Daily Devotionals

Mornings and Evenings with Jesus

Devotional: December 16th

The word of the Lord is tried. - 2 Samuel 22:31.

EVERY thing truly excellent and valuable admits of counterfeit; therefore, to determine the genuineness and value of a thing we bring it to the touchstone. Thus, silver and gold are tried in the fire. Experience signifies a knowledge derived from trial, and is, contrary to theory, founded on facts, not on conjecture. There is a knowledge which necessarily precedes faith, for how can we believe that of which we know nothing? But there is a knowledge which follows faith, of which the apostle, in referring to his experience, says, “I know whom I have believed, and that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.” Let us apply this to the case before us.

The word of the Lord comes to us with a peculiar recommendation: it comes to us as a tried word; it has been tried now for nearly six thousand years. It has been tried by millions. Numbers now in heaven have tried it, and numbers now in hell, and numbers living upon earth. It was tried by our first parents in the garden of Eden. They yielded to the temptation, and tried the truth of the Lord; and they soon found, in the corruption of their blood, in the mortality of their bodies, in the loss of communion with God, in their expulsion from Paradise, that the word of the Lord is true. How did the Jews try it! How they mocked the messengers of God that came to them with promises if they would believe and obey, and with fearful predictions if they continued to rebel against God! And did they not rebel? and have not the predictions been verified in their becoming a reproach, and a by-word, and a proverb, and a hissing among all the nations of the earth? and can we see a Jew at this very day without being reminded that the word of the Lord is true and faithful altogether?

We may take another view of this, and refer to the enemies of the church of Christ. There have been enemies who have used fraud and force in order to destroy Christianity; but they have not been able to do this, even by their combined efforts; and we learn the folly of suffering our hearts to tremble for the ark of God, seeing its destruction is impossible. “For God is not a man, that he should repent.” Eventually, every thing that opposeth the truth shall be destroyed. At his coming it shall be said, Babylon is fallen! Amen. The Lord hasten it in his time. It has been tried by the servants of God: many of them are now bearing their testimony to its faithfulness. Before they ever made the trial, they read that it was good to draw near to God, that the way of the Lord was strength to the upright; and they have tried it since, and can bear their testimony to the truth as well as to the grace of all this, and can say to others,-

“O ye despairing sinners, come,

And trust upon the Lord.”

The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him, to all that call upon him in truth. - Psalms 145:18.

THIS is not said of the Divine omnipresence, but of the Lord’s special and gracious presence. His presence in the ordinances of religion is in a way of dispensation. There he is always to be sought and found by those who are favoured with them. But there are many to whom these means are never available. There are many who have heard his word and have partaken of his own supper, to whom the Saviour will hereafter say, “Depart, I never knew you.” And though they will reply, “We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets,” he will immediately add, “I tell you I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.”

On the other hand, there are some who have the grace of the means without having the means of grace; for God is not confined to “temples made with hands,” but as to his own people “he is nigh unto them.” He is with them in the agency of his holy and blessed Spirit, in his inhabitation in them, in his influences upon them, “I will put,” says he, “my Spirit within them, and cause them to know my statutes and do them.” He is thus not only dwelling with them, but in them, to illuminate them, to sanctify them, to comfort, and to “seal them unto the day of redemption;” and he will never withdraw from them. Their fears will sometimes lead them to exclaim, “Cast me not away from thy presence, and take not thy Holy Spirit from me;” but he will not, he cannot, for he has been pleased to bind himself.

It is owing to this that we have continued to this day. If our feet have held his steps, if we have kept his way, and have not declined, to whom is the glory of this grace to be ascribed? Shall not we gratefully acknowledge that “having obtained help of the Lord, we continue to this day;” that with David we can look up and say, “By thee have I run through a troop, and with the help of my God have I leaped over a wall.” It is upon this we found and may found our confidence for the future, that though we may be assailed by men and by Satan, and all the hosts of darkness, yet greater is he that is in us than all they that are in the world. “In all these things, we shall be more than conquerors through him that hath loved us.”

Whenever we think of moving in life, Moses’ prayer becomes ours, “If thy presence go not with us, carry us not up hence.” But his promise to Moses becomes ours also, “My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest;” so that “as our day, our strength shall be.” So he will say to us as we move on, whatever may be our trials or our difficulties, “Fear thou not, for I am with thee; be not dismayed, for I am thy God. I will strengthen thee, yea, I will help thee, yea, I will uphold thee by the right hand of my righteousness.”