Evening and Morning
By Charles Haddon Spurgeon
April 7
Morning
"O ye sons of men, how long will ye turn my
glory into shame?"—Psalm 4:2.
An instructive writer has
made a mournful list of the honours which the blinded people of Israel awarded to their
long-expected King.
(1.) They gave Him a
procession of honour, in which Roman legionaries,
Jewish priests, men and women, took a part, He Himself bearing His cross. This
is the triumph which the world awards to Him who comes
to overthrow man's direst foes. Derisive shouts are His only acclamations, and
cruel taunts His only paeans of praise.
(2.) They presented
Him with the wine of honour. Instead of a
golden cup of generous wine they offered Him the criminal's stupefying
death-draught, which He refused because He would preserve an uninjured taste
wherewith to taste of death; and afterwards when He cried, "I thirst,"
they gave Him vinegar mixed with gall, thrust to His mouth upon a sponge. Oh! wretched, detestable inhospitality to the King's Son.
(3.) He was provided
with a guard of honour, who showed their
esteem of Him by gambling over His garments, which they had seized as their
booty. Such was the body-guard of the adored of heaven; a quaternion of brutal
gamblers.
(4.) A throne of honour was found for Him upon the bloody tree; no
easier place of rest would rebel men yield to their liege Lord. The cross was,
in fact, the full expression of the world's feeling towards Him;
"There," they seemed to say, "Thou Son of God, this is the
manner in which God Himself should be treated, could we reach Him."
(5.) The title of
honour was nominally "King of the
Jews," but that the blinded nation distinctly repudiated, and really
called Him "King of thieves," by preferring Barabbas, and by placing
Jesus in the place of highest shame between two thieves. His glory was thus in
all things turned into shame by the sons of men, but it shall yet gladden the
eyes of saints and angels, world without end.
Evening
"Deliver me from bloodguiltiness,
O God, Thou God of my salvation; and my tongue shall sing aloud of Thy
righteousness."—Psalm 51:14.
In this SOLEMN CONFESSION,
it is pleasing to observe that David plainly names his sin. He does not call it
manslaughter, nor speak of it as an imprudence by which an unfortunate accident
occurred to a worthy man, but he calls it by its true name, bloodguiltiness.
He did not actually kill the husband of Bathsheba; but still it was planned in
David's heart that Uriah should be slain, and he was before the Lord his
murderer. Learn in confession to be honest with God. Do not give fair names to
foul sins; call them what you will, they will smell no sweeter. What God sees
them to be, that do you labour to feel them to be;
and with all openness of heart acknowledge their real character. Observe, that
David was evidently oppressed with the heinousness of his sin. It is easy to
use words, but it is difficult to feel their meaning. The fifty-first Psalm is
the photograph of a contrite spirit. Let us seek after the like brokenness of
heart; for however excellent our words may be, if our heart is not conscious of
the hell-deservingness of sin, we cannot expect to find forgiveness.
Our text has in it AN
EARNEST PRAYER—it is addressed to the God of salvation. It is His
prerogative to forgive; it is His very name and office to save those who seek
His face. Better still, the text calls Him the God of my salvation. Yes,
blessed be His name, while I am yet going to Him through Jesus' blood, I can
rejoice in the God of my salvation.
The psalmist ends with A
COMMENDABLE VOW: if God will deliver him he will sing—nay, more, he will "sing
aloud." Who can sing in any other style of such a mercy as this! But
note the subject of the song—"THY RIGHTEOUSNESS." We must sing
of the finished work of a precious Saviour; and he
who knows most of forgiving love will sing the loudest.