promises

An Oasis of Life in a Desert of Death

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

Supposing Him to be the gardener. – John 20:15

Upon a hard and flinty rock the Lord has made the Eden of His Church to grow. How came it to be, here an oasis of life in a desert of death? How came faith in the midst of unbelief, and hope where all is servile fear, and love where hate abounds? “Ye are of God, little children, and the whole world lieth in the wicked one.” How came there to be a people for God, separated, and sanctified, and consecrated, and ordained to bring forth fruit unto His name? …How comes the Church of God to flourish in such a clime? This present evil world is very uncongenial to the growth of grace, and the Church is not able by herself alone to resist the evil influences which surround her. The Church contains within itself elements which tend to its own disorder and destruction if left alone; even as the garden has present in its soil all the germs of a tangled thicket of weeds. The best Church that ever Christ had on earth would, within a few years, apostatise from the truth if deserted by the Spirit of God. The world never helps the Church; it is all in arms against it; there is nothing in the world’s air or soil that can fertilise the Church even to the least degree. How is it, then, that notwithstanding all this, the Church is a fair garden unto God, and there are sweet spices grown in its beds, and lovely flowers are gathered by the Divine hand from its borders? The continuance and prosperity of the Church can only be accounted for by “supposing Him to be the gardener.” Almighty strength is put to the otherwise impossible work of sustaining a holy people among men; almighty wisdom exercises itself upon this otherwise insuperable difficulty. Hear ye the word of the Lord and learn hence the reason for the growth of His Church below. “I, the Lord, do keep it: I will water it every moment; lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1699.cfm

Our Vine-dresser

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

She, supposing Him to be the gardener… – John 20:15

“I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser.” – John 15:1

He says, “I am the true vine: My Father is the husbandman,” and that is one view of it; but we may also sing, “My Well-beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: and He fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine”-that is to say, He acted as gardener to it. Thus has Isaiah taught us to sing a song of the Well-beloved touching His vineyard. We read of our Lord just now under these terms-“Thou that dwellest in the gardens, the companions hearken to Thy voice.” To what purpose does He dwell in the vineyards but that He may see how the vines flourish and to care for all the plants? The image, I say, is so far from being unnatural that it is most pregnant with suggestions and full of useful teaching. In one of His own parables our Lord makes Himself to be the dresser of the vineyard…When the “certain man” came in and saw the fig tree that it brought forth no fruit, he said unto the dresser of his vineyard, “Cut it down: why cumbereth it the ground?” Who was it that intervened between that profitless tree and the axe but our great Intercessor and Interposer? He it is who continually comes forward with “Let it alone this year also till I shall dig about it and dung it.” In this case He Himself takes upon Himself the character of the vine-dresser, and we are not wrong in “supposing Him to be the gardener.”

If we would be supported by a type, our Lord takes the name of “the Second Adam,” and the first Adam was a gardener. Moses tells us that the Lord God placed the man in the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it…Behold, the Church is Christ’s Eden, watered by the river of life, and so fertilized that all manner of fruits are brought forth unto God; and He, our second Adam, walks in this spiritual Eden to dress it and to keep it; and so by a type we see that we are right in “supposing Him to be the gardener.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1699.cfm

A Hunger and Thirst for Our Beloved

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

“I thirst.” – John 19:28

Know ye not, beloved, -for I speak to those who know the Lord, -that ye are crucified together with Christ? Well, then, what means this cry, “I thirst,” but this, that we should thirst too? We do not thirst after the old manner wherein we were bitterly afflicted, for He hath said, “He that drinketh of this water shall never thirst:” but now we covet a new thirst. A refined and heavenly appetite, a craving for our Lord. O Thou blessed Master, if we are indeed nailed up to the tree with Thee, give us a thirst after Thee with a thirst which only the cup of “the new covenant in Thy blood” can ever satisfy. Certain philosophers have said that they love the pursuit of truth even better than the knowledge of truth. I differ from them greatly, but I will say this, that next to the actual enjoyment of my Lord’s presence I love to hunger and to thirst after Him…I would grow more and more insatiable after my divine Lord, and when I have much of Him, I would still cry for more; and then for more, and still for more. My heart shall not be content till He is all in all to me, and I am altogether lost in Him. O to be enlarged in soul so as to take deeper draughts of His sweet love, for our heart cannot have enough. One would wish to be as a spouse, who, when she had already been feasting in the banqueting-house, and had found His fruit sweet to her taste, so that she was overjoyed, yet cried out, “Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples, for I am sick of love.” She craved full flagons of love though she was already overpowered by it. This is a kind of sweet whereof if a man hath much he must have more, and when he hath more he is under a still greater necessity to receive more, and so on, his appetite for ever growing by that which it feeds upon, till he is filled with all the fulness of God. “I thirst,”-ay, this is my soul’s word with her Lord. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1409.cfm

Our Lord Thirsts for Us

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

“I thirst.” – John 19:28

Our blessed Lord has at this time a thirst for communion with each one of you who are His people, not because you can do Him good, but because He can do you good. He thirsts to bless you and to receive your grateful love in return; He thirsts to see you looking with believing eye to His fulness and holding out your emptiness that He may supply it…And what makes Him love us so? Ah, that I cannot tell, except His own great love. He must love, it is His nature. He must love His chosen whom He has once begun to love, for He is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. His great love makes Him thirst to have us much nearer than we are; He will never be satisfied till all His redeemed are beyond gunshot of the enemy. I will give you one of His thirsty prayers-“Father, I will that they also whom Thou hast given Me be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory.” He wants you brother, He wants you, dear sister, He longs to have you wholly to Himself. Come to Him in prayer, come to Him in fellowship, come to Him by perfect consecration, come to Him by surrendering your whole being to the sweet mysterious influences of His Spirit. Sit at His feet with Mary, lean on His breast with John; yea, come with the spouse in the song and say, “Let Him kiss me with the kisses of His mouth, for His love is better than wine.” He calls for that: will you not give it to Him…Let all your love be His. I know He loves to receive from you, because He delights even in a cup of cold water that you give to one of His disciples; how much more will He delight in the giving of your whole self to Him? Therefore, while He thirsts give Him to drink this day. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1409.cfm

Christ’s Desire to Save Men

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

There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water: Jesus saith unto her, “Give Me to drink.”…In the mean while His disciples prayed Him, saying, “Master, eat.” But He said unto them, “I have meat to eat that ye know not of.” – John 4:7,31-32

“I thirst.” – John 19:28

I cannot think that natural thirst was all He felt…”I thirst” meant that His heart was thirsting to save men. This thirst had been on Him from the earliest of His earthly days. “Wist ye not,” said He, while yet a boy, “that I must be about My Father’s business?” Did He not tell His disciples, “I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straitened till it be accomplished?” He thirsted to pluck us from between the jaws of hell, to pay our redemption price, and set us free from the eternal condemnation which hung over us; and when on the cross the work was almost done His thirst was not assuaged, and could not be till He could say, “It is finished.” It is almost done, Thou Christ of God; Thou hast almost saved Thy people; there remaineth but one thing more, that Thou shouldst actually die, and hence Thy strong desire to come to the end and complete Thy labour. Thou wast still straightened till the last pang was felt and the last word spoken to complete to full redemption, and hence Thy cry, “I thirst.”

Christ was always thirsty to save men, and to be loved of men; and we see a type of His life-long desire when, being weary, He sat thus on the well and said to the woman of Samaria, “Give Me to drink.” There was a deeper meaning in His words than she dreamed of, as a verse further down fully proves, when He said to His disciples, “I have meat to eat that ye know not of.” He derived spiritual refreshment from the winning of that women’s heart to Himself. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1409.cfm

Our Glorious Samson

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

After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, saith, “I thirst.” Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and they filled a sponge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to His mouth. When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, He said, “It is finished” and He bowed His head, and gave up the ghost. – John 19:28-30

It seems to me very wonderful that this “I thirst” should be, as it were, the clearance of it all. He had no sooner said “I thirst,” and sipped the vinegar, than He shouted, “It is finished”; and all was over: the battle was fought and the victory won for ever, and our great Deliverer’s thirst was the sign of His having smitten the last foe. The flood of His grief has passed the high-water mark and began to be assuaged. The “I thirst” was the bearing of the last pang; what if I say it was the expression of the fact that His pangs had at last begun to cease, and their fury had spent itself, and left Him able to note His lesser pains? The excitement of a great struggle makes men forget thirst and faintness; it is only when all is over that they come back to themselves and note the spending of their strength. The great agony of being forsaken by God was over, and He felt faint when the strain was withdrawn. I like to think of our Lord’s saying, “It is finished,” directly after He had exclaimed, “I thirst”; for these two voices come so naturally together. Our glorious Samson had been fighting our foes; heaps upon heaps He had slain His thousands, and now like Samson He was sore athirst. He sipped of the vinegar, and He was refreshed, and no sooner has He thrown off the thirst than He shouted like a conqueror, “It is finished,” and quitted the field, covered with renown. Let us exult as we see our Substitute going through with His work even to the bitter end, and then with a “Consummatum est” returning to His Father, God. O souls, burdened with sin, rest ye here, and in resting, live. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1409.cfm

Appetite Swallowing Up Itself

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

And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. – Genesis 3:6

“I thirst.” – John 19:28

We know from experience that the present effect of sin in every man who indulges in it is thirst of soul. The mind of man is like the daughters of the horseleech, which cry for ever, “Give, give.” Metaphorically understood, thirst is dissatisfaction, the craving of the mind for something which it has not, but which it pines for. Our Lord says, “If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink,” that thirst being the result of sin in every ungodly man at this moment. Now Christ standing in the stead of the ungodly suffers thirst as a type of His enduring the result of sin. The great Surety says, “I thirst,” because He is placed in the sinner’s stead, and He must therefore undergo the penalty of sin for the ungodly. “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” points to the anguish of His soul; “I thirst” expresses in part the torture of His body; and they were both needful, because it is written of the God of justice that He is “able to destroy both soul and body in hell,” and the pangs that are due to law are of both kinds, touching both heart and flesh. See, brethren, where sin begins, and mark that there it ends. It began with the mouth of appetite, when it was sinfully gratified, and it ends when a kindred appetite is graciously denied. Our first parents plucked forbidden fruit, and by eating slew the race. Appetite was the door of sin, and therefore in that point our Lord was put to pain. With “I thirst” the evil is destroyed and receives its expiation. I saw the other day the emblem of a serpent with its tail in its mouth, and if I carry it a little beyond the artist’s intention the symbol may set forth appetite swallowing up itself. A carnal appetite of the body, the satisfaction of the desire for food, first brought us down under the first Adam, and now the pang of thirst, the denial of what the body craved for, restores us to our place. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1409.cfm