promises

God Knows

Sherry Attributes of God, Christian Life, prayer, promises 3 Comments

You scrutinize my path and my lying down, And are intimately acquainted with all my ways. Even before there is a word on my tongue, Behold, O LORD, You know it all.…-Psalm 139:3-4

Prayerful man, prayerful woman, here is a consolation-God sees you: and if He can see you, surely He can hear you. Why, we can often hear people, when we cannot see them. If God is so near to us, and if His voice is like the thunder, surely His ears are as good as His eyes, and He will be sure to answer us. Perhaps you cannot say a word when you pray. Never mind, God does not want to hear; He can tell what you mean even by seeing you. “There,” says the Lord, “is a child of Mine in prayer. He says not a word; but do you see that tear rolling down his cheek? do you hear that sigh?” Oh! mighty God, Thou canst see both tear and sigh; Thou canst read desire when desire hath not clothed itself in words…Ah, God, when I cannot pray with words, I will throw myself flat on my face, and I will groan my prayer; and if I cannot groan it I will sigh it; and if I cannot sigh it I will wish it: and when these eye-strings break, and when death has sealed these lips, I will enter heaven with a prayer, which Thou wilt not hear but which Thou wilt see-the prayer of my inmost spirit, when my heart and my flesh fail me, that God may be the strength of my life and portion for ever. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0085.cfm

God’s Activity

Sherry Attributes of God, Christian Life, promises 3 Comments

Am I a God at hand, says the LORD, and not a God afar off? -Jeremiah 23:23

(L)est any should suppose that God may be in a place, and yet slumbering, let me remind him that in every spot to which he can travel, there is, not simply God, but also God’s activity. Wherever I go I shall find, not a slumbering God, but a God busy about the affairs of this world. Take me to the green sward, and pleasant pasture-why, every little blade of grass there has God’s hand in it, making it grow; and every tiny daisy, which a child likes to pluck, looks up with its little eye, and says, “God is in me, circulating my sap, and opening my little flower.” Go where you will through this London, where vegetation is scarcely to be found, look up yonder and see those rolling stars; God is active there: it is His hand that wheels along the stars and moves the moon in her nightly course…God is everywhere, not as a slumbering God, but as an active God. I am upon the sea; and there I see God making the everlasting pulse of nature beat in constant ebbs and flows. I am in the pathless desert, but above me screams the vulture, and I see God winging the wild bird’s flight. I am shut up in a hermitage; but an insect drops from its leaf, and I see in that insect, life which God preserves and sustains; yea, shut me out from the animate creation, and put me on the barren rock, where moss itself cannot find a footing; and I shall there discern my God bearing up the pillars of the universe, and sustaining that bare rock as a part of the colossal foundation whereon He hath built the world.

Oh! does not the conviction flash upon your mind with a brightness, against which you cannot shut your eyes, that since God is everywhere, and everywhere active, it follows, as a necessary and unavoidable consequence, that He must see us, and know all our actions and our deeds?~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0085.cfm

God Observes All Men

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

Thou God seest me. -Genesis 16:13

It were hard to suppose a God who could not see His own creatures; it were difficult in the extreme to imagine a divinity who could not behold the actions of the works of His hands. The word which the Greeks applies to God implied that He was a God who could see. They called Him “Theos” and they derived that word, if I read rightly, from the root “Theisthai,” to see, because they regarded God as being the all-seeing One, whose eye took in the whole universe at a glance, and whose knowledge extended far beyond that of mortals. God Almighty, from His very essence and nature, must be an Omniscient God. Strike out the thought that He sees me, and you extinguish Deity by a single stroke. There were no God if that God had no eyes, for a blind God were no God at all. We could not conceive such an one. Stupid as idolators may be, it were very hard to think that even they had fashioned a blind god: even they have given eyes to their gods, though they see not…Even the heathen can scarce conceive of a god that hath no eyes to see, and certainly we are not so mad as to imagine for a single second that there can be a Deity without the knowledge of everything that is done by man beneath the sun. I say it were as impossible to conceive of a God who did not observe everything, as to conceive of a round square. When we say, “Thou God,” we do, in fact, comprise in the word “God” the idea of a God who sees everything.

“Within thy circling power I stand;
On every side I find thy hand:
Awake, asleep, at home, abroad,
I am surrounded still with God.”

Take the wings of the morning and fly beyond the most distant star, but God is there. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0085.cfm

Saints Observed

Sherry Attributes of God, Christian Life, promises 3 Comments

Therefore seeing we also are surrounded with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which does so easily ensnare us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us…-Hebrews 12:1

Thou God seest me. -Genesis 16:13

There are more eyes fixed on man than he (knows) of: he sees not as he is seen. He thinks himself obscure and unobserved, but let him remember that a cloud of witnesses hold him in full survey. Wherever he is, at every instant, there are beings whose attention is riveted by his doings, and whose gaze is constantly fixed by his actions… We are taught by the Apostle that the noble army of martyrs, and the glorious company of confessors, are “witnesses” of our race to heaven, for he says, “seeing, then, that we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us.” From yon blue heaven the eyes of the glorified look down on us; there the children of God are sitting on their starry thrones, observing whether we manfully uphold the banner around which they fought; they behold our valour, or they detect our cowardice; and they are intent to witness our valiant deeds of noble daring, or our ignominious retreat in the day of battle… From heaven there look down upon you spirits who see all that finite beings are capable of beholding. But if we think that thought worth treasuring up, there is one which sums up that and drowns it, even as a drop is lost in the ocean; it is the thought, “Thou God seest me.” It is nought that angels see me, it is nought that devils watch me, it is nought that the glorified spirits observe me, compared with the overwhelming truth, that thou God at all times seest me. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0085.cfm

Out of Pawn

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises 3 Comments

Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a people for His own, zealous of good works. -Titus 2:14

I must tell you a singular story, which was related at our church meeting, because there may be some very poor people here who may understand the way of salvation by it. One of the friends had been to see a person who was about to join the church; and he said to him, “Can you tell me what you would say to a poor sinner who came to ask you the way of salvation?” “well,” said he, “I do not know-I think I can hardly tell you; but it so happened that a case of this sort did occur yesterday. A poor woman came into my shop, and I told her the way; but it was in such a homely manner that I don’t like to tell you.” “Oh, yes, tell me; I should like to hear it,” “Well, she is a poor woman, who is always pawning her things, and by-and-bye she redeems them again. I did not know how to tell her better than this. I said to her:-‘Look here; your soul is in pawn to the devil; Christ has paid the redemption money; you take faith for your ticket, and so you will get your soul out of pawn.'” Now, that was the most simple, but the most excellent way of imparting a knowledge of salvation to this woman. It is true our souls were pawned to Almighty vengeance; we were poor, and could not pay the redemption money; but Christ came and paid it all, and faith is the ticket which we use to get our souls out of pawn. We need not take a single penny with us; we have only to say, “Here, Lord, I believe in Jesus Christ. I have brought no money to pay for my soul, for there is the ticket; the money has been paid long ago. This is written in thy word: ‘The blood of Christ cleanseth from all sin.'” If thou takest that ticket, thou wilt get thy soul out of pawn; and thou wilt say, “I’m forgiven, I’m forgiven, I’m a miracle of grace.” May God bless you, my friends, for Christ’s sake.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0080.cfm

Thy Other Loves Turned into God’s Rod

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises 3 Comments

For whom the LORD loves He corrects; even as a father the son in whom he delights. -Proverbs 3:12

Christian, I would bid thee never put anything else with Christ; for as sure as ever thou dost, thou wilt have the whip for it. There never was a child of God who harboured one of the Lord’s traitors in his heart, but he always had a charge laid against him. God has sent out a search warrant against all of us; and do you know what He has told His officers to search for? He has told them to search for all our lovers, all our treasures, and all our helpers. God cares less about our sins as sins, than He does about our sins, or even our virtues, as usurpers of His throne. I tell thee, there is nothing in the world thou settest thy heart upon that shall not be hung upon a gallows higher than Haman’s. If thou lovest anything but Christ, He will make it to do penance; if thou lovest thy house better than Christ, He will make it a prison to thee; if thou lovest thy child better than Christ, He will make it an adder in thy breast to sting thee; if thou lovest thy daily provisions better than Christ, He will make thy drink bitter and thy food like gravel stones in thy mouth, till thou comest to live wholly on Him. There is nothing which thou hast, which He cannot turn into a rod, if thou lovest it better than Him; and rest assured He will do so, if thou makest it anything to rob thy Christ.

Keep thine eye, then, fixed on Jesus; for if thou dost turn away from Him, how ill wilt thou fare!~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0080.cfm

The Faith That Delights God

Sherry Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, promises, salvation, The Holy Spirit 1 Comment

So then they which be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham. -Galatians 3:9

(T)he crown of Christian experience is to be delivered from all trust in self or man, and to be brought to rely wholly and simply on Jesus Christ. I say, Christian, thy highest and noblest experience is not to be groaning about thy corruption, is not to be crying about thy wanderings, but is to say-

“With all my sin, and care, and woe,
His Spirit will not let me go.”

“Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief.” I like what Luther says: “I would run into Christ’s arms if He had a drawn sword in His hands.” Trust is called venturesome believing; but as an old divine says, there is no such thing as venturesome believing; we cannot venture on Christ; it is no venture at all; there is no hap-hazard in the least degree. It is a holy and heavenly experience, when we can go to Christ, amid the storm, and say, “Oh! Jesus, I believe I am covered by Thy blood;” …”Lord, I believe that through Christ Jesus, ragged though I am, I am fully absolved.” A saint’s faith is little faith when he believes as a saint; but a sinner’s faith is true faith when he believes as a sinner. The faith, not of a sinless being, but the faith of a sinful creature-that is the faith which delights God. Go, then, Christian: ask that this may be thy experience, to learn each day, “He only is my rock and my salvation.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0080.cfm