Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary
Job 29:2

Clarke's Commentary

Verse Job 29:2. O that I were as in months past — Job seems here to make an apology for his complaints, by taking a view of his former prosperity, which was very great, but was now entirely at an end. He shows that it was not removed because of any bad use he had made of it; and describes how he behaved himself before God and man, and how much, for justice, benevolence, and mercy, he was esteemed and honoured by the wise and good.

Preserved me — Kept, guarded, and watched over me.

Bridgeway Bible Commentary

Past glory; present humiliation (29:1-30:31)

Since the three friends have nothing more to say, Job proceeds to show that in the past he had indeed tried to fear God and avoid wrongdoing. So close was his fellowship with God in those days that he could call it friendship (29:1-4). He was blessed with family happiness and prosperity (5-6). He was one of the city elders and was highly respected by the whole community (7-10).
Most rulers were corrupt, favouring the rich and oppressing the poor, but Job’s impartiality and honesty were well known everywhere (11-14). He helped those who were exploited and never feared to give a judgment against the oppressors, no matter how rich or powerful they were (15-17). Job felt that in view of such uprightness he could look forward to a bright future of continued contentment and success (18-20). He would have the same freshness as in former days, when he guided people with his wise advice and cheered them with his warm understanding (21-25).
But instead of the honour and happiness he expected, Job has shame and misery. The lowest of society mock him cruelly (30:1). These worthless people had been driven into the barren wastelands in punishment for their misdeeds, but now they return to make fun of him as he sits in pain and disgrace at the garbage dump (2-8). God allows them to humiliate him without restraint, and he cannot defend himself (9-11). He feels like a city that was once glorious but is now smashed and overrun by the enemy (12-15).
In addition to suffering cruel humiliation, Job has agonizing physical pain. He gets no relief, day or night. As he rolls in agony, his clothes twist around him and become covered in the filth of burnt garbage (16-19). He cries to God, but God only sends him more pain, as if torturing him to death (20-23).
With the desperation of a person sinking into certain ruin, Job cries out for help; but no one gives him the sympathetic assistance that he once gave others (24-26). Depressed in spirit and loathsome in appearance, tortured by pain and rejected by his fellows, he can do nothing but groan (27-31).

Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible

JOB REMEMBERS HIS FELLOWSHIP WITH GOD

"And Job again took up his parable, and said, Oh that I were as in the months of old, As in the days when God watched over me; When his lamp shined above my head, And by his light I walked through darkness; As I was in the ripeness of my days, When the friendship of God was upon my tent; When the Almighty was yet with me, And my children were about me; When my steps were washed with butter, And the rock poured me out streams of oil."

In these verses, Job remembers particularly the fellowship with God, to whom he attributed all of the happiness and prosperity which he had enjoyed in those blessed days then gone forever.

"In the days when God watched over me" "The pathos of the whole book is in these words."The New Bible Commentary, Revised, p. 436. Job recognized God as the source of all of his prosperity and happiness; and the misery that Job was experiencing at the time of this speech was due to his feeling that God was no longer watching over him.

Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible

Oh that I were - Hebrew “Who will give?” a common mode of expressing a wish; compare Job 6:8; Job 11:5; Job 13:5; Job 23:3.

As in months past - O that I could recall my former prosperity, and be as was when I enjoyed the protection and favor of God. Probably one object of this wish was that his friends might see from what a state of honor and happiness he had been brought down. They complained of him as impatient. He may have designed to show them that his lamentations were not unreasonable, when it was borne in mind from what a state of prosperity he had been taken, and to what a condition of wo he had been brought. He, therefore, goes into this extended description of his former happiness, and dwells particularly upon the good which he was enabled then to do, and the respect which was shown him as a public benefactor. A passage strikingly similar to this occurs in Virgil, Aeneid viii. 560:

O mihi praeteritos referat si Jupiter annos!

Quails eram, cum primam aciem Praeneste sub ipsa

Stravi, scutorumque incendi victor acervos.

“O would kind heaven my strength and youth recall,

Such as I was beneath Praeneste’s wall;

There where I made the foremost foes retire,

And set whole heaps of conquered shields on fire!”

Smith's Bible Commentary

Chapter 29

Moreover Job continued ( Job 29:1 )

He's got a lot to say. Bildad has run out, so Job thought, "I'll just keep going on." And now it's sort of a lament of the days before all of his afflictions. Looking back and remembering the past glory that he had.

Oh that as I were as in months that are past, in the days when God was preserving me; When his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness; As I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle; When the Almighty was yet with me, when my children were about me ( Job 29:1-5 );

And now Job makes a reference to his children. Ten of them were all killed in that accident, and he remembers the beautiful day when the little children, his ten children, were round about him, on his knee and, you know, coming around him.

When I washed my steps with butter, and the rock poured me out rivers of oil; When I went out to the gate through the city, when I prepared my throne in the street! The young men they saw me, and they hid themselves: and the aged arose, and stood up for me. The princes refrained talking, and laid their hand on their mouth. The nobles held their peace, and their tongue stuck to the roof of their mouth. When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me: Because ( Job 29:6-12 )

Now Job is answering these accusations that they, false accusations that were made against him and he's telling what he actually was doing.

Because I delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me: and I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy. I put on righteousness, and it clothed me: my judgment was as a robe and a diadem. I was eyes to the blind, I was feet to the lame. I was a father to the poor: and the cause which I knew not I searched out. And I broke the jaws of the wicked, and plucked the spoil out of his teeth. Then I said, I shall die in my nest, and I shall multiply my days as the sand. My root was spread out by the waters, and the dew lay all night upon my branch. My glory was fresh in me, and my bow was renewed in my hand. Unto me men gave ear, and they waited, they kept silence at my counsel. And after my words they spoke not again; and my speech dropped upon them. And they waited for me as for the rain; and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain. If I laughed on them, they believed it not; and the light of my countenance they cast not down. I chose out their way, and sat chief, and I dwelt as a king in the army, as one that comforteth the mourners ( Job 29:12-25 ).

So Job speaks of the former glory. People used to come to him for advice and counsel; they harkened to his words. He was held in honor and esteem by all of them.

Chapter 29

Moreover Job continued ( Job 29:1 )

He's got a lot to say. Bildad has run out, so Job thought, "I'll just keep going on." And now it's sort of a lament of the days before all of his afflictions. Looking back and remembering the past glory that he had.

Oh that as I were as in months that are past, in the days when God was preserving me; When his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness; As I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle; When the Almighty was yet with me, when my children were about me ( Job 29:1-5 );

And now Job makes a reference to his children. Ten of them were all killed in that accident, and he remembers the beautiful day when the little children, his ten children, were round about him, on his knee and, you know, coming around him.

When I washed my steps with butter, and the rock poured me out rivers of oil; When I went out to the gate through the city, when I prepared my throne in the street! The young men they saw me, and they hid themselves: and the aged arose, and stood up for me. The princes refrained talking, and laid their hand on their mouth. The nobles held their peace, and their tongue stuck to the roof of their mouth. When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me: Because ( Job 29:6-12 )

Now Job is answering these accusations that they, false accusations that were made against him and he's telling what he actually was doing.

Because I delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me: and I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy. I put on righteousness, and it clothed me: my judgment was as a robe and a diadem. I was eyes to the blind, I was feet to the lame. I was a father to the poor: and the cause which I knew not I searched out. And I broke the jaws of the wicked, and plucked the spoil out of his teeth. Then I said, I shall die in my nest, and I shall multiply my days as the sand. My root was spread out by the waters, and the dew lay all night upon my branch. My glory was fresh in me, and my bow was renewed in my hand. Unto me men gave ear, and they waited, they kept silence at my counsel. And after my words they spoke not again; and my speech dropped upon them. And they waited for me as for the rain; and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain. If I laughed on them, they believed it not; and the light of my countenance they cast not down. I chose out their way, and sat chief, and I dwelt as a king in the army, as one that comforteth the mourners ( Job 29:12-25 ).

So Job speaks of the former glory. People used to come to him for advice and counsel; they harkened to his words. He was held in honor and esteem by all of them. "

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

Job’s past blessedness ch. 29

"Chapter 29 is another classic example of Semitic rhetoric with all the elements of good symmetrical style. . . . The pattern is as follows:

"Blessing, Job 29:2-6

Honor, Job 29:7-11

Job’s benevolence, Job 29:12-17

Blessing, Job 29:18-20

Honor, Job 29:21-25 . . .

"Job in asserting his benevolence places a description of it in the climatic position in this oration, with the key line (Job 29:14) in the exact middle of the poem." [Note: Smick, "Architectonics, Structured . . .," pp. 92-93.]

Another way to divide this chapter is into two sections. In Job 29:1-11 Job longed for the former days, and in Job 29:12-25 he explained why he had enjoyed them.

Job’s fellowship with God evidently meant the most to him since he mentioned this blessing first (Job 29:2-5 a). Butter and oil (Job 29:6) were symbols of prosperity. The rock (Job 29:6 b) may refer to an olive press or perhaps to the rocky soil out of which olive trees grew. Unlike God’s present treatment of him, Job had assisted the injured and had punished oppressors (Job 29:17). Most translators have rendered the Hebrew word hol at the end of Job 29:18 "sand," but one writer argued that it refers to the mythical phoenix bird. [Note: Henry Heras, "The Standard of Job’s Immortality," Catholic Biblical Quarterly 11 (1949):263-79.] Job had also provided encouragement and comfort for the despondent (Job 29:24-25) in contrast to his friends.

"Job’s review of his life [in this chapter] is one of the most important documents in Scripture for the study of Israelite ethics." [Note: Andersen, p. 230.]

Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

Oh that I were as [in] months past,.... Which is either an earnest wish for restoration to his former state of outward prosperity; which he might desire, not through impatience and discontent under his present circumstances, or from a carnal and worldly spirit; but either that the present reproach he lay under from his friends might be taken off, he observing that they accounted him a wicked man and an hypocrite, because of his afflictions; wherefore he judged, if these were removed, and he was in as prosperous a condition and in as good circumstances as before, they would entertain a different opinion of him; or, that his words might be better attended to, as they were by men, both young and old, and even princes and nobles before, it being a common case, that what a poor and distressed man says is not regarded; or that he might be in a capacity of doing good to the poor and fatherless, the widow and the oppressed, as he had formerly; or, this wish is only made to introduce the account of his former life, by which it would appear, that he was not the man his friends had represented him to be, from the favour he was in with God, and from the respect shown him by men, and the many good things done by him: but since, by various expressions, which before had dropped from his lips, it appears, that he had no hope nor expectation of ever being restored to his former outward happiness; this may be considered as a wish for the return of spiritual prosperity, wishing he was in as good frames of soul, and as much in the exercise of grace, and was as holy, as humble, as spiritual, and heavenly minded, as he was when he had so much of the world about him; and that he had but the like communion with God, and his gracious presence with him, as he had then. The state of the Lord's people, God-ward, is always the same; his election of them stands sure; the covenant of grace with them is unalterable; their interest in a living Redeemer always continues; grace in them is a principle, permanent and perpetual; but there may be, and often is, an alteration in their frames, and in the exercise of their graces, and in the open regard of God unto them; their graces may be low in exercise; there may be a decay of the life and power of godliness; their frames may change, and the presence of God may be withdrawn from them, and they may have no view of interest in salvation, at least not have the joys of it; wherefore, when sensible of all this, may be desirous it might be with them as it was before; that God would turn them again, and cause his face to shine upon them, that they might be comfortable; the particulars of Job's former case follow, which he desires a renewal of:

as [in] the days [when] God preserved me; either in a temporal sense; God having set an hedge of special providence about him, whereby he and his, his family and substance, were remarkably preserved; but now this was plucked up, and all were exposed to ravage and ruin; or in a spiritual sense, as he was both secretly and openly preserved, and as all the Lord's people are, in Christ, and in his hands, and by his power, spirit, and grace: the Lord preserves their souls from the evil of their own hearts, sin that dwells in them, that it shall not have the dominion over them; from the evil that is in the world, that they shall not be overcome by it, and carried away with if; and from the temptations of Satan, so as not to be devoured and destroyed by him, and from a final and total falling away; he preserves them in his own ways, safe to his kingdom and glory; but sometimes all this does not appear so evident unto them, as it might not to Job at this time; who observed the workings of his corruption, and the breaking out of them, in passionate words, wishes, and curses, and the temptations of Satan, who was busy with him to go further lengths, even to blaspheme and curse God; so that he might fear that God his defence was departed from him, the return of which he was desirous of; see Isaiah 49:14.

Henry's Complete Commentary on the Bible

      1 Moreover Job continued his parable, and said,   2 Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me;   3 When his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness;   4 As I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle;   5 When the Almighty was yet with me, when my children were about me;   6 When I washed my steps with butter, and the rock poured me out rivers of oil;

      Losers may have leave to speak, and there is nothing they speak of more feelingly than of the comforts they are stripped of. Their former prosperity is one of the most pleasing subjects of their thoughts and talk. It was so to Job, who begins here with a wish (Job 29:2; Job 29:2): O that I were as in months past! so he brings in this account of his prosperity. His wish is, 1. "O that I were in as good a state as I was in then, that I had as much wealth, honour, and pleasure, as I had then!" This he wishes, from a concern he had, not so much for his ease, as for his reputation and the glory of his God, which he thought were eclipsed by his present sufferings. "O that I might be restored to my prosperity, and then the censures and reproaches of my friends would be effectually silenced, even upon their own principles, and for ever rolled away!" If this be our end in desiring life, health, and prosperity, that God may be glorified, and the credit of our holy profession rescued, preserved, and advanced, the desire is not only natural, but spiritual. 2. "O that I were in as good a frame of spirit as I was in then!" That which Job complained most of now was a load upon his spirits, through God's withdrawing from him; and therefore he wishes he now had his spirit as much enlarged and encouraged in the service of God as he had then and that he had as much freedom and fellowship with him as then thought himself happy in. This was in the days of his youth (Job 29:4; Job 29:4), when he was in the prime of his time for the enjoyment of those things and could relish them with the highest gust. Note, Those that prosper in the days of their youth know not what black and cloudy days they are yet reserved for. Two things made the months past pleasant to Job:--

      I. That he had comfort in his God. This was the chief thing he rejoiced in, in his prosperity, as the spring of it and the sweetness of it, that he had the favour of God and the tokens of that favour. He did not attribute his prosperity to a happy turn of fortune, nor to his own might, nor to the power of his own hand, but makes the same acknowledgment that David does. Psalms 30:7, Thou, by thy favour, hast made my mountain stand strong. A gracious soul delights in God's smiles, not in the smiles of this world. Four things were then very pleasant to holy Job:-- 1. The confidence he had in the divine protection. They were the days when God preserved me,Job 29:2; Job 29:2. Even then he saw himself exposed, and did not make his wealth his strong city nor trust in the abundance of his riches, but the name of the Lord was his strong tower; in that only he thought himself safe, and to that he ascribed it that he was then safe and that his comforts were preserved to him. The devil saw a hedge about him of God's making (Job 1:10; Job 1:10), and Job saw it himself, and owned it was God's visitation that preserved his spirit,Job 10:12; Job 10:12. Those only whom God protects are safe and may be easy; and therefore those who have ever so much of this world must not think themselves safe unless God preserve them. 2. The complacency he had in the divine favour (Job 29:3; Job 29:3): God's candle shone upon his head, that is, God lifted up the light of his countenance upon him, gave him the assurances and sweet relishes of his love. The best of the communications of the divine favour to the saints in this world is but the candle-light, compared with what is reserved for them in the future state. But such abundant satisfaction did Job take in the divine favour that, by the light of that, he walked through darkness; that guided him in his doubts, comforted him in his griefs, bore him up under his burdens, and helped him through all his difficulties. Those that have the brightest sun-shine of outward prosperity must yet expect some moments of darkness. They are sometimes crossed, sometimes at a loss, sometimes melancholy. But those that are interested in the favour of God, and know how to value it, can, by the light of that, walk cheerfully and comfortably through all the darkness of this vale of tears. That puts gladness into the heart enough to counterbalance all the grievances of this present time. 3. The communion he had with the divine word (Job 29:4; Job 29:4): The secret of God was upon my tabernacle, that is, God conversed freely with him, as one bosom-friend with another. He knew God's mind, and was not in the dark about it, as, of late, he had been. The secret of the Lord is said to be with those that fear him, for he shows them that in his covenant which others see not, Psalms 25:14. God communicates his favour and grace to his people, and receives the return of their devotion in a way secret to the world. Some read it, When the society of God was in my tabernacle, which Rabbi Solomon understands of an assembly of God's people that used to meet at Job's house for religious worship, in which he presided; this he took a great deal of pleasure in, and the scattering of it was a trouble to him. Or it may be understood of the angels of God pitching their tents about his habitation. 4. The assurance he had of the divine presence (Job 29:5; Job 29:5): The Almighty was yet with me. Now he thought God had departed from him, but in those days he was with him, and that was all in all to him. God's presence with a man in his house, though it be but a cottage, makes it both a castle and a palace.

      II. That he had comfort in his family. Every thing was agreeable there: he had both mouths for his meat and meat for his mouths; the want of either is a great affliction. 1. He had a numerous offspring to enjoy his estate: My children were about me. He had many children, enough to compass him round, and they were observant of him and obsequious to him; they were about him, to know what he would have and wherein they might serve him. It is a comfort to tender parents to see their children about them. Job speaks very feelingly of this comfort now that he was deprived of it. He thought it an instance of God's being with him that his children were about him; and yet reckon amiss if, when we have lost our children, we cannot comfort ourselves with this, that we have not lost our God. 2. He had a plentiful estate for the support of this numerous family, Job 29:6; Job 29:6. His dairy abounded to such a degree that he might, if he pleased, wash his steps with butter; and his olive-yards were so fruitful, beyond expectation, that it seemed as if the rock poured him out rivers of oil. He reckons his wealth, not by his silver and gold, which were for hoarding, but by his butter and oil, which were for use; for what is an estate good for unless we take the good of it ourselves and do good with it to others?

Spurgeon's Verse Expositions of the Bible

Comfort for the Desponding

November 25, 1855 by C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892)

"Oh that I were as in months past." Job 29:2 .

For the most part the gracious Shepherd leads his people beside the still waters, and makes them to lie down in green pastures; but at times they wander through a wilderness, where there is no water, and they find no city to dwell in. Hungry and thirsty, their soul fainteth within them, and they cry unto the Lord in their trouble. Though many of his people live in almost constant joy, and find that religion's ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace, yet there are many who pass through fire and through water: men do ride over their heads, they endure all manner of trouble and sorrow. The duty of the minister is to preach to different characters. Sometimes we admonish the confident, lest they should become presumptuous; oftentimes we stir up the slumbering, lest they should sleep the sleep of death. Frequently we comfort the desponding, and this is our duty this morning or if not to comfort them, yet to give them some exhortation which may by God's help be the means of bringing them out of the sad condition into which they have fallen, so that they may not be obliged to cry out for ever "Oh that I were as in months past!" At once to the subject. A complaint; its cause and cure; and then close up with an exhortation to stir up your pure minds, if you are in such a position. I. First, there is a COMPLAINT. How many a Christian looks on the past with pleasure, on the future with dread, and on the present with sorrow! There are many who look back upon the days that they have passed in the fear of the Lord as being the sweetest and the best they have ever had, but as to the present, it is clad in a sable garb of gloom and dreariness. They could wish for their young days over again, that they might live near to Jesus, for now they feel that they have wandered from him, or that he has hidden his face from them, and they cry out, "Oh that I were as in months past!" 1. Let us take distinct cases one by one. The first is the case of a man who has lost the brightness of his evidences, and is crying out, "Oh that I were as in months past!" Hear his soliloquy: "Oh that my past days could be recalled! Then I had no doubt of my salvation. If any man had asked for the reason of the hope that was in me, I could have answered with meekness and with fear. No doubt distressed me, no fear harassed me; I could say with Paul, 'I know whom I have believed,' and with Job, 'I know that my Redeemer liveth;'

'My steady soul did fear no more Than solid rocks when billows roar.'

I felt myself to be standing on the rock Christ Jesus. I said

'Let cares like a wild deluge come, And storms of sorrow fall; Sure I shall safely reach my home, My God, my heaven, my all'

But ah! how changed it is now! Where there was no cloud it; all cloud; where I could read my 'my title clear,' I tremble to read my damnation quite as clearly. I hoped that I trusted in Christ, but now the dark thought rises up, that I was a hypocrite, and had deceived myself and others. The most I can attain to, is Methinks I will hope in him still; and if I may not be refreshed with the light of his countenance, still in the shadow of his wings will I trust.' I feel that if I depart from him there is no other Savior; but oh! what thick darkness surrounds me! Like Paul of old, there have been days and nights wherein neither sun, nor moon nor stars have appeared. I have lost my roll in the Arbour of Ease; I cannot now take it out of my breast, and read it to console me on my journey; but I fear that when I get to the end of the way they will deny me entrance, because I came not in by the door to receive his grace and know his love, but have been deceived, have taken carnal fancies for the workings of the Spirit, and have imputed what was but natural conviction to the work of God the Holy Ghost." This is one phase, and a very common one. You will meet many who are crying out like that "Oh that I were as in months past!" 2. Another phase of this great complaint, which it also very frequently assumes, is one under which we are lamenting not so much because our evidences are withered as because we do not enjoy a perpetual peace of mind as to other matters. "Oh "says one, "Oh that I were as in months past; for then whatever troubles and trials came upon me, were less than nothing. I had learned to sing

'Father, I wait thy daily will; Thou shalt divide my portion still; Give me on earth what seems thee best, Till death and heaven reveal the rest.'

I felt that I could give up everything to him; that if he had taken away every mercy I could have said

'Yea, if thou take them all away, Yet will I not repine; Before they were possessed by me, They were entirely thine.'

I knew no fear for the future. Like a child on its mother's breast I slept securely; I said, 'Jehovah-jireh, my God will provide,' I put my business into his hands; I went to my daily labor; like the little bird that waketh up in the morning, and knoweth not where its breakfast is to come from, but sitteth on the spray, singing

'Mortal, cease from toil and sorrow God provideth for the morrow;'

so was I. I could have trusted Him with my very life, with wife, with children, with everything, I could give all into his hands, and say each morning, 'Lord, I have not a will of my own, or if I have one, still, thy will be done; thy wish shall be my wish; thy desire shall be my desire.' But 'oh that I were as in months past!' How changed am I now! I begin fretting about my business; and if I lose now but a live pound note, I am worried incessantly, whereas, if it were a thousand before, I could have thanked the God who took it away as easily as I could the God that gave it to me. How the least thing disturbs me. The least shadow of a doubt as to some calamity that may befall me, rests on my soul like a thick cloud. I am perpetually self-willed, desiring always to have just what I wish. I cannot say I can resign all into his hands; there is a certain something I could not give up. Twined round my heart there is an evil plant called self-love. It has twisted its roots within the very nerves and sinews of my soul. There is something I love above my God. I cannot give up all now; but 'oh that I were as in months past!' For then my mercies were real mercies, because they were God's mercies. "Oh," says he, "'that I were as in months past!' I should not have had to bear such trouble as I have now, for though the burden might have pressed heavily, I would have cast it on the Lord. Oh! that I knew the heavenly science of taking the burdens off my own shoulders, and laying them on the Rock that supports them all! Oh! if I knew how to pour out my griefs and sorrows as I once did! I have been a fool, an arrant fool, a very fool, that I should have run away from that sweet confidence I once had in the Savior! I used then to go to his ear, and tell him all my griefs.

'My sorrows and my griefs I poured Into the bosom of my God; He helped me in the trying hour, He helped me bear the heavy load.'

But now, I foolishly carry them myself, and bear them in my own breast, Ah!

'What peaceful hours I then enjoyed!'

Would that they would return to me." 3. Another individual perhaps is speaking thus concerning his enjoyment in the house of God and the means of grace. "Oh," says one, "in months past, when I went up to the house of God, how sweetly did I hear! Why, I sat with my ears open, to catch the words, as if it were an angel speaking; and when I listened, how at times did the tears come rolling down my cheeks! and how did my eyes flash, when some brilliant utterance, full of joy to the Christian, aroused my soul! Oh! how did I awake on the Sabbath morning, and sing,

'Welcome, sweet day of rest, That saw the Lord arise; Welcome to this reviving breast, And these rejoicing eyes!'

And when they sang in the house of God, whose voice was so fond as mine. When I retired from worship, it was with a light tread; I went to tell my friends and my neighbors what glorious news I had heard in the sanctuary. Those were sweet Sabbaths; and when the prayer-meetings came round, how was I found in my places and the prayers were prayers indeed to my spirit; whoever I heard preach, provided it was the gospel, how did my soul feed and fatten under it! for I sat at a very banquet of joy. When I read the Scriptures they were always illuminated, and glory did gild the sacred page, whenever I turned it over. When I bent my knee in prayer, I could pour my soul out before God, and I loved the exercise; I felt that I could not be happy unless I spent my time upon my knees; I loved my God, and my God loved me; but oh! how changed now! 'Oh that I were as in months past!' I go up to God's house; it is the same voice that speaks, the same man I love so much, still addresses me; but I have no tears to shed now; my heart has become hardened even under his ministry; I have few emotions of joy; I enter the house of God as a boy goes to school, without much love to it, and I go away without having my soul stirred. When I kneel down in secret prayer, the wheels are taken off my chariot, and it drags very heavily; when I strive to sing, all I can say is, 'I would but cannot'; 'Oh that I were as in months past!' when the candle of the Lord shone round about me!" I trust there are not many of you who can join in this; for I know ye love to come up to the house of God. I love to preach to a people who feel the word, who give signs of assent to it men and women who can afford a tear now and then in a sermon people whose blood seems to boil within them when they hear the gospel. I don't think you understand much of the phase I am describing; but still you may understand a little of it. The word may not be quite so sweet and pleasant to you as it used to be; and then you may cry out "Oh that I were as in months past!" 4. But I will tell you one point which perhaps may escape you. There are some of us who lament extremely that our conscience is not as tender as it used to be; and therefore doth our soul cry in bitterness, "Oh that I were as in months past!" "When first I knew the Lord," you say, "I was almost afraid to put one foot before another, lest I should go astray; I always looked before I leaped; if there were a suspicion of sin about anything, I faithfully avoided it; it there were the slightest trace of the trail of the serpent on it, I turned from it at once; people called me a Puritan; I watched everything; I was afraid to speak, and some practices that were really allowable I utterly condemned; my conscience was so tender, I was like a sensitive plant; if touched by the hand of sin, my leaves curled up in a moment; I could not bear to be touched I was so tender, I was all over wounds, and if any one brushed against me I cried out. I was afraid to do anything, lest I should sin against God. If I heard an oath, my bones shook within me; if I saw a man break the Sabbath, I trembled and was afraid; wherever I went, the least whisper of sin startled me; it was like the voice of a demon when I heard a temptation, and I said with violence, 'Get thee behind me, Satan,' I could not endure sin; I ran away from it as from a serpent; I could not taste a drop of it; but 'Oh that I were as in months past.' It is true, I have not forsaken his ways; I have not quite forgotten his law; it is true, I have not disgraced my character, I have not openly sinned before men, and none but God knoweth my sin; but oh! my conscience is not what it once was. It did thunder once, but it does not now. O conscience! conscience! thou art gone too much to sleep, I have drugged thee with laudanum, and thou art slumbering when thou oughtest to be speaking! Thou art a watchman; but thou dost not tell the hours of the night as thou once didst. O conscience! sometimes I heard thy rattle in my ears, and it startled me, now thou sleepest, and I go on to sin. It is but a little I have done; still, that little shows the way. Straws tell which way the wind doth blow; and I feel that my having committed one little sin, evidences in what way my soul is inclined. Oh! that I had a tender conscience again! Oh! that I had not this rhinoceros conscience, which is covered over with tough hide, through which the bullets of the law cannot pierce! Oh! that I had a conscience such as I used to have! ' Oh that I were as in months past!'" 5. One more form of this sad condition. There are some of us, dearly beloved, who have not as much zeal for the glory of God and the salvation of men as we used to have. Months ago, if we saw a soul going to destruction, our eyes were filled with tears in a moment; if we did but see a man inclined to sin, we rushed before him with tears in our eyes, and wished to sacrifice ourselves to save him; we could not walk the street, but we must be giving somebody a tract, or reproving some one; we thought we must be for ever speaking of the Lord Jesus; if there were any good to be done, we were always first and foremost in it: we desired by all means to save some, and we did think at that time that we could give up ourselves to death, if we might but snatch a soul from hell. So deep, so ardent was our love to our fellowmen, that for the love we bore Christ's name, we would have been content to be scoffed at, hissed at, and persecuted by the whole world, if we might have done any good in it. Our soul was burning with intense longing for souls, and we considered all things else to be mean and worthless; but ah! now souls may be damned, and there is not a tear; sinners may sink into the scalding pit of hell, and not a groan; thousands may be swept away each day, and sink into bottomless woe, and yet not an emotion. We can preach without tears; we can pray for them without our hearts. We can speak to them without feeling their necessities; we pass by the haunts of infamy we wish the inmates better, and that is all. Even our compassion has died out. Once we stood near the brink of hell, and we thought each day that we heard the yellings and howlings of the doomed spirits ringing in our ears; and then we said, "O God, help me to save my fellow-men from going down to the pit! "But now we forget it all. We have little love to men, we have not half the zeal and energy we once had. Oh! if that be your state, dearly beloved; if you can join in that, as your poor minister, alas! can do in some measure, then may we well say, "Oh that I were as in months past!" II. But now we are about to take these different characters, and tell you the CAUSE AND CURE. 1. One of the causes of this mournful state of things is defect in prayer; and of course the cure lies somewhere next door to the cause. You are saying, "Oh that I were as in months past!" Come, my brother; we are going into the very root of the matter. One reason why it is not with you as in months past is this: you do not pray as you once did. Nothing brings such leanness into a man's soul as want of prayer. It is well said that a neglected closet is the birth-place of all evil. All good is born in the closet, all good springeth from it; there the Christian getteth it; but if he neglecteth his closet, then all evil comes of it. No man can progress in grace if he forsakes his closet. I care not how strong he may be in faith. It is said that fat men may for a time live on the flesh they have acquired; but there is not a Christian so full of flesh that he can live on old grace. If he waxes fat he kicks, but he cannot live upon his fat. Those who are strong and mighty in themselves cannot exist without prayer. If a man should have the spiritual might of fifty of God's choicest Christians in himself, he must die, if he did not continue to plow. My brother, cannot you look back and say, "Three or four months ago my prayers were more regular, more constant, more earnest than they are now; but now they are feeble, they are not sincere, they are not fervent, they are not earnest? "O brother, do not ask anybody what is the cause of your grief; it is as plain as possible; you need not ask a question about it. There is the cause; and where is the remedy? Why, in more prayer, beloved. It was little prayer that brought you down; it is great prayer that will lift you up. It was lack of prayer that brought you into poverty, it must be increase of prayer that will bring you into riches again. Where no oxen are the crib is clean. There is nothing for men to eat where there are no oxen to plough; and where there are no prayers to plough the soil, you have little to feed upon. We must be more earnest in prayer. Oh! beloved, might not the beam out of the wall cry against us? Our dusty closets might bear witness to our neglect of secret devotion; and that is the reason why it is not with us as in months past. My friends: if you were to compare the Christian to a steam-engine, you must make his prayers, fed by the Holy Spirit, to be the very fire which sustains his motion. Prayer is God's chosen vehicle of grace, and he is unwise who neglects it. Let me be doubly serious on this matter, and let me give a home-thrust to some. Dear friend, do you mean what you say, and do you believe what you say that neglect of prayer will bring your soul into a most hazardous condition? If so, I will say no more to thee; for thou wilt easily guess the remedy for thy lamentable cry, "Oh that I were as in months past!" A certain merchant wishes that he were as rich as he used to be: he was wont to send his ships over to the gold country, to bring him home cargoes of gold, but ne'er a ship has been out of port lately, and therefore can he wonder that he has had no cargo of gold? So when a man prayeth he sends a ship to heaven, and it comes back laden with gold; but if he leaves off supplication, then his ship is weather-bound and stays at home, and no wonder he cometh to be a poor man. 2. Perhaps, again, you are saying, "Oh that I were as in months past!" not so much from your own fault as from the fault of your minister. There is such a thing, my dear friends, as our getting into a terribly bad condition through the ministry that we attend. Can it be expected that men should grow in grace when they are never watered with the streams that make glad the city of our God? Can they be supposed to wax strong in the Lord Jesus, when they do not feed on spiritual food? We know some who grumble, Sabbath after Sabbath, and say they cannot hear such and such a minister. Why don't you buy an ear-trumpet then? Ah! but I mean, that I can't hear him to my soul's profit. Then do not go to hear him, if you have tried for a long while and don't get any profit. I always think that a man who grumbles as he goes out of chapel ought not to be pitied, but whipped, for he can stay away if he likes, and go where he will be pleased. There are plenty of places where the sheep may feed in their own manner; and every one is bound to go where he gets the pasture most suited to his soul; but you are not bound to run away directly your minister dies, as many of you did before you came here. You should not run away from the ship directly the storm comes, and the captain is gone, and you find her not exactly sea-worthy; stand by her, begin caulking her, God will send you a captain, there will be fine weather by-and-bye, and all will be right; but very frequently a bad minister starves God's people into walking skeletons, so that you can tell all their bones; and who wonders that they starve out their minister, when they get no food and no nutriment from his ministrations. This is a second reason why men frequently cry out, "Oh that I were as in months past!"

3. But there is a better reason still, that will come more home to some of you. It is not so much the badness of the food, as the seldomness that you come to eat it. You know, my dear friends, we find every now and then that there is a man who came twice a day to the house of God on the Sabbath. On the Monday night he was busy at work; but his apron was rolled up, and if he could not be present all the while, he would come in at the end. On the Thursday evening he would, if possible, come to the sanctuary, to hear a sermon from some gospel minister, and would sit up late at night and get up early in the morning, to make up the time he had spent in these religious exercises; but by-and-bye he thought, "I am too hard-worked; this is tiring; it is too far to walk." And so he gives up first one service, and then another, and then begins to cry out, "Oh that I were as in months past!" Why, brethren you need not wonder at it. The man does not eat so much as he used to do. Little and often is the way children should be fed, though I have given you a great deal this morning. Still, little and often is a very good rule. I do think, when people give up week-day services, unless it is utterly impracticable for them to attend them, farewell to religion. "Farewell to practical godliness," says Whitfield, "when men do not worship God on the week-day!" Week-day services are frequently the cream of all. God giveth his people pails full of milk on the Sabbath, but he often skims off the cream for the week-day. If they stay away, is it wonderful that they have to say, "Oh, that I were as in months past!" I do not blame you, beloved; I only wish to "stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance." A very plain fellow that is is he not? Yes, he always tells you what he means, and always intends to do so. Stand to your colors, my men! Keep close to the standard if you would win the battle! And when there seems to be the slightest defection, it is simply our duty to exhort you, lest by any measure ye depart from the soundness of your faith. 4. But frequently this complaint arises from idolatry. Many have given their hearts to something else save God, and have set their affections upon the things of earth, instead of the things in heaven. It is hard to love the world and love Christ, it is impossible: that is more; but it is hard not to love the creature; it is hard not to give yourself to earth; I had almost said, it is impossible not to do that; it is difficult, and only God can enable us; he alone can keep us with our hearts fully set on him; but mark whenever we make a golden calf to worship sooner or latter it will come to this, we shall get our golden calf ground up and put into our water for us to drink, and then we shall have to say, "He hath made me drunken with wormwood." Never a man makes an idol for himself to worship but it tumbles down on him and breaks some of his bones. There was ne'er a man yet who departed to broken cisterns to find water, but instead thereof he found loathsome creatures therein, and was bitterly deceived. God will have his people live on him, and on none else, and if they live on anything else but him he will take care to give them of the waters of Mara, to embitter their drink, and drive them to the Rock of purest streams. Oh, beloved, let us take care that our hearts are wholly his, only Christ's, solely Christ's! If they are so, we shall not have to cry out, "Oh that I were as in months past!" 5. We scarcely need, however, detail any more reasons. We will add but one more and that is the most common one of all. We have, perhaps, become self-confident and self-righteous. If so, that is a reason why it is not with us as in months past. Ah! my friends, that old rascal self-righteousness, you will never get rid of him as long as you live. The devil was well pictured under the form of a serpent because a serpent can creep in anywhere, though the smallest crevice. Self-righteousness is a serpent; for it will enter anywhere. If you try to serve your God, "What a fine fellow you are," says the devil. "Ah! don't you serve your God well! You are always preaching. You are a noble fellow." If you go to a prayer meeting, God gives you a little gift, and you are able to pour out your heart. Presently there is a pat on the back from Satan. "Did not you pray sweetly? I know the brethren will love you; you are growing in grace very much." If a temptation comes, and you are able to resist it, "Ah!" says he at once, "you are a true soldier of the cross; look at the enemy you have knocked down; you will have a bright crown by-and-bye; you are a brave fellow!" You go on trusting God implicitly; Satan then says, your faith is very strong: no trial can overcome you: there is a weak brother, he is not half as strong as you are!" Away you go, and scold your weak brother, because he is not as big as you, and all the while Satan is cheering you up, and saying, "What a mighty warrior you are! so faithful always trusting in God, you have not any self-righteousness." The minister preaches to the Pharisee: but the Pharisee is not fifty-ninth cousin to you; you are not at all self-righteous in your own opinion, and all the while you are the most self-righteous creature in existence. Ah! beloved, just when we think ourselves humble we are sure to be proud; and when we are groaning over our pride we are generally the most humble. You may just read your own estimate backwards. Just when we imagine we are the worst, we are often the best, and when we conceive ourselves the best, we are often the worst. It is that vile self-righteousness who creeps into our souls, and makes us murmur, "Oh that I were as in months past!" Your candle has got the snuff of self-righteousness upon it; you want to have that taken away, and then you will burn all right. You are soaring too high; you require something that will bring you down again to the feet of the Savior, as a poor lost and guilty sinner nothing at all; then you will not cry any longer. "Oh that I were as in months past!" III. And now, the closing up is to be an EXHORTATION. An exhortation, first of all, to consolation, One is saying, "Oh! I shall never be in a more happy state than I now am in, I have lost the light of his countenance; he hath clean gone away from me, and I shall perish." You remember in John Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress," the description of the man shut up in the iron cage. One says to him, "Wilt thou never come out of this cage?" "No, never." "Art thou condemned for ever?" "Yes, I am." "Why was this?" "Why I grieved the Spirit, and he is gone; I once thought I loved him, but I have treated him lightly and he has departed. I went from the paths of righteousness, and now I am locked up here, and cannot get out." Yes, but John Bunyan does not tell you that the man never did get out? There have been some in that iron cage that have come out. There may be one here this morning, who has been for a long while sitting in that iron cage, rattling the bars, trying to break them, trying to file them through with his own little might and strength. Oh! dear friend, you will never file through the iron bars of that terrible cage; you will never escape by yourself. What must you do? You must begin to sing like the bird in the cage does; then the kind master will come and let you out. Cry to him to deliver you; and though you cry and shout, and he shutteth out your prayer, he will hear you by-and-bye; and like Jonah you shall exclaim in days to come, "Out of the belly of hell I cried unto the Lord, and he heard me." You will find the roll under the settle, although you have dropped it down the Hill of Difficulty; and when thou hast it thou will put it in thy bosom again, and hold it all the more tightly, because thou hast lost it for a little season.

"Return, O wanderer, return, And seek an injured Father's face; Those warm desires that in thee burn Were kindled by reclaiming grace."

And now another exhortation, not so much to console you as to stir you up more and more to seek to be what you ought to be. O Christian men and women, my brethren and sisters in the faith of Jesus Christ! How many there are of you who are content just to be saved, and merely to enter heaven. How many do we find who are saying "Oh! if I can but just get in at the door if I can simply be a child of God!" and they carry out their desires literally, for they are as little Christian as possible. They would have moderation in religion! But what is moderation in religion? It is a lie; it is a farce. Doth a wife ask her husband to be moderately loving? Doth a parent expect his child to be moderately obedient? Do you seek to have your servants moderately honest? No! Then how can you talk about being moderately religious? To be moderately religious is to be irreligious. To have a religion that does not enter into the very heart and influence the life, is virtually to have no religion at all. I tremble sometimes, when I think of some of you who are mere professors. Ye are content ye whitewashed sepulchres; because ye are beautifully whitened ye rest satisfied, without looking at the charnel-house beneath. How many of you make clean the outside of the cup and platter; and because the church can lay nothing to your charge, and the world cannot accuse you, you think the outside of the cup will be sufficient. Take heed! take heed! The judge will look at the inside of the cup and platter one day; and if it be full of wickedness he will break that platter, and the fragments shall for ever be cast about in the pit of torment. Oh! may God give you to be real Christians! Waxen-winged professors! ye can fly very well here; but when like Icarus, ye fly upwards, the mighty sun of Jesus shall melt your wings, and ye shall fall into the pit of destruction. Ah! gilded Christians, beautifully painted, varnished, polished, what will ye do when ye shall be found at last to have been worthless metal? When the wood, hay, and stubble shall be buried and consumed, what will ye do if ye are not the genuine coin of heaven, if ye have not been molten in the furnace, if ye have not been minted from on high? If ye are not real gold, how shall ye stand the fire in that "great and terrible day of the Lord?" Ah! and there are some of you who can stand the fire, I trust. You are the children of God, but, beloved, do I charge you wrongfully when I say, that many of us know that we are the children of God, but we are content to be as little dwarf children, we are always crying out, "Oh that I were as in months past!" That is a mark of dwarfishness. If we are to do great things in the world we must not often utter this cry, We must often be singing

"I the chief of sinners am; but Jesus died for me;"

and with cheerful countenance we must be able to say that we "know whom we have believed." Do you wish to be useful? Do you desire to honor your Master? Do you long to carry a heavy crown to heaven, that you may put it on the Savior's head? If you do and I know you do then seek above all things that your soul may prosper and be in health that your inner-man may not be simply in a living state, but that you may be a tree planted by the rivers of water, bringing forth your fruit in your season, your leaf never withering, and whatsoever you do prospering. Ah! do you want to go to heaven, and wear a starless crown there a crown that shall be a real crown, but that shall have no star upon it, because no soul has been saved by you? Do you wish to sit in heaven with a dress of Christ's on, but without one single jewel that God has given you for your wages here below? Ah! no; methinks you wish to go to heaven in full dress, and to enter into the fullness of the joy of the Lord. Five talents well improved, five cities; and let no man be satisfied with his one talent merely, but let him seek to put it out at interest; "for unto him that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance." And finally, to many of you what I have preached about has no interest whatever. Perhaps you may say, "'Oh that I were as in months past!' for then I was quite well and a jolly fellow was I. Then I could drink with the deepest drinker anywhere. Then I could run merrily into sin, but I cannot now. I have hurt my body. I have injured my mind. It is not with me as it used to be, I have spent all my money. I wish I were as I used to be!" Ah! poor sinner, thou hast good reason to say, "Oh that I were as in months past!" But wait four or five months, and then you will say it more emphatically, and think even to day better than that day; and the further you go on, the more you will wish to go back again; for the path to hell is down, down, down, down always down and you will be always saying, "Oh that I were as in months past!" Thou wilt look back to the time when a mother's prayer blessed thee, and a father's reproof warned thee when thou wentest to a Sabbath-school, and sattest upon thy mother's knee, to hear her tell thee of a Savior; and the longer the retrospect of goodness, the more that goodness will pain you. Ah I my friends, ye have need to go back, some of you. Remember how far ye have fallen how much ye have departed; but oh! ye need not turn back! Instead of looking back and crying, "Oh that I were as in months past!" say something different. Say, "Oh that I were a new man in Christ Jesus "It would not do for you to begin again in your present state; you would soon be as bad as you now are; but say, "Oh that I were a new man in Christ Jesus; oh that I might begin a new life!" Some of you would like to begin a new life some of you reprobates, who have gone far away! Well, poor mortal, thou mayest. "How?" savest thou. Why, if thou art a new man in Christ Jesus thou wilt begin again. A Christian is as much a new man as if he had been no man at all before; the old creature is dethroned, he is a new creature, born again, and starting on a new existence. Poor soul! God can make thee a new man. God the Holy Spirit can build a new house out of thee, with neither stick nor stone of the old man in it, and he can give thee a new heart, a new spirit, new pleasures new happiness, new prospects, and at last give thee a new heaven. "But," says one "I feel that I want these things; but may I have them?" Guess whether you may have them, when I tell you "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners." It does not say it is worthy of some acceptation, but it is worthy of all the acceptation you will ever give it. If you now say, "Jesus came into the world so save sinners, I believe he did! I know he did; he came to save me," you will find it "worthy of all acceptation." You say still, "But will he save me?" I will give you another passage: "Whosoever cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out." Ah! but I do not know whether I may come! "Whosoever," it saith. "Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out." "Whosoever will, let him come," it is written. Dost thou will? I only speak to such as will, who know their need of a Savior. Dost thou will? Then God the Holy Spirit says, "Whosoever will let him come, and take the water of life freely."

The feeble, the guilty, the weak, the forlorn, In coming to Jesus shall not meet with scorn; But he will receive them, and bless them, and save From death and destruction, from hell and the grave.

and he will lift them up to his kingdom of glory. God so grant it; for his name sake.

Spurgeon's Verse Expositions of the Bible

Job's Regret and Our Own

September 17th, 1871 by C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892)

"Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me when his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness; as I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle." Job 29:2-4 .

If Job here refers to the temporal prosperity which he had lost, we cannot condemn him for his complaint, neither can we commend him. It is but the expression of a natural regret, which would be felt by any man who had experienced such great reverses. But there is everywhere in the expressions which he uses such a strain of spirituality, that we are inclined to believe that he had more reference to the condition of his heart than to the state of his property. His soul was depressed; he had lost the light of God's countenance; his inward comforts were declining, his joy in the Lord was at a low ebb, this he regretted far more than anything besides. No doubt he deplored the departure of those prosperous days when, as he words it, his root was spread out by the waters, and the dew lay all night upon his branch; but, much more did he bemoan that the lamp of the Lord no more shone upon his head, and the secret of God was not upon his tabernacle. As his spiritual regrets are far more instructive to us than his natural ones, we will turn all our attention to them. We may, without violence, appropriate Job's words to ourselves; for I fear that many of us can with great propriety take up our wailing and mourn for the days of our espousals, the happy days of our first love. I shall have to trouble you with many divisions this morning; but I shall be brief upon each one, and I hope that our thoughts may be led onward, and rendered practically serviceable to us, by the blessing of God's Spirit. I. Let us begin by saying, that regrets such as those expressed in the text are and ought to be very BITTER. If it be the loss of spiritual things that we regret, then may we say from the bottom of our hearts, "Oh that I were as in months past." It is a great thing for a man to be near to God; it is a very choice privilege to be admitted into the inner circle of communion, and to become God's familiar friend. Great as the privilege is, so great is the loss of it. No darkness is so dark as that which falls on eyes accustomed to the light. The poor man who was always poor is scarcely poor, but he who has fallen from the summit of greatness into the depths of poverty is poor indeed. The man who has never enjoyed communion with God knows nothing of what it must be to lose it; but he who has once been pressed upon the Savior's bosom will mourn, as long as he liveth, if he be deprived of the sacred enjoyment. The mercies which Job deplored in our text are no little ones. First, he complains that he had lost the consciousness of divine preservation. He says, "Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me." There are days with Christians when they can see God's hand all around them, checking them in the first approaches of sin, and setting a hedge about all their ways. Their conscience is tender, and the Spirit of God is obeyed by them; they are, therefore, kept in all their ways, the angels of God watching over them, lest they dash their foot against a stone. But when they fall into laxity of spirit, and walk at a distance from God, they are not so preserved. Though kept from final and total apostasy, yet they are not kept from very grievous sin; for, like Peter who followed afar off, they may be left to deny their Master, even with oaths and cursings. If we have lost that conscious preservation of God, which once covered us from every fiery dart; if we no longer abide under the shadow of the Almighty, and feel no longer that his truth is our shield and buckler, we have lost a joy worth worlds, and we may well deplore it with anguish of heart. Job had also lost divine consolation, for he looks back with lamentation to the time when God's candle shone upon his head, when the sun of God's love was as it were in the zenith, and cast no shadow; when he rejoiced without ceasing, and triumphed from morning to night in the God of his salvation. The joy of the Lord is our strength, the joy of the Lord is Israel's excellency; it is the heaven of heaven, it is heaven even upon earth; and, consequently, to lose it, is a calamity indeed. Who that has once been satisfied with favor, and full of the blessing of the Lord, will be content to go into the dry and thirsty land, and live far off from God? Will he not rather cry out with David, "My soul thirsteth for God; when shall I come and appear before God?" Surely his agonising prayer will be, "Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation, and uphold me with thy free Spirit." Love to God will never be content if his face be hidden. Until the curtain be drawn aside and the King's face be seen through the lattices, the true spouse will spend her life in sighing; mourning like a dove bereaved of its mate. Moreover, Job deplored the loss of divine illumination. "By his light," he says, "I walked through darkness," that is to say, perplexity ceased to be perplexity; God shed such a light upon the mysteries of providence, that where others missed their path, Job, made wise by heaven, could find it. There have been times when, to our patient faith, all things have been plain. "If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine;" but, if we walk far off from God, then, straightway, even the precious truth of God is no more clear to us, and the dealings of God with us in providence appear to be like a maze. He is wise as Solomon who walks with God, but he is a very fool who trusts his own understanding. All the wit that we have gathered by observation and experience will not supply us with sufficiency of common sense, if we turn away from God. Israel, without consulting God, made a league with her enemies; she thought the case most plain when she entered into hasty alliance with the Gibeonites, but she was duped by cunning because she asked not counsel of the Lord. In the simplest business we shall err, if we seek not direction from the Lord; yet, where matters are most complicated, we shall walk wisely, if we wait for a voice from the oracle, and seek the good Shepherd's guidance. We may bitterly lament, therefore, if we have lost the Holy Spirit's light. If now the Lord answereth us not, neither by his word, nor by his providence, if we wander alone, crying Oh that I knew where I might find him, we are in an evil case, and may well sigh for the days, when by his light we walked through darkness. Moreover, Job had lost divine communion: so it seems, for he mourned the days of his youth, when the secret of God was upon his tabernacle. Who shall tell to another what the secret of God is? Believing hearts know it, but they cannot frame to pronounce aright the words that could explain it, nor can they convey by language what the secret is. The Lord manifests himself unto his people as he doth not unto the world. We could not tell the love passages that there are between believers and their Lord; even when they are set to such sweet music as the Song of Solomon, carnal minds cannot discern their delights. They cannot plough with our heifer, and therefore they read not our riddle. As Paul in heaven saw things which it were unlawful for a man to utter, so the believer sees and enjoys in communion with Christ what it would not only be unlawful but impossible for him to tell to carnal men. Such pearls are not for swine. The spiritual discerneth all things, but he himself is discerned of no man. Now, it is a high privilege, beyond all privileges, to enter into familiar intercourse with the Most High, and the man who has once possessed it, and has lost it, has a bitterer cause for regret than if, being rich, he had lost his wealth; or being famous, he had lost esteem; or being in health, he were suddenly brought to the bed of languishing. No loss can equal the loss of thee, my God! No eclipse is so black as the hiding of thy face! No storm is so fierce as the letting forth of thine indignation! It is grief upon grief to find that thou art not with me as in the days of old. Wherever, then, these regrets do exist, if the men's hearts are as they should be, they are not mere hypocritical or superficial expressions, but they express the bitterest experiences of our human existence. "Oh that I were as in months past" is no sentimental sigh, but the voice of the innermost spirit in anguish, as one who has lost his firstborn. II. But, secondly, let me remind you that these regrets are NOT INEVITABLE; that is to say, it is not absolutely necessary that a Christian man should ever feel them, or be compelled to express them. It has grown to be a tradition among us, that every Christian must backslide in a measure, and that growth in grace cannot be unbrokenly sustained. It is regarded by many as a law of nature, that our first love must grow cold, and our early zeal must necessarily decline. I do not believe it for a moment. "The path of the just is us the shining light, which shineth more and more unto the perfect day;" and were we watchful and careful to live near to God, there is no reason why our spiritual life should not continuously make progress both in strength and beauty. There is no inherent necessity in the divine life itself compelling it to decline, for is it not written, "It shall be in him a well of water, springing up unto everlasting life;" "out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water." Grace is a living and incorruptible seed that liveth and abideth for ever, and there is nowhere impressed upon the divine life a law of pining and decay. If we do falter and faint in the onward path, it is our sin, and it is doubly sinful to forge excuses for it. It is not to be laid upon the back of some mysterious necessity of the new nature that it should be so, but it is to be brought as a charge against ourselves. Nor do outward circumstances ever furnish a justification to us if we decline in grace; for, under the worst conditions, believers have grown in grace: deprived of the joys of Christian fellowship, and denied the comforts of the means of grace, believers have nevertheless been known to attain to a high-degree of likeness to Christ Jesus: thrown into the midst of wicked companions, and forced to hear, like righteous Lot, the filthy conversation of the ungodly, yet Christian men have shone all the brighter for the surrounding darkness, and have been able to escape from a wicked and perverse generation. Certain is it, that a man may be an eminent Christian, and be among the poorest of the poor: poverty need not, therefore, make us depart from God; and, it is equally certain, that a man may be rich, and for all that may walk with God and be distinguished for great grace. There is no lawful position of which we may say, "It compels a man to decline in grace." And, brethren, there is no period of our life in which it is necessary for us to go back. The young Christian, with all the strength of his natural passions, can by grace be strong and overcome the Wicked One; the Christian in middle life, surrounded with the world's cares, can prove that "this is the victory which overcometh the world, even our faith." The man immersed in business may still be baptised of the Holy Ghost. Assuredly, old age offers no excuse for decline: "they shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be fat and flourishing; to show that the Lord is upright." No, brethren as Christ said to his disciples, when they would fain have sent the multitude away to buy meat, "they need not depart;" so would he say to the whole company of the Lord's people, "ye need not depart;" there is no compulsion for decline in grace." Your sun need not stand still, your moon need not wane. If you cannot add a cubit to your spiritual stature, at any rate, it need not decrease. There are no reasons written in the book of your spiritual nature why you, as a believer, should lose fellowship with God, and, if you do so, take blame and shame to yourself, but do not ascribe it to necessity. Do not gratify your corruptions by supposing that they are licensed to prevail occasionally, neither vex your graces by conceiving that they are doomed to inevitable defeat at a certain season. The spirit that is in us lusteth to evil, but the Holy Spirit is able to subdue it, and will subdue it, if we yield ourselves to him. III. But, now, I am compelled Lo say that the regrets expressed in our test are exceedingly COMMON, and it is only here and there that we meet with a believer who has not had cause to use them. It ought not to be so, but it is so. How grievously often will the pastor hear this among the other bleatings of the sheep: "Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me:"

"What peaceful hours I then enjoy'd, How sweet, their memory still; But they have left an aching void The world can never fill."

The commonness of this lamentation may be somewhat accounted for, by the universal tendency to undervalue the present and exaggerate the excellence of the past. Have you never noticed this in natural things, we are prone to cast a partial eye upon some imaginary "good old times?" It is gone, and therefore it was good; it is here, and therefore it is dubious. In the middle of the summer, we feel that the heat is so relaxing that a frost would be the most delightful thing conceivable; we love, we say, the bracing air of winter; we are sure it is much healthier for us: yet, usually, when winter arrives, and the extreme cold sets in, we are all most anxious for the advent of spring, and we feel that somehow or other the frost is more trying to us than the heat. Personally, I met with an illustration of this tendency the other day. I went down a steep cliff to the sea shore, and during the descent every step tried my weak knees, and I felt that going down hill was the most difficult travelling in the world. Soon I had to return from the sands, and climb the steep path again; and, when I began to pant and puff with the difficult ascent, I changed my opinion, and felt that I would a great deal sooner go down than come up. The fact is that whatever is with us we think to be the worse, and whatever was with us we conceive to be the better. We may, therefore, take some discount from our regrets; for, peradventure, were we more conscious of the benefit of the present state, and did we make less prominent the difficulty of it, we should not sigh to be as we were in months past. Then, again, regrets may in some cases arise from a holy jealousy. The Christian, in whatever state he is, feels his own imperfection much, and laments his conscious shortcomings. Looking back, he observes with joy the work of grace in his soul, and does not perhaps so readily recollect the then existing deficiencies of nature; hence, he comes to think that the past was better than the present. He is afraid of backsliding, and therefore he jealously fears that he is so; he is so anxious to live nearer to God, so dissatisfied with his present attainments, that he dares not believe that he advances, but fears that he has lost ground. I know this in my own experience, for when lying sick I have frequently lamented that pain has distracted my mind, and taken off my attention from the word of God, and I have longed for those seasons of health when I could read, meditate, and study with pleasure; but, now that I have risen up from the sick bed, and am growing strong again, I frequently look back to the long nights and quiet days spent in my sick chamber, and think that it was better with me then than now, for now I am apt to be cumbered with much serving, and then I was shut in with God. Many a man is really strong in Christ; but, because he does not feel all the juvenile vivacity of his early days, he fears that ritual decreptitude has come upon him. He is now far more solid and steadfast, if not quite so quick and impulsive; but, the good man in his holy jealousy marks most the excellencies of his juvenile piety, and forgets that there were grave deficiencies in it; while, in his present state, he notes the deficiencies, and fears to hope that he possesses any excellencies. We are poor judges of our own condition, and usually err on one side or the other. All graces may not flourish at the same time, and defalcations in one direction may be more than balanced by advantages in another. We may be deeper in humility if we are not higher in delight. We may not glitter so much, and yet there may be more real gold in us. The leaf may not be so green, but the fruit may be more ripe. The way may be rougher, and yet be nearer heaven. Godly anxiety, then, may be the cause of many regrets which are, nevertheless, not warranted by any serious declension. And, let me add, that very often these regrets of ours about the past are not wise. It is impossible to draw a fair comparison between the various stages of Christian experience, so as to give a judicious preference to one above another. Consider, as in a parable, the seasons of the year. There are many persons who, in the midst of the beauties of spring, say, "Ah, but how fitful is the weather! These March winds and April showers come and go by such fits and starts, that nothing is to be depended upon. Give me the safer glories of summer." Yet, when they feel the heat of summer, and wipe the sweat from their brows, they say, "After all, with all the full-blow of beauty around us, we admire more the freshness, verdure, and vivacity of spring. The snowdrop and the crocus, coming forth as the advance guard of the army of flowers, have a superior charm about them." Now it is idle to compare spring with summer; they differ, and have each its beauties. We are in autumn now, and very likely, instead of prizing the peculiar treasures of autumn, some will despise the peaceful Sabbath of the year, and mournfully compare you fading leaves to funeral sermons replete with sadness. Such will contrast summer and autumn, and exalt one above another. Now, whoever shall claim precedence for any season, shall have me for an opponent. They are all beautiful in their season, and each excels after its kind. Even thus it is wrong to compare the early zeal of the young Christian with the mature and mellow experience of the older believer, and make preferences. Each is beautiful according to its time. You, dear young friend, with your intense zeal, are to be commended and imitated; but very much of your fire I am afraid arises from novelty, and you are not so strong as you are earnest; like a newborn river, you are swift in current, but neither deep nor broad. And you, my more advanced friend, who are much tried and buffeted, to you it is not easy to hold on your way under great inward struggles and severe depressions, but your deeper sense of weakness, your firmer grasp of truth, your more intense fellowship with the Lord Jesus in his sufferings, your patience, and your steadfastness, are all lovely in the eyes of the Lord your God. Be thankful each of you for what you have, for by the grace of God you are what you are. After making all these deductions, however, I cannot conceive that they altogether account for the prevalence of these regrets; I am afraid the fact arises from the sad truth that many of us have actually deteriorated in grace, have decayed in spirit, and degenerated in heart. Alas! in many cases, old corruptions have fought desperately, and for awhile caused a partial relapse. Grace has become weak, and sin has seized the occasion for attack; so that for a time the battle is turned, and Israel's banner is trailed in the mire. With many professors, I am afraid, prayer is neglected, worldliness is uppermost, sin has come to the front, nature leads the van, and grace and holiness are in the background. It should not be so, but I am afraid, ah, sadly afraid it is so. IV. I will more fully speak upon this matter under the fourth head. Since these regrets are exceedingly common, it is to be feared that in some cases they are very sadly NEEDFUL. Now, let the blast of the winnowing fan be felt through the congregation. Behold, the Lord himself winnows this heap. Are there not many among us who once walked humbly with God, and near to him, who have fallen into carnal security? Have we not taken it for granted that all is well with us, and are we not settled upon our lees like Moab of old? How little of heart-searching and self-examination are practiced now-a-days! How little enquiry as to whether the root of the matter is really in us! Woe unto those who take their safety for granted, and sit down in God's house and say, "The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord are we." Woe unto them that are at ease in Zion. Of all enemies, one of the most to be dreaded is presumption. To be secure in a Christ is a blessing, to be secure in ourselves is a curse. Where carnal security reigns, the Spirit of God withdraws. He is with the humble and contrite, but he is not with the proud and self-sufficient. My brethren, are we all clear in this respect? Do not many of God's people also need to bemoan their worldliness? Once Christ was all with you, brethren; is it so now? Once you despised the world, and contemned alike its pleasures and its frowns; but now, my brethren, are not the chains of worldly custom upon you? Are you not many of you enslaved by fashion, and eaten up with frivolity? Do you not, some of you, run as greedily as worldlings after the questionable enjoyments of this present life? Ought these things to be so? Can they remain so and your souls enjoy the Lord's smile? "Ye cannot serve God and mammon." "If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him." You cannot be Christ's disciples, and be in fellowship with the ungodly. Come ye out from among them; be ye separate; touch not the unclean thing; then shall ye know right joyfully that the Lord is a Father to you, and that you are his sons and daughters. But, brethren, have ye gone unto Jesus without the camp, and do ye abide there with him? Is the line of your separation visible ay, is it existing? Is there any separation at all? Is it not often the case that the professed people of God are mixed up with the sons of men so that you cannot discern the one from the other? If it be so with anyone of us, let him humble himself, and let him cry in bitterness, "Oh that I were as in months past." Brethren and sisters feel ye the breath of the winnowing fan again. How is it with you as to private prayer? Are there not believers, and we hope true believers too, who are lax in devotion? The morning prayer is brief, but alas! it is not fervent; the evening prayer is too often sleepy; ejaculations are few and far between; communion with heaven is distant, suspended, almost non-existent in many cases. Look ye to this, my brethren; let each man commune with his own heart, and be still. Think not of others just now, but let each one consider his ways. How is it with your love to the souls of sinners? There was a time when you would have done anything to bring a man to Christ, when any exertion you could have put forth would have been made spontaneously, without the need of incessant exhortations; are you as ready to speak for Jesus now as you once were? Do you watch to bring souls to him? Does the tear tremble in your eye, now, as it once did for lost souls, perishing without Christ? Alas, upon how many has a hardening influence operated. Ah, and this is true even of us, ministers. We have grown professional in our service, and now we preach like automatons, wound up for a sermon, to run down when the discourse is over, and we have little more care for the souls of men than if they were so much dirt. Trifles of criticism, fancies of speculation, or fopperies of oratory, fascinate too many who should be wise to win smile. God forgive us if we have fallen into so deplorable a state. Ah, and how many of God's people must confess that their conscience is not so tender now as it used be. The time was when, if you said half a word amiss, you would hide away to weep over it; when, in business, if there had been a little mistake, and anything that might be construed into want of integrity, you would have felt ashamed for a week that such a thing had happened; but now ah, professors hear ye this some of you can be dishonest and speak words that border on lasciviousness, and be as others are, yet your heart does not smite you, but you come to the communion table and feel you have a right to be there, and listen to the Word of God, and take comfort from it, when rather you should be ashamed and confounded. Let me enquire whether there are not many of us whose zeal is almost gone? We once loved the Savior intensely, and his cause we eagerly sought to serve, but now we take matters easily, and do not travail in birth for souls. Some rich men were wont to give most freely to the cause of God, but now covetousness has palsied the hand of generosity. Even poor Christians are not always so ready with their two mites as they were in better days. You were wont to labor, too, but that Sunday School class sees you no longer; no street preaching now; no tract distributing now; all forms of Christ's service you have renounced, for you fancy you have done enough. Alas, poor sluggard! Has the sun shone long enough? Has God given you your daily bread long enough? Oh, cease not working, brethren, till God ceases to be merciful to you. "On, on, on," "forward, forward, forward," is the very motto of the Christian life. Let none of us talk of finality, for we have not yet attained. Till life is over, our zeal should still glow, and our labors for Christ should multiply. Are there but other signs of declension, that some of us might, with but a very slight examination, discover in ourselves? Is not brotherly love, in many Christians, very questionable? Have they not forgotten, altogether, the family ties which bind all Christians to one another? And, with brotherly love, has not love to the Gospel gone too, so that now with many, one doctrine is almost as good as another? If a man can talk well, and is an orator, they enjoy his ministry whether he advocates truth or error. Once they could go to the little meeting house, where Christianity was preached faithfully though in an uncouth style, but now they must have the help of organs or they cannot praise God; and there must be millinery and genuflexions, or else they cannot pray to him; and they must listen to oratory and elocution, or else they cannot accept God's word. He is sickly who cannot dine without made dishes and spiced meats, but he is a healthy man of God who can eat heaven's bread and heaven's meat, even when it is not served on a lordly dish. Might not many of us blush, if we were to think how low our graces are, how weak our faith, how few our good works, and our gracious words with which we should bear testimony to his name. Yes, in thousands of cases, Christians need not be stopped if they were to commence this mournful cry, "Oh that I were as in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle." V. But, I must pass on to observe that these regrets BY THEMSELVES ARE USELESS. It is unprofitable to read these words of Job, and say, "Just so, that is how I feel," and then continue in the same way. If a man has neglected his business, and so has lost his trade, it may mark a turn in his affairs when he says, "I wish I had been more industrious;" but if he abides in the same sloth as before, of what use is his regret? If he shall fold his arms and say, "Oh that I had dug that plot of land; oh that I had sown that field;" no harvest will come because of his lamentations. Up, man, up and labor, or you will have the sluggard's reward, rags and poverty will still be your portion. If a man be in declining health, if drunkenness and riot have broken down his constitution, it may mark a salutary reform in his history if he confesses his former folly; but if his regrets end in mere expressions, will these heal him? I trow not. So neither will a man, affected by spiritual decline, be restored by the mere fact of his knowing himself to be so. Let him go to the beloved physician, drink of the waters of life again, and receive the leaves of the tree which are for the healing of the nations. Inactive regrets are insincere. If a man really did lament that he had lost communion with God, he would seek to regain it. If he doth not seek to be restored he is adding to all his former sins this of lying before God, in uttering regrets that he does not feel in his soul. I have known some, I fear who even satisfied themselves with expressions of regrets. "Ah," say they, "I am a deep experienced man, I can go where Job went; I can mourn and lament as Job did." Remember, many have been on Job's dunghill, who knew nothing of Job's God; many have imitated David in his sins, who never followed him, in his repentance. They have gone from their sin into hell by the way of presumption, whereas David went from it to heaven by the road of repentance and forgiveness. Never let us; merely because we feel some uneasiness within, conclude that this suffices. If in the dead of the night you should hear thieves in your house, you would not congratulate yourself because you were awake to hear them. You would waive all such comfortable reflections till the rogues were driven out and your property was safe; and so, when you know things are amiss with you, do not say "I am satisfied, because I know it is so." Up, men, and with all the strength that God's Holy Spirit can give you, strive to drive out these traitors from your bosom, for they are robbing your soul of her best treasures. VI. Brethren, these regrets when they are necessary are very HUMBLING. Meditate now for a minute. Think, dear brother, what was thy position in thy happiest times, in those days that are now past. Had you any love to spare then? You were zealous; were you too zealous? You were gracious; were you too gracious? Nay, in our best estate, we were very far short of what we ought to be, and yet we have gone back from even that. It was a poor attainment at the best, have we fallen even from that. During the time we have been going back, we ought to have gone forward. What enjoyments we have lost by our wanderings! What progress we have missed! As John Bunyan well puts it, when Christian fell asleep and lost his roll, he had to go back for it, and he found it very hard going back, and, moreover, he had to go on again, so that he had to traverse three times the road he need only have traveled once, and then he came in late at the gates of the palace Beautiful, and was afraid of the lions, of which he would have had no fear had not the darkness set in. We know not what we lose, when we lose growth in grace. Alas, how much the church has lost through us, for if the Christian becomes poor in grace, he lessens the church's wealth of grace. We have a common exchequer as a church, and every one who takes away his proportion from it robs the whole. Dear brethren, how accountable are many of us for the low tone of religion in the world, especially those of us who occupy the foremost ranks. If grace be at a low ebb with us, others say, "Well, look at so and so; I am as good as he." So much in the church do we take the cue from one another, that each one of us is in a measure responsible for the low state of the whole. Some of us are very quick to see the faults of others; may it not be that these faults are our own children? Those who have little love to others generally discover that there is little love in the church, and I notice that those who complain of the inconsistencies of others, are usually the most inconsistent persons themselves. Shall I be a robber of my fellow Christians? Shall I be an injury to the cause of Christ? Shall I be a comfort unto sinners in their sin? Shall I rob Christ of his glory, I, who was saved from such depths of sin, I, who have been favored with such enjoyments of his presence, I, that have been on Tabor's top with him, and seen him transfigured, I, that have been in his banqueting house, and have drunk out of the flagons of his love, shall I be so devoid of grace, that I shall even injure his children, and make his enemies to blaspheme? Wretch that I am, to do this! Smite your breast, my brother, if such has been your sin; go home and smite your breast again, and ask God to smite it, till, with a broken heart, you cry repentingly for restoration, and then again go forth as a burning and a shining light, to serve your Master better than before. VII. These regrets, then, are humbling, and they may be made very PROFITABLE in many other ways. First, they shew us what human nature is. Have we gone back so far? O, brethren, we might have gone back to perdition: we should have done so, if it had not been for the grace of God. What a marvel it is that God has borne with our ill manners, when he might justly have laid the reins on our necks, and suffered us to rush on in the road which we so often hankered after. See you not, dear brethren, what a body of death we carry with us, and what a terrible power it possesses? When you see the mischief that corruption has already done, never trust yourself, but look for new grace every day. Learn again to prize what spiritual blessings yet remain. If you have such bitter regrets for what you have lost, hold fast what is still yours. Slip back no further, for if these slips have cost you so much, take heed that they do not ruin you. To continue presumptuous may be a proof that our profession is rotten throughout: only a holy jealousy can remove the suspicion of insincerity. Let your previous failings teach you to walk cautiously for the future. Be jealous, for you serve a jealous God. Since grey hairs may come upon you, here and there, and you may not know it, search, watch, try yourself day by day, lest you relapse yet more. This should teach us to live by faith, since our best attainments fail us. We rejoice to-day, but we may mourn to-morrow. What a mercy it is that our salvation does not depend on what we are or what we feel. Christ has finished our salvation; no man can destroy what he has completed. Our life is hid with Christ in God, and is safe there; none can pluck us out of Jehovah's hands. Since we so frequently run aground, it is clear that we should be wrecked altogether, if we went to sea in a legal vessel with self for our pilot; let us keep to the good ship of free grace, steered by immutable faithfulness, for none other can bring us to the desired haven. But oh, let that free grace fill us with ardent gratitude. Since Christ has kept us, though we could not keep ourselves, let us bless his name, and, overwhelmed with obligations, let us rise with a solemn determination that we will serve him better than we have ever done before; and may his blessed Spirit help us to make the determination a fact. VIII. So, to close; these regrets OUGHT NOT TO BE CONTINUAL: they ought to be removed, decidedly, removed, by an earnest effort, made in God's strength, to get back to the position which we occupied before, and to attain something better still. Dear brethren and sisters, if any of you desire now to come into the higher life, and to feel anew your first love, what shall I say to you? Go back to where you started. Do not stay discussing whether you are a Christian or not. Go to Christ as a poor guilty sinner. When the door to heaven seems shut to me as a saint, I will get through it as a sinner, trusting in the precious blood of Jesus. Come and stand again, as though all your sins were on you still, at the cross's foot, where still may be seen the dropping blood of the infinitely precious atonement. Savior, I trust thee again: guilty, more guilty than I was before, a sinful child of God, I trust thee: "wash me thoroughly from mine iniquities, and purge me from my sin." You will never have your graces revived, unless you go to the cross. Begin life again. The best air for a man to breathe when he is sickly is said to be that of his birthplace: it was at Calvary we were born; it is only at Calvary we can be restored when we are declining. Do the first works. As a sinner, repair to the Savior, and ask to be restored. Then, as a further means of health, search out the cause of your declension. Probably it was a neglect of private prayer. Where the disease began, there must the remedy be applied. Pray more earnestly, more frequently, more importunately. Or, was it a neglect of hearing the word? Were you enticed by novelty or cleverness away from a really searching and instructive ministry? Go back, and feed on wholesome food again perhaps that may cure the disease. Or, have you been too grasping after the world? Brother, you loved God when you had but one shop, you have two now, and are giving all your time and thoughts to business, and your soul is getting lean. Man alive, strike off some of that business, for it is a bad business that makes your soul poor. I would not check industry or enterprise for a single moment; let a man do all he can, but not at the expense of his soul. Push, but do not push down your soul. You may buy gold too dear, and may attain a high position in this world at a cost which you may have to rue all your days. Where the mischief began, there apply the remedy. And oh, I urge upon you, and most of all upon myself, do not make excuses for yourselves; do not palliate your faults; do not say it must be so; do not compare yourselves among yourselves, or you will be unwise; but to the perfect image of Christ let your hearts aspire, to the ardor of your divine Redeemer, who loved not himself, but loved you; to the intense fervor of his apostles, who laid themselves upon the altar of God for his sake, for Christ's sake, and for yours. Aspire to this, and may we as a church live near to God, and grow in grace, then shall the Lord add to us daily of such as shall be saved. There are some here who will say, "I do not comprehend this sermon: I have no cause to look back with regret. I have always been much the same as I am. I know nothing of religion." The day shall come when you will envy the least and most trembling believer. To you careless, Christless sinners, the day shall come when you will cry to the rocks for mercy, and beg them to conceal you from the eyes of him whom now you dare despise. I beseech you be not high minded, lift not up your horn on high, speak not so exceeding proudly, bow before the Christ of God, and ask him to give you the new life; for even if that new life have declined and become sickly, it is better than the death in which you dwell. Go and seek grace of him who alone can give it, and he will grant it to you this day, for his infinite mercy's sake. Amen.