Psalms 24:3

Psalms 24:3

The reply which the Spirit makes to His own question shows clearly whom He had in His mind when He proposed it. He who would ascend indeed must be a man whose life has never had a spot, in whose heart there is nothing to soil his life, and who has kept all his covenant engagements. When we speak of any Christian making a true ascension, we believe he can only make it as he is in Christ Jesus; we believe that none but One ever did, or ever will, or ever can ascend. But then we believe that One ascended, not alone, but as the Head of a whole mystical body; that all of us, as many as believe it, did actually ascend with Him and in Him.

Subject then to this great truth, and involved in it, we proceed to ask, Who are the ascending ones? What is an ascension indeed?

I. Life is the ascension. The actual step on to the throne is only the last of a series of steps which all lead up to it, and of which it is the obvious and necessary climax. The soul of a man is to refine itself, little by little, until at length it is so fine that it cannot stay in this grosser air, but it mounts, as by an obligation which is inherent to it, to its own proper and congenial atmosphere.

II. In these real ascendings we all know that there are some strange paradoxes. The way down is always the way up. Christ's life was one ever-deepening, consecutive abasement, lower and lower still, and so He ascended.

III. If God is love, he is going up the fastest who makes the best progress in love; for the top is love.

IV. One of the most beautiful characteristics of our Lord's ascension was simplicity. Simplicity is a very great height.

V. There will be no ascension if Christ Himself be not growing higher and higher to you, more felt, more precious, more all to your heart. For it is Christ rising in us that makes our rising. Every honour you heap upon Jesus is sending you higher and higher, closer and closer, to the bosom of God.

J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons,6th series, p. 233.

References: Psalms 24:3. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. vii., No. 396. Psalms 24:3; Psalms 24:4. H. Thompson, Concionalia: Outlines for Parochial Use,2nd series, p. 242; J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes,3rd series, p. 100.