Psalms 28:1-6

Psalms 28:1. Unto thee will I cry, O LORD my rock: be not silent to me: lest, if thou be silent to me, I become like them that go down into the pit.

Oh! if God did not hear prayer, we should become like dead men ay, like lost men. Our fall or despair would be terrible indeed. «Lest, if thou be silent to me, I become Like them that go down into the pit.»

Psalms 28:2. Hear the voice of my supplications, when I cry unto thee, when I lift up my hands toward thy holy oracle.

Is that the way you pray, dear friend? I know there are some that, if they have uttered certain good words got through a form of prayer are perfectly satisfied. As to whether God hears them or not, that does not trouble them. But if you are a true child of God, it will be your main thought in prayer, «Will he hear me? Will he hear me? Will he answer me.» And you will think nothing of a prayer at all unless you have the comfortable, believing persuasion that yore' prayer has reached the car and heart of God. Oh! believe us, for some of us do know, by experience, that prayer is a real thing. It is no repetition of words. It really is the heart speaking into the ear of God; and God does graciously respond when prayer is truly offered.

Psalms 28:3. Draw me not away with the wicked, and with the workers of iniquity, which speak peace to their neighbours, but mischief is in their hearts.

We are often afraid lest we should get numbered with them.

«Oh! were it not for grace divine,

Their fate so dreadful had been mine.»

«Gather not my soul with sinners,» is the prayer of many a godly man. When he looks within and sees the sin that is there, and what he deserves from the hand of God, apart from the blood and righteousness of Christ, he begins, indeed, to pray, «Draw me not away with the wicked. O Lord, do not let me wander into doctrinal error or into errors of life, or into laxity of behavior, or into backslidings, but keep me fast, for unless thou hold me fast:

«'I feel I must, I shall, decline,

And prove like them at last.'

Draw me not away with the wicked.»

Psalms 28:4. Give them according to their deeds, and according to the wickedness of their endeavors: give them after the work of their hands; render to them their desert.

And a just mind feels that such ought to be the case. God is a judge, and he will punish sin, and gracious men do not wish that it should be otherwise. Even to that terrible side of God's character, which is seen in his vengeance upon the ungodly, the Christian trains the loving eye. He is not reconciled to half a God, or to a God with half the attributes of God, namely, love and tenderness: but he loves God as he finds him. He loves that. God who is a consuming fire. I should be afraid if I could not love God under any aspect in which he is presented to me, because just as I should feel that I did net love a man truly if I said, «In such a character I cannot endure him,» I should feel that there was some difference between him and me. We must love God in every character upon the throne of justice, as well as upon the seat of love.

Psalms 28:5. Because they regard not the works of the LORD, nor the operation of his hands, he shall destroy them, and not build them up. Blessed be the LORD, because he hath heard the voice of my supplications.

Can you say this? Excuse me putting the question again and again to all now present, for it is a very vital question. If you never knew what answered prayer means, God help you to begin to pray, «Blessed be the Lord, because he hath heard the voice of my supplications.»

This exposition consisted of readings from Colossians 3:1; Colossians 4:1; Psalms 28:1.