Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 672
Delivered on Sunday Evening, January 14, 1866
“He gives to the beasthis food, and to the young ravens which cry.” Psalm 147:9.
I SHALL open this sermon with a quotation. I must give you, in Caryl’s own words his note upon ravens. “Naturalists tell us that when the raven has fed his young in the nest till they are well fledged and able to fly abroad, he thrusts them out of the nest and will not let them abide there, but puts them out to get their own living. Now when these young ones are upon their first flight from their nest and are little acquainted with means how to help themselves with food, then the Lord provides food for them.
“It is said by credible authorities that the raven is marvelously strict and severe in this—as soon as his young ones are able to provide for themselves, he will not fetch any more food for them. Some affirm the old ones will not suffer them to stay in the same country where they were bred, and if so, then they must wander. We say proverbially, ‘Need makes the old wife trot.’ We may say, ‘and the young ones too.’ ”
It has been, and possibly is, the practice of some parents towards their children, who, as soon as they can shift for themselves and are fit in any competency to get their bread, to turn them out of doors as the raven does his young ones out of the nest. Now, said the Lord in the text, when the young ones of the raven are in this pinch, that they are turned off, and wander for lack of meat, who, then, provides for them? “Do not I, the Lord? Do not I, who provide for the old raven, provide for his young ones, both while they abide in the nest and when they wander for lack of meat?”
Solomon sent the sluggard to the ant, and learned, himself, lessons from conies, greyhounds, and spiders! Let us be willing to be instructed by any of God’s creatures and go to the ravens’ nest tonight to learn as in a school. To the pure nothing is unclean, and to the wise nothing is trivial. Let the superstitious dread the raven as a bird of ill omen, and let the thoughtless see nothing but a winged thing in glossy black—we are willing to see more, and doubtless shall not be unrewarded if we are but teachable.
Noah’s raven brought him back no olive branch, but ours may! And it may even come to pass that ravens may bring us meat tonight as of old they fed Elijah by Cherith’s brook. Our blessed Lord once derived a very potent argument from ravens—an argument intended to comfort and cheer those of His servants who were oppressed with needless anxieties about their temporal circumstances. To such he said, “Consider the ravens: for they neither sow nor reap, which neither have storehouse nor barn, and God feeds them. How much more are you better than the fowls?”
Following the Master’s logic—which you will all agree must have been sound, for He was never untruthful in His reasoning any more than in His statements—I shall argue tonight on this wise: Consider the ravens as they cry! With harsh, inarticulate, croaking notes they make known their needs, and your heavenly Father answers their prayer and sends them food! You, too, have begun to pray and to seek His favor—are you not much better than they? Does God care for ravens, and will he not care for you? Does He not hearken to the cries of the unfledged ravens in their nests when they are hungry and cry unto Him to be fed?
Does He, I say, supply them in answer to their cries, and will He not answer you, poor trembling children of men who are seeking His face and favor through Christ Jesus? The whole business of this evening will be just simply to work that one thought out. I shall aim tonight, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, to say something to those who have been praying for mercy but as yet have not received it—who have gone on their knees, perhaps, for months, with one exceeding great and bitter cry—but as yet know not the way of peace.
Their sin still hangs like a millstone about their neck. They sit in the valley of the shadow of death. No light has dawned upon them and they are wringing their hands and moaning, “Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has He shut His ear against the prayers of seeking souls? Will He be mindful of sinners’ piteous cries no more? Will penitents’ tears drop upon the earth and no longer move His compassion?” Satan, too, is telling you, dear Friends, who are now in this state of mind, that God will never hear you. That He will let you cry till you die! That you shall pant out your life in sighs and tears and that at the end you shall be cast into the Lake of Fire!
I long, tonight, to give you some comfort and encouragement. I want to urge you to cry yet more vehemently! Come to the Cross and lay hold of it, and vow that you will never leave its shadow till you find the gift which your soul covets. I want to move you, if God the Holy Spirit shall help me, so that you will say within yourselves, like Queen Esther, “I will go in unto the King, and if I perish, I perish.” And may you add to that the vow of Jacob, “I will not let You go, except You bless me!” Here, then, is the question in hand: GOD HEARS THE YOUNG RAVENS. WILL HE NOT HEAR YOU?