Psalms 27:3

My heart shall not fear.

A stout heart

These are the words of a veteran, not of a raw recruit in the battle of life. A first disaster brings consternation; a ripened experience alone can take calamity calmly. God educates His servants by hard discipline, in conflict with the forces of evil; and He educates the world by calling it to watch the contest.

I. in the strife between good and evil, the good seems to be fearfully overmatched. The host of Midian were as grasshoppers for multitude, but the Israelitish army consisted of three hundred picked men. The Christians in workshops are but a feeble minority. Temples of vice are more crowded and longer open than Christian churches. The Devil’s recruits far outnumber those of the Prince of Peace.

II. evil ever appears to be hanging over the heads of the godly. To take a Christian stand is to expose oneself to ridicule and to danger. The struggle seems to be a hopeless one, both against the evil without and the evil within. Many an earnest Christian is fearful at times, lest the evil within should finally overmaster him. There seem to be times when the spirit of the lotos-eaters takes possession of us, and we feel that we must take a rest, and let sin sweep over us. Were it not better to make peace with powerful evils rather than contend longer against them?

III. but the threat of disaster is worse than the reality. The Devil’s bark is more frequent than his bite. Many a dark cloud passes without bursting with the threatening storm. The darkest hour is often that before the dawn. In any case, to treat a threatening evil as an actual one is to suffer needlessly. The coward dies a thousand deaths before he dies once. Courage! Do not yield to evil because the siege is a strait one.

IV. apparent odds are no test of ultimate victory. He who has not lost courage is master of the future. It is not true to say that “God is on the side of the biggest battalions.” What of Gideon’s three hundred, and the ten thousand Greeks at Marathon? What, too, of the immense hosts of the Spanish Armada? God’s greatest victories have been won by the smallest and apparently most feeble forces.

V. the suffering of apparent defeat in the cause of right is but sharing the burden of God. The hermit who stopped the gladiatorial contests at the cost of his own life, chose a nobler lot than they did who occupied seats of honour in the amphitheatre; and we all see it now, though few saw it then. We may do more for God’s cause by our suffering than we could by our prosperity. “How can man die better?”

VI. the calm endurance of calamity brings its own blessings. A regiment is of but little use in battle until it has been “shot over.” The tried man is the blessed man. By such endurance we bring a nobler ideal nearer to men. And we secure the sympathy of the noblest souls for truth and righteousness. (R. C. Ford, M. A.)

Fortitude

Fortitude is opposed to timidity, irresolution, a feeble and wavering spirit. It is placed, like other virtues, between two extremes: at an equal distance from rashness on the one hand, and pusillanimity on the other.

I. the high importance of fortitude.

1. Without some degree of fortitude, there can be no happiness; because, amidst the thousand uncertainties of life, there can be no enjoyment of tranquillity. The man of feeble and timorous spirit lives under perpetual alarms. On the first shock of adversity he desponds. On the other hand, firmness of mind is the parent of tranquillity. It enables one to enjoy the present without disturbance; and to look calmly on dangers that approach, or evils that threaten in future. It suggests good hopes. It supplies resources. It allows a man to retain the full possession of himself, in every situation of fortune.

2. If fortitude be thus essential to the enjoyment of life, it is equally so to the proper discharge of all its most important duties. He who is of a cowardly mind is, and must be, a slave to the world. He fashions his whole conduct according to its hopes and fears. He smiles, and fawns, and betrays, from abject considerations of personal safety. He can neither stand the clamour of the multitude, nor the frowns of the mighty. The wind of popular favour, or the threats of power, are sufficient to shake his most determined purpose.

3. Without this temper of mind, no man can be a thorough Christian. For his profession, as such, requires him to be superior to that fear of man which bringeth a snare; enjoins him, for the sake of a good conscience, to encounter every danger; and to be prepared, if called, even to lay down his life in the cause of religion and truth.

II. the proper foundations of fortitude.

1. A good conscience. There can be no true courage, no regular persevering constancy, but what is connected with principle, and founded on a consciousness of rectitude of intention. This, and this only, erects that brazen wall which we can oppose to every hostile attack. It clothes us with an armour, on which fortune will spend its shafts in vain. What has he to fear, who not only acts on a plan which his conscience approves, but who knows that every good man, nay, the whole unbiassed world, if they could trace his intentions, would justify and approve his conduct?

2. He knows, at the same time, that he is acting under the immediate eye and protection of the Almighty. The consciousness of such an illustrious spectator invigorates and animates him. He trusts that the eternal Lover of righteousness not only beholds and approves, but will strengthen and assist; will not suffer him to be unjustly oppressed, and will reward his constancy in the end, with glory, honor, and immortality.

III. considerations which may prove auxiliary to the exercise of virtuous fortitude in the midst of dangers.

1. It is of high importance to every one, who wishes to act his part with becoming resolution, to cultivate a religious principle, and to be inspired with trust in God. The more firmly this belief is rooted in the heart, its influence will be more powerful in surmounting the fears which arise from a sense of our own weakness or danger. The records of all nations afford a thousand remarkable instances of the effect of this principle, both on individuals and on bodies of men. Animated by the strong belief of a just cause, and a protecting God, the feeble have waxed strong, and despised dangers, sufferings, death.

2. Let him who would preserve fortitude in difficult situations, fill his mind with a sense of what constitutes the true honour of man. It consists not in the multitude of riches, or the elevation of rank; for experience shows that these may be possessed by the worthless, as well as by the deserving. It consists in being deterred by no danger when duty calls us forth; in fulfilling our allotted part, whatever it may be, with faithfulness, bravery, and constancy of mind. These qualities never fail to stamp distinction on the character.

3. But in order to acquire habits of fortitude, what is of the highest consequence is to have formed a just estimate of the goods and evils of life, and of the value of life itself. For here lies the chief source of our weakness and pusillanimity. We over-value the advantages of fortune; rank and riches, ease and safety. (H. Blair, D. D.)

Dauntless courage

A Dutch fleet once drew near to Chatham. Fearing it might effect a landing, the Duke of Albemarle determined to prevent it, and endeavoured to inspire his men with his own dauntless spirit. Calmly he took his position in the front, thus exposing himself to the hottest fire from the hostile ships. An affectionate but over-cautious friend, seeing him in such danger, darted forward, seized him by the arm, and exclaimed, “Retire, I beseech you, from this fierce shower of bullets, or you will be a dead man!” The Duke, releasing himself from his grasp, turned coldly on the man who would tempt him to cowardice in the hour of his country’s need, and replied, “Sir, if I had been afraid of bullets I should have given up the profession of a soldier long ago.” (Quiver.)