Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 776
Delivered on Thursday Evening, OCTOBER 10, 1867, by, the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington.
“And from there they went to Beer, which is the well where the Lord said to Moses, ‘Gather the people together, and I will give them water.’ Then Israel sang this song, Spring up, O well! All of you sing to it—The princes dug the well, the nobles of the people dug it, by the direction of the la wgiver, with their sta ves.”- Numbers 21:16-18.
WE have remarked in our reading that the children of Israel were continually changing their places and that there was usually a great difference between one station and the next. So, also, we are constantly varying in our experience, and the variations are sometimes exceedingly remarkable. You observe, in the neighborhood of the text, that the people pitched their tents at one time by the brooks of Arnon. There appears to have been an exceedingly abundance of water where they then were, but nevertheless they removed into the wilderness where there was not a single drop to quench their thirst.
So is it with us. At one time we are abounding in every good thing, rejoicing “with joy unspeakable and full of glory.” And at another time we discover how great our weakness is—faith is at a very low ebb—and joy seems as though the frost of doubt had nipped its root. But, great as the changes of our experience certainly are, our necessities never change. Whether they found water or not, the people always needed water. The great camp must always have a supply, or perish for the lack of it. So, at all hours, and in all places, Believers need the Divine Grace which only their Lord can give them. They carry no stores with them—they are daily dependent upon their God. “All my springs are in You,” said David, and every heir of Heaven must experimentally learn this Truth of God.
Now there is one thing certain, that although our experiences vary and our necessities remain the same, yet there is something that does not change, namely, the supply which God has provided for our needs. Our experience may be high or low, bright or dark, but JEHOVAH-JIREH is still the name of our God. In the mountain of the Lord it shall be seen, and in the valley, too, that the Lord will provide. As our day, so shall our strength be. If great our needs, great shall be our supplies!
Israel found it so, for when they came to this particular place where there was no natural water, they soon discovered a supernatural supply. They arrived at a spot that was all arid sand, but that was the very place of which God had spoken, “Gather the people together, and I will give them water.” Believer, your supplies shall never vary, and your greatest necessities shall only illustrate the fullness of the Lord your God! Be not afraid, but go forward. Though it is dark and dreary in the prospect, yet if God bids you advance, tarry not, for He has surely taken care to provide your necessities when they arise.
The particular text before us has four things in it which I think may be instructive to us. These people needed supplies just as we need Grace. There was, first, a promise concerning the supply. Secondly, there was a song. That song viewed in another light, was, in the third place, a prayer. And when this promise, song, and prayer were attended by the effort, then the blessing came.
I. To begin, then, these people required water as we greatly need Divine Grace and there was A PROMISE GIVEN CONCERNING THE SUPPLY. “The Lord said to Moses, ‘Gather the people together, and I will give them water.’ ” Beloved, we have a promise. A promise? No, a thousand promises! God’s people were never in any plight whatever but what there was a promise to meet that condition. There is not a single lock of which God has not the key. You shall never be placed in a difficulty without some provision being made for that difficulty which God foresaw, and for which His heavenly wisdom had devised a way of escape.
Now, the supply promised here was a Divine supply: “I will give them water.” Who else could satisfy those flocks and herds? By what mechanism or by what human toil could all those multitudes of people have received enough to drink? “I will give them water.” God can do it and He will. Beloved, the supply of Grace that you are to receive in your time of need is a Divine supply! You are not to look to man for Grace. God forbid that we should ever fall into the superstitions of some idiots in these modern days who suppose that God has given His Grace only to bishops and to priests— the most graceless of all men if they profess to have any grace to give away—for if they had true Grace at all they would not act after that fashion.
If you want Divine Grace, Beloved, you must go to God for it. You shall get it there, and nowhere else. As for even the ablest of God’s sent ministers—they are but broken cisterns if we trust in them. They shall have Grace enough to get to Heaven themselves, but they will be to themselves great wonders when they arrive there. Wise virgins always say to the foolish ones who apply to them for oil, “Not so, lest there is not enough for us and you: but go you rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves.”