by C. H. Spurgeon
(This is last part of former articles)
The Sorrows of God’s People:
This is frequently pleaded in the Bible. Jeremiah is the great master of this art. He says, “Her Nazarites were purer than snow, they were whiter than milk, they were more ruddy in body than rubies, their polishing was of sapphire: their visage is blacker than a coal.” “The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!” He talks of all their griefs and straitnesses in the siege. He calls upon the Lord to look upon his suffering Zion; and before long his plaintive cries are heard. Nothing so eloquent with the father as his child’s cry; yes, there is one thing more mighty still, and that is a moan — when the child is so sick that it is past crying, and lies moaning with that kind of moan which indicates extreme suffering and intense weakness. Who can resist that moan? And when God’s Israel shall be brought very low so that they can scarcely cry but only their moans are heard, then comes the Lord’s time of deliverance; and He is sure to show that He loves His people. Whenever you also are brought into the same condition you may plead your moanings, and when you see a church brought very low you may use her griefs as an argument why God should return and save the remnant of His people.
(5) The Past:
Experienced people of God, you know how to plead this. Here is David’s specimen of it:—”Thou hast been my help, leave me not neither forsake me.” He pleads God’s mercy to him from his youth up. He speaks of being cast upon his God from his very birth, and then he pleads, “Now also, when I am old and grey headed, O, God forsake me not.” Moses also, speaking with God says, “Thou didst bring this people up out of Egypt.” As if he would say, “Do not leave thy work unfinished. Thou hast begun to build, complete it. Thou hast fought the first battle; Lord, end the campaign! Go on till thou gettest a complete victory.” How often have we cried in our trouble, “Lord, thou didst deliver me in such and such a sharp trial, when it seemed as if no help were near; Thou hast never forsaken me yet, I have set up my Ebenezer in thy name. If thou hadst intended to leave me why hast thou showed me such things? Hast thou brought thy servant to this place to put him to shame?” We have to deal with an unchanging God, who will do in the future what he has done in the past. Because he never turns from his purpose; and cannot be thwarted in his design; The past thus becomes a very mighty means of winning blessings from him. We may even use our own unworthiness as an argument with God, “Out of the eater comes forth meat, and out of the strong comes forth sweetness.” David in one place pleads thus, “Lord, have mercy upon my iniquity, for it is great.” That is a very singular mode of reasoning; but being interpreted it means, “Lord, why shouldest thou go about doing little things? Thou art a great God and here is a great sinner. Here is a fitness in me for the display of thy grace. The greatness of my sin makes me a platform for the greatness of thy mercy. Let the greatness of thy love be seen in me.” Moses seems to have the same on his mind when he asks God to show his great power in sparing his sinful people. The power with which God restrains himself is great indeed. There is such a thing as creeping down at the foot of the throne, crouching low and crying, “O God, break me not — I am a bruised reed. Tread not on my little life, it is now but as the smoking flax. Wilt thou hunt me? Wilt thou come out as David said, after a dead dog, after a flea? Wilt thou pursue me as a leaf that is blown in the tempest? Wilt thou watch me, as Job said, as though I were a vast sea, or a great whale? I am so little, and because the greatness of thy mercy can be shown in one so insignificant and, yet so vile, therefore, O God, have mercy upon me.” There was once an occasion when the very Godhead of Jehovah made a triumphant plea for the prophet Elijah. On that august occasion, when he had bidden his adversaries see whether their God could answer them by fire, you can little guess the excitement there must have been in the prophet’s mind. With what stern sarcasm did he say, “Cry aloud: for he is a God: either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awakened.” And as they cut themselves with knives, and leaped upon the altar, oh the scorn with which that man of God must have looked down upon their impotent exertions, and their earnest but useless cry! But think of how his heart must have palpitated, if it had not been for the strength of his faith, when he repaired the altar of God that was broken down, and laid the wood in order, and killed the bullock. Hear him cry, “Pour water on it. You shall not suspect me of concealing fire; pour water on the victim.” When they had done so, he bids them, “Do it a second time;” and they did it a second time; and then he says, “Do it a third time,” and when it was all covered with water, soaked and saturated through, then he stands up and cries to God, “O God, let it be known that thou only art God.” Here everything was put to the test, Jehovah’s own existence was now put, as it were, at stake, before the eyes of men by this bold prophet. But how well the prophet was heard! Down came the fire and devoured not only the sacrifice, but even the wood, and the stones, and even the very water that was in the trenches; for Jehovah God had answered his servant’s prayer. We sometimes may do the same, and say unto him, “Oh, by thy deity, by thine existence, if indeed thou be God, now show thyself for the help of thy people!”
(6) The sufferings, death, merit, and intercession of Christ Jesus.
I am afraid we do not understand what it is that we have at our command when we are allowed to plead to God for Christ’s sake. I met with this thought the other day: It was something new to me, but I believe it ought not to have been. When we ask God to hear us, pleading Christ’s name, we usually mean, “O Lord, thy dear son deserves this of thee; do this unto me because of what he merits.” But if we knew it we might go farther, supposing you should say to me, you who keep a warehouse in the city, “Sir, call at my office, and use my name, and say that they are to give you such a thing.” I should go in and use your name, and I should obtain my request as a matter of right and a matter of necessity. This is virtually what Jesus Christ says to us, “If you need anything of God, all that the Father has belongs to me; go and use my name.” Suppose you should give a man your cheque-book signed with your own name and left blank, to be filled up as he chose; that would be very nearly what Jesus has done in these words, “If ye ask anything in my name I will give it you.” If I had a good name at the bottom of the cheque I should be sure that I should get it cashed when I went to the banker with it; so when you have got Christ’s name, to whom the very justice of God has become a debtor, and whose merits have claims with the most high, when you have Christ’s name there is no need to speak with fear and trembling and bated breath. Waver not and let not faith stagger! When you plead the name of Christ you plead that which shakes the gates of hell, and which the hosts of heaven obey, and God himself feels the sacred power of that divine plea.
You would do better if you sometimes thought more in your prayers of Christ’s griefs and groans. Bring before the Lord his wounds, tell the Lord of his cries, make the groans of Jesus cry again from Gethsemane, and his blood speak again from that frozen Calvary. Speak out and tell the Lord that with such griefs, and cries, and groans to plead, you cannot take a denial.
III — Praise and Thanksgiving
If the Holy Ghost shall teach us how to order our cause, and how to fill our mouth with arguments, the result shall be that we shall have our mouth filled with praise. The man who has his mouth full of arguments in prayer shall soon have his mouth full of benedictions in answer to prayer. You have your mouth full this morning, have you? What of? Full of complaining? Pray the Lord to rinse your mouth out of that black stuff for it will little avail you, and it will turn bitter within you one of these days. Oh have your mouth full of prayer, full of it, full of arguments so that there is room for nothing else. Then you shall soon go away with whatsoever you have asked of God. “Delight thyself also in the Lord, and He will give thee the desires of thine heart.” It is said — I know not how truly — that the explanation of the text, “Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it,” may be found in a very singular oriental custom. It is said that not many years ago — I remember the circumstances being reported — the King of Persia ordered the chief of his nobility, who had done something or other which greatly gratified him, to open his mouth, and when he had done so he began to put into his mouth pearls, diamonds, rubies, and emeralds, till he had filled it as full as it could hold, and then he bade him go his way. This is said to have been occasionally done in Oriental courts towards great favourites. Now certainly whether that be an explanation of the text or not, it is an illustration of it. God says, “Open thy mouth with arguments,” and then he will fill it with mercies priceless, gems unspeakably valuable. Would not a man open his mouth wide when he had to have it filled in such a manner? Surely the most simple-minded among you would be wise enough for that. Let us then open wide our mouth when we have to plead with God. Our needs are great, let our asking be great, and the supply shall be great too. You are not straitened in Him: you are straitened in yourselves. The Lord give you large-mouthedness in prayer, great potency, not in the use of language, but in employing arguments. What I have been speaking to the Christian is applicable in great measure to the unconverted man. God give you to see the force of it, and to fly in humble prayer to the Lord Jesus Christ and to find eternal life in Him.