Attributes of God

The Life-long Campaign

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, repentance, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

…only the stump of Dagon was left to him. – 1 Samuel 5:4

Here is the sphere in which faith is to work—it does not talk of ended warfare but carries on the life-long campaign to ultimate victory. Faith does not say, “I have ceased the conflict”—she knows better! Faith says, “I am in the midst of it, warring with a thousand foes and looking for the victory through Jesus Christ, my Lord.” O Brothers and Sisters, be strong in faith by the power of the Holy Spirit, for you have need to be, since the stump of Dagon still remains! The lusting of the flesh abides still in the regenerate! Look at this matter again. That stump of Dagon which remained was a vile thing—it was a piece of an idol—a fragment of a monstrous image which had been worshiped instead of God!

Now, the sin which dwells in you is never to be regarded by you as anything else than a horrible, loathsome and detestable thing. After such love as you and I have known, that there should be in us even the power to be ungrateful ought to shock us! After such proof of His Truth as God has shown us, that after such faithfulness and such abundant evidences of faithfulness we should still be capable of unbelief ought to be a sorrow to us! Oh, I wish I could never sin again throughout time or eternity! Oh, that every particle of the tinder of depravity into which the devil could let a spark fall was gone from my nature! It is a mercy to have the sparks put out, but it is a pity to have even the tinder left—and there is plenty of this tinder about us all!

Dagon’s Ups and Downs by C. H. Spurgeon

Fear Your Self

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The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? – Jeremiah 17:9

Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. – Ephesians 6:11

It is a good thing to look at your face in a mirror, but your face is not yourself—no mirror can show you yourself. There is a certain temptation which has an affinity to the evil within you and, should Satan bring that temptation near, you will see yourself to your horror and shame! There shall then look out of the window of your countenance a man whom you did not see when you looked in the glass, for you only saw the house he lived in! So ugly is he that he makes the very house he lives in look horrible! When the angry man comes up and is visible to the naked eye, how he deforms the countenance! When obstinate old Adam comes to the window, what a dark forbidding face he wears! When that envious spirit comes up, what an evil glance there is in the eye! When the unbelieving spirit peers through the lattice, what a miserable countenance he shows compared with the face of faith and childlike confidence in God!

There is nobody in this world, dear Brothers and Sisters, that you have so much cause to be afraid of as yourself! Augustine used to pray, “Lord, deliver me from that evil man, myself.” A very appropriate prayer for a woman, too— “Lord, save me from myself.” If you are saved from yourself, you will be saved from the devil—for what can the devil do unless self joins hands with him in unholy league? But, oh, what watchfulness it will need! Here is room for faith, indeed! Faith does not decline the conflict nor puff us up with the notion that the fight is over—on the contrary, it takes to itself the whole armor of God because it sees the battle to be still raging! Faith is needed to be the shield to keep off the fiery darts and the sword with which to smite the foe.

Dagon’s Ups and Downs by C. H. Spurgeon

The Reigning Power of Sin is Destroyed

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

Dagon was fallen upon his face to the ground before the ark of the LORD; and the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the threshold; only the stump of Dagon was left to him. – 1 Samuel 5:4

The hands of Dagon were broken off and even thus the active power, the working power of sin is taken away. Both the palms of the idols’ hands were cut off upon the threshold, so that he had not a hand left. Neither right-handed sin nor left-handed sin shall remain in the Believer when God’s sanctifying Grace fetches Dagon down! The secret reigning power is broken and so is the manifest working power. The Christian is kept from putting forth his hand into iniquity. He is crucified with Christ and so both hands are nailed to the Cross and fastened up from performing those deeds of ill towards which the lusts of the flesh would urge him! This happened, too, if you notice, very speedily, for we are told, a second time, that when they arose early on the morrow, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face.

It does not take Grace long, when it is once in the soul, to overturn the reigning power and the active energy of sin, even when these, for a while, appear to get the upper hand. Brothers and Sisters, I hope you know this. I hope that the Spirit of God, which is in you, and the love of Christ, which reigns in you, have destroyed the power which sin once had in your souls. If it is not so, then question yourselves whether the Spirit of God is in you at all! It is not possible that the Ark should be in the temple and that Dagon should be standing there unbroken! Not till the morrow morning shall evil remain unchallenged and unmoved upon the throne!

Dagon’s Ups and Downs by C. H. Spurgeon

The Result of the Grace of God

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

Dagon was fallen upon his face to the ground before the ark of the LORD; and the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the threshold; only the stump of Dagon was left to him. – 1 Samuel 5:4

Notice that although they again set Dagon up, he had to go down again with a worse fall. I have no doubt it took them a long pull and a great heave to haul the uncomely lump of marble into its place again. Many strong limbs were tired, and muscles strained to lift up the huge god and set him on his pedestal! But it was no trouble for the Lord to upset the ugly stone! No rope was needed and no straining or pulling! “Bel bows down and Nebo stoops” when Jehovah uplifts Himself! Only shut the temple gates and leave the Ark and Dagon to have it out between them—and Dagon gets the worst of it! Only, mark this, Dagon has not gained much by being reinstated, for this time, when he comes down, behold, he was fallen on his face to the ground before the Ark of Jehovah, “and the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the threshold.”

The idol’s head was gone and, even so, the reigning power of sin is utterly broken and destroyed—its beauty, its cunning, its glory are all dashed to atoms! This is the result of the Grace of God, and the sure result of it, if it once comes into the soul, however long the conflict may continue and however desperate the efforts of Satan to regain his empire. O Believer, sin may trouble you, but it shall not tyrannize over you! “Sin shall not have dominion over you,” says the Holy Spirit, “for you are not under the Law, but under Grace.” If the power of evil is set up for awhile, it shall only come down with the greater force—and its head shall be cut off.

Dagon’s Ups and Downs by C. H. Spurgeon

Our Dagon Cast Down Again

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And they took Dagon and set him in his place again. And when they arose early on the morrow morning, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the ground before the ark of the LORD; and the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the threshold; only the stump of Dagon was left to him. – 1 Samuel 5:3,4

The setting up of Dagon, the second time, and his second fall very well represent the battle going on in the soul between sin and Grace. What fools these Philistines were to continue worshiping a god which, when it tumbled down, could not get up again! To worship a god which fell on its face was bad enough, but to worship one that could not rise when he fell—but needed to be set in his place by human hands—was certainly vile infatuation!

Even thus Satan and the flesh come into our souls and try to set our fallen Dagon up, again, with some measure of success. It often happens that in young converts there comes a period when it looks as if they had altogether apostatized and gone back to their former ways. It seems as if the work of God were not real in their souls and Divine Grace was not triumphant. Do you wonder at it? I have ceased to wonder! The Gospel is preached and the man accepts it—and there is a marvelous difference in him! But when he goes among his old companions, although he is resolved not to fall into his former sins, they try him severely. He is assailed in a thousand ways! Now, all this is a violent attempt of Satan and the flesh to set Dagon up again! They know that the Lord has thrown him down and they cannot bear it…The wanderers have come back, weeping and sighing, to admit that they have dishonored their profession—and what has been the result in the long run?

Why, they have had more humility, more tenderness of heart, more love to Christ, more gratitude than they had before! And I have been glad, (not glad that they wandered), but glad that the Grace of God, when He has brought them back again more fully, has given them a deeper conversion and a more lasting and substantial work of Grace, so that afterwards they have continued, by the Grace of God, honorable, useful Christians even to the end! 

Dagon’s Ups and Downs by C. H. Spurgeon

Quietly Consider the Word of God

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

And when they arose early on the morrow morning, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the ground before the ark of the LORD; and the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the threshold; only the stump of Dagon was left to him. – 1 Samuel 5:4

Now, what happened on the night mentioned in the text? Dagon fell before the Ark when it was all quiet and still in the temple. While the worshipers were there, during the day, there was noise and shouting—the false god sat aloft, and you could not tell that there was any mysterious power about the Ark. It was in the quiet of the night that this deed was done and thus, often, in the hearing of the Word, Grace is introduced into the heart. But you would not know that any change was worked, for it is only when the man gets away from the world’s business—gets alone and begins to consider—that a Divinely-mysterious might is displayed by the inward Grace so as to sink sin and lay the power of evil low.

Would to God our hearers took more opportunities for quietly considering the Word of God! How much more blessing might often be gotten out of sermons and books if there were more meditation! You get the grapes, but you do not tread them in the winepress! There is more trouble taken to collect the sheaves of the sermon than is afterwards expended in threshing them out! The power which smote Dagon was displayed in the quiet of the night—and when the Grace of God has entered into your souls, it is probable that the coming down of sin will be better effected in times of quiet thought and searching of heart than at any other period. Thought is the channel of immense benefit to the soul. Shut the temple doors and let all be still—and then will the Holy Spirit work wonders in the soul!

Dagon’s Ups and Downs by C. H. Spurgeon

The Dagon Fall of Our Sin

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God Leave a comment

…behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the earth before the ark of the LORD. And they took Dagon, and set him in his place again.…behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the ground before the ark of the LORD… – 1 Samuel 5:3,4

Sin of every sort is bowed low before the triumphant Grace of God! Yes, and the man who receives the Grace of God feels that the love of any and every sin is cast out of its place in his heart. Now he desires to be quit of it all and anxiously cries, “Lord, what would you have me to do?” He will no more go and live in sin, as he did before, than Paul will continue to be a persecutor after the Lord, even Jesus, has appeared to him by the way. What a Dagon-fall there was in the Apostle’s pride just outside the Damascus gate! Such a fall takes place in the heart of every man to whom the Grace of God comes with power!

This fall of Dagon very soon began to be perceived, for, “When they of Ashdod arose early on the morrow, behold, Dagon was fallen on his face to the earth.” Very soon after the entrance of Divine Grace, this sign follows and, before long, it is seen and known. Let no man conceive that there is Grace in his soul if Dagon still sits on the throne! This is one of the earliest tokens of the entrance of the life of God into the soul—that sin falls down from its high place and is no more held in honor. At the same time, observe that Dagon was not broken. He had fallen on his face, but that was all—so that the next day his foolish worshipers set him up, again.

Sometimes, at the first entrance of Grace, there is a downfall of sin, but nothing like such a breaking and destroying of sin in the soul as there will be afterwards. When the Divine life has entered, sin is dethroned—it no longer sits up there in the place of God—but yet, for all that, there is an awful power remaining in the corrupt nature. There is a deadly tendency to sin, a powerful law in the members bringing the soul into captivity. Still, down the idol goes, even if it is not broken! It cannot reign, though it may remain to trouble us.

Dagon’s Ups and Downs by C. H. Spurgeon