3485. The Disconsolate Lover

A Sermon Published On Thursday, November 11, 1915.

By night on my bed I looked for him whom my soul loves: I looked for him, but I did not find him. I said, “I will rise now, and go around the city in the streets, and in the broad ways I will look for him whom my soul loves.” I looked for him but I did not find him. The watchmen who go around the city found me: to whom I said, “Did you see him whom my soul loves?” It was only a little time that I passed from them, but I found him whom my soul loves: I held him, and would not let him go, until I had brought him into my mother’s house, and into the room of her who conceived me. {So 3:1-4}

For other sermons on this text:

   {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 1035, “Real Presence, the Great Need of the Church, The” 1026}

   {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2485, “Love’s Vigilance Rewarded” 2486}

   {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 3485, “Disconsolate Lover, The” 3487}

   Exposition on Ge 45:1-13 So 1:1-7 3:1-5 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2516, “Jesus and His Brethren” 2517 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on So 2:1-3:5 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2485, “Love’s Vigilance Rewarded” 2486 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on So 2:1-7 3:1-5 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 3552, “Soul’s Desertion, The” 3554 @@ "Exposition"}

1. How exquisitely pleasant is communion with our Lord Jesus Christ! and how supremely favoured are those who enjoy it! Holy Scripture exhausts every earthly metaphor to delineate its sacred charms, its ineffable delights: yes, inspiration itself exhausts its metaphors without fathoming its mystery, because it is impossible for human language to express the sweetness of his grace, or the solace of our acquaintance with him. In just so much as it is sweet to know that fellowship, so it is sad not to know or to experience it. But alas! how frequently is this communion unfelt and unproved!

2. I. Our first point is:—THE BRIDEGROOM WAS MISSED.

3. In addressing this large assembly, I can only think a considerable number of the Lord’s people are in the condition of the spouse. You do not at present enjoy access to Christ, or communion with him. It may do you good to consider the things that remain to you, though this fellowship is suspended, for remember that our life does not depend on communion with Christ. Our salvation stands in the knowledge of him, not in communion with him. We are made safe by what he has done, not by what we feel. Not our enjoyments, but his sufferings we must lay as the solid foundation of our hope.

4. There remains to us, dear friends (for I confess to be sometimes in the same state)—though there is no privileged sign of our love for Christ, nor any palpable enjoyment of his love for us—there remains at this hour the positive conviction and the open confession that we love him. Four times, I think, this benighted spouse cries, “Him whom my soul loves.” She cannot see him, but she cherishes a tender affection for him. She does not enjoy his presence just now, but her heart cleaves to him and appreciates his excellence. Even though she may have been idle and slothful, or though her spirit may be heavy and hazy, one thing she knows, she does love her Lord; about that there can be no mistake. Publicly in the streets, in the hearing of the watchmen, before the ministers and messengers of the gospel, she does not blush to say, “Him whom my soul loves.” So it was with Peter. When he had much to regret, much to reprove himself for, he could say, “Lord, you know all things, you know that I love you.” In the same way can you not vouch for your sincerity when there is reason enough to challenge your propriety? You feel guilty of a carelessness or a cowardice that might reflect on your gratitude, but you cannot allow a recklessness or a wilfulness that could extinguish your love. My faithless heart, you would gladly tell him, has merited your rebuke, but your infinite discernment can bear witness to the kindling of my desires. Do not believe my actions, but believe my innermost soul. Do not judge me by the utterances of my cowardly lips; rather look at the throbbings of my penitent heart. You, oh Jesus Christ, are the one whom my soul loves.

5. Though the spouse does not just now enjoy communion with Christ, she knows its sweetness, and she feels uneasy until she partakes of it again. Just as the needle cannot stop until it points to the pole, so she trembles until her soul rests in personal communion with Jesus. The next best thing to present fellowship is to hunger and thirst after it. And you notice, too, in this case, and in the case of every true believer in Jesus, not only is love constant, and desire after Christ earnest, but there remains sufficient strength to resolutely seek for him. You may not as yet have your desire accomplished, yet your heart is buoyed up with hope, and you are saying, “I must seek him.” You are not like the traveller across the desert who at last loses all heart, gives up all effort, and perishes on the sand for lack of water. But you feel an inward impulse stronger than any outward discouragements, and, though faint, you are still pursuing. What if you have sought him and not found him, yet you will seek him again until you do find him, for divine grace stimulates you and urges you forward.

6. Just as the spark flies upwards towards the sun, so the new-born nature of the Christian seeks and soars after Christ. It is not simply unhappy without him, but it is restless and resolute to discover him. It would break through every law of nature to establish this law of grace. The new nature seeks the source from which it came; it pines and pants to meet him and talk to him in whom are all its life, and strength, and joy. Do you not feel this desire after Jesus, though you are complaining of dullness and deadness, and worldliness? Is there not some such indescribable yearning in your heart for a communion which you well understand, but do not now enjoy?

7. I do not know how you lost the fellowship, my brother, which you so grievously miss. There are many ways in which this may come about. You and I often lose the sweetness of communion with Christ, I do not doubt, through unbelief. We think so lightly of unbelief, as though it were an infirmity and not a sin, whereas of all evils, it is the chief. What can be more displeasing to the tender heart of Jesus than unkind thoughts concerning him? When last you were repining and reflecting that he had forgotten you, you quickly lost that hallowed calm, and that sweet confidence which you knew before. Could you wonder about it? How could he walk with you while you were casting into his ear a foul suspicion against his truthfulness and his love? Faith is the hand which holds the Saviour and will not let him go; unbelief opens the door and tells him to go. How shall he tarry when we will not believe in him? Do you tell him to his face that he is not true and trustworthy, yet expect to lean your head on his bosom? How can you expect this? Perhaps, my dear brother, you have been too busy with the world, and yet I know some with their hands full of business, and their heads full of enterprise, who have constant communion with Christ.

8. But perhaps you have let the world steal in on your heart. All the water in the sea, as I have often told you, does not frighten the mariner, but that little drop of water in the hold, which indicates a leak in the ship, gives him great distress. You might have an empire to govern, and yet never lose fellowship with Jesus, but with nothing more than your little family to manage, you may lose him, if you let the cravings and the covetousness of the world, its fashions or its ambitions, get inside your heart. Keep that room clear for Christ. Let your heart be the marriage bed, and keep it chaste for him who is your husband and your Lord.

9. Or possibly, dear brother, you have been negligent in the use of private prayer, and what can shut the windows through which Jesus looks so soon as laxness or slackness in supplication? Unless you are much on your knees, you cannot expect to have your head much on his bosom. The appointed place of audience is the mercy seat. If you refuse to resort there, how can you look for Christ to grant you another audience? Is it reasonable that he should alter his fixed institutions to suit your foolish negligence? Go then, dear brother, if you would renew your fellowship, go again to your closet, and there pray to the Lord your God, and make your supplication to him.

10. In many other ways the Christian may lose his fellowship with Christ. Especially by the indulgence of some known sin, by harbouring resentment or cherishing a bitter spirit against a brother, by shutting the eye to some gospel truth, by dissembling convictions in deference to the company you keep or the society in which you move, by not coming out from the world, or mixing too much with the ungodly. It may suffice to refer to these evils without enlarging on them. When you miss the fellowship, there is little comfort in determining the way you lost it. Your heart is rather craving its restoration. “Tell me how I may find him whom my soul loves, for I desire to renew my fellowship with him.”

11. Come then, beloved, with hearts humbled on account of past sin, and yet encouraged with the assurance that he who received us at the first still is willing to receive us; let us go to him anew. We were foul and vile all over then; if we are the same now, we will return to him; if it is in as bad a plight, yet let it be with as good a plea. Come to Jesus, as once you did come to him, though, maybe, you have known the Master lo! these many years. The same words will suit your case:—

   Just as I am—without one plea

   But that thy blood was shed for me,

   And that thou bidd’st me come to thee,

      Oh Lamb of God, I come.

12. II. While our text conducts us onward to the successful restoration of communion, it glances also at:—UNSUCCESSFUL ATTEMPTS TO FIND THE BELOVED ONE.

13. Of how many of us might it be said that with a lazy attitude and a listless wish, we have yawned after a blessing for which we might have vehemently yearned. “By night on my bed I looked for him whom my soul loves.” As it were on her bed of sloth and idleness, she dreamed of a happiness she was far from enjoying. But we shall never get the privilege of close communion with Christ by merely wishing for it. Even though now and then, with a hectic flush on our cheek, we exclaim, “Oh that I were like Christ; oh! that I lived nearer to him; I am not satisfied with what I know, I desire to know more!” This is no symptom of health. Does the idler ever prosper? He who lies in bed and will not sow by reason of the cold, where is his harvest? What pearls come into the hand of the merchantman who says, “A little more sleep and a little more slumber”? And do you think the pearl of pearls, the pearl to which no other in the universe can compare, the highest privilege which the King Eternal ever bestowed on his own courtiers—do you think that this, the most distinguished favour he ever confers on the darlings of his heart, this intimate fellowship with Jesus—do you think he will share that with you while you are tossing on your bed in indolence which is the bane of virtue and the nurse of folly? It was not because she looked for him by night that she did not find him, for Jesus is often found by his people in the dark. When no rays of light, no gleams of comfort, can steal over our senses, still if we seek Jesus with our whole heart, though to our own apprehension we grope about like blind men, we shall find him, to the joy of our spirits. It was not the night that prevented her finding him; it was the bed—her passiveness, her languor, and her sloth. Shake yourself from the dust and believe!

   Eschew the idle life!

      Flee, flee from doing nought!

   For never was there idle brain

      But bred an idle thought.

No longer yield to the insidious temptation which is so apt to beset us all. May the Lord deliver us from the lukewarmness of the Church of Laodicea, lest he should spue us out of his mouth. When she sought him like this, she could not find him; no marvel you will think, for your own experience has taught you that such disappointment is the invariable rule.

14. With no better success did she seek him when afterwards she went about in a self-sufficient spirit. I may be wrong in my conjecture, but to me the words, “I will rise now,” sound a little like dependence on her own exertions. “I will rise now” has not half so grateful a ring about it, nor is it half so graceful, as “Draw me, we will run after you.” This confiding rather than that confidence seems to be the impression which becomes the saint when cold and crushed he keenly feels how desolate he is. Arise, did I say, shake off dull sloth? Ah! then, it is easier said than done. “Awake, my soul,” is a poor invocation compared with “Oh! Sun of righteousness, arise!” or “Make haste, my Beloved,” or “Come, Lord Jesus, quickly come.” Beware, my brethren, of seeking after Christ in a legal spirit. Beware of going to Calvary as though you were going to Sinai. In coming to Christ, no merit of your own could commend you; so in longing for him to appear to you again, no strivings of your own can avail you. Let his rich grace be your poor plea. Your best way of suing is to say:—

   Oh! for this no strength have I,

   My strength is at thy feet to lie.

15. Once again, in trusting in the scrupulous using of the means the bride seems to have thoroughly relied on attaining her purpose. Lest I should seem too censorious of her conduct, allow me to say that my criticism of the text is bent on taking and applying the rebukes to ourselves. Do you not notice, however, how sure she seems of finding him if she goes around the city, in the streets and in the broadways, and if she meets the watchmen and enquires of them? But it does not appear that the fitness of the places to seek, or the people to enquire of, were of much avail. She went down one street, and another, as we may resort to the street of private prayer, a narrow and little-frequented way, and she said, “I shall find him there”; but after she had walked through it she said, “He is not here; my room is not a palace as it used to be; no more is it the private closet of the King of kings, the royal audience room” So she saw a wider way, and she said, “I will walk down here,” as we may go to the prayer meeting. “What blessed hours I have often enjoyed there,” she said; “I shall find him in that highway I feel sure,” but after traversing all its length she said:—

   I go where others go,

   But find not Jesus there.

16. Then she says, “I will go into the broad places where the preaching of the gospel is to be heard. I will go with the throng; where God speaks through his servants I will be,” but service after service, and sermon after sermon, were like clouds without rain, and wells without water. Others were refreshed, but she, trusting in the means, came away without a blessing. So, brethren, you may traverse every street in the city, you may even come to that street paved with gold, the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper, or you may go down Water-street, where in the ordinance of baptism, the Lord often reveals his death and burial to his people, but after having traversed both these streets you shall be compelled to say, “Though I love the means, they are a weariness to me when Jesus is not revealed to me in them.” What a difference there is between our preaching at one time and our preaching at another! How often do I bless God in the evening for what I groaned over in the morning, when my spirit has been bowed, my tongue-tied, and I could not preach as I would! It is a grand thing for the minister to be humbled in the sight of his hearers, when you discern that it is not the man in whom the power is vested, but it is his God whose might you cannot resist. My fear often is that your smiles may provoke his frowns; and he may withhold his blessing from me because you attribute to some genius of mine an influence which his Spirit alone could exert.

17. When I was only a lad, a stripling fresh from the country, you said when there were conversions, “How God helps him!” I am jealous of you now, lest you should not still say the same. God will take away his blessing when you refrain from offering him the praise. If you once ascribe what is done in any degree whatever to the creature, or to any power that he has, you will arouse the jealousy of his Lord. Remember the lessons that the spouse was taught. Means and ordinances are just what God likes to make them. Even divine institutions are beggarly elements when he forsakes them. They can be nothing better than matters of duty, and they may be very far from being matters of privilege. When he wills it he can make his ministers do exploits. The least of all his servants shall be mighty as David was, when he killed the giant Goliath with only the sling and stone. We are nothing in ourselves. The hand that moves the instrument is everything. If you would come to Christ, or seek after Christ, looking too much to the means, you will have to return again with the mournful cry, “I looked for him, but I did not find him.” Such, then, are the unsuccessful efforts to regain communion with Christ.

18. III. Our third point is:—WE FIND THE SUCCESSFUL HERE SET SIDE BY SIDE WITH THE UNSUCCESSFUL.

19. We shall now hold her up as an example which you will do well to imitate. With what constancy she sought this communion. She began in the dead of night, as indeed it is never too late to seek renewed fellowship. Yet she kept on looking. The streets were lonely, and it was a strange place for a woman to be at such a strange time, but she was too earnest in seeking to be abashed by such circumstances. The watchmen met her, and they were astonished, as well they might, how she came to be there at that hour. But she kept on looking; she would never rest until she had found him. Believer, if you would have fellowship with Christ, you must be in a continual quest after it. Your soul must get a craving for the one thing, and that such a craving as only that one thing can satisfy. I wish my own soul was like Anacreon’s harp, {a} only in a better sense. You know he says, though he wished to sing of Cadmus, his harp would only sing of love. Oh! that we might sing of the love of Jesus and of his love alone, then it would not be long before our fellowship with him would be renewed.

20. And since she sought Jesus continually, she neglected no means that seemed to her right and promising. Though I have warned you against trusting in what are called the means of grace, I did not have the slightest intention of undervaluing, much less of disclaiming, them. We cannot rationally expect the Lord to reveal himself other than in the way of his own appointment. He may sometimes do so, and he likes to surprise us with his grace, but we have no right to expect it. Abraham’s servant followed his master’s injunctions closely. And when he blessed the Lord God of his master Abraham, who had not left his master destitute of his mercy and his truth, he testified, “I being in the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master’s brethren.” It is in the way appointed that God most commonly condescends to meet with us. I do not expect that those of you who, every time there is half a shower of rain, stay at home will be very well fed, nor those of you who neglect the Monday prayer meeting on any trivial excuse. There are a goodly number of you who do so; you cannot expect that you will grow in grace, if you forsake the assembling of yourselves together. Those of you who, when the brethren join together in earnest prayer, cannot be present, must not marvel, if, like Thomas, you are not there when Jesus appears. You have good reason to be full of doubts and fears, when your fellow disciples are full of joy and love. Use the means; use all the means, I entreat you. Who knows how great and rich a blessing obedience in even the least of the Lord’s commands may bring to our souls! It is a blessed thing to walk tenderly and observe scrupulously the statutes of the Lord; to be afraid of leaving anything undone which is commanded, or of doing anything that is forbidden, lest in the omission or the commission we should by some means or other vex a jealous God, and provoke him to keep back from us much that we might have enjoyed through the means of his own appointment.

21. But the chief beauty of the whole story is that the spouse did not stay with the means of grace. She had applied to the watchmen on the walls, but even better for her, the watchmen had found her. The expression is remarkable, because it is expressive of much that we have often proven. You know, sometimes, what it is to be found by the watchmen on the walls. You come here with a trouble of which no one knows anything, and the watchman discovers you. In the description of your case he finds you. It often happens that the very thing you were talking about by the way, the watchman relates to you. You perceive that you cannot be hidden. How strange it seems to you. Is this not a sign of the Father’s love that he guides the watchman to find you in your midnight wanderings where you are unknown to anyone but your God, and thought you would be unrecognised by anyone? Yes; but even then you know, I hope, how to pass by the watchman. She asked, “Did you see him, whom my soul loves?” Why did they not answer? Perhaps because they were blind and never did see themselves. Alas! that some watchmen on the walls have need to watch for their own souls rather than for the souls of others.

22. Still, not the best of the watchmen there could console her with a smile of Jesus’ face. We can tell you what we have felt and proved of his love. We can sometimes, when the Lord helps us, tell you how his people are ravished with his smiles, but a smile of his face, it is for himself to give; and no one but he can bestow it. It would not be possible for him to send that second-hand. You must go directly to him. You see what honour God puts on his servants, because she says it was only a little way she had gone. You must go beyond the minister a little, only a little. The Lord helps his servants to bring you to the verge of fellowship. We know it is all of the Lord; to him be all the glory. Still, he chooses in the use of means to make it only a little time between the earnest, spiritual exercise of outward means, and the supply of the inward spiritual grace. “It was only a little time that I passed from them, before I found him whom my soul loves.”

23. So far, beloved brothers and sisters, I have led you on. Now I want you to go a little further. Away beyond the Church, away in advance of the bread and wine spread out for our mutual repast, a little beyond all these. It is not these that will satisfy your craving. A feast of bread and wine would never gratify this longing of your spirit. You want Jesus. The minister cannot suffice you; you want Jesus. You have gotten to this point of desire. You want Christ, and nothing but Christ. Go on then, dear brother, and to attain your object I can propose nothing better than the simple method I proposed to you just now. Go to him as you did at first. Forget the past, except to remember with penitence your sin, and to anticipate in the future the grace that welcomed you as a stranger. You know the love and mercy that are in his heart; unworthy as you are, cast yourself at his feet, and you may have the love of your espousals given back to you. You may once again cross the Jordan of doubt and fear, and enter into the Canaan of your blessed inheritance, enjoying rapt and rich fellowship with him.

24. If you do see him, be sure you lay hold of him. He himself loves to be embraced. Let your love lay hold of his love, for his love is laying hold of you. Hold him firmly. Dismiss all ungrateful thoughts, for they will fill your hands so that you cannot hold him. Divest yourself of all cares for a while, and now with an empty hand just lay hold of his righteousness and strength.

25. And when you get the blessing you long for, I charge you to tell your brothers and sisters. Bring him to your mother’s house. There are some in your mother’s house severely sick with weary apprehensions and dreary misgivings; tell them that you have seen your beloved; it will cheer their spirits. Tell them the same news that made good old Jacob’s eyes overflow with tears of joy; tell them Jesus is still alive; tell them that Jesus still sits on the throne; that he is still full of love for his chosen ones; and I think their desponding souls will immediately revive, and they with you will feast on free grace and dying love.

26. Well, dear friends, I shall occupy no more time in talking to you, for we want to devote the rest of our time at the communion table, to calm and quiet musings. I have conducted you as far as I can. Surely there is no need to stir up Christians to what is sweet to them; yet I beseech you let no sense of unworthiness keep you back, for you always were unworthy; as such Christ loved you at first. Neither let any consciousness of backsliding keep you back. “Just as a wife treacherously departs from her husband, so you depart from me,” says the Lord by the mouth of his servant; and yet he says, “Return, return.” I do not know of any metaphor more striking; none that involves more bitter reproach, yet for all that he invites her to come back. Though you are guilty, and have been unfaithful to your loving husband, still he invites you to come back, and assures you of a welcome. That hymn may suit the backsliders as well as the unconverted sinners:—

   Let not conscience make you linger,

   Nor of fitness fondly dream.

27. Oh! how sad it makes my heart when I think of some of you to whom this is all an idle tale. All this discourse is arrant nonsense in the judgment of some of you. Our faith must seem to you strangely credulous. Our views must seem to you altogether visionary. However, there is a land that you have never seen, a life that you have never felt, a truth that has never dawned on your understanding. These things that are so real to us are strange to you; still, it is more strange and more strangely sad to me that you should be without God, without Christ, without hope in the world. We are pleased to greet you in this sanctuary; though we can well imagine that the sight and sound are foreign to you as would be the other side of a sea you have never crossed. You may be led to ask, “What is it? What does it mean? Is there another and a better life? Are there other and brighter joys than we have ever tasted? Do these Christians have comforts that I do not know about? Have they a love which I do not have? I wish I knew the same!” Ah! thoughtless, heedless sinner! Whether you are a high caste or a low caste sinner, know this, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, bled on the cross and died for such as you are. Whoever believes in him shall never perish, but have everlasting life. Trust in him, and you are saved. This is the love which won our hearts. Oh! may it win yours! The things of which we have been speaking only spring from that simple fact, that he loved us and gave himself for us.

28. The way in which we learned the mystery of his love is as open to you as it was to us. This was the way. We put our trust in him; we knew we were not worthy of him, but we did trust him. Through his grace we did, without introduction or preparation, draw near to him, and cast ourselves on his mercy. May you do the same. Let there not be an hour’s delay, for the days are flying—the years are flying. Your grave is very close; within a few days you may be borne there. Flee at once to him who asks you to trust him. May God help you to do this, for Jesus Christ’s sake! Amen.

{a} Anacreon (570 BC-488 BC) was a Greek lyric poet, notable for his drinking songs and hymns. See Explorer "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anacreon"

Exposition By C. H. Spurgeon {1Pe 2}

1, 2. Therefore laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings, As new-born babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, so that you may grow by it:

Have we not constantly declared that our faith, if true, is always practical? Here, again, we have the precepts of God’s Word. Here we are told that there is much for us to lay aside, as if it were natural for us in every case, and must, therefore, be carefully laid aside. “Malice”—we are all inclined to return evil for evil: the Christian must not do so. “All guile”—everything like craft and cunning—this is unbecoming in a Christian. “Hypocrisy”—seeming to be what we are not; all kinds of mere seeming we must lay aside. “And envy”—how easy it is for us to envy one man’s wealth, or another his health, or another his talents; but “all envy” the Christian must have been finished with. “And evil speaking”—it is painful to reflect how much of evil speaking there is among people, who we still hope are good people. They are very fond of repeating stories to the disadvantage of their fellow Christians. Now, whether you are the author of it or not, do not be the retailer of it, for we are told here to lay aside all evil speaking. But then the religion of Jesus Christ does not consist in negatives: it is not merely what we are to lay aside; there is something to be taken up. We are told that since we are born again we are to consider ourselves as new-born babes, and are to desire the unadulterated milk of God’s Word, so that we may grow by it. It is not enough to be alive: we should desire to grow. To be saved is a great blessing; we ought not, however, to be contented with being barely saved: we should seek after the graces of the Spirit and the excellent work of God within us.

3. If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious.

Have you tasted this? Oh! search yourselves and see, and, if you have, then prove it by the laying aside of the evil, and the thirsting after the good.

4, 5. To whom coming, as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God, and precious. You also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.

The priesthood, among believers, does not belong to one here and there, but to the whole company of believers. As many as love the Saviour are priests and kings to God, and they should regard their whole life as the exercise of this priesthood. When we assert that no place is holy more than another, by so doing we do not desecrate any place, but rather consecrate all places. We believe every day to be holy, every hour to be holy, every place and occupation to be holy to holy men, and we should so live as to always exercise this consecrated priesthood.

6-8. Therefore also it is contained in the Scripture, “Behold, I lay in Zion a chief corner-stone, elect, precious: and he who believes in him shall not be confounded.” To you therefore who believe he is precious: but to those who are disobedient, the stone which the builders rejected, the same is made the head of the corner. And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to those who stumble at the word, being disobedient: to which also they were appointed.

Of which we can only say, with Augustine, “Oh! the depth,” and leave that mystery to be explained to us hereafter.

9, 10. But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a special people; that you should proclaim the praises of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvellous light: who in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: who had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.

How good it is to look back to the hole of the pit from where we were dug! What if today the sovereign grace of God has made us royal priests, yet let us remember that in past times we were not a people, “But are now the people of God.” “Who had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.” Yes, I think no exercise will be more profitable by way of expressing our gratitude than the remembering what we used to be before the hand of God was laid on us in love; for if all of us did not run to an excess of riot in our outward lives, yet some of us did; and others who were kept from gross outward sins had, nevertheless, a very sink of corruption within our nature. We felt that when the Spirit of God convicted us of sin we could truly say:—

   Depths of mercy, could there be,

   Mercy yet reserved for me?

And having obtained mercy, we will never cease to bless the name of God.

11-14. Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul; having your conduct honest among the Gentiles: so that, whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may by your good works, which they shall see, glorify God in the day of visitation. Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake: whether it is to the king as supreme; or to governors, as to those who are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of those who do well.

Christians should be good citizens. Though in one respect they are not citizens of this world, yet since they find themselves in it they should seek the good of those among whom they dwell, and be patterns of order.

15-17. For so is the will of God, that with well-doing you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men: as free, and not using your liberty for a cloke of maliciousness, but as the servants of God. Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king.

Even if they are beggars, they are men: honour them. God’s image, though marred and defiled is, in every man; and because he is a man, honour him—pity him. Never look down on him with contempt, but always feel that there is an immortal spark, even within that mass of filth. If the man is cast into all kinds of beggary and wickedness, “Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the King.” The same verse that says, “Honour the King,” however, says, “Honour all men,” and while we, therefore, have due respect to rank, yet a man is a man for all that, and we “Honour all men.”

18-20. Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward. For this is thankworthy, if a man for conscience towards God endures grief, suffering wrongfully. For what glory is it, if, when you are buffeted for your faults, you shall take it patiently? But if, when you do good, and suffer for it, you take it patiently, this is acceptable with God.

I have known some who could not do that, however. If they were only spoken to very gently, they were in a tiff immediately. “But if, when you do good, you bear it patiently, this is acceptable with God.” Here is something more than human nature can bear. Now grace comes in to help. “This is acceptable with God.”

21. For to this you were called:

Called, you see, to be buffeted when you do not deserve it.

21-23. Because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow his steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: who, when he was reviled, did not revile again; when he suffered, he did not threaten; but committed himself to him who judges righteously:

In this he is a pattern of patience to all his people.

24, 25. Who himself bore our sins in his own body on the tree, that we being dead to sins, should live to righteousness; by whose stripes you were healed. For you were as sheep going astray; but are now returned to the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls.

John Ploughman’s Almanac

For 1916, with a Proverb or Quaint Sayings for every Day of the Year. Suitable for Cottage Homes, Workshops, Mission Halls, etc. originated by C. H. Spurgeon. One of the most popular Sheet Almanacs published. Price 1d.

Spurgeon’s Illustrated Almanac

For 1916, containing Daily Texts and Choice Quotations from the Writings of C. H. Spurgeon, with numerous illustrations. A useful little Almanac for every home. Sixtieth year of publication. Price 1d.

Marshal Brothers Ltd., 47 Paternoster Row, London, E. C.