NO. 3344
PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, MARCH 6TH, 1913.
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.
ON THURSDAY EVENING, SEPT. 20TH, 1866.
“O my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not; and in the night-season, and am not silent.” — Psalm 22:2.
It is very clear to everyone who reads this Psalm that these are not so much the words of David as they are the words of David’s Son and David’s Lord, our blessed Master. He prayed with strong crying and tears; he came before his Father’s throne with supplications, and for a long time it seemed as if he would have no answer. It did appear as if God had utterly forsaken him, and that his enemies might persecute and take him.
Now, wherefore was the Savior permitted to pass through so sad an experience? How was it that he, whose lightest word is prevailing with heaven, that he who pleads with Divine authority this day in his continual intercession, was permitted, when here below, to cry, and, cry, and cry again, and yet to receive no comforting answer? Was it not mainly for this reason, that he was making an atonement for us, and he was not heard because we as sinners did not deserve to be heard? He was not heard, that we might be heard. The ear of God was dosed against him for a season, that it might never be dosed against us: that forever the mourner’s cry might find a way to the heart of God, because the cry of Jesus was for awhile shut out from mercy’s gate. He stood the surety for our sins, and was numbered with the transgressors: upon him the Lord laid the iniquity of all his people, and therefore, being the sinner’s representative, he could not for awhile be heard.
There was also, no doubt, another reason, namely, that he might be a faithful High-Priest having sympathy with his people in all their woes. As this not being heard in prayer, or being unanswered for awhile, is one of the greatest troubles which can fall upon the Christian, and fall it does, the Savior had to pass through that trouble, too, that so it might be said of him: —
“In every pang that rends the heart,
The Man of Sorrows bore his part.”
When I fear that I have not been heard in prayer, I can now look upon my Savior and say: —
“He takes me through no darker rooms
Than he went through before.”
He can now have a tender, touching sympathy with us, because he has been tempted in all points like as we are.
Was it not also, once more, in our Savior case, with a view to display the wondrous faith, fidelity, and trustfulness of the obedient Son of God? Having been found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient to his Father’s will. Now, obedience is not perceived until it is tried, and faith is not known to be firm and strong until it is put to the test and exercised. Through what an ordeal did this pure gold pass! It was put into the crucible and thrust into the hottest coals; all glowing with a white heat, they were heaped upon him, and yet no dross was found in him. His faith never staggered; his confidence in his God never degenerated into suspicion, and never turned aside into unbelief. It is, “My God! my God!” even when he is forsaken. It is, “My God and my strength” even when he is poured out like water, and all his bones are out of joint. In this thing he not only sympathizes with us, you see, but he sets us an example. We must overcome, as he did, through faith. “This is the victory which overcometh the world, even your faith”; and if we can copy this great High-Priest of our profession, who endured such contradiction of sinners against himself — if we can copy him so as to be neither faint in our minds, nor turn from our Master’s work — we shall triumph even as he overcame.
But my chief object in considering this theme is not so much to speak of the Savior’s trial, as to address myself to those of our number who may even now be passing through the same experience as our Lord.
It will already comfort you to know that Christ has been where you are. It will already guide you to know that he has set you an example, and that he bids you follow in his steps. Let us now draw near to his sorrow, and think on it for awhile for our instruction and comfort.
In the first place, the text — without any inquiry into the cause of unanswered prayer, seems to give: —
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I. A GENERAL GUIDE FOR OUR CONDUCT.
Supposing that we have been seeking some blessing from God for many months, and have not obtained it; whether it be a personal blessing, or on behalf of others, what ought to be our conduct under such a trial as that, the trial of a long delay, or an apparent refusal?
In the first place, brethren, the text, it is clear, teaches us that we must not cease to trust God. “O my God,” Oh! that appropriating word! It is not, perhaps, “My Father.” The spirit of adoption is not here so much, as the spirit of reverent trustfulness, but still there is the hold-fast word still — “O my God.” Christian, never be tempted to give up your hold upon your only strength, upon your solitary hope. Under no conceivable circumstances, ever give place for an instant to the dark thought that God is not true and faithful to his promises. Though you should have seven years of unanswered prayer, yet suggest any other reason to your mind than one which would dishonor him. Say, with the Savior in this Psalm, “But thou art holy.” Settle that in your mind. Oh! never suffer the faintest breath of suspicion to come upon the fair fame of the Most High, for he doth not deserve it. He is true; he is faithful. In this apparently worst of all cases, he did deliver his Son, and come to the rescue in due time. In all other cases he has done the same, and I pray you never to distrust your God until you have some good and valid occasion for it. Never cast a slur upon his integrity till he really does forsake you, till he absolutely gives you up to perish. Then, but not till then, shall you doubt him. Oh! believe him to be good and true! You may not know why it is that he deals so strangely with you, but oh! never think that he is unfaithful for an instant, or that he has broken his word. Continue still to trust him. You shall be rewarded if you do, and the longer your faith is tried, it shall be with you as when the ship is longest out at sea, it goeth to the richest climes, and cometh home with the heaviest and most precious freight. So shall your faith come back to you with joy.
She may lie among the pots for many a day: but the time of her deliverance shall come, and, like a dove, shall she mount, with wings covered with silver, and her feathers tipped with yellow gold. “Trust in the Lord at all times ye people, and pour out your hearts before him.”
Once again, as we are never to cease to trust, so we are never to cease to pray. The text is very express upon this point. “I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not: and in the night-seasons I am not silent.” Never cease your prayers. No time is ill for prayer. The glare of daylight should not tempt you to cease: and the gloom off midnight should not make you stop your cries. I know it is one of Satan’s chief objects to make the Christian cease praying, for if he could but once make us put up the weapon of all-prayer, he would easily vanquish us and take us for his prey. But so long as we continue to cry to the Most High, Satan knows he cannot devour the very weakest lamb of the flock. Prayer, mighty prayer, will yet prevail if it hath but time.
Oh! if this be the dark suggestion of the Evil One, “Forsake the closet; give up private devotion; never draw near to God, for prayer is all a fancy” — I pray you spurn the thought with all your might, and still cry, both in the daytime and at night, for the Lord will still hear your prayer.
And while you never cease from your trust, nor from your prayer, grow more earnest in both. Let your faith be still more resolved to give up all dependence anywhere but upon God, and let your cry grow more and more vehement. It is not every knock at mercy’s gate that will open it; he who would prevail must handle the knocker well, and dash it down again, and again, and again. As the old Puritan says, “Cold prayers ask for a denial, but it is red-hot prayers which prevail.” Bring your prayers as some ancient battering-ram, against the gate of heaven, and force it open with a sacred violence, “for the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by storm.” He that would prevail with God must take care that all his strength be thrust into his prayers. The Lord will not hear thee, if thou only bringest up a rank or line of the array of thy desires. There must be no reserves; but the whole army of thy soul must come into the conflict, and thou must beleaguer the mercy-seat, determined to win the day, and then shalt thou prevail. If there be delays, take them as good and sound advice to be more firm in your faith, and more fervent in your cry.
And yet again, cease not to hope. The New Zealander has a word for hope which signifies “the swimming-thought”; because when all other thoughts are drowned, hope still swims. She lifts her head out of the foamy waves, with her tresses all trailing, but sees the blue heaven above her, and hopes, as that is there. So if thou hast prayed never so long, yet hope on. “Hope thou in God, for I shall yet praise him, who is the strength of my life, and my portion for ever.” As long as there is a place of prayer, and a promise of an answer, no believer ought to give way to despair. “Go again,” said Elijah to his servant seven times. It must have been weary work to the prophet to have to wait so long. He did not stand up once and pray to God as on Carmel, and then instantly came down the fire to continue the sacrifice; but again and again, and, getting more humble in posture, with his face between his knees, he beseeches the Lord, not for fire, which was an unusual thing, but for water, which is the common boon of the skies. And yet, though he pleads for that which the Lord himself had promised, yet it did not at once come, and when his servant came back, four, five, six times, the answer was still the same; there was no sign of rain, but the brazen heavens looked down on an earth which was parched as if in an oven. “Go again!” said the prophet, and at the seventh time lo! there appeared the cloud like unto a man’s hand, and this cloud was the sure forerunner of the deluge and storm. Christian, go again seven times. Nay, I will venture to say seventy times seven, for God must keep his promise. Heaven and earth may pass away, but not one jot or tittle of Jehovah’s word can fail.” The grass withereth, the flower thereof fadeth away, but the word of our God endureth for ever.” Do you plead that enduring word? Let no dark thoughts drive you to despair. Continue to trust; continue to pray; increase in your fervency, and in the hope that the blessing will yet come. It did come to the Savior. The morning broke upon his midnight after all. Never tide ebbed out so far as in the Savior case, when the great stretches of misery and sorrow were visible where once God’s love had rolled in mighty floods; but when the time came it began to turn, and see how it hath turned now in mighty floods of matchless joy. The love of God has come back to our once suffering Savior, and there upon the eternal throne he sits, the Man, the Crucified, who bowed his head under mountains of almighty wrath, which broke in huge billows, and covered his soul. Be of good courage, Christian! Hope on, poor soul, and hope on forever.
Thus much by way of general direction; but we now go on to a second point, and shall inquire into: —
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II. The Causes Of Unanswered Prayer.
We shall, perhaps, on this theme, get a few special directions which may be available in particular cases. Dear friends, there are some of us who are not often troubled about unanswered prayer: on the contrary, our own experience is such that the existence of a God who hears his people’s cry is reduced to an absolute, mathematical certainty.
I have no more doubt about this than about my own existence, not because I can see it clearly and understand it perfectly, nor because, with a blind credulity, I submit myself to the Bible as being the infallible revelation of God. But because I have had real dealings with God, have tried and proved his promises to be true, and have found out that, according to my faith, it has been done unto me in a thousand instances. This is truth that those who have learned to live in the spirit-world, and to talk with God, understand and know as plainly as they understand and know that when a child speaketh to its father, its father granteth its request. It has become to many believers, not at all a matter to be argued or talked of by way of dispute. They know that they have fellowship with the Father, and with his Son, Jesus Christ, and their prayers are answered. But occasionally, to all believers, I suppose, there will come staggering moments, when they scarcely know how to reply to their doubts, because certain of their prayers have not been answered.
It may possibly happen that the cause of unanswered prayer may many times lie in something connected with sin. Do you not think that unanswered prayers are often a Fatherly chastisement for our offenses. The Savior, in that wonderful chapter where he tells out his love to us, says, “If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love,” and then he notes, as a special favor, if a man abide in his love, and keep his commandments, he “shall ask what he will, and it shall be done unto him.” Now, it seems to me to be only reasonable that if I will not do what God wills, God will refuse to do what I will; that if he asks of me a certain duty, and I refuse it, when I ask him for a certain privilege or favor, it is not unkind, but, on the other hand, most wise and kind, that he should say, “No, my child, no: if thou wilt not listen to my tender command, it is kind to refuse thee thy desire until thou dost repent and obey.”
Perhaps this is the way in which, too, are visited upon God’s people, some neglects of ordinances. “He that knoweth his Master’s will and doeth it not, the same shall be beaten with many stripes”; and one of these stripes may surely be our non-success in prayer. It may be also temporal affliction, but probably this is one of the main ways in which the Master inflicts the stripes upon his children. They are negligent of his commands, and he says, “Then thou shalt tarry awhile; I will not yet grant thee what thou seekest; but when thou comest to a better mind, and art more scrupulous and tender in the fulfilling of my commands, then thy longings shall be satisfied.”
It may occur, too, that this delay may be a sort of disclosure to us as to wherein our sin lieth. Sin sometimes lieth in a Christian unrepented of, because he only dimly realizes that it is there. Hear what Job declares: “Are the consolations of God small with thee? Is there any secret thing with thee?” That is to say, if thou lovest selfish ease and feeble comforting, if thou dost not prevail with God in prayer, is there some secret sin in thee which keepeth back the blessing? God doth, as it were, say to us, “Search ,and look.” Unanswered prayer should be to every Christian a search-warrant, and he should begin to examine himself to see whether there be not something harbored within which is contrary to the will of God. Oh! believer, this is not a hard work for thee to do, surely, but it is a very necessary one. Search thyself, and breathe the prayer, “Search me, O God, and try me, and know my ways, and see if there be any evil way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” I think this is one great reason for unanswered prayer, namely, that it is a chastisement for sin committed, or an admonition against sin harbored.
Sometimes there may be great sin in the prayer itself. Are not our greatest sins often connected with our holiest things? We must be aware of our prayers. There is such a thing as polluting the mercy-seat. Remember what became of Nadah and Abihu, who offered strange fire before the Lord. Beware, Christian, beware; thou mayest sin against God in the prayer-chamber, as well as thou canst in the market; and thou mayest offend on thy knees, as well as when thou art in thy business. Have a care, for how canst thou hope that a prayer thus stained with sin can ever succeed, unless thou bringest it to the blood to have it purged and cleansed from all defiling before it mounts to the throne of grace?
And I do sometimes fear, too, that our prayers do not speed, because the thing asked for, though as we think good for us, is asked for from a wrong motive.
If, for instance, a Christian minister asks that he may win souls in order that he may gain reputation and fame as a useful and successful evangelist for his Master, he will probably not be heard, for he asks from an unworthy motive. If I seek to be useful merely that I may be known to be a useful man or woman, I am really seeking my own honor, and can I expect God to minister to, and pamper that?
I must take care, then, that even when I ask for a good thing, I ask it, for the purest of reasons, viz., for God’s glory. Oh! what washing even our prayers need! What cleansing, what purging! Can we wonder that they do not succeed when we so often make mistakes, both in the substance of the prayers, and the motives from which we offer them?
Praying seems, to some persons, to be simply a child’s play or a formal habit. They will take a book, read a form of intercession, and perhaps offer a few extemporary words, and that is all. But these are all naught, and naughty prayers, unless God shall touch them, and give them life.
Sometimes, then, non-success in prayer may be caused by sin. In such a case, heart-searching, deep repentance, and especially a speedy going to the Cross to have renewed fellowship with the cleansing blood, and to be brought once more in contact with the holy sufferings of the blessed Substitute, will make us speed.
But we go on to notice that non-success in prayer may sometimes be the result of ignorance.
I think persons often offer very ignorant prayers indeed. I am sure I have good evidence that some do. There is scarcely ever a week passes in which I do not receive intelligence from different persons who are on the verge of bankruptcy, or deeply in debt, that they have prayed to God about it, and that they have been guided to write to me to get them out of their difficulties, and to pay their debts. Now, I am always perfectly willing to do so as soon as ever I am directed expressly by God himself, but I shall not receive the direction at second-hand. As soon as I receive it myself — and I think it is only fair that I should receive it, as well as they — I shall be quite willing to be obedient to his direction, provided, too, the funds are in hand, which does not often happen. But folks must be very foolish to suppose that, because they ask God that such and such a debt may be paid by miraculous means, it will certainly be done. I have a right to ask for anything which God has promised me, but if I go beyond the range of the Divine promises, I also go beyond the range of assured and confident expectation. The promises are very large and very wide, but when one gets a fancy in his head, he must not suppose that God is there, in his fancy. I have known some fanatical persons who thought they could live by faith. They were going to preach the Gospel, having no gifts whatever for preaching. They were going to be missionaries in a district having no more gift to be missionaries than horses in a plough. But they thought they were destined to do it, and therefore they tried to live by faith, and when they had been nearly half-starved, then they complained against the goodness, and abandoned the labor. Had God really inspired and sent them, he would have sustained and kept them, but if they go about it willfully and stubbornly on their own account, they must be driven back to realize their own ignorance of the Divine will. Now, we must not pray ignorantly; we must pray with the understanding and with the spirit, so that we may clearly know what we are praying about. Get the promise, and then offer the prayer, and the prayer will be answered as sure as God is God; but get thine own fancy into thy head, and thou wilt only have to get it out again, for it will be of no service to thee.
And then often-times we pray in a way in which our prayers could not be heard consistent with the dignity of the Most High. I love a holy familiarity with God, and I believe it to be commendable; but still, man is but man, while God is God, and, however familiar we may be with him in our hearts, still we must recollect the distance there is between the Most High and the most elevated and most beloved of his creatures, and we are not to speak as though it were in our power to do as we will and as we please. No; we are children, but we are to remember that children have a limit as to how they are to speak to their father. Their love may come as near as they please, but their impertinence may not, and we must mind that we do not mistake the familiarity of communion for the impudence of presumption. We must be careful to distinguish between the two, for he who is taught of God, and waiteth upon him according to his own mind, will find, as a general rule, that he will not be long without an answer to his prayer.
Now, if it be ignorance that thus prevents the answering of thy prayers, thou shouldest get better instructed, and search thou specially into such texts as bear upon the matter of prayer, that thou mayest know how to use thy private key of heaven, and open the sacred portals, the gate of the Divine mercy, for ignorance will often make thee to fail.
Again, does it not often happen that there may be reasons for delay lying in our own infirmity?
Sometimes, if a mercy were to come to a believer immediately that he asked for it, it would come too soon, but God timeth it until it appears only at the right and best moment. When a gracious godly soul has been much exercised in his mind concerning a special mercy: has studied it, weighed it, arrived at a proper apprehension of it, and arranged his plans for its proper use and benefit, then — just at the time that the barn was swept, and all the lumber taken out, then God’s harvest of bounty came home, and, the man being quite ready for the blessing, the blessing came.
Perhaps thou art not yet ready for the blessing. Thou hast asked for strong meat, but thou art but as yet a babe, and therefore thou art to be content with milk for a little while longer. Thou hast asked for a man’s trials, and a man’s privileges, and a man’s work, but thou art as yet only a child growing up into manhood, and thy good Father will give thee what thou askest for, but he will give it thee in such a way as to make it not a burden to thee, but a boon. If it came now, it might involve responsibilities which thou couldest not overtake, but, coming by and bye, thou shalt be well prepared for it.
There are reasons, too, I doubt not, which lie in our future, why our prayers are not answered. Delays in prayer may turn out to be a sort of training school for us. Take the Apostle’s instance. The “thorn in the flesh” was very painful, and though he was a chosen apostle, yet he had no answer. Thrice he cried, but still the “thorn in the flesh” was not removed. It was well that it was not, for Paul needed to be taught tenderness, in order that he might write those loving epistles of his, and therefore he received an answer of another sort, “My grace is sufficient for thee.” Oh! Christian! if thou couldest get rid of the trouble in which thou now art, thou wouldest not be able to comfort poor mourners, as thou shalt yet do. Thou wouldest not be a full-grown, strong man, if thou hadst not these stern trials to develop thy manly vigor. Men do not learn to be intrepid sailors by staying on dry land. Thou art to put out to sea in the midst of the storm, that thou mayest learn how to manage and guide the vessel of thy soul. Thou art going through a rough drill, that thou mayest be a valiant and stalwart, a good soldier of Jesus Christ, for battles are yet to come, and grim foes yet to face: for thou hast many fightings between now and the blessed active ease of heaven.
Thou hast not yet won the crown, but thou wilt have to cut thy way inch by inch and foot by foot, and the Master is making thee an athlete, that wrestling with thine enemies thou mayest overcome. He is strengthening thy muscles and tendons, thews and sinews, by the arduous exercise of unanswered prayer, that thou mayest be finely useful in the future.
Still, yet again, perhaps the reason why prayer is not always quickly answered is this: a reason which no tongue can tell, but which is inscrutable lying in the sovereign purposes and wisdom of God.
Now, see! If I cannot tell why God doth not hear me, what must I say? I had better say naught, but put my finger on my lips and wait. Who am I that I should question him as to what he doeth? Who am I that I should arraign my Maker before my bar, and say unto him, “What doest thou?”? Almighty Potter, thou hast a right to do as thou willest with thine own clay! We have learned to submit to thy will, not because we must, but because we love that will, feeling that thy will is the highest good of thy creatures, and the sublimest wisdom. Why should we be so anxious to know the depth of the sea, which cannot be fathomed by our line? Why must we be toiling to heave the lead so often? Leave these things with God, and go thou on with thy praying and thy believing, and all shall yet be well with thee.
And now I conclude this point by saying that if the Christian, after looking into the matter, cannot find out a reason why he should not be answered, let him still expect that he shall be, and wait still upon God, remembering, however, that he may never be answered after his own fashion, but that he shall be answered after God’s fashion.
I like that verse of old Erskine’s, for, though rough and quaint, it is true: —
“I’m heard when answered soon or late;
Yea, heard when I no answer get;
Yea, kindly answered when refused,
And treated well when hardly used.”
In heaven every believer will realize how great was this truth, and so here I leave it.
And now, to conclude, I thought I would say a few words upon a very special case which may occur, and which may be here represented this evening. I have no doubt that it is in more than one instance. It was once my case. It is not the case of a Christian asking a boon for himself, but it is the case of a sinner, conscious of his danger as a sinner, asking for mercy.
Brethren and sisters, it was a very unhappy lot to have to seek the Lord, with such earnestness as I could command as a child for four or five years, with sighs, and cries, and entreaties, but to have no comfortable answer whatsoever, to be as one that chooses strangling rather than life, because of a sense of God’s anger, in my soul. to desire reconciliation, to live in the midst of gospel light, and to hear the truth preached every Sabbath day, indeed everyday in the week after a fashion, and yet not to discover the way to heaven. Now, sometimes it is not good advice to say to such a person, Go on praying. It is good advice; I must correct myself there, but it is not the best advice in such a case. Soul, if thou hast been seeking mercy, and thou canst not find it, go on praying by all means; never relax that, but it is not by that that thou wilt ever get peace. The business of thy soul is to listen to Christ’s command, and his command is contained in the gospel, which gospel is not, “Go ye into all the world and tell every creature to pray,” but it is, “He that believeth and is baptised shall be saved.” Now, thy business is to pray, certainly, but thy first business is to believe. Thy prayers before thou believest have but little weight in them. Unbelieving prayers! Shall I call them prayers? Prayers without faith! They are birds without wings, and ships without sails, and beasts without legs. Prayers that have no faith in Christ in them are prayers without the blood on them: they are deeds without the signature, without the seal, without the stamp — they are impotent, illegal documents. Oh! if thou couldest but come as thou art, and look to Christ on the Cross! It is not thy prayers that can save thee: it is Christ’s prayers and Christ’s tears, and Christ’s sufferings, and Christ’s blood, and Christ’s death. If thou trusteth to thy prayers, thou hast gone back again to the old beggarly elements of the law. Thou mightest as well trust to thy good works as to thy prayers, and to trust either will be to rest in “a refuge of lies.” Thy hope, sinner, lies in the altogether gratuitous mercy of God, and that mercy only comes to those who rest in Jesus Christ alone, waiting patiently for him. Oh! that thou couldest but come just as thou art, and lay thyself at mercy’s door, with such a word as this on thy lips: —
“My hope is fixed on nothing else
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.”
There are no doings of thine needed to complete the work. Nay! I venture to say, not even any praying of thine. Thy prayings and thy doings shall each occupy their proper place afterwards, and then they shall be essential in their way, but now, as a sinner, thy business is with the sinner’s Savior. If thou art enabled now to look completely out of self, and see all that thy flesh can do as dead and buried forever in the grave of Christ, and as being naught and worse than naught, and if thou canst see Jesus, the mighty Savior, distributing the gifts which he has received for men, even distributing them to the rebellious — if thou canst thus trust him, thou art saved. What sayest thou, sinner? Art thou enabled to do it now? Canst now fall flat before his Cross? Oh! the happy day when I learned that I was no longer to look to self, but found that the gospel was, “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all ye ends of the earth.” Many of you have looked, brethren and sisters! Look again to that sacred head once wounded, and filled with pain and grief, but which now is crowned with glory! Look and renew your vow of dedication, and he will lift you up to be above the angels, and only second to God himself.
Oh! look now!
And as to you who have never looked before, I pray the Master to open your blind eyes, and cause the scales to drop, so that you may look now, and, while you look, may see everything you want laid up for you in Jesus. Everything a sinner needs can be richly supplied by him, and then the sinner can go his way rejoicing and singing, “Christ is all, and happy am I that I have sought and found him.” The Lord bless you all for his name’s sake. Amen.
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON.
PSALM 32.
This is a great psalm of grace, a psalm in which a sinner, cleansed by sovereign grace, adores and blesses the mercy of God.
Verse 1. Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.
This is not a blessing for the man who says he has no sin; this is not a benediction for the innocent, who talk about their own good works; but blessed is the man who, having sinned, is pardoned, whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered: in a word, it is a gospel blessing, it is the blessing of free grace.
2. Blessed is the man unto whom the LORD imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.
He had a thousand iniquities; he transgressed in all sorts of ways. The Lord does not impute these things to him. He has set them down to the account of another, who has ventured to stand in the sinner’s stead, and be made sin in the sinner’s place, but to this man, this blessed man, God doth not impute iniquity, and in his spirit there is no guile — he confesses his sin with honesty, he is pardoned with certainty, and in his spirit there is no cunning concealment.
3, 4. When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned into the drought of summer. Selah.
This is the experience of those men whom God saves. Till they confess sin, that sin rankles in them like venom; it boils their blood, it eats into their bones, it makes life worse than death, it makes them dread the wrath to come; their days are nights, and their nights are hells; they cannot bear themselves. This was David’s experience, and it has been the way by which God has led thousands of his redeemed ones that he might bring them to himself. As long as we cloak our sin and conceal it, and pretend that we are innocent, the fire burns within us; but when we just confess the sin, then it is that we are dealing with God aright, and God deals with us in grace.
5. I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the LORD; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Selah.
All gone, gone forever, gone at a stroke. Oh! what a mercy this is, that, when once we will take the place of sinners and plead guilty, then it is that we are absolved at once. We have but to own that we deserve the punishment, and straightway that punishment is remitted. This is the way of grace, the plan of infinite condescending love.
6. For this shall everyone that is godly pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found: surely in the floods of great waters they shall not come nigh unto him.
The man that has so prayed as to find complete forgiveness, he is the man that will never leave off praying as long as he lives. The one gain which covers everything, the gain of conscious forgiveness, inspires a man to pray about anything, and about everything, as long as ever he lives. “For this shall everyone that is godly pray unto thee.” “Thou art my hiding-place.” You see God was his hiding-place when he was in a storm of sin, and now he takes God to be his hiding-place in every time of trouble, from all the afflictions of his life, all the sorrows of the way. “Thou art my hiding-place; thou shalt preserve me from trouble.” Shall he not, since he has blotted out our sins? Oh! if God has preserved us from the wrath to come, what is there to be afraid of? “Thou shalt preserve me from trouble; thou shalt compass me about with songs of deliverance.” I shall live in a ring of music. I shall march onward to heaven as in the center of song. Why, it may well be so, when once God has freely blotted out our sins — “Thou shalt compass me about with sings of deliverance.” Ay, saith God, that I will, and I will do more.
8. I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye.
I have not blotted out thy sins to leave thee to wander back into them again — I will be thy teacher, thy folly shalt not be thy ruin, thine ignorance shall not be thy destruction. I will guide thee — look at me! — “I will guide thee with mine eye.” A glance, a look, shall be enough for thee. I will give thee such a heart that thou shalt understand the least motion of my finger. Nay, I will guide thee with mine eye.
9. Be ye not as the horse, or as the mule, which have no understanding: whose mouth must be held in with bit and bridle, lest they come year unto thee.
A pardoning God may well ask this of us, that we would be tender. Oh! let us be very willing to do the Lord’s will, plastic in his hands like clay in the hand of the potter. It is a great pity, brothers and sisters, when we won’t be guided by the gentle leadings of God, and must be whipped and spurred, and tugged at. For God will govern us if we are his people. If one bit will not do it, he will get a tougher bit that shall cut us and hurt us, but he will rule us, and so he ought to do, blessed be his name.
10, 11. Many sorrows shall be to the wicked: but he that trusteth in the LORD, mercy shall compass him about. Be glad in the LORD, and rejoice, ye righteous: and shout for joy, all yet that are upright in heart.