Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2671
“I have kept Your precepts and Your testimonies: for all my ways are before You.” Psalm 119:168.
“I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek Your servant; for I do not forget Your commandments.”
Psalm 119:176.
IF anyone says that these two texts contradict one another, I say that they do not. They form a paradox and they are both true, and true of the same man, at the same time. I will read them to you again. “I have kept Your precepts and Your testimonies: for all my ways are before You.” “I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek Your servant; for I do not forget Your commandments.”
I purpose to take our first text as a sincere summary of a godly man’s life and our second text as a searching scrutiny, or as the result of a searching scrutiny, which looks below the surface, and then comes to a conclusion, not contradictory to the former one, yet supplementary to it.
I. First, then, dear Friends, our first text is A SINCERE SUMMARY OF A GODLY MAN’S LIFE. Looking back, he can say of it in general, “I have kept Your precepts and Your testimonies: for all my ways are before You.”
First, let me say that it is necessary that we should have so lived that this shall be the summary of our life, for if we have not so lived, what evidence have we that we have been born again—that we have passed from death unto life—that we have been delivered from the bondage of sin and brought into the way of holiness? If our life is not different from what it used to be, how can we try to deceive ourselves with the idea that we are converted? If our lives are no better than the lives of unregenerate men, what reason can we have for believing that we are regenerate? After all, at the last we shall be judged according to our works. “By their fruits you shall know them,” is a test that still stands good and will stand good even to the end. “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatever a man sows, that shall he also reap.” And, in looking back, if our life has been ungodly—if it has been wanton and unchaste—if it has not been characterized by sobriety, honesty, prayerfulness, consecration, what can we say of it? We shall have to judge ourselves to be still “out of the way” and to have need that we should turn to God with full purpose of heart and seek what, evidently, we have not at present found. If the Grace which we are supposed to have received has not made us to differ both from our former self and from men of the world, then it is not the true Grace of God.
Next, whenever a man can truly say, with the Psalmist, “I have kept Your precepts and Your testimonies,” it is a fruit of Grace. I t is not a product of the legal spirit. It is not a result of free will un-helped by God’s Grace and love. Wherever there is even a spark of holiness, it must have come from that great central fire which is in the heart of God. “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” There is not on earth a rare flower of loveliness and purity which is not an exotic—it is blooming in a clime to which it is a stranger. God has planted it with His own right hand.
So, then, he who can thus sum up his life has nothing of which to glory, for he has received from God everything of good there is in it and, therefore, he gives all the glory of it to the Giver and takes none of it to himself. It is faith that works by love, purifying the soul, and producing the devout and godly character—and faith never claims any honor for
itself, for it is, itself, the gift of God. Christ says much in praise of faith because faith says so much in praise of Christ! And faith is used, in the Covenant of Grace, as a means of blessing, because it excludes boasting and gives all the glory to God, who works all that is good within us. So, you see, dear Friends, that there is nothing of legality in what I am saying now when I testify that a godly Christian, when he sums up his life, can say, “I have kept Your precepts and Your testimonies.”
Next, this summary of life is excellent for its breadth. Notice how it is worded. It comprehends the precepts and the testimonies of the Lord. That is, the practical and the doctrinal parts of true religion. There are some persons who appear to be very scrupulous concerning the precepts and they are very anxious to keep them. So far, they do well. But as to the Doctrines of Grace, they say, “We do not know much about them,” and they appear to think that it is not at all necessary that they should know about them. A very large part of God’s Word, which teaches most precious Truth, they slur. They think that it does not matter to them. Should they not believe according to the denomination in which they were born or brought up? They say that there is no particular necessity for them to be so diligent in searching and knowing the Word. The Psalmist thought not so, but he said to the Lord, “I have kept Your precepts and Your testimonies.” I feel that I am as much bound to believeright as to actright and it is just as truly a sin to believe error, when I can learn the truth, as it is to commit iniquity. We are responsible to God for the use we make of our understanding, as well as for the exercise of our affections. There is nothing in the Word of God to justify men in believing what they like, and anyone who neglects to search out the Truth of God commits a sin of omission. He who holds an error which he might see to be an error if he looked in the mirror of God’s Word, is guilty of rebellion against the teaching of God. If we would live a life such as we can look back upon with pleasure, we ought to try to keep the testimonies as well as the precepts of the Lord.