2. The qualification, that love thy law.
3. The effect, nothing shall offend them. Let me open these branches.
First, The privilege is peace, and that is threefold — (1.) External ; (2.) Internal; (3.) Eternal.
1. External, in the house, the city, or country, and societies where we live. In this sense it is taken, Ps. exxii. 6, 7, ' Pray for the peace of Jerusalem ; they shall prosper that love thee ; peace be within thy walls.' Now this is not all that is meant here, for this is a common benefit, though often vouchsafed for the sake of them that love God ; as music cannot be heard alone, though intended but to one person, yet others share with him in the benefit of it. Or if you understand it of his own personal peace, or being at amity with men, they do not always enjoy that. God's best children are often forced to be
200 SERMONS UPON PSALM CXIX. [SER. CLXXIX.
men of contention, that is, passively ; they are contended Jwith and troubled in the world, Jer. xv. 10. And therefore the apostle saith, Eom. xii. 18, 'If it be possible, as much as lieth in yon, live peaceably with all men.' It is not always to be had, but we should endeavour to live in peace with all men.
2. There is internal peace, arising either from justification, Rom. v. 1 ; or sanctification : Isa. xxxii. 17, ' The fruit of righteousness is peace;' or from contentment with our condition, Phil. iv. 7. By justification we have peace, when God is reconciled and made a friend ; by sanctification we have peace, when we walk evenly with God ; and by contentment we have peace, when our affections are calmed and rightly ordered, or set upon more worthy and noble objects, so that we are not troubled at the loss of outward things. These are the ingredients necessary to eternal peace, which is, I suppose, principally intended here — inward comfort and contentment of mind.
3. There is eternal peace, that happy and quiet estate which we shall enjoy in heaven, when we are above all desertions, temptations, and the trouble of hostile incursions, when we shall never have frown more from God's face, when our sun shall always shine without cloud or night, when our strife is over, and our enemies that do infest us now are all overcome. There is no Satan to tempt us, no serpent in the upper paradise, no world to trouble or divert us ; for all the wicked are bound hand and foot, and cast into unquenchable fire ; there is no flesh to clog us, for all is perfect. This glorious estate is called peace in scripture ; as Ptom. ii. 10, ' God will give glory, honour, peace to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile ;' and Eom. viii. G, ' To be carnally mind is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.' By death is meant the torments of hell, and by life and peace the joys of heaven. And, speaking of the blessedness of those that die in the Lord, he saith, Isa. lvii. 2, ' They shall enter into peace.' Now this cannot principally be intended here, for the man of God speaketh of what we have, not of what we hope for ; and he speaks of God's righteous dispensations here in the world, for which he praised him ; and therefore it is meant of our peace here ; but yet it is the sense of peace and happiness we shall have in heaven that hath an influence upon the tranquillity of our hearts and minds here.
Secondly, Let me a little explain the qualification, ' that love thy law.' The word ' law ' is sometimes taken in a limited sense for the decalogue or moral law ; or else, more generally, for the whole doc- trine of the covenant, the whole tenor of religion, law, and gospel. So here and elsewhere ; as ' The isles shall wait for thy law,' Isa. xlii. 4 ; that is, shall readily receive and embrace his doctrine. So Dan. vi. 5, 'We shall not find occasion against this Daniel, unless we find it in the law of his God;' that is, in his religion. So Ps. i. 2, 'But his delight is the law of the Lord.' By the law of the Lord is meant the whole word of God. Well, now, it is said they love his law ; not only keep it, but love it. A child of God is sometimes described by his faith, sometimes by his hope or by his fear, but more often by his love, that commanding and swaying affection that sets the whole soul a-work. They love thy law ; there is emphasis in that.
VER. 165.] SERMONS UPON PSALM CXIX. 201
Thirdly, Here is the consequent, 'Nothing shall offend them.' The Septuagint renders it ovk ecrrcv avToh o-icdvSaXov, they have not scandals, they have their troubles, but no stumbling-blocks: 1 John ii. 10, ' There is no occasion of stumbling in them.' There is the same word used there which the Septuagint useth here. Scandal is either active or passive, given or taken ; that which is taken out of weak- ness, as young professors, or out of pride and malice ; they interpreted many things in a worse sense when they knew it might be interpreted in a better. Now, nothing shall scandalise them. Peace with God prevents the scandals of weakness, and love to the law prevents scan- dals out of pride and malice. Nothing shall scandalise them. Many things are apt to scandalise men, as God's judgments, for which David did so often every day and so solemnly praise God. But they that love his law, and thereby obtain great peace, they will not stumble at God's dispensations, let them be never so cross to their desires and expectations, because they have a sure covenant, that is, a sure rule, and sure promises. They are not scandalised by the miscarriages of men; they can distinguish between the art and the artificer; if the artist fail, the art is not to be blamed. The reproaches that are cast upon the ways of God, it doth not offend them, for they have found God in that way others speak evil of. Gold is gold though cast into the dirt ; dogs will bark at the moon when it shineth brightest. Would any man be troubled if a cripple mock him for going uprightly ? Shall we leave the ways of God, wherein we have found comfort and peace, because others speak against them ? He is not offended at this. But that which is meant here is such an offence as turneth them from God, otherwise a good man may fall and stumble, but not into final apos- tasy, and he is usually kept from lesser offences. A child of God may be offended in lesser cases, but not so offended as to fall and break his neck.