Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1505
Delivered on Lord’s-Day Morning, November 9, 1879
“And call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify Me.” Psalm 50:15.
THE Lord God in this Psalm is described as having a controversy with His people. He summons Heaven and earth to hear Him while He utters His reproof. This indictment will show us what it is that the Lord sets the greatest store by, for His complaint will evidently touch upon that point. We are informed most plainly that the Lord had no controversy with His people concerning the externals of His worship. He does not reprove them for their sacrifices and burnt offerings. He even speaks of these symbolic sacrifices and says—“I will take no bullock out of your house, nor he goats out of your folds.” His complaint was not concerning visible ceremony and outward ritual and this shows that He does not attach so much importance to outward things as most men suppose Him to do.
His complaint was concerning inner worship, soul worship, spiritual worship! His reproof was that His people did not offer thanksgiving and prayer and that their conduct was so inconsistent with their professions that, clearly, their hearts went not with their outward formalities. This was the essence of the charge against them. They were faulty, not in visible religiousness, but in the internal and vital part of godliness—they had no true communion with God though they kept up the appearance of it. We see, then, that heart worship is the most precious thing in the sight of the Lord. We learn what is that priceless jewel which must be set in the gold ring of religion if the Lord is to accept it.
Nor is it hard to see why it is so, for it is plain that if a man had kept the ritual of the old Law to the very fullest, he still might not be, in sincerity, a worshipper of God at all. He might drive whole flocks of his sheep to the Temple door for sacrifice and yet he might feel no spiritual reverence for the Most High. It has been proven times without number that the most careful and zealous attention to external ceremonies is quite consistent with the absolute absence of any true apprehension of God and hearty love for Him. Habit may keep a man outwardly religious long after his mind has forgotten the Lord! Yes, the conscious lack of inward and vital Grace may drive a man to a more intense zeal in formalities in order to conceal his defect.
It is written, “Israel has forsaken his Maker and builds temples.” You would think if he built temples he must recognize his God, but it was not so. Within those buildings he hid himself from Him who dwells not in temples made with hands. Beneath the folds of vestments, men smother up their hearts so that they come not to God. Fine music drowns the cry of the contrite soul and the smoke of incense becomes a cloud which conceals the face of the Most High! Great sacrifices might often be an offering made to a rich man’s personal pride. No doubt certain kings that gave great contributions to the house of God did it to show their wealth or to display their generosity, somewhat in the spirit of Jehu, who said to Jehonadab, the son of Rechab, “Come with me and see my zeal for the Lord.”
A great sacrifice might be nothing more than a bid for popularity and so an offering to selfishness and vanity. With such sacrifices God would not be well pleased. Alas, how easy it is to defile the worship of God and nullify its quality till, like milk which is soured, it may be utterly rejected. I am sure you know right well that it may be so in the simplest form of public worship such as our own. Bare as is our mode of service, there is room for self. Singers may lift up their sweet voices that others may hear how charmingly they sing. Ministers may preach with graceful eloquence that they may be admired as men who are models of exquisite speech. Believers may even pray devoutly that their fellow Christians may see how gracious they are.
Alas, this blight of self may come into any and every part of outward service and turn the worship of God into an occasion for self-glorification! Thus does Belshazzar drink out of the vessels of the sanctuary while the buyers and sellers turn the temple into a den of thieves. Wonder not, therefore, that God looks with but scant complacency—I was about to say with bare tolerance—upon the abundance of outward worship because He sees how easy it is for it not to be His
worship at all, but a mere exhibition of man’s carnal glorying. Many, too, have performed outward worship with a view to merit somewhat of the Lord—they have supposed that God would be their debtor if they were zealous in furnishing His altars and frequenting His courts. If they have not put it in that coarse form, it has certainly come to that, that they hoped to be held worthy of particular regard if they were zealous above others.