Psalms 31:13

Fear was on every side.

The length and the breadth are equal

(with Psalms 71:21):--Life is circumvented by peril; yet on every side we are promised assurance and safety.

I. the hinder side.

1. The world of the past clings to us, and in many ways alarms and embarrasses. We cannot rub out the blood stains. We can plead no “Statute of Limitations.”

2. But our God comforts us on this side, with pardoning and renewing grace.

II. The farther side.

1. How much of a deeply distressing order may happen to us in this new year. Changes, trials, disappointments, bereavements. We feel that we are like Nansen in the Arctic region--the ice is all around us holding us firmly in its threatening grip. We go up to the crow’s-nest and survey the scene, but there is no open sea, no inviting shore, only one iceberg jamming another until the last is lost in the dark horizon. We need not wonder that men look into the strange, uncertain, threatening future with deep seriousness.

2. Yet is there comfort on this side also. God goes before us, preparing us for the future, preparing the future for us. The trees on this winter’s day are being secretly prepared for the summer days of sunshine, so are the bulbs in the soil, so are the flies and butterflies, and the summer is on its way getting up its fires and showers; the two will meet at the right moment exactly ready for each other; in six months’ time again all these things will secretly undergo another great change, and although there is not a morsel of ice or flake of snow to be seen, they will be preparing for the winter, God is secretly equipping us for the trial that is to try us; He is quietly getting us ready for old age; He is establishing harmony between us and the circumstances He must introduce; He is already making it easy for us to die. Let us be of good heart. Many bright things and scenes are ahead for most of us; if our goodness is like the morning cloud and the early dew God’s goodness is not. And as to the evil things, God’s government shall soften them one by one and lead us out of them.

III. The outside.

1. Like the apostle (2 Corinthians 7:5), we all have our Macedonia, and sustain desperate fightings. It is vain to speak as some do of the smoothness and pleasantness of modern life as compared with life in the ancient days. The well-dressed congregation of to-day is fighting ‘a battle as difficult and bitter as those noble saints fought in sheep-skins and goat-skins. We, too, bear in our bodies the marks of the Lord Jesus.

2. Yet here also we are comforted. “Our flesh had no rest,” says the apostle, but their spirit had. God shelters and strengthens us amid dilemmas and tribulations, making them to work out our salvation and glory.

IV. the inside. The apostle continues in the passage just quoted: “Within were fears.” We have, perhaps, most to fear here. The garrison itself is unsatisfactory, weak. We know the force within to be ten thousand, the investing army to be thousands of thousands. It is a sceptical garrison. It has little faith in itself--little faith in victory--it is fainthearted to begin with. It is a treacherous garrison--so much that is within us perfidiously allies itself with the alien army. But here also we are comforted. He Himself enters into our life; He makes us heroic and conquering by virtue of His presence manifested in our heart. The peace of God keeps our heart--“garrisons” our heart. Here is the victory of Mansoul--the great white flag of the Prince waves over it, and, weak as we are in ourselves, we are invincible in the power of purity and faith. This is the “garrison” on which we rely, and which shall keep us in the hour and power of darkness. (W. L. Watkinson.)