Psalms 88:18

REFLECTIONS

SHALL I not ponder over the contents of this plaintive Psalm, and reflect on the sad cause of human misery? Day and night may tears run down, when the soul reviews the melancholy source of this world's afflictions. But, my soul, when in Jesus thou beholdest such sorrow, to what a height of increased lamentation doth the subject arise? That man, who is a child of sin, should be the child of sorrow, is what might well be supposed, and is to be expected in a state like the present. But when we hear his holy soul, who knew no sin, and in whose mouth was found no guile, thus crying out under the water-spouts of Divine wrath, sore amazed and distracted; what a horrible idea doth this awaken of the baleful malignity of sin and man's fallen estate? To have been present at the destruction of the old world by the flood; to have seen Sodom destroyed by fire, or Korah and his company swallowed up by the earthquake; these would all have given lively ideas of God's irreconcilable hatred of sin. But to view sin in all its horrors, no representation can come up to the cries of the Son of God. If, my soul, thou wouldest see sin exceedingly sinful, go to Gethsemane, or to Golgotha; there hear the holy Jesus uttering strong cries, and learning obedience by the things which he suffered. And shall I not, precious Lamb of God, shall not my soul be drawn, out in love to thee, in delight in thee, in affection towards thee, and dependence upon thee, when I behold thee, in these unequalled sufferings, and when I am constrained to say, Lo, all this, and more, did Jesus suffer and endure when he knew no sin, that his people might be made the righteousness of God in him? Oh Lord, in the contemplation of thee and thy sufferings, enable me to go on and find confidence in all the trifling difficulties and sorrows with which thou wast fit to exercise me here below. Thou art still the God of my salvation and thou will bear me up, and carry me through, and lighten all my pressure, until thou shalt bring me home to behold thy glory and to dwell with thee forever.