Spurgeou (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, xviii. (1872), No. 1078 ; XXV. (1879), No. 1492 ; xlix. (1903), No. 2860. „ „ Evening hy Evening, 152.
Voysey (C), Sermons, xviii. (1895), No. 34 ; xxv, (1902), No. 44 ; xxvii.
(1904), No. 10. Christian World Pulpit, xxvii. 161 (M. G. Pearse) ; xxxvi. 218 (A. B.
Bruce) ; xlix. 72 (J. Stalker) ; Ixxv. 59 (J. Birch). Contemporary Pulpit, 1st Ser., viii. 10 (A. Whyte) ; ix. 175 (A. Saphir). Weeldy Pulpit^ i. 582 (D. Daun).
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All His Benefits.
Bless the Lord, O my soul ;
And all that is within me, bless his holy name.
Bless the Lord, O my soul,
And forget not all his benefits :
Who forgiveth all thine iniquities ;
Who healeth all thy diseases ;
Who redeemeth thy life from destruction ;
Who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies:
Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things ;
So that thy youth is renewed like the eagle. — Ps. ciii. 1-5.
This psalm, with which we are all familiar from our childhood, shines in the firmament of Scripture as a star of the first magni- tude. It is a song of praise, yet not the praise of an angel, but the praise of one who has been redeemed from sin and from destruction, and who has experienced that grace which, although sin abounds unto death, doth much more abound unto eternal life. It is the song of a saint, yet not of a glorified saint, but of one who is still working in the lowly valley of this our earthly pilgrimage, and who has to contend with suffering, with sin, and to experience the chastening hand of his Heavenly Father. And therefore it is that this psalm, after beginning upon the lofty mountain heights of God's greatness and goodness, in which all is bright and strong and eternal, descends into the valley where the path is always narrow and often full of darkness and danger and sadness. But as the Psalmist lives by faith, and as he is saved by faith, so he is also saved by hope; and after having described all the sadness and all the afflictions and conflicts of this our earthly pilgrimage, he shows that even at this present time he is a member of that heavenly and everlasting Kingdom of which the throne of God is the centre, and where the angels, who are bright and strong, are his fellow- worshippers, and in which
all the works which God has made will finally be subservient to
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286 ALL HIS BENEFITS
His glory and be irradiated with His beauty. And thus he rises again, praising and magnifying the Lord and knowing that his own individual soul shall, in that vast and comprehensive Kingdom, for evermore be conscious of the life and of the glory of the Most High.
I.
Bless the Lord.
1. To praise God, to bless God, is only the response to the blessing which God has given us. God speaks, and the echo is praise. God blesses us and the response is that we bless God. And those five verses of praise in Psalm ciii. are nothing but the answer of the believing heart to the benediction of Aaron, which God commanded should be continually laid upon the people. The Lord who is the God of salvation ; the Lord, who has revealed His Holy Name as Eedeemer ; the Lord who, by His Spirit, imparts what the Father of love gives, what the filial love reveals — this is the Lord who is the object of the believer's praise. For to praise God means nothing else than to behold God and to delight in Hiiu as the God of our salvation. Singing may be the expression of praise, may be the helpful accompaniment of praise, but praise is in the spirit who dwells upon God, who sees the wonderful manifestation of God in His Son Jesus Christ, and the wonderful salvation and treasures of good things stored up in His beloved Son.
^ We commonly begin our prayers with a request that God will bless us ; the Psalmist begins his prayer by calling on his soul to bless God ! The eye of the heart is generally directed first to its own desires ; the eye of the Psalmist's heart is directed first to the desires of God ! It is a startling feature of prayer, a feature seldom looked at. We think of prayer as a mount where man stands to receive the Divine blessing. We do not often think of it as also a mount where God stands to receive the human blessing. Yet this latter is the thought liere. Nay, is it not the thought of our Lord Himself ? I have often meditated on these words of Jesus, " Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness " ! I take them to mean: Seek ye first the welfare of God, the establishment of His Kingdom, the reign of His righteousness!
PSALM cm. 1-5 287
Before you yield to self-pity, before you count the number of the things you want, consider what things are still wanting to Him ! Consider the spheres of life to which His Kingdom has not yet spread, consider the human hearts to which His righteousness has not yet penetrated ! Let your spirit say, " Bless the Lord." Let the blessing upon God be your morning wish. It is not your •power He asks, but your wish. Your benediction cannot sway the forces of the Universe ; your Father can do that without prayer. But it is the prayer itself that is dear to Him, the desire of your heart for His heart's joy, the cry of your spirit for His crowning, the longing of your soul for tlie triumph of His love. Evermore give Him this bread ! ^