Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1078
“Bless the Lord, O my Soul: and all that is within me, bless His holy name.” Psalm 103:1.
You see here a man talking to himself, a soul with all his soul talking to his soul. Every speaker should learn to soliloquize. His own soul is the first audience a good man ought to think of preaching to. Before we address ourselves to others we should lecture within the doors of our own heart. Indeed, if any man desires to excite the hearts of others in any given direction, he must first stir up himself upon the same matter. He who would make others grateful must begin by saying, “Bless the Lord, O my Soul.”
David had never risen to the height of saying, “Bless the Lord, you His angels,” or, “Bless the Lord, all His works,” if he had not first tuned his own voice to the gladsome music. No man is fit to be a conductor in the choirs of holy song until he has learned, himself, to sing the song of praise. “Bless the Lord, O my Soul,” is the preacher’s preparation in the study, without which he must fail in the pulpit. Self-evident as this is, many persons need to be reminded of it, for they are ready enough to admonish others, but forget that true gratitude to God must, like charity, begin at home. There is an old proverb which says, “The cobbler’s wife goes barefoot,” and I am afraid this is too often the case in morals and religion.
Preachers ought especially to be jealous of themselves in this particular, lest, while they are crying aloud to other men to magnify the Lord, they should be shamefully silent themselves. I would this morning glow with the sacred flame of personal thankfulness while I call upon you to bless the holy name of Jehovah, our God. But what is true of preachers is true of all other workers. The tendency among men is, when they grow a little earnest, to expend their zeal upon other people and frequently in the way of fault-finding. It is wonderfully easy to wax indignant at the indolence, the divisions, the coldness or the errors of the Christian Church, and to issue our little bulls against her, declaring her to be weighed in our balances and found wanting, as if it mattered one halfpenny to the Church what the verdict of our imperfect scales might be!
Why, instead of a tract upon the faults of the Church, at the present moment, it would be easy to write a folio volume and when it was written it would be wise to put it in the fire! Friend, mind those beams in your own eye and leave the Lord Jesus to clear the motes from the eyes of His Church. Begin at home—there is in-door work to be done. Instead of vainly pointing to the faults of others, pour forth your earnestness in praising God and say unto your own heart, “Bless the Lord, O my Soul: and all that is within me, bless His holy name.”
You observe that this preacher, with an audience of one, has a very choice subject—he is exhorting himself to bless God. Now, in a certain sense it is not possible for us to bless God. He blesses us and in the same sense we cannot bless Him. He has all things—what can we give Him? When we have given our best we are compelled to confess, “Of Your own have we given unto You.” But we bless Him by being thankful, by extolling Him for the gifts He has bestowed, by loving Him in consequence of His bounty towards us and by allowing these emotions of our mind to influence our life so that we speak well of His name, and act so as to glorify Him among our fellow men. In these ways we can bless God and we know that He accepts such attempts, poor and feeble though they are. God is pleased with our love and thankfulness, and so, speaking after the manner of men, He is blessed by His children’s desires and praises.
Note that the Psalmist stirred himself up to bless God’s name, by which is meant His Character—though, indeed, we may take the word literally, for every name of God is a reason for thankfulness. We will praise Jehovah, the Self-Existent. We will praise El, the mighty God whose power is on our side. We will praise Him who gives Himself the Covenant name of Elohim and reveals therein the Trinity of His sacred unity. We will praise the Shaddai, the All-Sufficient God and
magnify Him because out of His fullness have we all received. And whatever other name there is in Scripture, or combination of names, every one shall be exceedingly delightful to our hearts and we will bless the sacred name.
We will bless the Father, from whose everlasting love we received our election unto eternal life—the Father who has begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of His Son, Jesus Christ, from the dead. We bless the Father of our spirits, who has given to us an inheritance among all them that are set apart. And we bless the Son of God, Jesus our Savior, Christ—anointed to redeem. Our heart dances for joy at every remembrance of Him! There is not a name of Jesus Christ’s Person, or offices, or relationships which we would forget to bless. Whether He is Immanuel, Jesus, or the Word. Whether He is Prophet, Priest or King—whether He is Brother, Husband or Friend—whatever name seems His beloved Person dear to us, we will bless Him under it.