the Fourth Week after Easter
Click here to join the effort!
Daily Devotionals
Mornings and Evenings with Jesus
In thy presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore. - Psalms 16:11.
WE may consider this as importing the dignity of the believer’s joy. There are many joys that are ignominious. Such are the pleasures so eagerly sought after by the men of the world. They are a shame to their possessors; they, therefore, require darkness; and it will soon be said to them, “What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death.” There are other pleasures that are humiliating. We enjoy them in common with the brutes that perish, and perhaps in a far less perfect degree: the mind loves not to dwell upon them; we make them not the topic of conversation. We speak more highly of some other pleasures,-the pleasures of music, the pleasures of science, the pleasures of kindred and friendship; these are more noble and praiseworthy; but even in much wisdom there is much grief, and he “that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow;” and the knowledge of many of those things on which we may pride ourselves, and for which we may be admired by others, will soon be useless; for “whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.”
But the apostle speaks of another joy, and says, “Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord;” and there is not only an excellency in this knowledge, but there is also an excellency in this joy. It will bear examination; it will justify review. An angel may come and look into a Christian while he is rejoicing, and he will not have to blush; and the angel, if he were Gabriel himself, would approve and applaud. It is joy that reaches the noblest part of man; it enters the soul, it makes the soul “glad with the light of God’s countenance.” There is nothing impure, nothing of dross, in this joy; it is as pure as the air of Paradise, it is as “clear as crystal,” as the water of the “river of life” proceeding from “the throne of God and the Lamb.” It ennobles the possessor; and therefore Isaiah says, “The redeemed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs, and everlasting joy upon their heads.”
This seems a strange kind of expression. What has joy, it may be asked, to do with the head? joy belongs to the heart. Yes, as to the feeling of it: but Isaiah is speaking of it as an ornament; he is comparing it to a crown that bedecks the brow of a Christian traveller and sparkles in the eyes of beholders, so that when they meet him they say, “There is a distinguished character; there goes a great conqueror or a king; you see he is crowned!” And there is nothing by which Christians can so recommend the religion of Jesus, and adorn the doctrine of Christ their Saviour, as this. It elevates the possessor. It makes him look down upon and despise the business of sin and the dissipations of the world, and relinquish these, just as a man who is full grown will give up the toys of childhood,-just as a thirsty man will turn away from the filthy puddle when he comes within sight of the fountain of living waters.
Those are exceedingly mistaken, therefore, who are ready to pity Christians because they think they are restrained from those amusements and those dissipations which seem essential to their very existence. But let such remember that Christians are not restrained from them: they are weaned from them; and they are weaned from them by the discovery and realization of something infinitely better.
And Ahaziah fell down through a lattice in his upper chamber, that was in Samaria, and was sick. - 2 Kings 1:2.
THE Bible abounds with biography. We do not, indeed, meet with many full-length likenesses, but we have many sketches of characters which enable us to distinguish them, accompanied with facts the most interesting, instructive, and profitable. The Scripture not only encourages, but warns; not only records good examples, but evil; and he who said, “Remember Lot’s wife,” calls upon us this morning to remember Ahaziah. Ahaziah was the son of Ahab and Jezebel. Where both parents are wicked, and notoriously wicked, as in this case, what depravity may be looked for from their united example, authority, and influence! “One sinner destroyeth much good;” and although his course was short-for he filled the throne of Israel only two years, but during these two years what guilt did he contract, and what misery did he produce!-we have here his affliction. This was two-fold. First, national. Moab, who had been tributary to the king of Israel, now rebelled against him, and thus his revenue was curtailed. And, secondly, personal; “he fell down through a lattice in his upper chamber, that was in Samaria.”
To how many evils are we exposed! How much do we owe to the providence of God as the preserver of men! There are many who think they are only in danger when they travel by land or by water, in winds, or tempests, or in hurricanes; but we are daily and hourly, yea we are always in danger, when we are walking in our gardens, and in danger even when we are walking in the rooms of our dwellings. His affliction was the result of accident, that is, as to the sufferer himself; but “shall there be evil in a city and the Lord hath not done it.” Though his providence is never to be blamed, it is always to be owned and acknowledged; and of every affliction we may say, as our Saviour did to Pilate, “Thou couldst have no power at all against me, unless it were given thee from above.”
He was also sick, but whether from the fall and the fright, which was probable, or whether it was an addition to the accident, cannot be determined; but he was sick. Afflictions seldom come alone. The clouds return after the rain. But as God “doth not willingly afflict, nor grieve the children of men,” why is this? He himself asks the question: “Why should ye be stricken any more? Ye will revolt more and more.” “Many are the afflictions of the righteous.” And we often speak as if they were peculiar to the righteous, whereas Paul says to the Corinthians, “There has no temptation befallen you but such as are common to men.”
Yea, there are some troubles and sufferings from which religion secures its possessors. Though afflictions be the effect of sin, according to Isaiah, “they are the fruit to take away sin,” they are designed for our profit. Yet they could do little of themselves. When they find principles in us, they can actuate those principles, but they cannot produce them. Seed, sun, and showers may cause vegetation, but where nothing is sown nothing can be brought forth. It is well when chastening and teaching go together. As David says: “Happy is the man whom the Lord chastens, and teaches him out of his law,” and which was his own experience; “It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn thy statutes.” But how seldom is this the case! How many there are concerning whom we exclaim with Jeremiah, “Thou hast stricken them, but they have not grieved. Thou hast consumed them, but they have refused to receive correction. They have made their faces harder than a rock. They have refused to return.” And this was the case with Ahaziah under all his complicated afflictions; on his bed of languor and pain he is devising mischief, and seeking to work wickedness.
