3396. Experience Confirming Testimony

A Sermon Published On Thursday, March 5, 1914.

As we have heard, so we have seen in the city of the LORD of hosts, in the city of our God. {Ps 48:8}

For other sermons on this text:

   {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2014, “As We Have Heard, So We Have Seen” 2015}

   {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 3396, “Experience Confirming Testimony” 3398}

   Exposition on 1Ki 5 Ps 48; 95 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 3313, “Practical Discourse, A” 3315 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on Ps 114; 48 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2788, “Prayer for the Church” 2789 @@ "Exposition"}

1. “As we have heard so we have seen.” This is not always the case, but frequently it is the very opposite. Things are exaggerated; the imagination is largely drawn on, and we hear great things, but when we come to look at them, or try practically to enjoy them, the great things have become very small. It is so in the world generally. We have heard, and were told in our youthful days by those who have been before us, that the paths of sin are pleasant, that there are great enjoyments to be found in the indulgences of evil passions, and that if we will give ourselves up to the general run and current, we shall find ourselves very smoothly floating along on a stream of happiness. Ah! how many who have sown their wild oats, and looked for a happy harvest, have discovered that nothing but mischief comes from this! Jaded by the satiety of their lusts, and at last utterly destroyed by their own wickedness, they have sat down, and wrung their hands in despair at finding out that things are not what they heard they were. As they have heard, so they do not see, but the very opposite — for pleasure, pain: for happiness, misery: even here remorse, and afterwards an anguish that shall know no end.

2. Nor is it any better with the teachers of false doctrine. As we have heard, so we have not seen. We have sometimes been told that philosophy will civilize a nation: that the spread of education will most certainly cure the human heart: and that the bias and propensity to sin will be put down by an increase of mental light. But as we have heard, so we have not seen, for philosophy has thrown many burdens on men, but it has not touched those burdens to remove them, with so much as its little finger. We hear a great deal of what is to be done for society by this scheme and by that, but nothing is done. Theories are propounded: wind-bags are inflated and brought out, bubbles are blown, but we do not see much that is solid and valuable produced. One after another of these eminent theorizers have arisen who were about to revolutionize and reconstruct society. Instead of making the causes of evil in the world to increase, they were to uproot them, and turn the desert into the garden of the Lord. But it has not been so; our eyes have never seen it. Rather the bad has been made worse, and the good has been impeded by those who were so pretentious and loud in their professed benevolence.

3. Take any of the false doctrines which are often affiliated to our holy faith, and you will find that when you come to examine them and put them to the test, they do not hold water. How often have we heard about “the dignity of human nature”; how congenial the heart of man is to what is noble, and to what is Christ-like. We are told that we only have to hold up Christ, and there is such a beauty in him that all the world will be sure to love him. But as we have heard, so we have not seen, but we have seen men to be as God saw them — corrupt. There is no one who does good, no not one, and in the perfect light of Calvary we have seen that even the perfections of Jesus will not be seen by a blind world, nor will they attract a corrupt world. “Crucify him! Crucify him!” will be the verdict of humanity, even on the perfections of the incarnate God.

4. We have heard a great deal about the power of free will. We have sometimes heard that men come to Christ by themselves; that there is no power of irresistible grace which turns them from darkness to light, and from the power of sin and Satan to God. Ah! we have heard this, but we have never seen it. To this moment, though we have mixed with all classes of Christians, we never did yet meet a single believer who declared that his conversion was the result of his own efforts, and that his coming to Christ was entirely through the motive power of his own free will.

5. We have been told, too, that God forsakes his people, that real saints, after all, turn back and perish. But we bless God that, though we have often heard this, we have never, never seen it.

   If ever it should come to pass,

      One of his sheep should fall away:

   My fickle, feeble soul, alas!

      Would fall a thousand times a day.

But being kept in safety by another and greater power than our own, and preserved in the midst of appalling temptations, we still hold to it that he does keep his people. We have heard it, and we have seen it, but the other doctrine we have heard, but, thank God, we have never seen.

6. And so there are many other things that pass current in certain sections of Christendom as being true, which, if they were brought to a practical test, might be seen not to be so. We have heard them, heard them delivered with a glowing eloquence that might have convinced us, if we were to be convinced, but we have referred to the Old Book, and the Old Book has been more to us than all the siren songs that sweetest oratory could raise. We have nailed our colours to the mast, and could not take them down. We have found everything here in this blessed Bible to be true; but man’s word, when it has come into conflict or even competition with God’s Word, we have found to be light as chaff, and as easily consumed as the fat of rams on the altar’s fire.

7. Now, just for a little time I thought we would illustrate this general truth, that in the things of God, and in the church of God, “as we have heard, so we have seen.”

8. I. Now, notice: — IT HAS BEEN SO ALL DOWN THE LINE OF REVELATION.

9. Could a man have lived a sevenfold Methuselah-life, and have stood at the gates of Paradise, and listened to the first promise that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent’s head, if he could have beheld Noah shut up inside the ark, and have seen the covenant rainbow when for the first time it spanned the clouds; could he have lived in Abraham’s day, and have seen the father of that seed in which all the nations of the earth should be blessed; could he have seen all the types and ceremonies which Israel saw in the wilderness, all pointing onwards to a coming Saviour; could he have listened to the prophetic utterances of David in some of those matchless Psalms, which are full of the Messiah; could he have heard the notes of Isaiah when he spoke of him who was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; yes, could he have heard every prophecy, and beheld every symbol, and listened to every sacred portent — when he came to behold the person of Christ, to see him living, dying, rising, ascending, and to see the Pentecost, and to see the history of the Church right down until now, such a grave and reverend man, revered and venerable above all other men through the long lapse of years that had passed over his snowy head, would say, “As I heard during the first portion of my life, so I have seen in the latter days of it: God has always kept his promise: as was the shadow, so was the substance: as the type, so was the antitype: as the word that flowed from prophetic lips, so was the Christ who, in the fulness of time, came into this world to bless and redeem mankind.”

10. This is not merely a great general truth, but, notice that, it is true in every jot and tittle. We do not expect men, when they speak frequently, to speak so that every word of what they say may be correct. We admit them to be fallible: we always make some allowance for some slips of the tongue. But all through these thousands of years, in which God spoke of Christ and of the gospel kingdom, there never was a single trifling word that was not fulfilled.

11. There have been no slips of the tongue, no drops that blot the page. Everything has been accurately, minutely, precisely, what if I say, microscopically fulfilled in Christ. Just as the jewel-box key exactly fits the wards of the lock, so the life of Christ, and the history of the Church, exactly fits all the types and all the prophecies. Sometimes it has been said that if anyone doubts the inspiration of the four gospels, it would be a very pretty puzzle for him to try to write a fifth gospel which should have in it some new details that would be congruous to the rest and that would fit in with the promises and prophecies of the Old Testament. That is a task we propound to those wits who seem to want something to do in these days, since they are impugning everything that is held sacred by us. Let them attempt that. If this problem could have been put to the wise in all ages — Now there is the Old Testament, and, whether it is true or not, construct the life of a man who shall fit all that; use your poetic powers, or whatever other abilities you choose to employ; imagine a man that shall fit the lamb, the scapegoat, the passover, Noah’s ark, the Psalms of David, the prophecies of Jeremiah, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Joel — why the enigma must have been given up in despair. It would not have been possible for the united abilities of men and angels to have discovered an ideal Messiah who would have exactly met all this. But our Lord did in every jot and in every tittle, so that as we read some parts of the Old Testament, we often say to ourselves, “This looks as if it were written after the event.” We read the twenty-second Psalm, and if we did not know that it had been composed many, many years before our Lord came, we should look at it as history rather than as prophecy. One can only comprehend this by admitting inspiration, and by rejoicing in the wonderful truthfulness of God. Even such little points as the casting of lots for the vesture of Christ, things which seem insignificant, God took care should be fulfilled, and though our Lord died, and as yet he had not been pierced in his heart, at any rate, yet after death there must be a piercing of him so that they “may look at him whom they have pierced,” and weep and wail because of him. “As we have heard, so we have seen.” The life of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ certainly carries out the prophecies which God had uttered before concerning him.

12. II. But now, I shall go on to speak of: — THE CHURCH OF GOD — CHRISTWARD AND GODWARD — AS FOR OUR OWN EXPERIENCE. Some of you have thoughts of Christ, but as dead or as far away. We have come to deal with him as a living Saviour. Now the question is, whether, in so dealing with him, we have found everything true that we were told concerning him.

13. Now, when we first enlisted in the Christian army, we were told from Christ’s own Word that we must count the cost, and should have to suffer a degree of persecution. We were warned not to take upon ourselves hastily, to carry out that for which we should have no power unless we sought it from above. We were warned, “In the world you shall have tribulation.” Have we found it so? “Oh!” one says, “abundantly that has been true for me; from those of my own household I first experienced opposition; the gospel has set those against me who were once my fondest friends.” Just so, but now that it has come to pass, you will see how sincerely he dealt with you; that he would not entrap you into his service as though it would be altogether a thing of pleasure, but he warned you that it was a conflict, that it was a pilgrimage. You have found it so, and now that it has come to pass, let this help you to trust him for the future.

14. But you were also told that if you trusted him, you who were burdened with many sins, you should have them all forgiven, and that this forgiveness would bring about a solid peace of mind. Have you found it so? Can you not stand up and add your name to the long roll of witnesses who say, “We looked to him and were enlightened, and our faces were not ashamed; this poor man cried, and the Lord heard him and delivered him from all his fears?” I bless the Lord I can say that the joy of the pardoned sinner is a sweeter and a better thing than I ever dreamed it to be, and the peace of conscience, which a reflection on the atonement always brings, is better and more enduring than one could have imagined could have fallen to the lot of so unworthy a one as he whom Christ had called.

15. Our Lord Jesus told us, too, that if we came and trusted him, he would give us the victory over our sins. Now, has he done that? I know you will confess sometimes that you have not conquered your sins as you would desire. The battle is still raging: there is still a need for that watch-tower. But, brethren, if a sin has not been conquered, has that ever been Christ’s fault? Has it not been ours? “They overcame through the blood of the Lamb,” is true of all the saints with regard to their struggles with sin. There is no sin that we cannot pray down and weep down if we live at the foot of the cross. The worst temper that ever a soul was plagued with is to be controlled and softened if one looks to the griefs of Christ, and becomes like him in temperament. It does not matter how constitutional the sin may be, though you may say, “It is my easily-besetting sin”; you may be delivered from it. Christ Jesus, when he comes into the island of our nature, can drive out all the cruel and deadly reptiles that are there, or if they remain there, he can give us abundant grace, so that they can make no headway, but we shall be kept as “holiness to the Lord.”

16. Now, you and I have read and heard from the saints of God that our Lord Jesus, when he is really known and understood, is inexpressible sweetness itself. Some of them have told us — writing like Rutherford of his wonderful Master — that the joy of heaven is to be possessed in a measure even here below, that in contemplation on, and communion with, Christ, the heart can be made to dance with joy eternal and full of glory. Now, brethren, have we found it so? Oh! some of us can endorse that in this thing the saints of God have found it to be true. He has ravished our souls with his presence, and made our hearts to melt while he spoke into our ears the marvellous story of his love. Perhaps in our unbelief we think that this is a fantasy, or fanaticism, or some high-strained sentimentalism, but it is not so. It is the sober fact that when a man gets to lean on the arm of Christ, he laughs at trouble, defies persecution; he passes through temptation all unharmed; he walks here below, and his citizenship is in heaven; he sits down with the sons of men, and yet he is “raised up and made to sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” I would say to you saints who have not proceeded far in the college of Christ, who have only just begun to study his precious character and the divine virtues that flow out of him, never be content until you have, for as you have heard from the song of the Canticles as you have heard from the saints who, out of their experience, have told you of Christ’s love, so you will find it. Do not harbour the idea that the further you go the less enjoyment you will have in religion. Oh! no! it has deep draughts of great bliss. The shallow draughts will sustain, but oh! it is sacred intoxication with the love of Christ, which brings the highest joy and the most divine mirth.

17. To go in up to the ankles in the sea of Christ’s love is good; but oh! to pass up to the loins, and to get further still, until you find it “a river to swim in,” this is to know the true delights of godliness. As you have heard of these things, though they seem to be too high for you, and you tremble at them, yet if you will only ask for more grace that you may press forward, so you shall see. There are no exceptions about Christ. He offers nothing in the market that has been proffered to catch the eye, but is not worth the purchase. His diamonds are never trashy paste, his gold is not mere gilt. You may buy bread from him, and put it in the scales, and find it ounce for ounce. The water that he gives turns neither stale nor sour; it is always fresh and cool: the further you shall go in the enjoyment of it, the more you shall prize the well of water springing up in your souls to everlasting life.

18. Now, I might just turn this same point around in another form, and say that just as we have heard of Christ in his life on earth, so we have found it in dealing with him. When Christ was here on earth, he was all tenderness and love, and so we have found him. We went to him covered with the leprosy of our sin, and ready to die of our iniquities; but one touch of his hand was freely given, and that touch healed us. When he was on earth he was holiness itself, and so he is now, for he will not walk with us if we fall in love with sin. He is quick to tell our faults, and he gently chides us until conscience awakens us, and we turn from the evil with abhorrence. Christ was in this world as a very faithful friend. Having loved his own, he loved them to the end. And we have found him just such until now. There was never an hour in which he left us naked to our enemies. When we have been tempted, his intercession has always been like a bronze wall around us to keep us from being devoured by the foe. When we have been bewildered he has, like a good shepherd, led us by ways that we did not know, but that he well understood. In the days of famine we have been fed: in the times of poverty we have been satisfied. We can speak well of his name. If any of his saints have anything to say of him who is high and beautiful, that will exalt him and set him on high, we after our measure can endorse it all.

19. So far as our experience has gone, he is a better Christ than we thought him to be. Oh! he is altogether precious, altogether lovely. Up to this day we have never discovered a blemish in him. We have tried him — oh! how sadly, and our sins have tried him — oh! how heavily. But he is always true, the same yesterday, today, and for ever. We can only bless him and praise him, for “as we have heard, so we have seen.”

20. How my heart desires that some of you who are here would just now, at this very moment, come to my Lord and try him. Oh! I so remember when I first came to him. They told me he was ready to pardon, and that a look at him would remove my crushing burden from my weary heart. I could not think it to be true, but: — 

   I came to Jesus as I was,

   Weary, and worn, and sad.

And did he disappoint me? Ah! no; I can happily join in with the rest of that verse:

   I found in him a resting-place,

   And he has made me glad.

21. If any of you think that Christ will cast you out when you come, I wish you would come and try him; it would be the beginning of a new method with him; the turning over of a new black leaf. “Whoever comes to me,” he says, “I will by no means cast out.” He never did find it in his heart to do so to any sinner who has sought his mercy; and I will not believe it, though all the angels in heaven swear it, that he ever cast away a soul. I would call them liars. It cannot be; it never shall be. While the heavens are above the earth, and God is true, and Christ is God, no sinner who comes and puts his trust in him, shall find him unable or unwilling to save him. Oh! taste and see that the Lord is good, and as you have heard, so you shall see.

22. III. Now, in the next place, I think: — THIS ALL STANDS GOOD WITH REGARD TO THE CHURCH OF GOD ITSELF.

23. Some have been apt to find fault with the church, and some Christians seem to act on the principle of getting to heaven one by one. God’s people are called “Sheep,” and I suppose one reason is because sheep are gregarious and go in flocks, but there are Christian professors who seem to like the one by one principle. Well now, speaking of the Church of God as we have seen her, she has many faults — many faults — but Jesus Christ loves her, and she is his Bride, and I dare not find fault with her. If she is the Princess Royal, if she is his Imperial Highness’s own betrothed one, I would rather see her with his eyes than with my own, and while it may be very striking to rail about ministers and their defects, to sneer at church members and all kinds of other things, and there may be sometimes good reason for it, yet we may say much on the other side, too. “As we have heard, so we have seen.”

24. When we joined the Christian Church first, we were told very plainly in the Scripture that there would be tares among the wheat, that there would be some among us who would go out from us, because they were not of us. Christ taught us that, among his twelve disciples, there was one Judas, and if some hypocrites do intrude among us, it need not astonish us. We knew it would be so. He forewarned and admonished us of it. We have heard it, and so we have seen: and if the seeing of it has been painful, we can at least say that God was truthful and frank in warning us that it would be so.

25. Well, there were good things spoken of the Church of God, and we have found them to be true, too. I expected to find in the Christian Church some holy, prayerful, devout Christian men and women, and I have found them, and have rejoiced to be among them, to mingle with them, and to be of their company, joining with them in holy worship, the washing in the blood that has washed them. I can truly say that I have found a Peter — many a bold, earnest brother like Peter; many a loving John; many a busy Martha, and some communing Marys. The Church of God always seems to me as I have seen it, to be a great deal too good for me to be a member of it, if I only judged myself, and, instead of finding fault, I would join with David and say, “You are my Lord: my goodness does not extend to you, but to the saints that are in the earth, and to the excellent, in whom is all my delight.” I know the world will often find fault, and rail, and tell us there are no such things as ancient Christians. I have seen as glorious Christianity as even the apostles saw, and as good works of the Holy Spirit in members of this church as ever gladdened the eyes of those apostles; suffering endured with an astonishing patience, labour done with a perseverance that was most commendable, generosities prevailed with a freedom that showed that the love of Christ constrained; prayer kept up with a fervency that denoted the indwelling Spirit; and souls cared for, sought after, and won, too, with an indefatigable love that only the love of Christ could inspire. I know we always think we live in the worst times, but we do not.

26. There were worse times than these, and there will be yet again. These may not be the best, but they are a long way off from being the worst. I think it happened when Dr. Newton died that the good divine who preached the funeral sermon took some such text as this, “My father, my father, the chariots of Israel, and its horsemen,” and he deplored that now this eminent saint was gone they had no great divines left like the great preachers of the olden time. That went on very prettily for some time, but it was too much for an old Methodist woman, who stood in the aisle and cried out, “Glory be to God! that is a lie!” And often when I hear people decrying the times and saying there are no good people left, and that Christianity is at a low ebb, and that there remains no true zeal, I can say from what I myself see in the people among whom I dwell, “Glory be to God, that is a lie: it is a slander on the Church of God!” For as we have heard, so we have seen: we have seen the gracious, fair fruits of the Spirit, and we honour God by testifying to that fact.

27. I wish, however, dear brothers and sisters, that we were always conscientiously concerned never to undermine in any degree the statements made in Scripture concerning the holy living of the saints. Alas! there are some professors who, if you could track them to their business, are so much given to loose trading that as we have heard, so we cannot see. If you go into their houses, their maidservants, their children, and their wives are obliged to say, “We have heard what Christian fathers, and mothers, and masters ought to be, but as we have heard, so we do not see.” It all ends in talk, in profession. Now, while I stand up for it that there are many who do adorn the doctrine of God their Saviour in all things, and so prove that they are God’s true people, yet we sorrowfully confess that many walk “of whom” we would say with the apostle, “We have told you often, and now tell you even with weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ,” though they are professed members of the Church of Christ. Their lips honour God, but their inconsistent lives degrade the Church, and bring on it much loss of spiritual power. “As we have heard, so we have seen.”

28. I think some of us can say that we have heard of the church’s glorious assemblies. We have heard that they said they were glad when they went up to the house of the Lord. We have heard that the people of God are happy in their assemblies, and that they long for the place where God’s honour dwells. Well, and so we have seen, for our Sabbaths have been our happiest days, and we have often said: — 

   My willing soul would stay

      In such a frame as this,

   And sit, and sing herself away

      To everlasting bliss.

It has been so.

29. We have heard that the preaching of the gospel is the power of God to salvation, and the great means of comfort and edification to the saints; and “as we have heard, so we have seen,” for often when the truth has been preached in our hearing, it has been as marrow and fatness, and other times a rebuke has come just as we needed it to quicken us from our spiritual sloth.

30. We have heard that the ordinances of God’s house have a blessing connected with them. Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. That in the keeping of his commandments there is great reward, and as we have heard, so we have seen. I am sure that the blessed Supper of the Lord, though many of his people come to the table every week, never seems to grow stale.

31. There is always a freshness in it. Oh! that blessed ordinance! Some, I know, make a God of it, and an idolatrous mystery of it, but because they misuse it, we dare not depreciate it. It is to us none other than the very gate of heaven very often. “As we have heard, so we have seen.” Let us press on in our Church fellowship, and increase in our love and earnestness, and then as we have heard of the Zion that travails and becomes like the mother of children, so we shall see; as we have heard that those who sow in tears shall reap in joy, so we shall see; as we have heard that there is great pleasure connected with the winning of souls for Christ, so we shall see. In a word, all the glorious things that are spoken of Zion, we shall have fulfilled to ourselves.

32. Brethren, before I close, I want to say that there is a dreadful side to this truth. As we have heard, so we have seen. There are some of you here who are not saved. You have so far loved your sins, and have not repented. You have heard of Christ, but you have put off all thoughts of him. Now, you have heard often that he who does not believe shall be condemned, and from this Book you have heard that condemnation is something terrible and overwhelming, for there are words like these, “Beware, you who forget God, lest I tear you in pieces and there is no one to deliver”; and these, “These shall go away into everlasting punishment”; and these, “Where their worm does not die, and their fire is not quenched.” Now as you have heard, so you will see. Depend on it you shall not find the pit of hell to be less awful than this Book describes. God sets up no bugbear to frighten souls. They are all realities of which he speaks, and that they are realities many dying sinners have been made to know before they have been dead, for their horror, their alarms their fears have been premonitions of that wrath to which they were drawing near. I have seen some death scenes which I dare not try to picture before you: and the memory of which would unman me if I were to continue to contemplate them — hearers of the gospel who had neglected Christ, and who died conscious of their sins, unable, however, to seek mercy, and while we prayed with them, telling us that our prayers would never be heard, for they were given over, and now they were cursing God, even while they were feeling the anguish of lost souls. Yes, and though there are some who become the advocates for evil, by trying to say that the punishment of sin is to be little, settle it in your souls that, since it took the blood of the dying Son of God to wash out the sin of those who were pardoned it will take an anguish such as no heart can conceive, before the sinner shall have suffered for his sin what God will certainly pour on him. Do not think lightly of the doom of the lost, lest you think lightly of sin, and lightly of Christ, for as you have heard, and infinitely more than you have heard, you shall see. Oh! unhappy spirit, unless you will turn to Christ, and believe in him, and live. Oh! that you may do so tonight, for another night may never come to you; but one long, endless night may be your portion.

33. But there is a bright side to it, too. The saints in heaven might all say, “As we have heard, so we have seen,” only that I think they would make a great improvement in our text. It is true, you heard that heaven was full of joy and mercy, and so you have seen. You heard of its pearly gates, and its streets of shining gold. You heard of its foundations of jasper, and its walls of chrysolite and all kinds of precious stones. You heard of its eternal rest, and of the presence of God, and the glory of the overflowing bliss, and all you heard you have seen! But I say they would make an improvement on this, for, like the Queen of Sheba, I think their glorified spirits would say, “The half has not been told.” Yes, brethren, we have heard things, but “what must it be to be there” — to be there? The enjoyments transcend description, and though the words of Scripture portray the bliss that remains, we alas! are dull of understanding, and cannot find out all the meaning of the golden sentences. But we shall soon be there, and once there we shall, as I have said before, declare, “As we have heard, so we have seen, only that the half was not told us about the splendour and the glory of the court of our heavenly Solomon.” May we be there to find everything true, and join in the everlasting song of, “To him who loved us, and washed us from our sins in his blood, to him be glory for ever and ever. Amen.”

Exposition By C. H. Spurgeon {Ps 45:1-9}

The lily psalm — a psalm of loves. Oh! that our hearts might be full of love tonight, and, while we read, may our hearts be singing to the praise of the Well Beloved.

1. My heart is inditing a good matter: I speak of the things which I have made touching the king: my tongue is the pen of a ready writer.

Sometimes the heart could speak if it could move the tongue; but it is a blessed time with us when, first of all, the heart is fully warmed with love, and then the fire within burns the strings that tie the tongue, and the tongue begins to move very joyfully in expressing the heart’s love. May it be so with us tonight who have to preach. May it be so with all our brethren who have, in public, either to preach or to pray.

2. You are fairer than the children of men: grace is poured into your lips therefore God has blessed you for ever.

No sooner does he begin to write about Christ than he sees him. A warm heart soon kindles the imagination. The eye of faith is soon opened when once the heart is right. We feel the presence of Christ. We begin to speak of him and to him. “You are fairer than the children of men.” Oh! I wish tonight that Christ would only lift the corner of his veil and show you only one of his eyes. Your hearts would be ravished with his infinite beauty. “You are fairer than the children of men.” Oh that he would only speak half a word into our weary ear, and we should say. “Grace is poured into your lips.” Oh! for some sense and sight of him! Do not our hearts hunger for this tonight?

3, 4. Gird your sword on your thigh, oh most mighty with your glory and your majesty. And in your majesty ride prosperously, because of truth and meekness and righteousness; and your right hand shall teach you terrible things.

The heart never glows with love for Christ unless, as a result, there is a longing that his kingdom may be extended. It is an instinct of a loving heart, that it desires the honour of its object. We long for Christ to rule and reign, simply because we love him. Oh! that he would lay his right hand to his work in these slow times. How little is being done, comparatively! Oh! for an hour of the right arm of Jesus. If he himself would only come to the battle, and the shout of a king were heard in our camps, what victories would be won. Cry to him, oh you who love him. He will come to your call.

5. Your arrows are sharp in the heart of the king’s enemies; by which the people fall under you.

Christ not only has power close by, with his right hand, but also far off for he shoots the arrows of his bow and heathens are made to feel that the gospel is mighty. Oh that it were so now. Cry for it.

6. Your throne, oh God, is for ever and ever: the sceptre of your kingdom is a right sceptre.

And this we know to be spoken concerning Jesus Christ, for this was quoted by the apostle, “Your throne, oh God.” Let those who wish, deny his Deity. It shall be the joy of our heart to worship him, and, in express terms, to address him who is our brother as “very God of very God.” “Your throne, oh God, is for ever and ever. The sceptre of your kingdom is a right sceptre.”

7. You love righteousness, and hate wickedness: therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness more than your fellows.

Fellow with us and yet equal with God. Man anointed, the Christ, yet still the reigning God. Glory be to his name.

8. All your garments smell of myrrh, and aloes and cassia, out of the ivory palaces, by which they have made you glad.

Not only is Christ precious, but everything that touches him. Every garment that hangs on his shoulder becomes sweet by contact with him. “All your garments smell of myrrh.” There is myrrh about the priestly robe that falls down to his feet, and about the golden sash of his faithfulness that is girt around his waist. There are myrrh, and aloes, and cassia about his crown, though it is of thorns. About every garment that he puts on there is a sweet perfume.

9. King’s daughters were among your honourable women: on your right hand stood the queen in gold of Ophir.

Blessed queen of Christ — his church. Let us never think little of her. There are some who are always extolling “the church,” “the church,” “the church”; but that is not the true church that tries to take the place of Christ. It is antichrist. The true church has her place, however, and that is at her husband’s own right hand, where she sits in the best of the best — in gold, and that is the gold of Ophir, for he spares nothing for her beauty and her glory.