Isaiah 26:9

With my soul have I desired Thee in the night

The religious craving and seeking of the soul at night

There is no work so momentous, me influential, as the work of the soul in the sleepless hours of night.

Busy in calling up departed friends and interchanging thoughts again, busy in recalling the past and foreboding the future, busy in reflections concerning itself and its God. In these words we have--

I. The soul’s religious LONGING in the night. The soul has many instinctive cravings, cravings for knowledge, for beauty, for order, for society.; but its deepest hunger is for God. “My heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God.” For what in God does it hunger?

1. For the assurance of His love. We are so formed that we crave the possession of the object of our love. Were all the works of God ours, we should be hungry without Him. He who gives His strongest love to us gives Himself.

2. For revelations of His mind. It yearns for ideas from the great Fountain of intelligence and love.

II. The soul’s religious SEARCHING in the night. “With my spirit within me will I seek Thee early.” The soul seeking for God implies--

1. A consciousness that it has not got Him. All have God’s works everywhere, God’s influence everywhere, God’s presence everywhere; but only a few have Himself, the assurance of His love. Hence the searching.

2. A belief that He may be obtained. We may all have God as our portion by seeking Him in Christ. Men hunger for some things they can never get--wealth, power, social influence, the distinctions of genius, etc. But allwho hunger for God obtain Him. Conclusion--God is the great want of the soul. Without Him what are we? Planets detached from the sun, wandering stars for whom are reserved blackness and anarchy. “Whom have I in Heaven but Thee?” etc. (Homilist.)

Death and judgment

The judgments recorded in the Old Testament by the special inspiration of God, showing them to be, as common centres, retribution on the sons of men, are intended to lead us to the belief in that final judgment after death of which we read in the New Testament. These early judgments of nations and states were the shadows, “the going before,” of that awful time when all mankind shall appear to receive the sentence with its eternal consequences for good or evil. Now, here we see the power of religion in sustaining the soul of man under the awfulness of Divine retribution and the expectations of God’s anger on the sons of the world; we see the expression, by those who have passed through such time, set before us as indications of the mind we are to cherish and the hopes we may entertain in view of that final judgment, and it shows the power of religious faith to maintain the soul in peace against the two greatest fears which darken the soul of man.

1. The fear of death. How nature shrinks from what teems to be an annihilation of this life!

2. Yet there is a greater fear than this--the thought of meeting God in the solitary going forth into what seems the dark night. It was not always so with man’s soul He did not fear God in his original creation. But as soon as sin was committed observe the change; he shrank from the thought and the presence--from the approaching sound of the Divine appearance. That was the effect of one sin, and since that sin has spread through the whole of nature and has caused sinfulness to taint the whole being of men. Men shrink from their follow creatures when they are better than themselves. Those children who have committed faults shrink from their parents’ eyes, however fond they may be of them. Men shrink from themselves when conscious of their own sin, and often it leads them to commit self-murder. Now, religious faith raises a man above these two dark fears haunting the soul, produces peace, and kindles brightest hopes. (T. T. Carter, M. A.)

The desire of the soul in spiritual darkness

Night appears to be a time peculiarly favourable to devotion. Its solemn stillness helps to free the mind from that perpetual din which the cares of the world will bring around it; and the stars looking own from Heaven upon us shine as if they would attract us up to God. I shall not speak of night natural at all, although there may be a great deal of room for poetic thought and expression.

I. I shall speak to CONFIRMED CHRISTIANS; and I shall bring one or two remarks to bear upon their case, if they are in darkness

1. The Christian man has not always a bright, shining sun; he has seasons of darkness and night. It is a great truth, that the true religion of the living God is calculated to give a man happiness below as well as bliss above. But, notwithstanding, experience tells us that if the course of the just be “as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day,” yet sometimes that light is eclipsed.

(1) Sometimes it is night over the whole Church at once. Of course each Christian participates in it.

(2) At other times this darkness over the soul of the Christian rises from temporal distresses.

(3) “But oh!” says another, “you have not described my night. I have not much amiss in business; and I would not care if I had--but I have a night in my spirit.” “Oh,” says one, “I have not a single evidence of my Christianity now. I was a child of God, I know; but something tells me that I am none of His now.”

2. A Christian man’s religion will keep its colour in the night. “With my soul have I desired Thee in the night.” What a mighty deal of silver slipper religion we have in this world. Men will follow Christ when everyone cries “Hosanna!” But they will not go with Him in the night. There is many a Christian whose piety did not burn much when he was in prosperity, but it will be known in adversity.

3. All that the Christian wants in the night is his God. “With desire have I desired Thee in the night.” By day there are many things that a Christian will desire besides his Lord; but in the night he wants nothing but his God.

4. There are times when all the saint can are is to desire. We have a vast number of evidences of piety: some are practical, some experimental, some doctrinal; and the more evidences a man has of his piety the better. We like a number of signatures, to make a deed more valid, if possible. We like to invest property in a great number of trustees, in order that it may be all the safer; and so we love to have many evidences. But there are seasons when a Christian cannot get any. He can scarcely get one witness to come and attest his godliness. But there is one witness that very seldom is gagged, and that is, “I have desired Thee--I have desired Thee in the night.”

II. Speak to NEWLY AWAKENED SOULS.

1. The first question they would ask is this--How am I to know that my desires are proofs of a work of grace in my soul?

(1) You may tell whether your desires are of God by their constancy.

(2) By their efficacy. If your desires lead you into real “works meet for repentance,” then they come from God.

(3) By their urgency.

2. But you say, “If I have desired God, why have not I obtained my desire before now?”

(1) You have hardly a right to ask the question; for God has a right to grant your petition or not as He pleases. But since thine anxiety has dictated the question, let my anxiety attempt to answer it.

(2) Perhaps God has not granted thy desire because He wishes thine own profit thereby. He designs to show thee more of the desperate wickedness of thine heart, that in future thou mayest fear to trust it; He wants thee to see more of the blackness of darkness under the horrible pit of sin, that like a burnt child thou mayest shun the fire forever. He lets thee go down into the dungeon, that thou mayest prize liberty the better when it comes. And He is keeping thee waiting, moreover, that thy longings may be quickened.

(3) Besides, God keeps thee waiting, perhaps, in order that He may display the riches of His grace more fully to thee at the last. I believe that some of us who were kept by God a long while before we found Him, loved Him better perhaps than we should have cone if we had received Him directly; and we can preach better to others, we can speak more of His loving kindness and tender mere

(4) One thought more. Perhaps it has come already. I fancy some of you think you will have a kind of electric shock--that a sort of galvanism, or something or other, will pass through you, such as you never had before. Do not be expecting any miracles now. If you will not think you are pardoned till you get a vision you will have to wait many a year.

3. But there is one more serious inquiry: and it is, Will God grant my desire at last? Yes, poor soul, verily He will. It is quite impossible that you should have desired God and should be lost. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

With my spirit within me will I seek Thee early

Seeking God early

1. Early, in the morning of life, which is the most proper season for this employment, your faculties being then most active and vigorous.

2. Early, in preference to all other objects which solicit your attention, seeking first, and above all things, the kingdom of God and His righteousness.

3. Early, in every day of life, after you are refreshed with rest; before you engage in company, in business, or amusement; determined, with the man according to God’s own heart, that your voice the Lord shall hear in the morning. (R. Macculloch.)

When Thy Judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness

The judgments of God

I. THE AUTHOR OF THOSE JUDGMENTS WITH WHICH WE ARE VISITED; THE ENDS FOR WHICH THEY ARE SENT; AND THEIR FITNESS TO INSTRUCT US IN RIGHTEOUSNESS.

1. Judgments come from God. Judgments that would crush us when proceeding from any other source, can be borne when viewed as coming from the hand of God.

2. But why does God visit us with judgments? Not that He delights in the miseries of His creatures. “He afflicteth not willingly, nor grieveth the children of men.” He would rather “draw them by the cords of love”; and “by His goodness lead them to repentance.”

3. A few plain considerations are sufficient to show that the judgments of God have a natural tendency to awaken men from their security and to teach them righteousness. Man is a depraved and corrupted creature. The very multitude of Divine favours hides the hand which confers them, and makes us forget our Benefactor; intoxicated and blinded by enjoyment, in the bosom of peace and abundance, piety languishes, our passions are inflamed, and we cease to “hunger and thirst after righteousness.” In this situation, what does the mercy, the compassion of our Father, require from Him? To visit us with His judgments. Then we see the impotence of the idols which have seduced us; conscience wakes from its lethargy, and retraces to us in accents awfully impressive all our wanderings from God and righteousness.

(1) The judgments of God deeply affect us and lead us to repentance, because they are rarer than mercies.

(2) The judgments of God address powerfully that passion which has most influence on the greater part of mankind--the passion of fear.

(3) These judgments of God lead to righteousness because they teach in that most compendious and efficacious mode, by example. On beholding them we feel that the threatenings of God are not a mere dead letter, which need fill us with no dismay.

(4) Judgments lead to righteousness because they present God in such a character that even the most stout-hearted sinners tremble to oppose Him. When He comes to plead with them, clothed with grace and compassion, they may abuse these attributes to their destruction; but to sport with Him when “He maketh His way in the whirlwind and the storm”; when He comes armed with the thunders of omnipotence, and dressed in the robes of vengeance, requires a depravity worse than diabolical; since, on such occasions, even “devils tremble.” But although judgments have thus a natural tendency to lead men to God, although they have often in an eminent degree taught righteousness, yet have they invariably this effect? Alas, no! there are some who can resist judgment as well as mercies.

II. INQUIRE WHY THE JUDGMENTS OF GOD DO NOT ALWAYS HAVE THIS HAPPY EFFECT, which they are designed and calculated to produce. Judgments are frequently rendered useless because of our insensibility. (H. Kollock, D. D.)

The judgments of God

I. THE JUDGMENTS OF GOD ARE DESIGNED BY HIM, AND IN THEIR OWN NATURE DO TEND TO TEACH THE INHABITANTS OF THE WORLD TRUE REPENTANCE AND RIGHTEOUSNESS.

1. They are apt to work on our minds a stronger conviction of the providence of God.

2. They most powerfully awaken in us the thoughts of the great day of judgment.

II. INQUIRE WHETHER THEY DO ALWAYS PRODUCE THIS EFFECT. And here experience acquaints us that there is something in the corruption and acquired wickedness of some men’s hearts that baffles this as well as other methods of God’s dealing with them; they are so far from repenting and learning righteousness by the corrections of God that they many times add impiety to their immoralities, and deny that He concerns Himself in the government of the world.

III. EXHORT YOU TO LEARN RIGHTEOUSNESS FROM THE PRESENT JUDGMENTS OF GOD. (T. Manningham, D. D.)

The judgments of God

By the term, “judgments of God,” the Scriptures sometimes denote the decisions, whether favourable or adverse, which God passes upon the conduct of men. But more frequently this phrase is employed to denote the effect of such decisions when they are unfavourable--to denote those remarkable punishments by which the Almighty chastises the wickedness of guilty individuals and the crimes of guilty nations. In the course of God’s providential procedure, we often see His judgments; we see misfortune and distress following so closely and visibly the conduct of men, that we can have no doubt whatever concerning the connection that, by His appointment, subsists between them. But there are many eases where the precise object of the Divine visitation is unknown. In such eases it would therefore be rash and uncharitable to interpret particularly, and with reference to individuals, the views of Divine judgment when affecting a multitude. It is enough for us to know that these judgments, whatever be their kind, their nature, or their degree, are instruments of God’s government of His moral and rational offspring, and that the inhabitants of the earth may learn from them lessons of righteousness.

I. The judgments of God, whatever their form and degree, are found powerfully to excite SENTIMENTS OF WARM PIETY AND DEEP DEVOTION toward that God from whom these judgments proceed. There are various principles of our constitution, by which the judgments of Heaven contribute to a salutary effect upon the minds of a thoughtless world. Unexpected revolutions, either in the natural or moral world, naturally arrest our attention. They demonstrate, in the most sensible manner, to our consciences, our own weakness, and the incompetency of our powers, either to produce or control the changing events around us; and to every mind that is not totally enfeebled and darkened, through corruption, such revolutions suggest with irresistible force the notion of a powerful Supreme Ruler; they alarm our fears at His displays, and awaken all those sentiments (this is at least their natural tendency, or ought to be their constant effect) of humility and penitence, which form the beginning of a pious and devout temper. And we learn from Scripture that this is not only the tendency of the Divine judgments when rightly improved, but often the very purpose for which they were sent by the providence of God.

II. If, then, the judgments of God be both fitted and designed to awaken us to the ways of His providence, HOW SHOULD WE LABOUR TO REGARD AND IMPROVE THEM! (G. H. Baird, D. D.)

National judgments

I. THAT THIS COUNTRY HAS BEEN VISITED BY THE JUDGMENTS OF GOD.

1. Our nation has, indeed, been a scene of many and extraordinary mercies. The rise and establishment of free institutions, and that wonderful balance of constitution which has prevented both the extremes of government,--royal despotism on the one hand, and popular anarchy on the other,--deserve our grateful recognition. Our own soil has long been e, stranger to the desolating ravages of war, and the shouts and confused noise of battle have been heard only at a distance. The discoveries of science and the attainments of art have been unparalleled; and useful knowledge has been diffused to an unexampled extent over the various classes of society. We have had the benefits of a Divine religion, reformed from the corruptions which had accumulated with the course of ages; we have had an almost universal diffusion of the pure Word of God, the inspired oracles of truth. “The lines are fallen to us in pleasant places; yea, we have a goodly heritage!”

2. Yet it is also true that the judgments of God have been abroad in the land. That mighty hand is the hand of God; that mysterious and invisible power is the power of God. There is indeed a sinful and fatal disposition abroad, to account for things only by speaking of fortune and chance, or by referring, at most, to the passions and principles of those human agents by whom the management of national interests is conducted. This forgetfulness of the Most High, amounting to a practical atheism, and spread widely over the habits of men, is one of the worst signs of the times in which we live.

II. WHETHER, BY THE INHABITANTS OF THIS COUNTRY, A RIGHT IMPROVEMENT OF ITS VISITATIONS HAS BEEN MADE. “When Thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.” We do not imagine this to be a positive assertion, that the learning of righteousness is the invariable consequence of the Divine judgments, but a statement that such ought to be their result. If it be true that the Divine judgments are poured forth in consequence of transgression, it must be clear that the right conduct to be pursued by those who feel them is to repent and to reform.

III. THE REFLECTIONS BY WHICH AN IMMEDIATE IMPROVEMENT OF PAST VISITATIONS IS FORCIBLY URGED.

1. Consider what must be expected as the public consequences of continued impenitence and transgression.

(1) The removal of religious privileges is an event scarcely to be doubted; and it seems but just and right that when the means of spiritual guidance and blessing have been for a protracted period undervalued and abused, they should be withdrawn (Revelation 2:5).

(2) The removal of religious privileges will be the harbinger of national desolation.

2. Consider what will doubtless be the results of the desired amendment and repentance. “Iniquity shall not be our ruin.” New glories will then arise upon our land. (James Parsons.)

Instruction from the judgment of God

It is an act of righteousness to give everyone their own; to God, the things that are God’s; to do right to all men, and a man’s self also.

I. PIETY TOWARDS GOD consists in these six particulars--

1. Reverence and awful regard of the Divine majesty.

2. The admiring and adoring Him, in His height, excellency, and perfection.

3. Love and delight in Him, because of His grace and goodness and free communication; with thankfulness for His benefits.

4. Trust in God, because of His faithfulness and to give Him credit, because of His approved truth and goodness.

5. Submission to Him, because of His superiority and sovereignty.

6. Duty and service, because of His dominion and property.

II. RIGHTEOUSNESS TOWARDS MEN. That doth comprehend in it good behaviour and equal dealings.

1. In general, it doth take in the obedience and subjection that all inferiors owe to their superiors and governors.

2. That fairness and complacency which ought to be between all those that converse upon terms of equality.

3. That tenderness that ought to be used towards inferiors, or in a worse condition than ourselves.

4. Thank, fulness, where we are beholden.

5. Uprightness with all with whom we have to do.

(1) In our speeches, truth and honesty.

(2) Fidelity, where we are credited and trusted.

(3) Performance of our engagements and undertakings.

(4) Candour in all our judgments and censures.

(5) Fair and benign representations of men, and handsome constructions and interpretations: always being ready to take things in the best sense; and to interpret other men’s words, as we would they should interpret ours.

(6) Lowliness and courtesy in our transactions with others.

(7) Clearness and integrity in all our converse.

(8) Moderation in our demand of reparation, in case of wrong received.

(9) Gentleness and calmness, in case of provocation.

(10) Clemency and compassion towards those that have done us evil.

(11) Bounty and charity towards those that are in necessity.

(12) Love and goodwill towards all men.

III. RIGHTEOUSNESS TO OURSELVES.

1. It doth comprehend in it modesty and humility: that is the soul’s temper.

2. Sobriety: that is the mind’s balance.

3. Temperance and chastity: that is the body’s security. More particularly--

(1) The mind equally poised, free from vanity, conceit, intoxication; and the body ordered according to the rules of reason and virtue.

(2) The soul discharged of corroding envy and biting malice; and the body gently used. For as we should not live to feed the beast, which is done by epicurism, and giving way to sensual pleasure: so are we to be merciful to our bodies.

4. The whole man at heart’s ease, through Christian courage and resolution; reposing in God’s protection and providence; charging ourselves only with the use of lawful means; and when we have done our-duty, leaving the success to God, acknowledging our dependence upon Him, and the need of His blessing. These are instances of righteousness, wherein the inhabitants of the world are to be instructed, when God’s judgments are upon the earth. (B. Whichcote, D. D.)

The judgments of God

1. The judgments of God ought to drive the open transgressor of God’s law from his sins and criminal indulgences.

2. The judgments of God ought to stimulate every individual, who is destitute of personal religion, to attend to his spiritual interests without a moment’s delay. Religion is a personal concern, and essential to extensive usefulness and real happiness.

3. The judgments of God ought to excite in every Christian more of the spirit and exercise of prayer both for himself and others. (Alex. Harvey.)

Fast-day sermon

The faculties of man are too limited to comprehend the nature of the Divine judgments. The direction of events in the moral government of the world baffles his investigation. With respect to individuals, those afflictions are improperly called “judgments” which may be merely instances of trial or discipline, or even of highly beneficial example. Yet we can seldom err in calling those evils which visit a nation by the name of “judgments.” We may justly consider them as the penalty and correctives of a people’s sin. For, as such collective bodies may have national iniquities of a flagrant kind, and as they can exist in that collective capacity of sinning as nations only in this world, we may conclude that such wide visitations of evil are nothing less than national chastisements, or a general penal discipline of the people so afflicted: Still their object is always some ultimate good.

1. The perversion of great wealth in a life of dissipation and voluptuousness, idleness and uselessness, as it is a spectacle by no means uncommon, so is it a most offensive and insulting sight in the eyes of Him “who maketh poor and who maketh rich.”

2. This leads me to another crying sin, that seems to pervade all the ranks of modern society--“the love of money”: that which the apostle calls “the root of all evil,” and, by another name, the most offensive to a jealous God, who claims for Himself and His service the powers of the mind, the strength of the body, and the yearnings of the heart, namely, “idolatry.” It is habitual covetousness, which early blights and mildews the tender shoots of religion in the breast, hardens every finer feeling, and concentrates every thought and care and wish upon self.

3. Another alarming sin of our country is pride.

4. This leads me next to our ingratitude.

5. The virtual unbelief, the practical infidelity of the present day. National sins are, after all, the collective vices of individuals; and every man has his own peculiar sins, which must weigh also upon his country’s welfare. For the removal, therefore, of present, and the prevention of future judgments, we must look to the correction of individual character. (A. B.Evans, D. D.)

Affliction a school of instruction

I. Let us consider WHAT THAT IS WHICH MUST INSTRUCT US. Our sufferings and afflictions. And they are here described in a threefold notion.

1. In their nature and propriety; what, and whose they are. They are no other than God’s “judgments.”

2. By their time and season; that is implied in this particle of time, “when.”

3. By the circumstance of place, where they are inflicted. That which God makes the school of correction; “the earth.” Are our afflictions God’s “judgments”?

Then--

1. They are deserved by us; God doth justly inflict them upon us.

2. They are wisely ordained.

3. They are proportioned in a just and holy manner, with a due measure and moderation.

II. THE LESSON WE MUST LEARN BY THEM. “Righteousness.”

1. Who are the scholars? They are the inhabitants of the world.

2. What is their duty? They must be learners.

3. What is their lesson? They must learn righteousness. (Bishop Brownrig.)

The teaching of ordinary life

Persons are apt too much to separate spirituality of mind from the teaching of ordinary life, and the lessons which the facts of this world convey. Undoubtedly the mind may be spiritualised without this teaching, and even before it can be had; at the same time, in the case of the great majority of men, the spiritual temper is not attained without this teaching. (J. B. Mozley, D. D.)

The world a great monitor

The world is the great tempter, but at the same time it is the great monitor. It is the great saddener, the great warner, the great prophet. (J. B. Mozley, D. D.)

God’s judgments best awaken sinners

I. I shall endeavour to confirm the truth of THE GENERAL OBSERVATION IN THE TEXT, of the good effects of God’s judgments upon mankind.

1. The end and design of God, in His judgments, is to do good to men; to make the bad good, and the good better. God has told us, in His Holy Word, that He is love, and that fury is not in Him. Now, it is demonstration that from love nothing but love can flow.

2. The judgments of God have a natural tendency and efficacy to convert and reform sinners, and to perfect the righteous. The two predominant and ruling passions in human nature are the fear of evil and the desire of happiness; and nothing is more proper to work upon these, and direct them to and fix them upon their right object, than the judgments of God.

3. And that thus it has been in fact I come now to prove by examples. The Ninevites were so terrified with the threatening of the prophet Jonah that they repented, and escaped the judgment. The same did Ahab upon the threatening of Elijah, and had the same success, etc.

II. THE PARTICULAR EXAMPLE of the good effect the judgments of God had upon those whom the prophet personates, and in whose name he speaks in the text. In which expressions we have the description and characters of the most sincere, excellent, and acceptable conversion of the soul to God which are--

1. To turn the whole bent and force of our desire wholly to God alone.

2. To turn the attention and application of our soul inward, to God dwelling within us, by endeavouring to live in a constant sense of His presence, and in a continual seeking Him and lifting up our hearts to Him in prayer. (Val. Nalson.)

God’s relation to evil

There is a very dark side to human history: calamity, disappointment, disease, death are facts and factors in human history that no one of us can deny. And the minds of men have always been attempting a solution of this dark aspect of human experience. There have been three solutions which have been suggested:

(1) We have been told that this is the work of chance, that man is forced up and down on the capricious waves of fate.

(2) A second attempt at solution has been made by those who tell us that there are two powers in the universe, one good and one evil: that to the good power all benevolent developments of human history are to be traced; that to the evil power all male relent activities are to be traced, and that there is no telling which is the stronger, the benevolent or the malignant--that now it seems as though the good triumphed, and now it seems as though the evil triumphed; and so the old Persians embraced what has been called the dual theory, Ormuzd and Ahriman, the good and the evil.

(3) The Holy Scriptures teach us quite another solution, and it is the only one that brings comfort to a human soul. That solution is, that human history is the unfolding of the plan of God; that in the darker and in the brighter aspects of human experience God is still ruling; that He governs absolutely; that there is a moral purpose in things evil: that success comes out of failure, and prosperity out of adversity, and that therefore we are to rejoice evermore, because He occupies the throne; and when clouds and darkness are round about Him, be assured that, within the clouds and behind the darkness, righteousness and judgment inhabit that throne. (A. T.Pierson, D. D.)

The Divine sovereignty

If you take the Bible, and study this subject from Genesis to Revelation, it will grow upon you how magnificently awful is this sovereignty of God. Take the ten plagues of Egypt; they were an early lesson in human history about this sovereignty of God, that reaches through all things as well as to all creatures. In these ten plagues, for instance, we have examples of God’s control over the forces of nature. In those same plagues we have illustrations of God’s control over animated nature. And we have illustrated God’s control over those subtle and mysterious influences that we cannot define, and the nature of which we do not understand, but which lie at the bottom of disease--the murrain among cattle, the boils and the blains, the death of the firstborn. Now, if we pass along in this remarkable history we shall next meet, in Exodus 23:1, the declaration, “I will send the hornet before you, and drive out the people of the land of Canaan, that ye may take possession.” We go still further, and we read, in the Book of the Psalms, that He “called for the famine”; as though the famine were an obedient servant, summoned to the Master’s presence, to go forth and do the Master’s bidding. In these Psalms we are likewise told that He makes the winds His messengers, and the flames of fire His ministers. In Isaiah 54:1 we are told distinctly, “I have created the waster to destroy.” We pass to the Book of Jonah, and Jonah is a revelation of the sovereignty of God in human affairs. For instance, we are told here, in four separate places, how the Lord had “prepared a great fish” to swallow Jonah, and He “spake unto the fish.” “The Lord prepared a gourd,” and made it to come up over Jonah. “The Lord prepared a worm,” that it might smite the gourd. The Lord “prepared a vehement east wind,” that it might smite upon the head of Jonah. Notice the comprehensiveness of these declarations. God controls the wind, which is not an intelligent form of life; God controls the gourd, which belongs to the vegetable kingdom; God controls the worm that is among the insects; God controls the great fish that is among those that swim the waters. Turn now to the Book of Joel 1:4. And what does he say in 2:25? “And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpillar, and the palmerworm, My great army which I sent among you.” There is no more sublimely awful verse in the whole Old Testament than that--“My great army which I sent among you.” And just think what an army is this going forth in four detachments one after the other! The student of history will observe that about three times in a century there comes among men some form of disease with regard to which science is utterly ignorant and impotent. No one knows how to prevent it, no one knows how to cure the disasters which it engenders. And it is another remarkable fact, that just as soon as science begins to have a limited control over these forms of scourge a new plague develops about which they know nothing; simply shewing that Almighty God has not surrendered the throne of the universe, nor given up His control even over the malignant and destructive forces of nature. If God did not keep the scourges of nature doing their work, the human race would rot in its own iniquity. (A. T. Pierson, D. D.)

God’s judgments and their lessons

What are we to understand by “judgments of God”? Judgments are the activities of a judge, and a judge is one that scans the conduct of men, and visits it accordingly. We do not say, of course, that every individual instance of suffering from this chastisement is an individual instance of judgment for personal sin. We are bound up in society, and it is impossible that a scourge shall come down upon the human family that does not involve the good as well as the wicked; for we are dependent upon one another, and intimately associated in social life. Why are these judgements of God visited?

1. There is judgment on the sin of dirt, on the sin of physical uncleanness, unwholesome habits, unwholesome diet, clothing, habitation; and for that reason the most of these scourges originate in those districts where humanity is most thickly congregated, and where all sanitary laws are set at defiance.

2. There are God’s judgments on moral iniquity.

3. These scourges are God’s judgments on the sin of greed and selfishness. Think how many forms of social evil there are in the various communities that are upheld by the greed and selfishness of man.

4. There are two sorts of judgments: one the temporal, which is corrective and preventive; the other the eternal, which is punitive and retributive only. It is to the former that the reference is made these judgments that are “in the earth,” not in the next world or in the next life. And these judgments are designed not to be retributive, but to be corrective of iniquity and preventive of further sin. Therefore, just as soon as these judgments come upon the people, they should begin to inquire what laws of God have been violated that ought to be obeyed. (A. T. Pierson, D. D.)

The God of judgment

In the Catskill Mountains, about a quarter of a century ago, an infidel got up on one of those heights, and, in the presence of some atheistic companions, defied the God of heaven to show Himself in battle. He swung his sword to and fro, and challenged the Almighty to meet him in single combat. The Almighty paid no attention to him, of course; but He just commissioned a little gnat, so small that it could scarcely be seen by a microscope, to lodge in his windpipe and choke him to death. (A. T. Pierson, D. D.)

God’s judgment on American slavery

It reigned in the United States of America for a hundred years. It was defended by almost the entire body of preachers in the southern States--defended and upheld, and its extension vindicated and advocated. And then God brought an awful war of four years’ duration upon the United States, and Mr. Lincoln, that heroic man in the midst of that country, made this significant announcement: “It would not surprise me if, in view of the long-continued oppression of the slave in this country, it should please Almighty God that this war shall not cease until the life of one freeman has been exacted for the life of every slave that has been sacrificed during these hundred years.” And the cost of that American war was 500,000 people killed, 300,000 people maimed, 300,000 women made widows, 700,000 children made orphans, and 3000 millions of dollars, or 600 million sterling expended. God’s judgment on the sin of greed and selfishness! (A. T. Pierson, D. D.)

Pestilence and prayer

Minnesota is the centre of the great western granary of the world. There came down upon those splendid fields that extend over thousands of acres, without even the division of a fence, an awful scourge, known as the grasshopper scourge. Nothing could be done by man to remove the scourge. The grasshoppers laid their eggs, and the next year, as soon as the wheat appeared, the destructive insect appeared alongside of it, and the utmost zeal and effort of the farmers failed even to abate this dreadful pestilence. The governor of Minnesota, who was a very high-toned Christian gentleman, called upon the people of the State to observe a day of fasting, humiliation, and prayer for the removal of the plague. Secular papers, and especially the infidel papers, scouted the idea of reaching this natural visitation of insects by an appeal to God. They made the thing as ridiculous as they could make it, but still the Christian people assembled in their places of prayer, and many came together on the appointed day. Spring came, the wheat began to appear in the furrow, and the grasshopper appeared alongside of the wheat; and then the secular papers, that had scorned the idea of prayer to Almighty God, said, “Where is the result of your day of prayer, and fasting, and humiliation?” The grasshoppers developed, but at the same time there developed a parasite that attached itself to the grasshopper and accomplished two results. In the first place, it made the grasshopper impotent to harm the wheat; and in the second place--which was more important--it made the grasshopper impotent to reproduce itself. And from that year there has been no scourge of grasshoppers in the State of Minnesota. And so the righteous have seen it and rejoined, and all iniquity has stopped her mouth in the presence of the manifest interposition of God. (A. T. Pierson, D. D.)