AT THE SURREY TABERNACLE, BOROUGH ROAD
“And the Lord said, behold, there is a place by me, and you shall stand upon a rock.” Exodus 33:21
WE have this morning, in addition to what we advanced upon this text last Lord's day morning, to notice simply two things; first, the after revelation, which the Lord has promised, in connexon with our text, as you read in the last verse of this chapter, “I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back parts, (or after revelation) but my face,” on law grounds, as we showed last Lord's day morning, “shall no man see.” We have therefore, this morning, to notice, first, the after revelation, and secondly the promise; “you shall stand upon a rock.”
First: The first thing we have to attend to this morning, is The Name Of The Lord; and we must be careful in looking into this declaration, for the Lord's proclaiming his name is a part of his answer to the prayer of Moses. Moses prayed to him, “show me your glory;” and the Lord answered and said that he would make his goodness pass before him, of which goodness last Lord's day morning we took a threefold view; namely, Jesus Christ passing before us as our Forerunner; secondly, the Lord's gracious dealings; and thirdly, ultimate and everlasting glory. And then the next part of the after revelation, is the declaration of his name, “I will proclaim the name of the Lord.” Let us therefore be careful to see how the Lord does this. We read in the next chapter that the Lord fulfilled his promise and passed by and proclaimed the name of the Lord, “Jehovah! Jehovah El!” I am thus particular because I shall want this part very especially presently.
Now the Lord commenced the proclamation of his name with declaring his eternity. He proclaimed, “Jehovah,” that is the first word relative to his name that of eternity. Hence, the Lord will bring his people to know that their salvation is made up of eternal things; that the things that constitute their salvation were provided in Christ before the world was that in the matter of their salvation, God the Father has gone forth in purpose and provision from everlasting; and that the Lord Jesus Christ has gone forth from everlasting; and that the Holy Spirit has been witness of this covenant from everlasting. And we shall see that all the attributes or qualities named afterwards all accord with this. And this then, is the first thing, Jehovah, or his eternity. Our salvation is a matter of eternity with him; and there is not anything else that is matter of eternity with him as is the eternal salvation of his people. We see that everything else shall pass away: but this is the great matter of this kind; this is a matter that astonished the prophets. This is God's special delight; this is Jehovah's highest pleasure; this is his most, shall I say, extensive and unmixed glory. Oh, may the Lord, awaken our souls more and more to that in which he so delights, for I am sure there is nothing more pleasing in the sight of the Lord than to see his children delighting in that in which he himself delights. That was a blessed state of mind into which the apostle was brought, with those with him, when he could say, “we look not at the things which are seen;” as though he would say, let them be pleasing or painful, let them be what they may, we look not at them, “but at the things which are unseen and eternal.” I say, that it is a blessed state of mind when we can thus estimate the things of time and sense, and look at the blessed truth that our hope is in heaven, that our inheritance is there, and that our real life, the real life of our existence, is that eternal life which we have in Christ; and that the real glory of our existence is not that we are sons and daughters of men, but that we are sons and daughters of the Almighty, that he is our Father, and that we are heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ.
Now the next part of this name is the Lord God or Jehovah El. The word El means interposition; so, it is not merely eternity, but it is an Eternal Interposer; that is, the idea here is, a God that interposes; Jehovah El, the Eternal interposer; one that can always interpose. We see in the Old Testament, when a good king died, what the people did for want of an interposer. Now we have a King that never dies, we have a Priest that never dies, we have a God that ever does and ever will interpose, an Eternal Interposer; so that whatever you may meet with, or I may meet with, between this and the other world, here is the Interposer, to interpose spiritually, to interpose providentially, to interpose correctively.
I now go on to notice the name of the Lord in answer to the prayer of Moses; “Show me, I beseech you, your glory.” Now if the Lord himself had not proclaimed his own name, no one else could have done it; no one else knew what relationship he had entered into, what his mind was, what his purposes were, what his counsels were: therefore, he proclaimed his name himself. And this shows to us how very careful we should be not to alter that revelation. It is a great mercy to be conformed to it, and to understand the truth in the Lord's own proclamation and meaning of it.
Now then, eternity and interposition are the beginning of the name of the Lord. Let us look, then, at the qualities by which he interposes. The very first he names is mercy. “The Lord, the Lord God merciful” Now we must, in going through these points, keep close to the Lord Jesus Christ. You recollect that he is called “The merciful High Priest;” and that the Lord promised that his mercy should be with his dear Son. Therefore, if we would be where the mercy of God is, we must be with Christ, brought to believe in Christ, to receive Christ Jesus the Lord. There is the mercy. If you ask, how merciful? I answer, let what the Savior has done decide that matter; and let this one truth be expressive of it, “The blood of Jesus Christ, God's dear Son, cleanses us from all sin.” Therefore, the first thing, when we were made concerned about our state, that we needed, was mercy, though we did not at that time see so deeply into our need as we have since seen; we did not then know how deeply we were sunk; we did not then know how utterly corrupt, wretched, blind, miserable, poor and destitute we were; yet we knew enough to know that mercy was the first thing we needed. Here then, is mercy, “The Lord, the Lord God is merciful;” and this mercy is in and by the Lord Jesus Christ. Here is everything to encourage us; and that scripture is very beautiful, where it says, “The Gentiles shall glorify God for his mercy.” The greater, therefore, our sinner-ship, the greater is the mercy that turns us into saints; the greater our sinner-ship, the greater is that mercy which saves us from it; the greater our sinner-ship, the greater is that mercy by which we shall be accepted of our God and presented before him. Here is the first feature of his interposition, namely, he comes to us in his mercy; mercy, which never has hurt anyone yet, and never will do.
Then the next quality is grace. And the mercy which I have just spoken of, for we must keep up the first part of the idea of his name, Jehovah, or eternity: this mercy, you see how it accords with the first part of his name, Jehovah. He appears in his eternity, that is the first; and then, interposition, to denote that he interposes eternally, that he will never be moved from that interposition. He interposed for the Jews, as a nation, but he was moved from that interposition, because that interposition was only for external and temporal purposes. But his interposition for his own people is a position from which he will never be moved. The Savior came into the world to achieve eternal redemption, and he did not return without achieving it. The Holy Ghost is come into the world to give life to all that the Father has given to Christ, and that Christ has died for, and to abide with them forever, and from that interposition he never will be driven. God the Father, rests in Christ; there he holds all his children, and all he has for them, and from that position he will never be moved. And so, the mercy of the Lord is “From everlasting to everlasting.” Yes, say you, “upon them that fear him, and keep his covenant.” He will take care that they shall fear him and keep his covenant; he will take care that they shall be kept so firm to it as never to be moved from it.
Then the second quality is grace. “The Lord God merciful and gracious.” That is just what a sinner wants; after he has obtained mercy, he says, Now then, if I have obtained mercy, if my sins are blotted out, if I am saved according to your mercy; now then I want grace; I want the grace of faith, and the grace of love, and the grace of prayer. I want grace now, Lord, whereby I may serve you acceptably; for there is no serving you acceptably without grace. Why not? Because “Without faith it is impossible to please God and therefore where the grace of God is in the heart, it convinces us of our unworthiness of the least of all his mercies, and brings us to receive Christ Jesus as the end of the law, the entire end of the law, the legal end of the law, the glorious end of the law, the everlasting end of the law, never to go back under it again: the end of the law for righteousness. We receive him. And then what is said of this grace? Something certainly in accordance with God's eternity; that “Grace shall reign through righteousness unto eternal life.” So, you see in Romans chapter 5, when the Apostle puts the fall of man in contrast with the grace of God, and the grace of God in contrast with the fall of man, we see how in all the parts grace prevails, grace reigns, and will reign to all eternity, when death shall be swallowed up in victory; and then will the Lord show forth in eternal ages to come the exceeding riches of his grace. These are his after revelations, then. The first revelation is the wrath of God revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness and ungodliness of men; that is the first revelation; the after revelation is that grace which shall reign through righteousness unto eternal life. Hence, when the Lord revealed unto Paul an increase of Paul's weakness, and suffered a messenger of Satan to unite with the fallen nature of the apostle Paul, to unite with some suitable evils for Satan's purpose in his nature, the apostle trembled; he said, Oh, this is a revelation; this is something new; this is something very distressing, something very despairing; what am I to do now? He besought the Lord that he would remove it. What is the after revelation? What was the next revelation made to him? Did the Lord appear, and say, Well, Paul, it is your own fault, you put yourself in the devil's way, you should have resisted him, and not allowed him to have fixed that thorn in your flesh; it was your own fault, you neglected something; and now your sins and your iniquities are separating between you and me, and between you and those things I intended for you. It is your own fault, and there the matter must be left. That is the kind of answer, it strikes me, that he would get from the gospels of the present day; but the Lord's answer was in accordance with his name, “My grace is sufficient for you.” What did he say to this? Why, perhaps I am, speaking this morning to someone who is saying, “Well, if the grace of God is sufficient for me, then I cannot despair; but really I feel in the various evils of my nature, and workings of my heart, more like a beast before God than anything else.” All I can say to such, is, the more need you have of the exceeding grace of a gracious God; if you can, this morning, find enough sin, enough corruption, enough abomination to enable you to say, the grace of God Almighty, the grace of God eternal, the grace of Jehovah El, the Almighty and Eternal Interposer, is not sufficient for you, then I must say, you must be very singular in your view of things; for, after all, you are but a creature; but he, by whose grace you are to be saved, is the Creator, the Lord God, the Interposer, the Everlasting God. So, then, mercy accords with his eternity, grace accords with his eternity.
Then the third is the very thing we need. Just my religion, that is, it brings all these truths into play every day, more or less; or into work, that is the more proper phrase. The next is long-suffering. That is just what I want: I want the long-suffering of God, I want a God who will bear with me; I want a God that is immutable, a God that never changes; I want a God whose long-suffering I may reckon upon, according to apostolic direction, “Account that the long-suffering of our God is salvation;” for if he did not bear with us, but looked at us in ourselves, he might then cut us down; but he looks at us in his dear Son, bears with us as a God of long-suffering. I glory in this. I rejoice in this. And how long will he suffer? Just as long as you need. You know some have gone before us and left us a good example. Take that good old patriarch, though we have none of his experience on record; I have sometimes been inconsistent enough to wish we had; I mean the good old Methuselah, living to 969 years. Why, he had all the evils in his heart all that time, that worked more gigantically than yours; because the human constitution must have been, living as long as they then did, exceedingly strong and capable of going on in profligacy to much greater extent than such poor Lilliputians as we are, by reason of our comparatively little physical strength. Yet the Lord bore with them all that time. It must have been long-suffering, it must have been the immutability of the blessed God, it must have been because he was a faithful and unchanging God. So, he interposes by mercy in Christ Jesus; interposes by grace in Christ Jesus; for grace and truth come by Jesus Christ; interposes by long-suffering by Jesus Christ; that is where the long-suffering is found. And it is the work of Christ, friends, that hides everything from the eyes of infinite purity that is offensive thereto, hides everything from the eyes of infinite justice that is offensive thereto.
Again, “Abundant in goodness and truth.” Abundant in goodness. Well, what is that to you if you are not abundant in badness? The sinner must be brought to feel that sin has abounded in him and corrupted every part; that he is abundant in badness, and abundant in evil, full of enmity to God, led captive by the devil; that is descriptive of the feelings that the Christian sometimes has towards God; not towards God in Christ, but towards God in some of his dealings with us. What, you say, a Christian? Yes, a Christian. Let the Lord touch you in some part, where you had just rested your fondest earthly hopes; and then, after he has done that, leave you to your own feelings, you would then understand what Job meant by cursing the day of his birth. These words describe the Christian, sometimes under that terrible state, full of enmity to God, led captive by the devil. And some Christians know what it is, until some of you old Christians have thought, that of all beings you ever heard of, or read of, there is none so cruel as the Almighty; and you have trembled at him and shuddered at yourselves. I hope I love God, and enjoy his presence; yet I get into such a disturbed state of mind, and into such a condition, that some of his dealings with me seem so monstrous and so offensive, that I feel rather to be full of enmity against him, led captive by the devil, and I seem to be everything that is wrong, except in one point; and that is, I cannot give up his truth; I feel I cannot do that; I should do it but for grace; and therefore, if he be abundant in goodness, I have had enough to need such abundant goodness, let his own goodness be as great as it may; and it must be measured by what Jesus Christ is. Here the secret lies which will unite the two, “abundant in goodness and truth.” Let us hear the secret explained, “I am the good Shepherd; the good Shepherd gives his life for the sheep.” There is the abundant goodness! “And my sheep shall never perish; neither shall any man pluck them out of my hands;” there is the abundant truth. Are you going to say this morning, then, if the Lord interposes for you by his mercy, and by his grace, and by his long-suffering, and by his goodness, and by his truth, that he cannot save you? Why, the moment that you feel your need of salvation, it is for you. He never yet turned away a poor and needy one: never, and he never will. This is the way he brings us to know him, and love him, and adore him, and cleave to him, and serve him; this is something worth a minister coming to preach, this is something worth a poor sinner coming to hear.
But he interposes also by a reservation of mercy, a reservation of mercy. Now notice his words, “keeping mercy for thousands:” keeping mercy. You and I have wanted the mercy on a wrong day sometimes: but he keeps it. I should like to have it now. No, you won't have it yet. By and bye, when you come to extremity, to the ends of the earth, to the swellings of Jordan, to some, shall I say, calamity; when you come to some terrible trial, when you come to something that shall bring to light more and more yet, of what a poor creature you are, then the Lord will step in, and say, Well, I knew it would be so; and I have kept some mercy for you; I knew how much you would need it, when you would need it, and in what order you would need it; and I have kept this mercy. And so, if you appeal to the saints, you will find that the saints in their old age need mercy more than ever. David, in his old age and in his dying hour, found shelter only in reserved mercy, covenant mercy. Paul was Paul the aged, when he. said, “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief;” interposing by reserved mercy. Why, when I was first brought to the knowledge of the gospel, I had not the most remote idea that I should need one millionth part of the mercy that I now know I need. When brought to walk in fellowship with God, the world tempted me! the flesh tempted me! Satan tempted me! unbelief tempted me! anything for a moment affect me! and my heart ever again dare to wander! My heart ever again become like the deceitful bow, that would start aside again and again! I could not believe it. But I have found it so; and here I am and but for mercy of infinite depth, and height, and breadth, and duration, I know not what would have become of me. And how men can make so much of a little creature doing, I know not. I desire to do all the good I can do; but at the same time turn my back upon the whole of it; and I desire to be found nowhere but on that river of mercy, whose tide is so mighty when it rises as to overtop every sin, however mountainous that sin may be; every difficulty, however formidable it may be; and that will bring me at last into the presence of that God at whose presence mountains flow down, and in the light of whose countenance there is glory greater than mortal eye has seen.
One more aspect of his name. The Lord closes up the whole with something very natural. Perhaps you will almost wonder why that part of his name is placed last; it does not imply that it is not found in the first quality; of course, mercy implies that; but he places pardon in the last part; “pardoning iniquity, transgression and sin.” That is the last part; and that is just what you will need as long as you live. Now if the Lord come to you in a dying hour, interpose there, for you in his mercy, then there is his grace, there is his abundant goodness that will cover your badness, and his truth that will take away all your lies. Lies! you don't mean to tell me that I tell lies! Why, my heart tells thousands every day. A very bad one, then, say you. Of course, it is I need God's truth to take that away. Well, then, there is his reserved mercy; and then the Lord finishes up the whole with pardon; “pardoning iniquity, transgression and sin.” You cannot enter heaven with a sweeter feeling than that. It was this very feeling of pardoning love that made the woman happy at the Savior's feet. “Pardoning iniquity, transgression and sin.”
This, then, is a part of the after revelation. We have thus seen, friends, the revealed name of the Lord; and you see how the dear Savior answers to every part of it. His mercy, it is in Christ; his long-suffering, it is in Christ; his abundant goodness and truth, it is in Christ; covenant mercy, it is in Christ, treasured up in Christ, manifested in Christ; “Pardoning iniquity, transgression, and sin;” your sins are forgiven you, for his name's sake. There the law is ended, there the covenant is established, there the promises are confirmed, there the soul is saved, there God is glorified, there his name shines as out of Zion, eternal perfection.
But his name bears another relation: it bears a relation to the lost; therefore, it goes on to say, it goes on now to describe his relation to the lost, “That will by no means clear the guilty.” Now all by nature are guilty; that is a self-evident truth; that “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God;” that “by the offence of one, judgement came upon all men to condemnation;” yet it there says, “He will in no wise clear the guilty;” and yet the very preceding clause says that he will pardon; “pardoning iniquity, transgression, and sin;” actually doing it. What then are we to understand by his not clearing the guilty? You cannot understand it in the universal sense because it would not be true; every soul in heaven is a pardoned sinner, and is there as a pardoned sinner, according to God's forgiving mercy; and therefore, it means the guilty in another relation. The finally guilty. Who are they? They are people who are left in the fall, whose names are not written in the book of life. That is not their fault; God is not obliged to do it, and they have no claim or right, that it should be done; and therefore, it is not their fault, nor God's fault; he has not given them to Christ Jesus; it is not their fault, and they have no right to Christ. The Holy Spirit never engaged to quicken them or teach them. “All your children shall be taught of God.” “All that the Father gives me, shall come unto me;” therefore, the others are left behind; they are guilty, and they are left in their guilt. Election has not given them to Christ, grace has not recorded their names in God's eternal book; if it has, let men prove it; Christ did not die for them: if he did, let men prove it; the Holy Spirit never engaged to take up his abode in their souls: if he did, let men prove it. Therefore, God will by no means clear them. That is the doctrine of it; and hence he said to Moses, in connection with our text, “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious: and I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy.” When men tell you, you have nothing to do with these truths, you take your Bibles, and ask whether the Bible would talk to you in that way: let your answer be, when men tell you that you have nothing to do with these truths, let your answer be this: that “all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable.” Oh, but, say some, it discourages men from coming to Christ. It discourages them from coming wrongly; and if you come wrongly you will have to go back again. What is coming wrongly? Why, contrary to his truth. Well, says one, I come to Christ, but I hate election. Then you will have to go back again. Well, says another I come to Christ, but I do not believe in predestination. Then you will have to go back again. Well, says another, I come to Christ, but I do not like that doctrine of an immutable covenant. Then you will have to go back again. You have not come poor enough, helpless enough, needy enough; and you will have to go back again. And therefore, I say, does this discourage men from coming to Christ? It discourages them from coming wrongly; and gives them to see, that if they come rightly, it must be in God's own order. Again, let us take another view of this matter. How are these men known among men? They cannot be known in one sense, for the Lord's people hear by nature the same mark as the reprobate do. But then the Lord takes that mark from them and marks them with another mark. What is the mark then that the reprobate bear by nature? The same mark that all bear. Take Exodus 20; that will enlighten us upon the matter, “I am the Lord your God, which have brought you out of the land of Egypt,” and so on. “You shall have no other gods before me, or besides me, or with me.” “You shall not make unto you any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: you shall not bow down yourself to them, nor serve them; for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me.” That is the mark of reprobation; hatred to that new covenant name, of which I have spoken, is the mark of reprobation; therefore, if you hate that eternal relationship, into which he has taken his people; if you hate him in his sovereignty, that is the mark of reprobation: and all the time you bear that mark, you are on your way to hell! You are the guilty! Nothing can clear you if you die in this state! But all by nature bear this mark. Therefore, the apostle, says, (and he speaks it very emphatically and beautifully,) “You, (he says,) who were enemies, yet has he reconciled by the death of his Son.” That is how it is done. You who sometime were far off, and enemies by wicked works, crucifying the Lord, despising his prophets, despising his truth, practical enemies to him, yet now has he reconciled you, by the blood of Jesus Christ. So, he blots out this mark of reprobation, and puts upon you the mark of salvation: and the destroying angel dares not come near any man, upon whom that mark of salvation is. So that the mark of reprobation is hatred; the mark of salvation is love. In this is manifest the children of God and the children of the devil: the one loves the Lord, the other hates him. And therefore, those who are left will live in hatred and die in hatred; you cannot make them otherwise. Well, then, says one, I hate such a doctrine as you have been preaching this morning. Then I am grieved for you; and if you die as you are, you will be lost. Well, say you, it is not my fault if I am. Certainly not; I do no not say it is you are lost by original sin, there is the root of your condemnation, there is the root of it. Oh, but I do not believe it; I believe I am lost by my practical sins. You were lost before you committed practical sins, sir; your practical sins have augmented your guilt, but not at all altered your condition. The newborn infant is as much exposed to eternal damnation, apart from Christ's interposing mercy, as the man of seventy or eighty years old. We live in a day when the fall is almost universally denied; just lop off the branches, that is the right way; make the man an outward sinner, and then put him off with an outward gospel. Now that is how they do it; whereas we are inward sinners; “and the Lord desires truth in the inward parts, and in the hidden parts you shall make me to know wisdom.” The guilty then I take to be those whose names are not in the book of life, for whom Christ has not died, and whom the Holy Ghost will never soften nor savingly enlighten, nor quicken, nor bring to Christ. Therefore, if I am speaking to any that have discovered through mercy, and it is through mercy, who have discovered that this is your character, that you tremble at yourselves, and would desire to cease to hate the Lord, and to know what it is to love him, that very feeling, I should hope, will be a sign in your favor.
“Keeping mercy for thousands of them that love him.” There is the contrast; the hatred is the mark of reprobation; the love is the mark of salvation. Hatred is a hateful thing between creature and creature. What a hateful thing it is to see hatred where love should be. But nowhere where I can think of, is hatred so detestable and so awful as when it stands between the creature and the Creator. Hate my Maker! hate the very God whose sun is shining on me! who sends the genial shower, the abundant harvest, filling my heart with food and gladness! hate the very God in whose hand my breath is! Such is our hateful state by nature. Well may the Lord say, that when brought to know what they are they shall loathe themselves in their own sight.
But what are we to understand by “visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children?” I do not apprehend that “fathers” there should be understood literally as parents, or children as children; fathers there refer rather to teachers; and they convert people to their false religions, and their converts follow the traditions of their fathers; and therefore, so far as these converts follow the traditions of their Satan-taught fathers, so far the sins of the fathers shall be visited upon the children, if they follow in the same path of hatred to God's truth. That I conceive to be the idea here.
Thus, then, friends, the name of the Lord in relation to his own people is a saving name; and the name of the Lord in relation to the others is a consuming fire, is a condemnation name, a law name, a judicial name, a fearful name. And yet (and this is a matter I should just notice before I leave this part,) when the Lord comes to his law he does not take away the eternity of it; but as we have the eternity of his name in the gospel part, so we have it in the law part; and therefore if he eternally interposes for the salvation of his people, he eternally interposes also for the majesty of his eternal law; never suffering through all eternity one jot or tittle of. that law to fail.
Now I must, in conclusion, merely notice the heads of the other parts of the subject. “You shall stand upon a rock.” God's law name you will fly from; but taught of God, and flying from that name, or from his name in that relation, you will flee to Christ, where his name appears in another relation, where he reveals the immutability of his counsel; and there shall you find refuge, find strong consolation.
Now there are four things, and I should have liked an hour to have spoken upon them, implied in the last part of our subject. You are brought to know his name, love his truth, “you shall stand upon a rock.” This will mean, in the first place, right. It is a right by promise; God gives us that standing place. If we have a standing place upon the rock, God gave us that before the world was. Therefore, that is our original right, to have a standing before God that will never give way.
Then our mediatorial or equitable right is the dear Savior's perfect work; he has taken us out of the place where we had no standing, taken us away from the sandy foundation; taken us away from that where we must have sunk. As a poet somewhere very well says,
,
“On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand,
All other ground is sinking sand.”
The Savior's perfect work, therefore, is our equitable right. Then, thirdly, our faith is our evidential right. “Noah by faith became heir of the righteousness of God.” Therefore, faith, or reception of this truth, is our evidential right. And, fourthly, the eternity of our right lies in the immutability of the blessed God. So, nothing can move us from this rock, you see; it is firm. And then also it will mean possession. “You shall stand upon a rock.” And so, when Joshua was about to enter the promised land, the Lord made use of this expression, “Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon have I given unto you, as I spoke to Moses.” And the Lord, more than 400 years before that, commanded Abraham to arise, and walk through the length and breadth of the land. If Abraham had said, I do not think I shall go up to that Hermon, I don't much like that; I do not think I shall go up to that mount Tabor, I don't much like that; I do not think I shall go up to that mount of Olives, I don't much like that; I don't want it, Lord. Oh, there was no danger of his so speaking of the Lord's directions. And, therefore, to walk through the length and breadth of the land, denoted possession of it, and acquaintance with it. So, it is now, there is a covenant and a gospel, and the Lord will make his people walk through the length and breadth of it. Hence, the apostle sums it up thus: “That you may know what the breadth is” you are to have possession of, (I want to survey your land,) “and the length, and. the depth, and the height of the love of God that passes knowledge.” Therefore, it is a possession. Why, I try every day, to get into possession all I can of the gospel, to tell you all I know. Well, say you, that's very little. Well, then you must pray to the Lord to give me more. I don't keep anything back; I do not say little this morning, because I think I shall not have enough to say this afternoon or this evening. But it is not much saying; it is not that; it is what the Lord is pleased to do; one sentence carried home by him, will do more in the soul, than ten thousand sermons without him; “Yea, without him we can do nothing.” Paul, with all his wonderful experience, may plant; Apollos, with all his eloquence, may water; yet God alone can give the increase. Strength then is another idea implied. “You shall stand upon a rock!” Christ is the Rock; he is strong. “Trust in the Lord, for in the Lord alone is everlasting strength.” The margin gives a more literal translation to that, and renders it, “Trust you in the Lord forever; for in the Lord Jehovah is the Rock of Ages;” everlasting strength. Now the strength of the most robust must give way; the strength of the wealth of the wealthiest must give way; the strength of the universe itself must give way; but ours never; as our day is, so shall our strength be. What a blessed truth is that; strength to keep us in love to God; strength to keep us in immoveable decision for his blessed truth; floods may rise, the winds may blow; but we cannot be moved; for we are founded upon a rock. Lastly, certainty. “You shall stand upon a rock. Now I had three ideas here; and the first idea was taking a conflicting view of our position, or viewing our position as connected with conflicts. Then the truth rose to my mind: Psalm 46. there, through all conflicts, I saw the certainty of victory. “He cuts the spear in sunder; he burns the chariot in the fire. Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.” Then I looked at it ultimately; and the last verse of the Book of Daniel came into my mind; “Go your way, Daniel, till the end be for, you shall rest, and stand in your lot at the end of the days.” Again, I looked at it; matrimonially, and then the second chapter of Hosea came into my mind; and there I saw the Lord saying, “I will betroth you unto me forever; yea, I will betroth you unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving kindness, and in mercies. I will even betroth you unto me in faithfulness; and you shall know the Lord.” Then I took another view, and I saw the Lamb and the Bride on Mount Zion; I saw the Savior presenting the church without spot, without wrinkle, or any such thing; I saw the sun go down to rise no more; I saw the moon go down to rise no more; I saw the earth pass away to appear no more; I saw the universe pass away; I saw the Lord coming to judgment; I saw him on his throne, and his people on his right hand; and I heard him say, “Here am I, and all you have given me.”