Evening, June 16
Go To Morning Reading
“The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the Lord
is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?”
Psalm 27:1
“ The Lord is my light and my salvation .” Here is personal interest, “ my light ,” “ my salvation ;” the soul is assured of it, and therefore declares it boldly. Into
the soul at the new birth divine light is poured as the precursor
of salvation; where there is not enough light to reveal our own darkness
and to make us long for the Lord Jesus, there is no evidence of salvation.
After conversion our God is our joy, comfort, guide, teacher, and
in every sense our light: he is light within, light around, light
reflected from us, and light to be revealed to us. Note, it is not
said merely that the Lord gives light, but that he is light; nor that
he gives salvation, but that he is salvation; he, then, who by faith
has laid hold upon God, has all covenant blessings in his possession.
This being made sure as a fact, the argument drawn from it is put
in the form of a question, “ Whom shall I fear ?” A question which is its own answer. The powers of darkness are not
to be feared, for the Lord, our light, destroys them; and the damnation
of hell is not to be dreaded by us, for the Lord is our salvation.
This is a very different challenge from that of boastful Goliath,
for it rests, not upon the conceited vigour of an arm of flesh, but
upon the real power of the omnipotent I AM. “ The Lord is the strength of my life .” Here is a third glowing epithet, to show that the writer’s hope was fastened with a threefold cord which could not be broken.
We may well accumulate terms of praise where the Lord lavishes deeds
of grace. Our life derives all its strength from God; and if he deigns
to make us strong, we cannot be weakened by all the machinations of
the adversary. “ Of whom shall I be afraid ?” The bold question looks into the future as well as the present. “If God be for us,” who can be against us, either now or in time to come?