Sovereignty of God

For What is Your Life?

Sherry Christian Life, Sovereignty of God Leave a comment

Their inward thought is, that their houses shall continue for ever… – Psalm 49:11

How many live as if their tenant rights of this mortal life, and all its goods, were a fixed tenure and entailed upon themselves irrespective of assigns, or heirs, or superior lord of the manor or freeholder of the soil. “Their inward thought is that their houses shall continue forever and their dwelling places to all generations. They call their lands after their own names.” To such people as these, the words of the apostle James are very applicable, “Come now, you who say, Today or tomorrow we will go into such-and-such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain: whereas you know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.” Yet how often we fall into the same error! Have not some of you, my friends, been laying out your plans for months and even years to come? You have considered where you will spend the summer and where you will live when you retire from your business. Ah, boast not yourselves of tomorrow, much less of summer or of autumn, for you know not what a day, or even an hour, may bring forth. O man of dying woman born, ask of God to give you day by day your daily bread and let your living and your planning be after the fashion of day by day, for when you begin to reckon for far-off time, it looks as if you had never prayed, “So teach me to number my days, that I may apply my heart unto wisdom.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

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What Is Man’s Lease?

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

Thou turnest man to destruction; and sayest, Return, ye children of men. – Psalm 90:3

One would imagine, from the way in which some men talk, that we were freeholders, or at least had a lease for nine hundred and ninety-nine years. The truth is, we are but tenants at will. We may possess the tenement, in which our soul now finds a house for itself, together with its appurtenances and outhouses, for the term of seventy years, and the tenure may even be prolonged to fourscore years, or even to a longer period in rare cases. But at no one time is the tenure altered. We always occupy from moment to moment. Our lease is not for three, seven, fourteen, or twenty-one years, nor is it even from day to day, or from hour to hour—but from second to second we hold precarious possession. We are tenants at the absolute will of God. The commencement of a day never secures the ending of it to us alive, and the striking of the clock, as the commencement of the hour, is no guarantee that we shall hear it strike again. Every second, we hold our lives, and goods, and chattels upon the sole tenure of the divine will. God has but to say to us, “Return, ye children of men,” and we return to the dust. Flowers are not more frail, moths more fragile, bubbles more unsubstantial, or meteors more fleeting than man’s life. What transient things we are! I said, We are, but I made a mistake—we are not. We but begin to be, and ere we are, we are not. It is God alone who can say, “I AM.” None of the human race should dare to pronounce those words. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

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The Rights of God

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

Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the LORD hath spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against Me. – Isaiah 1:2

It is most useful for each of us to know what are the rights of God towards us. Even if we do not acknowledge them, yet candor demands that at least we hear them defined. Sad is the reflection, however, that when we learn these rights, if we resist them, we become willful robbers and so increase our guilt. If we will not have God to reign over us, if, in our spirits we say, like Pharaoh, “Who is the LORD, that we should obey His voice?” it will go harder with us at the last than if we had never heard the claims of God proclaimed. Men and women, how is it that God has made you and yet so many of you never think of Him? Shall I bring against you the accusation which the prophet of old brought against his people? “Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the LORD hath spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against Me. The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel doth not know; My people doth not consider.” Who among you would retain in your house a tool or a piece of furniture which was of no use or value to you? Who among you would keep so much as an ox or an ass if it rendered you no service? How much less would you nurture it if, instead thereof, it did you harm—if it had a spite against you and lifted up its heels against you? And yet, are there not some here who have been forgetful of their obligations to their Maker, who have never been of any service to Him, have never praised Him, have never desired to advance His glory? But who, on the contrary, have even spoken high and haughty thingy things against Him, and it may be words of profanity and blasphemy? O God, how are You ill-treated in the very world which is full of Your goodness! ~ C.H. Spurgeon

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Who Is the Landlord?

Sherry Attributes of God, Christian Life, Sovereignty of God 1 Comment

Thus saith the LORD, Set thine house in order: for thou shalt die, and not live. – Isaiah 38:1

This mortal life and its surroundings are likened to a house and the first point of the similitude will be seen if we inquire, WHO IS THE LANDLORD? The first answer is that certainly we are not. To all men, it may be truthfully said, “Ye are not your own.” We are tenants, but not freeholders. We are mere tenants at will without a lease. The earthly house of this tabernacle belongs to Him who built it. He who sustains it keeps the title deed in His own possession. Our house belongs to God. Dear friend, do you ever think of this? Do you remember, as a matter of fact, that you and yours are God’s property? He created you and created you for His own glory. Your soul was spoken into existence by Him. Your bodily powers were all bestowed by His hand. You are the creature of the Almighty. In every vein, sinew, and nerve of your body, there are traces of the Divine Embroiderer’s skill. You are God’s in all the most secret goings and issues of your life, for to Him you owe every day the continued possession of your existence… Day by day you are a commoner at the table of divine bounty, a pensioner, hour by hour, upon the infinite mercy of God. You have nothing and are nothing but as God pleases. You owe all you have and all you are to Him. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

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God Gives His Grace Freely

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, Sovereignty of God 2 Comments

How long are ye slack to go to possess the land, which the LORD God of your fathers hath given you? – Joshua 18:3

All that any child of God was, you may be; all the joy, and bliss, and holiness ever enjoyed on earth, you may enjoy. The land is before you; go in to possess it. Do not be without the knowledge of Christ Jesus your Lord, for in Him is “joy unspeakable, and full of glory.” Some of our dear friends hear a doctrine which is gospel and water; and they really do not know what the undiluted gospel is. The doctrines of grace are the cream which many cautious preachers skim from the milk of the Word lest it should prove too rich for the stomachs of their hearers. A solid portion of Calvinistic doctrine is like a joint of nourishing meat, and the people of this generation are such babes that they cannot digest it. It is too rich for me!” cries one. I know it, I know it. But I pray the Lord to make you grow into men, who can enjoy the fat things full of marrow, and the wines on the lees well refined. There are glorious truths of which beginners know nothing, and through not knowing of them they miss much joy. Full many a child of God goes fretting and worrying when he ought to be singing and rejoicing, and would be so if he knew what God has provided for him. God gives His grace freely; freely take it. God bless you, for Christ’s sake! Amen. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2086.cfm

This Holy Battle

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

There shall not any man be able to stand before thee all the days of thy life: as I was with Moses, so I will be with thee: I will not fail thee, nor forsake thee. – Joshua 1:5

God’s people are in conflict with sin, and they carry out this war vigorously when they have first seen their right to the blessings of grace, as given them of the living God. You may not claim a piece of land unless you are sure that it is really yours; you are a thief if you do. But when you are sure that an estate is rightfully yours, then you commence your action, and strive to win it, In spiritual things, waive no spiritual right. Say to sin, that now mars your peace, “Peace is mine, clear out!” Say to sin, that stops your usefulness, “That usefulness is mine, I claim it: clear out!” “Hivite, Jebusite, Girgashite, whatever sort of fellow you are, clear out of my heart and life, for holiness is mine. God, the sovereign possessor of all things, has given us our redeemed nature, to have and to hold for His glory, and we mean to have it!”

Each blessing is yours, since you put the foot of faith upon it; but the actual enjoyment of it will need a struggle. War! war! war! with every Canaanite! Break their images, and cut down their groves. They must be driven out at the sword’s point. You have God’s help with you in this holy battle. Your warfare will be accomplished, for the Lord Himself has said, “There shall not any man be able to stand before thee all the days of thy life: as I was with Moses, so I will be with thee. I will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2086.cfm

Put Your Foot On It

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, Sovereignty of God 2 Comments

Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, that have I given unto you. – Joshua 1:3

The Lord says to you, “Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, that have I given unto you.” This is an easy way of taking land: to put your foot down upon it. I delight in that word of the Lord to Jacob, when he lay asleep, “The land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed.” If you can, by faith, lie down on a promise, and find rest in it, it is yours. Every place in the grace country upon which the sole of your foot shall tread is yours. You will remember that the Red Indians agreed to sell to William Penn as much land as a man could walk round in a day; and I do not wonder that at the end of the day they complained that the white brother had made a big walk. I think I should have put my best leg foremost, if whatever I could put my foot upon would be mine; would not you? Why, then, do you not hurry up in spiritual matters? Do you value earthly things more than spiritual? Mark, then, that if you put your foot down upon a blessing, and say, “This is mine,” it is yours. What a very simple operation is the claim of faith!

Strangers cavil, children claim. He that can trust his Lord may say, “In the name of the living God this blessing is mine.” Come, then, brother, if there be more holiness, put your foot on it; if there be more happiness, put your foot on it; if there be more usefulness, put your foot on it. Lay your claim to all that is put within your reach in Scripture; this is the victory that overcometh the world, and conquereth Canaan, even our faith. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2086.cfm