The promises of the Lord are sure to all His people for they are yea and amen in Christ Jesus. However tried His people may be — and they are often tried and tempest-tossed, yet all the promises of God’s Word are theirs in Christ Jesus. These precious promises belong to the weak as well as the strong. They are intended for their help and encouragement in their wilderness course in this world and when, in the strength of divine grace, they are enabled to lay hold upon them, they are strengthened and encouraged by them. What is more fitted to bring comfort to their soul than being enabled to embrace the promise, of whatever nature it may be, and to rejoice in it and in Him who is the sum and substance of all the promises of God?
The true child of God is painfully aware of his proneness to wander out of the right way. Of one thing he is fully persuaded, and it is this — that he cannot keep himself. He finds in himself an evil of heart of unbelief which departs from the living God. Therefore if left to himself he must wander in a wilderness wherein there is no way. Consequently he is acutely conscious of his need of direction and guidance in the way in which he should go. In this he differs radically from the worldling who needs no such guidance or direction, being fully persuaded that he is well able to mark out his own course. The worldling in his worldly wisdom is a law to himself and woe betide the person who would find fault with him in the way that he takes. He will never be persuaded that he knows not how to direct his path until either the Lord shows him his folly and madness in a day of His power or he perishes forever in a lost eternity.
What comfort there is, then, in the promise of the Lord to His people that He will guide them continually. All the promises of God are suited to some particular need of His people and this one relates to their need of guidance and of the provision which the Lord has made for it. He is promising to be their Guide and where could they find a better. Has He not wisdom to direct their path? The way that He has mapped out for them is the right way that leads to a city of habitation. There is no circumstance through which they shall pass that is unknown to Him, therefore He is able to guide them in such a way that they will find that all things are working together for their good. At times it may be difficult for them to see this, far less acknowledge it, yet it is so. Sometimes they may be discouraged because of the way, particularly when it leads down into some valley which they little thought that they would ever have to tread. They are not to be despondent, however, as though the Lord did not know what He was doing in leading them and guiding them in such a path. Let them never lose sight of the fact that what the Lord promises His people is not only to guide them but to guide them continually. This means that His eye is ever upon them. Job could say: He knows the way that I take — and that is how it is with all the people of God. The Lord is leading and guiding them in every step of the way according to His promise:
I will instruct thee and teach thee
the way that thou shalt go
And with mine eye upon thee set
I will direction show.
The true children of God in this world desire a willingness of mind to follow the leading and guidance of the Lord in His Word. They know that only thus will they honour the Lord and that only thus will they receive comfort in their soul. It was when His people ceased from their own ways and honoured and served Him, that the Lord promised to guide them continually. A rebellious spirit is not in keeping with what God requires of His people, but rather a meek and submissive spirit and a willing embracing of His yoke. The Lord may show His people from time to time into what confusion following the dictates of their own heart must bring them. To be left even for a short season to go our own way cannot but bring us sorrow and pain, and will cause us anew to ask the Lord to be our guide.
The Psalmist was in no doubt where the Lord was leading him. He could say:
Thou, with Thy counsel, while I live,
wilt me conduct and guide;
And to Thy glory afterward
receive me to abide.
This is where the Lord is leading all His people. The direction they receive points them onward to the haven of rest — for “there remaineth a rest to the people of God.” How blessed it shall be for every one of those who are under the continual guidance of the great Shepherd of the sheep in their wilderness journey here. Step by step the Lord is leading them onward to the desired haven. He will never leave them nor forsake them. Their sins He has put away for ever; they are cast into the ocean of His deep forgetfulness. He will receive them to Himself, that where He is there they may be also. They shall see Him as He is.
What need there is in the light of this revelation of God’s mercy and love to seek an interest in it for our own souls. This is something that we will never have regret over — that we sought and found the Lord and the salvation that is in Him. May we each one be found amongst those whom the Lord is guiding continually through His Word and by His Spirit.