PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
The Great Texts of the Bible — Volume 5
James Hastings · 172,846 words · 178 reading sections
Section 1
Division ii 13 ^~R \ .H3S V-S Copy I Si'«. :.i' THE GREAT TEXTS OF THE BIBLE <v;vn^\' THE GREAT T OF THE BIBLE EDITED BY THE REV. BDITI JAMES 'Hastings, d.d. EDITOR OF "THE EXPOSITORY TIMES" "THE DICTIONARY OF THE BIBLE' "THE DICTIONARY OF CHRIST AND THE GOSPELS" AND "THE ENCYCLOPiEDIA OF RELIGION AND ETHI…
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3 4 THE LIGHT OF GOD'S WORD course which thought and conduct should follow, and on the efforts which are necessary to that end. With the Word of God at hand, we should be in no doubt about the greatest practical question with which man has to deal : the true road to everlasting happiness in another life. The Functio…
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* W. L. Watkinson. * Dr. John Brown, Horce Subsecivce, ii. 470, 6 THE LIGHT OF GOD'S WORD 2. If it be the case that, in a great proportion of cases, the Bible fails of its true purpose, and men read it, if at all, without securing the gift which it is meant to bestow, what is the reason ? The answer is, that certain …
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8 THE LIGHT OF GOD'S WORD historical faith in the Bible and said : He will not make me glad, but He shall not find me, therefore, swerve from following Him. I will do His holy will so far as I can, I will serve Him as well as I can, though not perhaps so well as others to whom the joy of the Lord gives strength. I wil…
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3. God hides Himself from those who would saunter with easy off-handedness through the pages of the Bible, as though they were taking a stroll up and down a back garden, and languidly noting the Immensities as if they were daisies or dandelions growing on either side of the path ; as though, forsooth, nothing was so ea…
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^ I grant you that the Bible will have no power over my life 1 T. H. Huxley. PSALM cxix. 105 13 if ever it ceases to command my conscience, or appeal to my judgment. It may contain passages of transcendent beauty that touch my aesthetic sense. It may arouse my curiosity by the light it sheds on the customs of strange…
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i. The stories of the Fall and of the Flood, the grandest human traditions founded on a true horror of sin. » J. Hamilton, jrurks, ii. 30. PSALM cxix. 105 15 ii. The story of the Patriarchs, of which the effective truth is visible to this day in the polity of the Jewish and Arab races. iii. The story of Moses, with…
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not thy law." 19 20 THE OPENING OF GOD'S WORD 2. The object of Christian faith may be compared to a jewel enclosed in a casket. The jewel is the Lord Jesus Christ; the casket is the Bible. Now, we believe that a man may possess the jewel who has never seen the casket, or who has got it in his hands in an imperfect a…
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3. No book can adequately express God's word. What God had to say to men, what God at last actually did say to men, was something too great for human words to record. " God," we read in the Bible itself, " God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in times past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these…
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II. The Light Eevealed. " The opening of thy words giveth light." When the book is opened, the light streams forth. The term translated "giveth light " is a transitive verb which means " to cause to shine." The direct object of the verb may be supplied by using any term which will indicate the lover of God's word. "T…
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1 G. H. James. ' G. Jackson. * A. Macartbui. PSALM cxix. 130 27 III. The Light Utilized. 1. " It giveth understanding unto the simple." We all know what it means to have the intellect enlightened. Everywhere we are encountering new knowledge. The sciences are all new, the practical affairs of life are conducted on …
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^ The other day I was reading a story of a Frenchman who was being entertained by a Christian chief in one of the Pacific Islands. The chief had a Bible, which the Frenchman sneered at, saying that in Europe they had got past that. The chief led his guest out of the house, showed him where they used to cook and eat the…
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Morrison (Q. H.), The Return of the Angels, 98. Moule (H. C. G.), Thy Keeper, 7. Power (P. B.), Tlie " I wills " of the Psalms, 217. Pulsford (W.), Trinity Church Sermons, 50. Scott (J. M.), Some Favourite Psalms, 117. Smellie (A.), In the Hour of Silence, 42. Smith (G. A.), Four Psalms, 99. Voysey (C), Sermons,…
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> H. C. G. Moule, Thy Keeper, 8. • D. Burns, The Song of the Well, 66. » 0. H. Morrison, The Return of the Angels, 98. PSALM cxxi. I, 2 35 I The Call of the Hills. " I will lift up mine eyes unto the mountains." 1. The hills that the Psalmist was thinking about were visible frem no part of that long-extended plai…
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» Q. H. Morrison, Tht Retwm of the Angels, 100, PSALM cxxi. I, 2 37 ^ From Venice, Euskin travelled by Milan and Turin to Susa, and over the Pass of Mont Cenis. Among the mountains he recovered at once health and spirits. His first morning among the hills after the long months in Italy, he accounted a turning- point …
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God hath His uplands, bleak and bare, Where He doth bid us rest awhile — Crags where we breathe the purer air, Lone peaks that catch the day's first smile. » H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, Day by Day DxUy, 27. PSALM cxxi. I, 2 39 Lift me, 0 Lord, above the level plain. Beyond the cities where life throbs and thrills, And i…
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^ We must avoid the mistakes frequently made by poets who have sought to personify nature and find in it a response to the varying moods of human life, and by theologians who have found in it an analogy of the ways of God, Nature is not like God. Her laws disclose no moral standards. When these are intro- duced she app…
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1. Help from God is sure to come when our spirits hold fellowship with Him. To do this often, and on occasion to linger long, cannot but have a great influence on our spirit. We become 44 HELP FROM BEYOND THE HILLS more and more of a heavenly mind, and look to heaven as our own place and as the goal of all our hopes.…
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46 HELP FROM BEYOND THE HILLS not accomplish. Not in vain had he made frequent flight of spirit beyond the hills, and kept alive his fellowship with the Lord of Zion. What though he could not stay day and night in the sanctuary ? He who made it safe would come forth with him and be ever by him. The earthly figure was …
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PS. CXIX.-SONG OF SOL. — 4 50 GUARDIANSHIP IN DAILY LIFE L Going Out and Coming In. 1. These words practically mean the activities, the intercourse, the incidents of life. Again and again we meet with this phrase in the Old Testament Scriptures. Take for instance 2 Sam. iiL 25 There Joab warns David that Abner has …
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If we were thus to dwell and linger on the thought of God and His care for us, to insist on it to ourselves, to repeat and vary our expression of it, to hark back to it again and again ; if we could but rise and settle into the conviction of a tender fatherly Providence that covers our whole life, and extends through a…
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2. There is peril in coming in. — It might seem to some that once a man was safely across the threshold of his home he might stand in less need of this promise of help. But experience says otherwise. Tlie world has little respect for any man's threshold. It is capable of many a bold and shameless intrusion. The things …
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> J. E. Gumming, The Blessed Life, 100. PSALM cxxi. 8 57 ever-defending Presence. And there is nothing that can counter- act this movement towards spiritual pessimism, but "practising the presence of God." In the little introductory poem to the Autobiography of Mark Rutherford, there is a line that expresses the fee…
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PSALM cxxi. 8 59 upon the eyes of our race ; it is impossible for any field of righteous battle, any flood of suffering to unroll, without the vision of Christ upon it. He dominates our highest aspirations, and is felt by our side in our deepest sorrows. There is no loneli- ness, whether of height or of depth, which H…
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1 P. C. Ainsworth, The Threshold Oraee, 17. "^ Henry Melvill. PSALM cxxi. 8 6i her husband, ** into the face of death. Three times has my life been given back to me after a dire struggle that nearly ended it all. But oh ! I can tell you death is not so dark and drear as it is painted, even to the Christian. I felt as…
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66 THE HOUSE OF THE LORD unto me ? I will receive the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the Lord. I will pay my vows unto the Lord in the sight of all his people ; in the courts of the Lord's house, even in the midst of thee, O Jerusalem." And once more, in my text observe the psalmist's joy at the prospect …
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^ The boy was expressing the opinion of many older than himself when he said to his mother, " I should like to be just such a Christian as father is, for no one can tell whether he is a Christian or not." This father is like the clock attached to a certain church, which possessed neither face nor hands, but which was w…
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^ An unfamiliar instance of special interest in sacred places was given by Professor Minas Teheraz to the "World's Parlia- ment." Speaking of the Armenian Church, he said : " One result of the manifold persecutions has been to strengthen the attach- ment of the Armenians to the Church of St. Gregory, the Illuminator. E…
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\ There was a time in Scotland when the Church stood immediately behind the King's throne as counsellor, when the Church regulated the homes of men, and their habits, when the Church conducted commercial treaties, when the Church granted charters to boroughs. All that is now changed in Scotland. It is so much changed t…
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' B. E. Prothero, The Psalms in Human Life, 15. PSALM cxxii. 1 75 the wife counting the weary days in the hills of Ithaca ; the dog leaping up in his master's face and dying of joy; the aged servants recognizing their long-lost chief as he treads once more his father's threshold. To any man worthy of the name, the th…
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1 G. Calthrop. « Stopford A. Brooke. PSALM cxxii. I ^>^ be our joy in communion with God, we ought to be reverent when we come before Him. One cannot help wondering that some people who do go to the House of God should go at all, they show so little interest in the services. You see their want of interest even in th…
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^ J«mes Martineau, Endeavours after tlie Christian Life, 138. PSALM cxxii. I 79 if he desires on general grounds to do so, but these are paltry motives for cutting oneself off from communion with believers. It is clear that Christ Himself thought many of the orthodox practices of the exponents of the popular religion…
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I. Sowing in Teaes. 1. The sower is represented as weeping. The language here ■s very strong. One commentator puts it in this form, "may indeed weep every step that he goes." It has also been rendered, " takes no step of his way without weeping." Dr. Thomson, the author of The Land and the Book, in giving an interpre…
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4. Lastly, there is the sorrow of disappointment. All earnest labourers are liable to fits of despondency. Christian labourers certainly not less than others. Overwork, perhaps, is followed by reaction, or the too eager hope is disappointed because we do not see any results for all our doing. We think that our fellow- …
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And care not what hands shall reap it, Or if you shall have passed away Before the waving corn-fields Shall gladden the sunny day. Sow; and look onward, upward, Where the starry light appears — Where in spite of the coward's doubting, Or your own heart's trembling fears, You shall reap in joy the harvest You have…
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3. " They that sow shall reap." The seed is God's, and God's too is the increase ; only let us cast God's seed into God's soil, it matters not though we sow in tears, He will bless us with the harvest. God has His purpose in every call of duty ; His purpose is to give us the blessedness of what we do. Were the work our…
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^ Mrs. Browning has told us that there was no verse in the Book of Psalms which fell upon her ear with such comfort as this — Of all the thoughts of God that are Borne inward unto souls afar, 95 96 THE GIFTS OF SLEEP Along the Psalmist's music deep, Now tell me if that any is, For gift or grace, surpassing this — "…
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Peace within makes peace without. Where there is no dis- turbance in the heart, there can be none in the billows, there can be none in the storm. These may wanton furiously. Their wild sport may threaten shipwreck to the vessel. But God's sleep can exist amid them. It can hold in sweet oblivion the untroubled soul. And…
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11. Giving in Sleep. There cannot be the slightest doubt that the English equiva- lent for the Hebrew words is, "He giveth to His beloved in sleep." "He giveth blessing to His beloved during sleep." If the words so rendered are less perfect rhythmically, and suggest a less beautiful meaning or no meaning at all, we c…
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^ We cannot underrate the enormous importance of discipline and training in childhood and youth, nor the enormous importance of teaching children to help themselves; but how much of the influence which goes to mould our human nature in its early days, and to build it up, is of the silent sort — subtle influences from n…
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^ The sect called the Quietists, who flourished in the seven- teenth century, and who taught that God came closest to the soul when it simply waited for Him, and did not actively search for Him, may have too exclusively chosen the Psalmist's line for their motto, and its spirit as their guide in the religious life. But…
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2. Gifts of spiritual illumination and direction have come through sleep. When God shuts the doors of sense, He keeps open His own way into the spirit ; and many a time He gives His beloved thoughts of truth and desires for good that surprise the sleeper when he gets himself back again. He awakes to earth as » L. A. Ba…
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sight, And hear the angels singing to the sleepers through the night ; And, lo ! throughout the hours of day those gentle flowers prolong The music of the angels in that tender slumber-song, — " Sleep, oh, sleep ! The Shepherd loveth His sheep. He that guardeth His flock the best Hath folded them to His loving brea…
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PSALM cxxx. I 115 We are often only passing judgment upon ourselves, upon our want of thought, imagination, and insight, when we proclaim our fellows to be lacking in those elements to which the great and deep things of life make their appeal. In the circle in which we live and move there would be many rich discoverie…
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^ God in His infinite mercy has placed us in those deeps of wonder at life and death, of why and whither, deeps of intense agony : " Wherefore hidest thou thy face ? " " Verily thou art a God that hidest thyself." Deeps of intense joy : " Thou art about my bed, and spiest out all my ways, there is not a thought in my h…
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^ The one thought which possesses me most at this time and, I may say, has always possessed me, is that we have been dosing our people with religion when what they want is not this but the Living God, and that we are threatened now, not with the loss of religious feeling, so-called, or of religious notions, or of relig…
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^ " Perhaps to suffer," wrote the Swiss theologian, Vinet, in one of his letters, " is nothing else than to live deeply. Love and sorrow are the conditions of a profound life." A truer word was never spoken. The tragedy in which we live is meant to educate us. There would indeed be no understanding of life at all did w…
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^ We must hold on fast to the fact that God's forgiveness is a very real thing, and not a mere dramatic thing ; and that if we ' J, Brierley, Religion and To-Day, 64. 124 DE PROFUNDIS have to sufifer what seems a disproportionate penalty for our fault, it is not sent us because God is merely an inflexible exactor of …
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1. A common life binds together the members of a family. A common life is the basis of the unity of a nation. Yet these can but illustrate the far more complete and searching unity of those, who, having the common life — the sublime, spiritual, eternal life in Christ — come together into the fellowship of the Christian…
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1 O. F. S. P. Jenkins. PSALM cxxxiii. I 131 that is other than its own, the severed limb or dissected organ loses its whole reality and worth, and becomes mere dead matter. ^ In the last year of his life, the Bishop wrote to Dr. Guinness Eogers, one of the best known of the leaders of English Noncon- formity : " To …
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2. The Spirit of unity needs to be cultivated. The unity of brotherly love will never become general, still less perfect, until we have all come to love God our Father supremely, with all our hearts, never until we see that the next great law which He wishes us to keep is to love one another as brethren, as all childre…
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136 UNITY who laid down their lives for their cause proved the tension and suspense with which they were being watched. These men were, and felt themselves to be, trustees of the national honour and national traditions. It was therefore true instinct which led their leader not only to plant his country's flag at the S…
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^ It is related of the Duke of Wellington, that once when he remained to take the sacrament at his parish church, a very poor old man went up the opposite aisle, and, reaching the communion table, knelt down close by the side of the duke. Some one (probably a pew opener) came and touched the poor man on the shoulder, a…
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^ No mere coincidence of opinion or of practice in other directions can be compared in uniting power with devotion to our Lord Jesus Christ. Even now, amidst all our outward schisms, and all our inward alienations from each other, it makes our hearts burn within us to speak together of Christ. At such moments — of cour…
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Now, in reference to all this intimate self-knowledge, man is not superior to God. He may be certain that in no respect does he know more of himself than the Searcher of hearts knows. He may be an uncommonly thoughtful person, and little of what is done within his soul may escape his notice ; let us make the extreme su…
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^ Might I follow the bent of my own mind, my pen, such as it is, should be wholly employed in setting forth the infinite love of God to mankind in Christ Jesus, and in endeavouring to draw all men to the belief and acknowledgment of it. The one great mercy of God, which makes the one, only happiness of all 1 N. M. Wat…
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> N. M. Waters. PSALM cxxxix. 5 151 and meekness and self-mistrust. The failures and indiscretions of yesterday are no longer creatures of moral impoverishment and despair. He " besets me behind," and they become the teachers of a quiet wisdom and well-proportioned thought. ^ When you reflect that your evil thoughts…
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On Eichard's own confession — 0 coward conscience, how dost thou afflict me! . . . Methought the souls of all that I had murder'd Came to my tent; and every one did threat To-morrow's vengeance on the head of Eichard. Ghosts all, yet speaking in the voice of reality. Conscience wears the form of a haunting fiend as w…
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2. The Psalmist sets forth in poetry what theology calls the doctrine of the Divine Omniscience. He believes in Jehovah, the God of all the earth, and therefore believes in a Providence so universal that nothing is missed. It is not an intellectual dogma to him, but a spiritual intuition. It is not stated as an abstrac…
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^ R. Stephen, Divine and Human Influence, i. 262. i6o THE SEARCHER OF HEARTS us the experience which makes this psalm intelligible, and forces us also to cry, " (^JLord^ thou JhAstsearchedjnei and kQOj?mm ^ It is a fact well known to seamen that objects under water, such as shoals and sunken rocks, become visible, …
1,060 wordsSource & rights
Public-domain historical edition (1910); OCR text from Internet Archive. OCR may contain scanning/transcription errors. Verify quotations against page images when precision matters.
Project Gutenberg source record →
Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.