Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 3064
“And it was so.” Genesis 1:7.
You will find those words six times upon the first page of Scripture. God spoke and said, “Let there be a firmament.” “And it was so.” He said, “Let the dry land appear.” “And it was so.” He bade the earth bring forth grass, “And it was so.” He ordained the sun and moon for lights in the firmament of Heaven. “And it was so.” Whatever it was that He willed, He did but speak the Word, “and it was so.” In no single case was there a failure. There was not even a hesitation, a pause or a demand for a more powerful agency than the Divine Word. In each case, Jehovah spoke, “and it was so.” Nor is this first week of Creation the only instance of the kind, for in no case has the Word of God fallen to the ground—whether of promise or of threat—the Word has been confirmed and fulfilled. “As it was in the beginning, it is now, and ever shall be, world without end.” Whatever the mighty God decrees, foretells, declares, or promises shall, before long come to pass.
I shall ask you to accompany me in a mental voyage down the stream of history to show that this has been the case as far as all history is concerned up till now. ’ ‘And it was so.” The Lord’s will has been Law. His Word has been followed by fact. Dictum factum, as the Latins say. We shall then endeavor to show that with an Immutable God, it will be so continually in the great and in the small—in the affairs of the world—and in our own personal matters. What God has promised shall come to pass! And at the winding-up of all history, it shall be said, “God said this and that, and it was so.”
I. We stand at the fountainhead of human history and hear the Lord declare to our parents that in the day in which they should break His commands and eat of the forbidden fruit, they would surely die. “And it was so.” They died that moment. That spiritualdeath which was the great and essential part of the sentence, was then and there fulfilled! The likeness and image of God was broken in them immediately and we are dead in trespasses and in sins by reason of their death. He also warned them when His wrath, as it were, glanced aslant from them to smite the soil on which they stood, that the earth would bring forth thorns and thistles to them, and that in the sweat of their face they should eat bread, and truly it has been so. The earth has yielded her harvest, but she has produced her thorns and briars, also. And though the curse of labor has become a blessing, yet man’s toil and woman’s travail vindicate the Divine veracity.
When all flesh had corrupted its way, God repented that He had made man, and sent His servant Noah as a preacher of righteousness to threaten a universal flood. It did not appear very probable that the dense population of the earth could all be swept away and that the billows should rear their proud heads above the mountains—but it turned out that Noah was no fool and his prophecy was no raving. God had said that the world should be drowned “and it was so.” The sluices of the great deep beneath were drawn up, the cataracts of Heaven descended and none escaped, save the few—that is eight—whom God enclosed within the ark.
A little further on the Lord appeared to His servant Abraham and told him that the wickedness of Sodom had been so great that the cry had gone up even to His Throne and the Lord communicated to His servant that He would go and see if it was altogether according to the cry thereof. And if so, Sodom would be destroyed. Abraham pleaded and his intercession almost prevailed, but as no righteous salt was found in the filthy cities of the plain, they were doomed to perish. They had given themselves to strange flesh and a strange judgment must, therefore, come upon them. Hell must
fall out of Heaven upon such abominable offenders! “And it was so,” for when the morning dawned, Sodom was utterly consumed and the smoke thereof went up to Heaven.
You know how God kept His Covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who were strangers with Him, dwelling in tents, looking for a better city, that is, a heavenly. Whatever promise was made to the Patriarchs was fulfilled to the letter! In all respects, “it was so.” When they went down into Egypt, God declared that after 400 years He would bring them out and though the tribes appeared to be naturalized in Egypt and were rooted to the soil, yet God would bring them forth. And though Pharaoh took strong measures and thought to hold them fast, yet God had said that they should come out with a high hand and an outstretched arm— “and it was so.” Let the wonders which He worked on the fields of Zoan, the plagues which overthrew the sons of Ham, the going forth out of Egypt and the terrors of the Red Sea when the depths covered all the chivalry of Egypt—let these remind you that God had spoken—and so it was. Pharaoh was hardened, but he was not able to resist the will of the Almighty! He stands forever in history as a memorial that none shall harden himself against the Most High and prosper, for the Lord does as He wills in Heaven and on earth and in all deep places! Has He said, and shall He not do it? “Is anything too hard for the Lord?”