I delight to do Your will, O my God; Your law is within my heart.”I delight to do your will, my God. Yes, your law is within my heart.”I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart.I delight to do thy will, O my God; Yea, thy law is within my heart.
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… in life. God, I've got to know your will. I must want to be led by the Spirit. Psalm 40, verse 8. My God, I want to do what you want, and your teachings are in my heart. The reason why he wants it is because he's reading the Bible. Your teachings are in my heart. Number two, I must be willing to do what God says. I must not only want God's will, I've got to be willing to do what God says. I'm willing to obey in advance. In other words, God, before you even tell me what you want me to do, my answer in advance is already yes. God doesn't tell you his will, and then you get to decide whether you do it or not. You have to decide in advance. You pre-qualify. God's not going to show you what he wants to do with your life, and then you get to decide about it. You say, God, I surrender my life to you completely. I don't just want your will. I'm willing, whatever it is. I don't even understand it. I don't even know it. But whatever it is, I am willing in advance. John 7, 17, Jesus said this, whoever is willing to do what God wants and chooses it, it's a choice. You choose God's will. Will know if what I teach comes from God. So he says, trust me in advance. …
But now, Beloved, I have to go a step further and say that if you know the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ to you, I come to claim that in proof of your love, you render to Him your daily service. Paul was writing to tell the Corinthians that the poor Christians in Macedonia had made a very generous contribution towards the poor saints in Jerusalem. And He wanted the richer brethren in Corinth to give their share to help those in need. Instead of telling them that they ought to do this, he put it to them thus—"You know how freely Jesus Christ, though He was rich, became poor that you might be rich. Now, for His sake, act in the same spirit toward your needy Brothers and Sisters in Judea." Let me explain how this principle affects me and every one of you, my dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ. It means this—praise Jesus for dying for you! Do not need anybody to urge you to be obedient to Jesus—spontaneous love deserves spontaneous love. Do not need to be driven to your duty and do not let it be duty so much as delight, even as Jesus said to His Father, "I delight to do Your will, O My God." You know the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ in all that He did—do all that you have to do with a like gracefulness of spontaneity, that is, do it without needing to be pressed to do it. No honey is so sweet as that which drops freely from the comb, and no service is so sweet to the Lord Jesus as that which a Believer spontaneously renders to Him. …
Christ and Him Crucified! If He is lifted up, He will draw all men unto Him—and He must be lifted up, or else the preaching is a mere sham, a joy to devils, but to no one else! David next very expressively says of the sun, "which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber," and is not this a true picture of Christ as He is revealed in the Scriptures? He compared Himself to a bridegroom during His earthly ministry and this is His relationship to His Church, which is "the bride, the Lamb's wife." He is here said to be "coming out of His chamber," as He came out of the council chamber of the Divine decree, saying, "Lo, I come: in the volume of the Book it is written of Me. I delight to do Your will, O My God: yes, Your Law is within My heart"—coming out of the chamber of the Divine and invisible, and dressing Himself in the humble robes of our humanity! Coming to a life of sorrow and suffering, yet coming to it with joyous steps because He delighted to do the will of God and was charmed to redeem His spouse from death and Hell! Then later, coming out of the chamber in which He had concealed the glories of His Deity during the 33 years of His sojourn among men. And now, coming out of His chamber continually as His Gospel is faithfully proclaimed in the power of the Holy Spirit! Verily, this is a true picture of Christ as He is revealed in the Scriptures, "as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber." …
does not reveal a Divine Savior is no Gospel at all—it is like a ship without a rudder—the first contrary wind that blows shall drive it to destruction and woe be to the souls that are trusting to it! No shoulders but those almighty ones which bear the earth's huge pillars can ever carry the enormous weight of human guilt and human need. We preach to you Christ, the Son of Mary, once sleeping in His mother's arms, yet the Infinite even while He was an Infant! Christ the reputed Son of Joseph, toiling in the carpenter's shop, yet being all the while the God who made the heavens and the earth! Christ, who had nowhere to lay His head, the despised and rejected of men, who is, nevertheless, "over all, God forever." Christ nailed to the accursed tree, bleeding at every pore and dying on the Cross, yet, living forevermore. Christ suffering agonies that are indescribable, yet being at the same time the God at whose right hand there are pleasures forevermore. If Christ had not been Man, He could not have sympathized with you and me, nor could He have suffered in our place. How could He have been the Covenant Head of the sons and daughters of Adam if He had not been made in all points like them, except that He was without sin? With that one exception, He was just as we are—bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh—yet He was as truly God as He was Man, the One of whom Isaiah was Inspired to prophesy, "His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace." So, in preaching Christ crucified, we preach the Glory of Heaven conjoined with the beauty of earth—the perfection of humanity united with the Glory and dignity of Deity! …
Perhaps you have a willful, wayward boy—one who costs you much, but brings you little comfort—yet, would you like to lose him? If you saw him in his coffin tomorrow, would you not cry over him as David cried over his son, "O my son, Absalom! My son, my son Absalom! Would God I had died for you, O Absalom, my son, my son"? Vile he may be, and a disgrace to your name, yet he is still your child and you could not bear to give him up. But what shall I say of the child who, from his youth up, has been obedient to you? Who, having grown up to manhood, has become your friend as well as your offspring? Who has been with you in every holy enterprise and has proved himself to be worthy of his father's love and esteem? Could you give him up? Mother, you know how dear is your first-born son to you. Of all griefs that tear a mother's heart, perhaps the greatest is to lose her first-born. Even if he is only in his infancy, it is a wound from which the mother's tender heart does not soon recover. But to lose that son in manhood. To see the hale strong man suddenly cut down—this is no small sorrow—and many, under such trying circumstances, have found it no easy task to say, "The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." To lose one's child even for some object which is nearest and dearest to our heart, is pain and grief, indeed. Then what must it have cost God to give up His Son to die for His people? What must God's love to His only-begotten Son be? We can only speak of God after the manner of men, for we know not how otherwise to speak of Him and, inasmuch, as God is infinitely greater than we are, His love is infinitely greater than ours! We can only love to the finite degree of which humanity is capable, but God loves beyond all degree. The heart of God is filled with fathomless oceans of eternal affection—and this affection has always been fixed upon His Son! Christ is infinitely more dear to God than your son can ever be to you because of the greatness of the heart of the Father who loves His Son who has always been with Him, and ever His delight, who has never offended Him, who takes His share in all the Father's plans and who said of old, and says it always, "I delight to do Your will, O My God." …
2. More particularly should ministers of the gospel follow the example of their great Master, in the manner in which they seek the salvation and happiness of the souls of men. They should follow his example of love to souls: though it be impossible that they should love them to so great a degree, yet they should have the same spirit of love to them, and concern for their salvation, according to their capacity. Love to men’s souls in Christ was far above any regard he had to his temporal interest, his ease, his honour, his meat and drink; and so it should be with his ministers. They should have the same spirit of compassion to men under their spiritual calamities and miseries that he had, of whom we read, Mark vi. 34. “That when he came out and saw much people, he was moved with compassion towards them, because they were as sheep not having a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things.” The word translated moved with companion, signifies, that he was most sensibly affected, and his inmost bowels moved with pity. And again we read, Luke xix. that when Christ was riding to Jerusalem, that wicked city, but a few days before his crucifixion, and was come to the descent of the Mount of Olives, where he had a fair view of the city, when he beheld it, he wept over it, on account of the misery and ruin they had brought themselves into danger of by their sin; although the sin by which especially they had made themselves thus miserable, was their vile treatment of him; (for Jerusalem was a city that had been peculiarly injurious to him;) and though Christ knew how cruelly he should be treated in that city before that week was past, how he there should be set at nought, and with great malignity bound, falsely accused and condemned, reviled, spit upon, scourged, and crucified: yet all does not prevent his most affectionate tears of compassion towards them. “When he was come near, he beheld the city, and wept over it, saving, If thou hadst known, even thou, (thou, as wicked as thou art, and as vile as thou hast been in thy treatment of me; even thou,) the things which belong unto thy peace! But now they are hid from thine eyes. ” (Compare Matt. xxiii. 37. and Luke xiii. 34.) One would have thought he would have been more concerned for himself than Jerusalem, who had such a dreadful cup to drink, and was to suffer such extreme things by the cruelty of Jerusalem that week. But he, as it were, forgets his own sorrow and death, and weeps over the misery of his cruel enemies. …
2d. This spiritual priesthood offers to God the sacrifice of praise. Many of their sacrifices under the law were sacrifices of peace-offerings, which were mostly for thanksgiving and praise. But the spiritual sacrifice of the hearty and sincere praises of a saint, are more acceptable to God than all the bulls, and rams, and he-goats that they offered. The heartfelt praises of one true Christian, are of more account with God than all those two and twenty thousand oxen, and a hundred and twenty thousand sheep, which Solomon offered to God at the dedication of the temple, as a sacrifice of peace-offerings. Praise is called a sacrifice. Heb. xiii. 15. “By him, therefore, let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to his name.” Ps. l. 13, 14. “Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats? Offer unto God thanksgiving, and pay thy vows unto the Most High;” ver. 23. “Whoso offereth praise, glorifieth me; and to him that ordereth his conversation aright, will I show the salvation of God;” Ps. lxix. 30, 31. “I will praise the name of God with a song, and will magnify him with thanksgiving. This also shall please the Lord better than an ox or bullock that hath horns and hoofs.” Praises are therefore in Hosea called calves of our lips, because they are like calves offered in sacrifice; Hosea xiv. 2. “Take with you words, and turn to the Lord: say unto him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously; so will we render the calves of our lips.” Only true Christians offer those sacrifices. However hypocrites pretend to praise God, and to offer thanksgiving to him, yet they, being insincere, offer not sacrifices with which God is well pleased; they offer not spiritual sacrifices, and therefore they are not of the spiritual priesthood. In heaven especially are the saints a holy priesthood upon this account; whose work it is for ever to offer these sacrifices to God, who cease not day nor night to praise God and sing forth their ardent joyful hallelujahs. They sing a new song, a song that never will end, and never will grow old. …
CHRIST AND SHED AGAIN FROM HIS LIPS. First, let us regard our Savior as the eternal Surety of the Covenant and we shall see that Grace was poured into His lips. When God the Father originally made the Covenant, it stood somewhat in this form, "My Son, You desire, and I also agree with You, to save a multitude that no man can number, whom I have elected in You. But, in order to their salvation, that I may be just, and yet the Justifier of them that believe, it is necessary that someone should be their Representative, to stand responsible for their obedience to My Laws, and their Substitute to suffer whatever penalties they incur. If You, My Son, will agree to bear their punishment and endure the penalty of their crimes, I on My part will agree that You shall see Your seed, shall prolong Your days, and that the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in Your hands. If You are prepared to promise that You will bear the punishment of all the people whom You would save, I on my part am prepared to swear by Myself, because I can swear by no greater, that all for whom You shall atone shall Infallibly be delivered from death and Hell, and that all for whom You bear the punishment shall hence go free, nor shall My wrath rise against them, however great may be their sins." Jesus spoke the word and He said, "My Father! Lo, I come: in the volume of the Book it is written of Me, I delight to do Your will, O My God." …
objective and intent to do that which I need him to do? Now, wherever there is an empty sinner, a full Christ has come on purpose to fill that empty sinner! Wherever there is a thirsty spirit, the river of the Water of Life is poured out on purpose for that thirsty soul to drink! If you hunger after Christ, rest assured that Christ has met with you and discerns in you one of those whom He came to call. He would not have made you hunger, nor made you thirst, nor made you feel your emptiness if it had not been His intention to remove your hunger, slake your thirst and fill your emptiness to the full! Look upon the Savior as being commissioned by His Father to save sinners. Never indulge the thought that He came to save better ones than you are and that you are just beyond the pale of His mercy! Instead thereof, let your sinfulness, your nothingness, your conscious weakness, your utter ruin and Hell-deserving inspire you with a surer hope that you are such a sinner as Jesus Christ came to deliver! He came to seek and to save that which was lost. Who is more lost than you are? Believe, then, that He came to seek and to save you—and cast yourself upon Him—and you shall find it so! Perhaps the greatest consolation to a despairing sinner which this text affords is the delight which Jesus Christ experiences in the work of saving souls. It was His one objective. From of old He looked forward to the day when a body would be prepared for Him that He might come into the world to redeem His people. When the fullness of time was come, He was no unwilling servitor to our souls. "In the volume of the Book it is written of Me, I delight to do Your will, O My God!" Down from the portals of the skies the Savior came with glad alacrity—willing, panting to save! When He was on earth, He was not loath to seek out the guilty—no, it was alleged against Him, "This Man receives sinners, and eats with them." He could have healed the leper, if He had pleased, while He stood at a distance, but He chose to touch Him when He healed Him, to show how near He had come to humanity, that He did not shrink from it, but that it was His delight to come into contact with all the woe and suffering of our fallen race! He did not retire from sinners to guard His holiness in solitude. He did not surround Himself with a bodyguard to keep off the throng, but there He was among them, surrounded by a press of common folks. Many thronged Him and some touched Him who received healing virtue through their believing touch. He was at the beck and call of everybody! He had not time so much as to eat. And when He did, through weariness, seek a little rest, they followed Him on foot and hounded Him with their entreaties. Yet He was never angry, but always full of compassion towards them. …