. Who is any poor mortal man that he should come between a sinner and his Saviour? Take care to go straight away to Christ. But, in the true scriptural sense, there is a priesthood which belongs to all Christians; and I want you to understand, poor believer, notwithstanding all your infirmities and imperfections, that the Lord has so covered you with the righteousness of Christ that you are clad in a priest’s holy vestments. You have all over you the pure white linen, which is the righteousness of saints, and you are wearing that royal mitre which permits you to exercise the priesthood, for he “has made us kings and priests to God”; we are “a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a special people.”

19. Oh child of God, how glad you would be if you could really rejoice in all this! Just think of it, at this moment you are a priest to God on behalf of the world; the dumb world cannot speak to God, but you are to speak to him in the place of the whole animate and inanimate creation. You are a priest to the Most High; the rest of mankind must be ploughmen, and vine-dressers, and tend the flocks, and mind earthly things; but you, as a believer, have to do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, and to make everything you have to do into a daily sacrifice to God. What a wonderful thing it is that you, who once were only fit to associate with demons, you who were black as hell itself, are now, through faith in Christ, made so clean, and are so gloriously arrayed, that you, indeed stand before the Lord, and swing the censer to and fro, and let the sweet perfume of your praises fill the whole house, and ascend acceptably to God; you may stand here, and offer to God the living sacrifice of your entire being, which shall be holy, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ, your Saviour. Will you not be glad that it is so? Made a priest to God, can you be miserable? You must not; do you not remember that the priests were never to mar the corners of their beards? They were not to shave their heads, or to adopt the common customs of men in mourning, because they were God’s servants, and they must be glad and rejoice before him. Ordained to such a sacred office as the priesthood, put on your ornaments, yes, put on your beautiful robe that is all of blue. Christ gives to you a garment fringed with holy bells, which causes you, wherever you go, to sound out the sweet tinklings of holy joy, for he makes even you to be like himself for glory and for beauty, and to stand before the presence of God without fear, accepted in himself. What a good reason for joy there is in all this!

20. Now I must bring you back again to the text, so that you may see that there is a joy here which is perhaps the sweetest of all, that is, the joy of heavenly marriage: “as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments.” “A bridegroom!” then it is true that I, a poor stranger and an alien, am married to Christ. There is the mention of a bride and a bridegroom, too, and it is all to impress on us this idea, that every believing soul is joined to Christ in a true, real, mystical, conjugal union which shall never be broken. “ Quis separabit? ” “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” Jehovah hates putting away; so he will never divorce a soul that is once married to him. Now we are no longer our own, but we belong to Christ; and our song, the sweetest that can be sung this side of heaven, is, —

    I my Best-Beloved’s am,
       And he is mine.

“My beloved is mine, and I am his; he feeds among the lilies.” There is no angel with whom Christ has entered into union as he has with you and with me. “He did not take on him the nature of angels.” He did not take up angels, but he has taken on him the nature of the seed of Abraham. He came here as a man, bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh. The Head of all the redeemed is Christ. His name is named on us; and as surely as Adam is our father, so surely is Christ the second Adam, our Heavenly Bridegroom. Glory be to his holy name! Oh, that this blessed marriage union were more fully understood by us, and that our expectancy bestirred us to wait with sacred impatience until the time when he shall come to take us to himself to be one with him, partakers of his throne, and of his crown, and of his glory, for ever and for ever! Come, my brothers and sisters, have I not given you a grand reason for making as your own this good resolution of the prophet, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God?”

21. Last of all, to work out the whole text, we have here attractive adornment: “as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.” So that every believer in Christ is a person goodly to look on; in the esteem of God, he is fair and lovely. “He does not delight in the strength of the horse: he does not take pleasure in the legs of a man. The Lord takes pleasure in those who fear him, in those who hope in his mercy.” Does it not surprise you that God should ever have seen anything beautiful in you? My heart has often melted when I have read those words of the Heavenly Bridegroom to his spouse, “Turn away your eyes from me, for they have overcome me.” What, my eyes! shall they ever overcome my blessed Bridegroom? Yes, and he says to you, believer, “You are all fair, my love; there is no spot in you.” So thoroughly has he washed and cleansed you, that he sees his own image reflected in your eyes, and he takes infinite delight in what he has made you by his grace. “He will rejoice over you with joy; he will rest in his love, he will rejoice over you with singing.” I want each one of you to drink in this blessed truth, if you can; not only that you are not the object of hatred to God, but that you are the object of his intense delight; not only that you never cause anger to spring up in his heart, for his anger is turned away from you, but that you even raise in his heart emotions of divine affection. So you are able to hold the King in his inner chamber of communion, and to say him, “I will not let you go.” Oh beloved, if you only understood where you once were, and where you now are, and where you shall be for ever and ever, you would be ready to leap for joy. Come, then, will you not be glad in your Lord? What! Is some little petty trial to rob God of his glory? I have said to myself, sometimes, when I have been severely sick, and have become fearfully depressed through pain, “If I get over this illness, I will give God a sevenfold portion of thankful service and praise.” I have tried to pay up my arrears when I recovered. I have thought, “I am afraid, while I was full of pain, I was very dull, and stupid, and despondent, and almost despairing. Now that I have gotten rid of all that, I will let my dear Lord see whether I cannot make up a little for lost time.” I want you, dear friends, to do so from this very hour. Go home, and sit down, and bless the Lord. Sometimes, even singing is not good enough to present to our God, and music cannot convey all we want to say. Then let —

    “Expressive silence muse his praise.”

Sit still and mediate on all the Lord’s goodness to you, and so keep out all sadness while you bless his holy name. I like sometimes to be like those beautiful lilies, that shoot up a long straight stem, and then produce a lovely flower in which white and gold are charmingly blended, just as if they would give God all they could. They cannot say a word, but they stand quite still, and they seem to bless the Lord by standing still, and looking so beautiful. I like to sit down, and feel as if he had made me to consider the lilies, and so to consider them that I would do just the same as they do, just show myself to him, as much as to say, “See, my Lord, what you have done for me. I was a poor, lost, all-but-condemned wretch; yet you has made me a prince of the blood-royal; you have lifted me from the dunghill, and set me among your saints. Glory, glory, glory, glory be to your dear name for ever and ever!”

22. While I have been talking about this choice theme, I have been grieving over the many who do not know by personal experience what it is to have this great change created within them. Dear friends, let me tell you, once and for all, that you cannot make yourselves fit for heaven, you cannot clothe yourselves with the garments of salvation, you cannot renew your own nature. Someone says, “But, sir, you discourage people by telling them that they cannot change themselves.” That is the very thing I want to do. “Oh, but, I want to set a man working!” one says. Do you? I want to set him not working; that is to say, I want him to get rid of any idea that salvation is from himself; I want him to drop that thought altogether, and just to feel that, if his salvation is to come out of himself, he has to get everything out of nothing, and that is not only difficult, but impossible. He has to get life out of his own death, to get cleanness out of the filthy ditch of his own nature, out of which it can never come. Discouragement of this kind is the very thing I always aim at in my preaching. I am afraid that there are many people who are made to believe that they are saved when they are not. My belief is that God never healed a man until he was wounded, and that he never made a man alive until he was dead; it is God’s way first to drag us down, and make us feel that we are nothing, and can do nothing, and that we are restricted to be saved by grace, that Christ must save us from beginning to end, or else we can never be saved at all. Oh, if I could only bring all my hearers, not only into a state of discouragement, but into a condition of despair about themselves, then I should know that they were on the road to a simple faith in the Lord Jesus Christ! Our extremity is God’s opportunity. Oh, how I long to get you all to that extremity!

    ’Tis perfect poverty alone
       That sets the soul at large;
    While we can call one mite our own,
       We have no full discharge.

23. It is absolute helplessness and death that lays the sinner where Christ can deal with him. When he is nothing, Christ shall be everything. Have you never heard of the man who saw a person drowning, and plunged into the river after him, and swam to him? The poor fellow tried to clutch him, but the swimmer knew that, if he let the man get hold of him, he could not bring him ashore, so he kept swimming around him; the man went down, and still his rescuer swam around him, but did not touch him. He went down again because the swimmer could see that he was still too strong; and, when he was just going down the third time, then the wise rescuer laid hold of him, for he was helpless, and so could not impede his deliverer. That is what you have to be, dear friends; when you cannot do anything, then you cannot hinder Christ any longer; but, as long as you can do a hand’s turn, you will hamper my dear Lord and Master. Your business is just to yield yourself right up into his hands to be saved only by him.

24. “Are there to be no good works?” someone asks. Oh, yes! plenty of them, as soon as ever Christ has saved you. The first thing the man does when he has ceased his own works, and given himself up entirely to Christ, is to cry, “Lord, what will you have me to do? You have saved me. Now I will do all I can, not for my self-salvation, but to glorify you, and show to men what your grace has done, and so express in some poor feeble way the gratitude I feel for the free salvation which your grace has given to me.” Some of you will have to go down once or twice more before the Lord Jesus Christ will give you eternal salvation; you are still too good, you are still too big, you are still too strong, you still have such a very respectable character, that you are not content to come in at Christ’s backdoor, where he receives no one but poor, guilty sinners. You are not quite naked yet, brother, there is a rag or two of your own righteousness on you. You will have to be stripped, and then you shall put on the robe of Christ’s righteousness. You have only a bone or two broken, and you can crawl around a little; you still have to be ground to powder. When you become just nothing, when you have no good feelings, no good desires, or anything you can bring to Christ, — when you come to Christ, not with a broken heart, but for a broken heart, then he will receive you, then you will be the kind of man that Christ came to save. Oh, that he would bring you to that point very speedily, for his dear name’s sake! Amen.

{a} Ossa and Pelion: In Greek mythology, Mount Pelion (which took its name from the mythical king Peleus, father of Achilles) was the homeland of Chiron the Centaur, tutor of many ancient Greek heroes, such as Jason, Achilles, Theseus and Heracles. It was in Mount Pelion, near Chiron’s cave, that the marriage of Thetis and Peleus took place. The uninvited goddess Eris, to take revenge for having been kept outside the party, brought a golden apple with the inscription “To the Fairest.” The dispute that then arose between the goddesses Hera, Aphrodite and Athene resulted in events leading to the Trojan War. When the giants Otus and Ephialtes attempted to storm Olympus, they piled Mount Pelion on Mount Ossa, which became a proverbial allusion for any huge but fruitless attempt. See Explorer "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pelion"

Exposition By C. H. Spurgeon {Isa 61}

1. The Spirit of the Lord GOD is on me;

These are the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet, looking forward to the time of his coming into the world, put them into his mouth; and in due time our Saviour read them, and applied them to himself in the synagogue at Nazareth as he said, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your ears”: “The Spirit of the Lord God is on me”; —

1. “Because the LORD has anointed me to preach good tidings to the meek; he has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, —

God has sent Christ to bind up the broken-hearted; then, will he not do it? Will he refuse, my broken-hearted brother or sister, to bind you up? Oh deeply-troubled, tempest-tossed spirit, will the Anointed One reject you, and refuse to fulfil his office on you? Never; it is both his name and his office to save, for he is called Jesus, the Saviour. Oh broken-hearted one, look to him; hear him say, at this moment, “Jehovah has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted,” —

1. To proclaim liberty to the captives, —

Where are you, poor, wretched bondslaves of sin, fettered with the iron chains of despair? Christ proclaims liberty even to you. Trust him, and you shall be —

    Freed from sin, and walk at large,
    Your Saviour’s blood your full discharge.

“Jehovah has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives,” —

1. And the opening of the prison to those who are bound;

There is a general discharge of prisoners; the time has come for it. Christ died to make it possible: he lives to perfect the emancipation of all for whom he died. He comes, by his Spirit, to give you the experience of it: “the opening of the prison to those who are bound.”

2. To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn;

Oh, what precious words are these! Christ comes, commissioned by the Father, “to comfort all who mourn.”

3. To appoint to those who mourn in Zion, to give to them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; so that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, so that he might be glorified.”

This message is spoken to all the Lord’s people; but it has a special reference to the Jews, God’s ancient people. Happy times are coming for them in the years that still lie in the future, when they accept the Messiah whom they have so long rejected.

4. And they shall build the old ruins, they shall raise up the former desolations, and they shall repair the waste cities, the desolations of many generations.

In the days to come, Judea shall again be inhabited, and the ruined cities shall be built up once more. God will bring back his ancient people, converting them to the true faith, and clothing them with glory. As for ourselves, this verse is true in another sense. If we believe in Jesus, that part of us which has been given up to ruin shall still be turned to usefulness, and to God’s praise.

5, 6. And strangers shall stand and feed your flocks, and the sons of the alien shall be your ploughmen and your vine-dressers. But you shall be named the Priests of the LORD: —

This was true of God’s ancient people, but it is true of us also. Let us cast away our earthly cares, let our only care be to serve our God; for then, strangers shall stand and feed our flocks, and the sons of the alien shall be our ploughmen and our vine-dressers; but we “shall be named the Priests of the LORD.”

6. Men shall call you the Ministers of our God: you shall eat the riches of the Gentiles, and in their glory you shall boast yourselves.

God’s chosen people are his children; all the rest of mankind are only his servants, and the servants must wait on the children whether they like it or not. Even concerning the angels in heaven it is written, “Are they not all ministering spirits, sent out to minister to them who shall be heirs of salvation?” All things are the servants of the man who is the servant of God. He who is consecrated to God shall find all things consecrated to him. When all that is yours works for God, then all things shall work together for good for you.

7, 8. For your shame you shall have double; and for confusion they shall rejoice in their portion: therefore in their land they shall possess the double: everlasting joy shall be for them. For I the LORD love judgment, I hate robbery for burnt offering; —

God cannot endure that we should sacrifice to him what we have gained by oppression and wrong-doing. Some men seem to try to cut themselves in halves, and then to say, “So much is to be secular, and so much is to be sacred.” Do not believe it; you are only one man, and what you are in secular things, that you are altogether. You cannot say, “So much is to be religion, and so much is to be business.” If your religion is not your business, and if your business does not melt into your religion, there is not much that is good in you. We cannot say, “I shall do this because it is religion, and I shall do that because it is business.” No, no; the man is one, and there is nothing to a Christian that can be marked off as secular; for all things are sacred for the man who truly serves God.

8, 9. And I will direct their work in truth, and I will make an everlasting covenant with them. And their seed shall be known among the Gentiles, and their offspring among the people: all who see them shall acknowledge them, that they are the seed whom the LORD has blessed.

A visible stamp of divine blessing shall be on believers in Christ: “They are the seed whom the Lord has blessed,” and all men shall acknowledge that it is so.

10, 11. I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation, he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. For as the earth brings forth her bud, and as the garden causes the things that are sown in it to spring up; so the Lord GOD will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations.

So may it be very speedily, for our Lord Jesus Christ’s sake! Amen.

 {See Spurgeon_Hymnal “The Christian, Joy and Peace — Spiritual Apparel” 721}
 {See Spurgeon_Hymnal “The Christian, Privileges, A Happy Portion — ‘Say Ye To The Righteous, It Shall Be Well With Him’ ” 758}
 {See Spurgeon_Hymnal “The Christian, Privileges, Communion with Jesus — God My Exceeding Joy” 775}

The Christian, Joy and Peace
721 — Spiritual Apparel
1 Awake, my heart; arise, my tongue;
      Prepare a tuneful voice,
   In God the life of all my joys,
      Aloud will I rejoice.
2 ‘Twas he adorn’d my naked soul,
      And made salvation mine!
   Upon a poor polluted worm
      He makes his graces shine.
3 And lest the shadow of a spot
      Should on my soul be found,
   He took the robe the Saviour wrought,
      And cast it all around.
4 How far the heavenly robe exceeds
      What earthly princes wear!
   These ornaments, how bright they shine!
      How white the garments are!
5 The Spirit wrought my faith and love,
      And hope, and every grace;
   But Jesus spent His life to work
      The robe of righteousness.
6 Strangely, my soul, art thou array’d
      By the great Sacred Three!
   In sweetest harmony of praise
      Let all thy powers agree.
                           Isaac Watts, 1709.

The Christian, Privileges, A Happy Portion
758 — “Say Ye To The Righteous, It Shall Be Well With Him”
1 What cheering words are these!
      Their sweetness who can tell?
   In time and to eternal days,
      ‘Tis with the righteous well.
2 Well, when they see his face,
      Or sink amidst the flood;
   Well in affliction’s thorny maze,
      Or on the mount with God.
3 ‘Tis well when joys arise,
      ‘Tis well when sorrows flow,
   ‘Tis well when darkness veils the skies,
      And strong temptations blow.
4 ‘Tis well when at his throne
      They wrestle, weep, and pray,
   ‘Tis well when at his feet they groan,
      Yet bring their wants away.
5 ‘Tis well when they can sing
      As sinners bought with blood,
   And when they touch the mournful string,
      And mourn an absent God.
6 ‘Tis well when on the mount
      They feast on dying love,
   And ‘tis as well in God’s account,
      When they the furnace prove.
                           John Kent, 1803.

The Christian, Privileges, Communion with Jesus
775 — God My Exceeding Joy
1 Where God doth dwell, sure heaven is there,
      And singing there must be:
   Since, Lord, thy presence my heaven,
      Whom should I sing but thee?
2 My God, my reconciled God,
      Creator of my peace:
   Thee will I love, and praise, and sing,
      Till life and breath shall cease.
3 My soul doth magnify the Lord,
      My spirit doth rejoice;
   To thee, my Saviour and my God,
      I lift my joyful voice;
4 I need not go abroad for joys,
      I have a feast at home;
   My sighs are turned into songs,
      My heart has ceased to roam.
5 Down from above the blessed Dove
      Is come into my breast,
   To witness thine eternal love,
      And give my spirit rest.
6 My God, I’ll praise thee while I live,
      And praise thee when I die,
   And praise thee when I rise again,
      And to eternity.
                        John Mason, 1683, a.