Attributes of God

All Praise for Thee and Only for Thee

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

Praise waiteth for Thee, O God, in Zion. – Psalm 65:1

“Praise for Thee, and all the praise for Thee,” and no praise for man or for any other who may be thought to be, or may pretend to be, worthy of praise. Have I not sometimes gone into places called houses of God where the praise has waited for a woman-for the Virgin, where praise has waited for the saints, where incense has smoked to heaven, and songs and prayers have been sent up to deceased martyrs and confessors who are supposed to have power with God? In Rome it is so, but in Zion it is not so. Praise waiteth for thee, O Mary, in Babylon; but praise waiteth for Thee, O God, in Zion. Unto God, and unto God alone, the praise of His true church must ascend. If Protestants are free from this deadly error, I fear they are guilty of another, for in our worship, we too often minister unto our own selves. We do so when we make the tune and manner of the song to be more important than the matter of it. I am afraid that where organs, choirs, and singing men and singing women are left to do the praise of the congregation, men’s minds are more occupied with the due performance of the music, than with the Lord, who alone is to be praised. God’s house is meant to be sacred unto Himself, but too often it is made an opera-house, and Christians form an audience, not an adoring assembly. The same thing may, unless great care be taken, happen amid the simplest worship, even though everything which does not savor of gospel plainness is excluded, for in that case we may drowsily drawl out the words and notes, with no heart whatever. To sing with the soul, this only is to offer acceptable song! We come not together to amuse ourselves, to display our powers of melody or our aptness in creating harmony we come to pay our adoration at the footstool of the Great King, to whom alone be glory for ever and ever. True praise is for God-for God alone. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1023.cfm

Our Holy Worship

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

Praise waiteth for Thee, O God, in Zion: and unto Thee shall the vow be performed. – 65:1

Although we shall never cease to pray as long as we live here below, and are surrounded by so many wants, yet we should never so pray as to forget to praise. “Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth, as it is heaven,” must never be left out because we are pressed with want, and therefore hasten to cry, “Give us this day our daily bread.” It will be a sad hour when the worship of the church shall be only a solemn wail. Notes of exultant thanksgiving should ever ascend from her solemn gatherings. “Praise the Lord O Jerusalem; praise thy God, O Zion.” “Praise ye the Lord. Sing unto the Lord a new song, and His praise in the congregation of saints. Let Israel rejoice in Him that made him: let the children of Zion be joyful in their King.” Let it abide as a perpetual ordinance, while sun and moon endure, “Praise waiteth for Thee, O God, in Zion.” Never think little of praise, since holy angels and saints made perfect count it their life-long joy, and even the Lord Himself saith, “Whoso offereth praise, glorifieth Me.’ The tendency, I fear, among us has been to undervalue praise as a part of public worship, whereas it should be second to nothing. We frequently hear of prayer-meetings, but seldom of praise-meetings. We acknowledge the duty of prayer by setting apart certain times for it; we do not always so acknowledge the duty of praise…In everything we are to give thanks; it is as much an apostolic precept as that other, “In everything, by prayer and supplication, make your requests known unto God.” I have often said to you, dear brethren, that prayer and praise are like the breathing in and out of the air, and make up that spiritual respiration by which the inner life is instrumentally supported. We take in an inspiration of heavenly air as we pray: we breathe it out again in praise unto God, from whom it came; if then, we would be healthy in spirit, let us be abundant in thanksgiving…”Praise the Lord; for the Lord is good: sing praises unto His name; for it is pleasant.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1023.cfm

Only One Altar

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

Praise is awaiting You, O God, in Zion; and to You the vow shall be performed. – Psalm 65:1

Upon Zion there was erected an altar dedicated to God for the offering of sacrifices…The worship of God upon the high places was contrary to the divine command: “Take heed to thyself that thou offer not thy burnt offerings in every place that thou seest: but in the place which the Lord shall choose in one of thy tribes, there thou shalt offer thy burnt offerings, and there thou shalt do all that I command thee.” Hence the tribes on the other side of Jordan, when they erected a memorial altar, disclaimed all intention of using it for the purpose of sacrifice, and said most plainly, “God forbid that we should rebel against the Lord, and turn this day from following the Lord, to build an altar for burnt offerings, for meat offerings, or for sacrifices, beside the altar of the Lord our God that is before his tabernacle.”

In fulfillment of this ancient type, we also “have an altar whereof they have no right to eat that serve the tabernacle.” Into our spiritual worship, no observers of materialistic ritualism may intrude; they have no right to eat at our spiritual altar, and there is no other at which they can eat and live for ever. There is but one altar Jesus Christ our Lord. All other altars are impostures and idolatrous inventions. Whether of stone, or wood, or brass, they are the toys with which those amuse themselves who have returned to the beggarly elements of Judaism, or else the apparatus with which clerical jugglers dupe the sons and daughters of men. Holy places made with hands are now abolished; they were once the figures of the true, but now that the substance has come, the type is done away with. The all-glorious person of the Redeemer, God and Man, is the great center of Zion’s temple, and the only real altar of sacrifice. He is the Church’s head, the Church’s heart, the Church’s altar, priest, and all in all. “To Him shall the gathering of the people be.” Around Him we all congregate even as the tribes around the tabernacle of the Lord in the wilderness…So where Christ is the center, where His one sacrifice is the altar whereon all offerings are laid; and where the Church unites around that common center, and rejoices in that one sacrifice, there is the true Zion. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1023.cfm

The Great Redeemer Lives

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

I am He that liveth, and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen. – Revelation 1:18

The Lord in the glory of His tenderness mentions…His atoning death. He says, “I was dead,” the original more correctly rendered is “was made dead.” Here we come upon the human nature of our Redeemer. As God and as man He had two natures, but He was not two persons. As one person He ever lives, and yet He was made to die. He came into this world in human form that He might be capable of death; the pure spirit of God could not die, it was not possible that He, the I AM, could be subject to death; but He allied Himself with humanity, and in that human form Jesus could die, and did die. In very deed, and truth, and not in semblance; Jesus bowed His head, and gave up the ghost, and they laid His corpse in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. Here to the child of God is a fruitful source of consolation. He died, then the atonement is complete; without the shedding of blood there is no remission, but the death of the Son of God brings plenteous pardon. There must be in the death of such a one of sufficient merit to remove guilt and cleanse transgression. Is it not written, “He hath washed us from our sins in His own blood?” Dost thou not hear that song in heaven? Will not its music make thee glad? His own blood hath washed thee; if thou believest in Him thou art clean. Look to Calvary, and as thou lookest there and perceivest that He was dead, “fear not.”

And then the master declared His endless life, “I am alive for evermore.” He who offered up the atonement lives again to claim the effect of His sacrifice. He has presented the meritorious sacrifice, and now He has gone to heaven to plead the sacrifice before the throne of God, and to lay claim to the place which He has prepared for them that love Him. Thou hast no dead Savior to trust to: thou reliest in Him who once died-this is comfort to thee, but He lives, the great Redeemer lives. He has risen from the tomb; He has climbed the hills of heaven; He sits at the right hand of the Father, prepared to defend His people. If thou hadst a Christ in the sepulcher that were sorrow upon sorrow; but thou hast a Christ in heaven, who can die no more. Be thou of good cheer. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm

Only God is First and Last

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

And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am He that liveth, and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen. – Revelation 1:17,18

As to the Lord’s person, Jesus revealed to His disciple that He was most truly divine. “I am the first and the last.” This language can be used of none but God Himself; none but He is first; none but He is last; none but God can be first and last. Now, our Lord Jesus Christ was evidently first. He existed before He was born into the world. We read, “a body hast Thou prepared Me.” Then Christ was a previously existing one for whom that body was prepared; and He it is who said, “Lo, I come, to do Thy will O God.” He came into the world, but He had from old eternity dwelt in the bosom of the Father. John the Baptist was born into the world before the Savior, of whom he was the forerunner, but what does he say? His testimony is “He, coming after me, is preferred before me, for He was before me.” He is first in order of honor because first in order of existence. John was the elder as man, but as God the Lord Jesus is from everlasting. Go back in history as far as you will; with one leap ascend to the days of Moses, and there is Christ before you, for we read: “Let us not tempt Christ as some of them also tempted and were destroyed of serpents.” There was Christ, then, in the wilderness vexed by the people. He it was whose voice then shook the earth, but who will yet shake not the earth only but also heaven.

By the words “the first and the last” are signified, in most languages, the sum and substance of all things. We say sometimes the top and the bottom of it is so and so; we mean that it is the whole of it. And the Greeks were wont to say, “This is the prow and stern of the business,” meaning that it is the whole. And so Jesus Christ, in being first and last, is all in all. And, truly, it is so in the working of redemption and salvation; He begins, carries on, completes; He asks no creature help and will have none. To us He is the author and the finisher of our faith, the alpha of our first comfort, and the omega of our final bliss. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

 https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm

The Right State for Celestial Instructions

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

And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am He that liveth, and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen. – Revelation 1:17,18

In order to complete the cure of His servant our Lord went on to give him fuller instruction in that very matter which had overpowered him. Sometimes like cures like. If in a certain sense it is true of divine revelations, that “shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,” it is assuredly true that “drinking largely sobers us again.” If a glimpse of Christ makes holy men to faint, a clearer sight of Him will set them on their feet again. Our Lord went on to instruct John in the glory of His person and power, that his fears might be removed. And truly, brethren, John was in a right state for such celestial instruction; he who is lowly is ready to learn mysteries. He was like wax ready for the seal; or as paper cleansed of all other writing. Because we think we know, we know not; but the death of the pride of knowledge is the birth of true understanding. The Lord loves best for pupils those who lie lowest before Him. “The meek will He guide in judgment, the meek will He teach His way.” “With the lowly is wisdom.” Where Jesus is the teacher, and instructs the heart in the things concerning Himself, the soul is made to inherit substance, and its treasures are filled. Blessed are the men who are taught by Him who is the wisdom of God, even though while they watch at the posts of His doors they lie as dead men; they are blessed, for they shall find life, and obtain favor of the Lord. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm

The Power of THE WORD

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

Fear not… – Revelation 1:17

The word of God, as we find it in this book, is very consoling; the word of God, as we hear it from Christ’s ministers, has great power in it; but the real and true power of the word lies in Jesus THE WORD. When the truth falls fresh from His own lips, then is it power. Right truly did the Master say, “the words which I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” With what power did those syllables fall on the fluttered heart of John-“Fear not.” Oh, that we might hear the same voice by the Spirit in our inmost souls.

“Oh, might I hear Thine heavenly tongue,
But whisper ‘Thou art Mine.’
Those gentle words should raise my song
To notes almost divine.”

Truly there are many voices and each has its significance, but the voice of Jesus has a heaven of bliss in its every accent. Let but my Beloved speak to me, and I will forego the angelic symphonies. Though He should only say, “Fear not,” and not a word beyond, it were worth worlds to see Him open His mouth unto us. But you say, can we still hear Jesus speak to us? Ay, by His Spirit. His Spirit still hath fellowship with the hearts of men, and He can bring the word of Scripture right home into the soul, until it becometh no more the letter but the living, quickening word of Christ. Do you know what I mean by this? If you do not, it is not possible to tell you; and if you do, you will need no explanation. Jesus speaks to the heart, the truth comes not in word only, but in demonstration of the Spirit and with power. O thou troubled believer, thou who art abashed by the very glory thou hast been made to see, be assured that Jesus will draw near unto thy soul, and touch thee, and speak with thee, so that thou shalt be strengthened with might by His Spirit in thine inner man. Had John not fallen as dead, he might never have heard the voice and felt the touch of His Lord. Sweet is the fall which leads to such a rise again. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm