Ver. 18.] SERMONS UPON PSALM CXIX. 163
cxix. 105, ' Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my paths.' His glory : Col. iii. 17, ' And whatsoever ye do, in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.'
[4.J Death shall not prevent ns, till we have ended our appointed service. As long as God hath work for us to do, he will maintain life and strength : Gal. i. 15, ' Who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace.' The decree taketh date from the womb. God frames parts and temper ; God rocketh us in our cradles, taketh care of us in our infancy, and all the turns of our lives.
[5.] If God will use us to a great age, we must be content. You may adorn your profession, and bring forth fruit in old age. The longest life is too short to honour God: Ps. xcii. 13, * Those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God.' AVe should count it our happiness to be still used, and that we are fully rewarded by being employed in further service.
[6.] Life must be willingly laid down when we cannot keep it but with forsaking the word : Luke xiv. 26, ' If any man come unto me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my dis- ciple.'
[7.] The life of eternity must be subordinate to this great end, the glory of God ; our desire of it must be, that we may be to the praise of God.
SERMON XIX.
Open thou mine eyes, that I may heJioId zuondrous things out of thy law. — Ver. 18.
The heathens thought that man had not a power over his life, but a power over his actions — Quod vivamus, Deorum miinus est ; quod bene vivamus, nostrum. But the Psalmist acknowledgeth God in both : ' Deal bountifully with thy servant, that I may live, and keep thy law ; ' that he could not live nor keep the word without God's grace. This latter he amplifieth in this verse, that he was so far from keeping it, that he could not so much as know it savingly and practically without divine grace : ' Lord, open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.^ Here is —
1. A request, ' open thou mine eyes.'
2. The reason, from the end, benefit, and fruit of it, ' that I may/ or then I shall, ' behold wondrous things out of thy law.'
In which reason is intimated the necessity of divine illumination, and then the profit of it.
1. The necessity, that I may behold, do. — i.e., otherwise I cannot.
2. The profit, then I shall behold icondrous things out of thy laio. Boot. 1 . That we need that God should open our eyes, if we would
have a right understanding of his word. 1. What is meant by opening the eyes.
164 SERMONS UPON PSALM CXIX. [SeR. XIX.
2. The necessity of such, a work in order to a right understanding of the word of God.
First, What is meant by opening the eyes. Before I come to the particular explication of the terms, let me premise two observations.
1. The saints do not complain of the obscurity of the law, but of their own blindness. The Psalmist doth not say, ' Lord, make a plainer law,' but, ' Lord, open mine eyes.' Blind men might as well complain of God that he doth not make a sun whereby they might see. The word is 'A light that shineth in a dark place,' 2 Peter i. 19. There is no want of light in the scripture, but there is a veil of dark- ness upon our hearts ; so that if in this clear light we cannot see, the defect is not in the word, but in ourselves.
2. The light which they beg is not anything besides the word. When God is said to enlighten us, it is not that we should expect new revelations, but that we may see the wonders in his word, or get a clear sight of what is already revealed. Those that vent their own dreams under the name of the Spirit and divine light, they do not give you mysteria, but monsira, portentous opinions ; not show you the won- drous things of God's law, but the i3rodigies of their own brain ; un- happy abortives, that die as soon as they come to light : Isa. viii. 20, ' To the law and to the testimony ; if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.' The light which we have is not without the word, but by the word.
Now to the phrase. The Hebrew signifieth ' unveil mine eyes.' There is a double work — negative and positive : there is a taking away the veil, and an infusion of light. Paul's cure of his natural blindness is a fit emblem of our cure of spiritual blindness : Acts ix. 18, ' Imme- diately there fell from his eyes as it had been scales, and he received sight forthwith.' First the scales fail from our eyes, and then we receive sight.