I have not spoken in secret, from a place in a land of darkness. I did not say to the descendants of Jacob, 'Seek Me in a wasteland.' I, the LORD, speak the truth; I say what is right. Sermons
Henderson regards this as an appeal "to the publicity" and perspicuity with which the Divine predictions had been announced; with manifest reference to the responses of the heathen oracles, which were given from deep and obscure caverns, or the hidden recesses of temples; and were, at the best, artful and equivocal, and, in cases of extreme difficulty, were altogether withheld." Cheyne says, "The heathen oracles are as obscure in their origin as they are unveracious and disappointing. Those who deliver them say, as it were, 'Seek ye me as chaos.' But the revelations of Jehovah are the embodiments of righteousness and uprightness." (comp. Proverbs 8:6). It may be urged (1) that God's message to men is plain; (2) is satisfactory; (3) is just. Or it may be shown that God's will is clearly and sufficiently revealed, in all its several forms: (1) in creation; (2) in history; (3) in individual experiences; (4) in Word-revelations spoken directly within man, as the law of conscience; and (5) in Word-revelations spoken to man, as the law of conduct. It is suggestive of illustration to recall the declaration of our Lord Jesus, "In secret have I said nothing" (John 18:20). Another line of treatment may be offered. I. MEN'S SELF-PURSUITS END IN VANITY. We do "seek them in vain" Illustrations should be taken from the Book of Ecclesiastes, which is precisely this - a man's record of his seeking the "chief good" as he could conceive it. He sought this way and that, in every conceivably hopeful direction, and with every possible advantage in the search; and his conclusion of the matter is, "Nothing satisfies. All is vanity." Byron sought self-satisfaction in pursuing self-ends; and long ere old age could come with its burdens he wrote, "The worm, the canker, and the grief, are mine alone." Before the ruins of the self-seeking life, we stand and say, "So is he who heapeth up riches for himself, and is not rich toward God." II. MAN-MADE RELIGIONS END IN VANITY. To trust them is "spending money for that which is not bread." Illustrate this by showing how, in St. Paul's day, the Athenians had multiplied gods because, one after another, they had been sought, and failed to satisfy; and at length they even, in their unrest, inscribed altars to the "Unknown God." III. GOD'S WAY OF LIFE IS ABUNDANTLY SATISFYING. It is a living fountain of waters. 1. It meets the soul-cry for righteousness in God. 2. It meets the soul-cry for pardon of sin. 3. It meets the soul-cry for restored and happy relations with God. 4. It meets the soul-cry for power to perform that which is good. 5. It meets the yearning of the soul for assurance concerning the future. So men never seek God in vain. - R.T. I have not spoken in secret. is an expression used for the purpose of pointing out the contrast between the prophecies of Jehovah and the heathen cave, oracles and spirit-voices of the necromancers, which seemed to rise up from the interior of the earth. () Two thoughts branch off — 1. Prophecy, proceeding from Him is a thing of the light, no black art, essentially different from heathen divination. 2. The same love of Jehovah which is revealed already in creation, is also shown in His relation to Israel; He did not point Israel to Himself as chaos ("I said not to the seed of Jacob; seek Me as chaos!"), even as He did not create the earth a chaos ("He has not created it a chaos," ver. 18). () I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye Me in vain. literally, in waste, i.e where there are no ways or indications how He is to be found.() We might gain much solace by considering what God has not said. We have an assurance that God will answer prayer, because He hath not said unto the seed of Israel, Seek ye My face in vain. The proposition is this: that those who seek God, in God's own appointed way, cannot, by any possibility seek Him in vain; that earnest, penitent, prayerful hearts, though they may be delayed for a time, can never be sent away with a final denial (Romans 10:13; Matthew 7:8).I. I SHALL PROVE THIS BY THE NEGATIVE, as our text has it. 1. Suppose that sincere prayer could be fruitless, then the question arises, Why are men exhorted to pray at all? Would it not be a piece of heartless tyranny if the Queen should wait upon a man in his condemned cell, and encourage him to petition her favour, nay, command him to do it, saying to him, be importunate, and you will prevail; and yet, all the while, should intend never to pardon the man, but had determined in her heart that his death-warrant should be signed and sealed, and that on the execution morning he should be launched into eternity? Would this be consistent with royal bounty — fit conduct for a gracious monarch? Can you for a moment suppose that God would bid you come to Him through Jesus Christ, and yet intend never to be gracious at the voice of your cry? 2. If prayer could be offered continuously, and God could be sought earnestly, but no mercy found, then he who prays would be worse off than he who does not pray, and supplications would be an ingenious invention for increasing the ills of mankind. For a man who does not pray has less woes than a man who does pray, if God be not the answerer of prayer. He who has been taught to pray has great desires and wants; his heart is an aching void which the world can never fill; but he that never prays has no longings and pinnings after God. If, then, a man may have these vehement longings, and yet God will never grant them, then assuredly the man who prays is in a worse position than he who prays not. How can this be? 3. If God do not hear prayer, since it is clear that in that case the praying man would be more wretched than the careless sinner, then it would follow that God would be the author of unnecessary misery. This is inconsistent with the character of God. 4. Should there still be some desponding ones, who think that God would invite them to pray and yet reject them, I would put it on another ground. Would men do so? Would you? Can God be less generous than men? 5. This is God's memorial by which He is distinguished from the false gods (comp. Psalm 115:6 and Psalms 65:2). One of the standing proofs of the Deity of Jehovah is, that He does answer the supplications of His people. 6. If God do not hear prayer what is the meaning of His promises? 7. What is the meaning of all the provisions which He has already made for hearing prayer? Why a mediator, an intercessor? &c. 8. If God hear not prayer, what Gospel have I to preach? 9. Where, then, were the believer's hope? 10. What would they say in hell, if a soul could really seek the Lord and be refused? There are some who, when. under conviction of sin, still cleave to this dark delusion, that God will not hear them. Therefore, I have tried, by blow after blow, to smite this fear dead. II. THAT THE LORD DOES HEAR PRAYER MAY BE POSITIVELY SUBSTANTIATED. 1. For the Lord to hear prayer is consistent with His nature. 2. It is harmonious with all His past actions (Psalm 107:3). Conclusion — Try for yourself. () 1. The seed of Jacob are a praying people; it is the generation of them that seek Him (Psalm 24:6).2. As He has invited them to seek Him, so He never denied their believing prayers, nor disappointed their believing expectations. 3. If He did not think fit to give them the particular thing they prayed for, yet He gave them that grace sufficient and that comfort and satisfaction of soul which was equivalent. () "I, the Lord, speak righteousness." The word is used in its ethical sense of "trustworthiness," or straightforwardness, — perfect correspondence between deeds and words.()
People Cyrus, Isaiah, JacobPlaces Cush, Egypt, JerusalemTopics TRUE, Dark, Darkness, Declare, Declaring, Descendants, Didn't, Jacob, Jacob's, Offspring, Request, Righteousness, Secret, Seed, Seek, Somewhere, Speak, Speaking, Spoken, Truth, Underworld, Upright, Uprightness, Vain, WasteOutline 1. God calls Cyrus for his church's sake
5. By his omnipotence he challenges obedience
20. He convinces the idols of vanity by his saving power
Dictionary of Bible Themes Isaiah 45:19 1155 God, truthfulness
1461 truth, nature of
5096 Jacob, patriarch
5941 secrecy
8160 seeking God
8275 honesty Isaiah 45:18-19 5395 lordship, human and divine Library Hidden and Revealed
'Verily thou art a God that hidest Thyself, O God of Israel, the Saviour.... I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth; I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye Me in vain: I the Lord speak righteousness, I declare things that are right.'--ISAIAH xlv, 15,19. The former of these verses expresses the thoughts of the prophet in contemplating the close of a great work of God's power which issues in the heathen's coming to Israel and acknowledging God. He adores the depth of the divine …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy ScriptureSovereignty and Salvation
"Ere since by faith I saw the stream His flowing wounds supply, Redeeming love has been my theme, And shall be till I die." I shall never forget that day, while memory holds its place; nor can I help repeating this text whenever I remember that hour when first I knew the Lord. How strangely gracious! How wonderfully and marvelously kind, that he who heard these words so little time ago for his own soul's profit, should now address you this morning as his hearers from the same text, in the full and …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 2: 1856 The Solar Eclipse
I shall note this morning, in addressing you, that since the Lord creates darkness as well as light; first of all, eclipses of every kind are part of God's way of governing the world; in the second place, we shall notice that since God creates the darkness as well as the light, we may conclude beyond a doubt that he has a design in the eclipse--in the darkness as well as the light; and then, thirdly, we shall notice that as all things that God has created, whether they be light or whether they be …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 4: 1858 Ecce Homo
"Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth."--Is. xlv. 22. Mechthild of Hellfde, 1277. tr., Emma Frances Bevan, 1899 Wilt thou, sinner, be converted? Christ the Lord of glory see By His own denied, deserted, Bleeding, bound, and scourged for thee. Look again, O soul, behold Him On the cross uplifted high; See the precious life-blood flowing, See the tears that dim His eye. Love has pierced the heart that brake, Loveless sinner, for thy sake. Hearken till thy heart is broken To His …
Frances Bevan—Hymns of Ter Steegen and Others (Second Series) The Eve of the Restoration
'Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying, 2. Thus saith Cyrus king of Persia, The Lord God of heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth; and He hath charged me to build Him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. 3. Who is there among you of all His people? his God …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture Jehovah-Shammah: a Glorious Name for the New Year
THESE words may be used as a test as well as a text. They may serve for examination as well as consolation, and at the beginning of a year they may fulfill this useful double purpose. In any case they are full of marrow and fatness to those whose spiritual taste is purified. It is esteemed by the prophet to be the highest blessing that could come upon a city that its name should be, "JEHOVAH-SHAMMAH, The Lord is there." Even Jerusalem, in its best estate, would have this for its crowning blessing: …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 37: 1891 The Eternity and Unchangeableness of God.
Exod. iii. 14.--"I AM THAT I AM."--Psal. xc. 2.--"Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting thou art God."--Job xi. 7-9.--"Canst thou by searching find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know? The measure thereof is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea." This is the chief point of saving knowledge, …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning Of Four Things which Bring Great Peace
"My Son, now will I teach thee the way of peace and of true liberty." 2. Do, O my Lord, as Thou sayest, for this is pleasing unto me to hear. 3. "Strive, My Son, to do another's will rather than thine own. Choose always to have less rather than more. Seek always after the lowest place, and to be subject to all. Wish always and pray that the will of God be fulfilled in thee. Behold, such a man as this entereth into the inheritance of peace and quietness." 4. O my Lord, this Thy short discourse …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ Covenanting According to the Purposes of God.
Since every revealed purpose of God, implying that obedience to his law will be given, is a demand of that obedience, the announcement of his Covenant, as in his sovereignty decreed, claims, not less effectively than an explicit law, the fulfilment of its duties. A representation of a system of things pre-determined in order that the obligations of the Covenant might be discharged; various exhibitions of the Covenant as ordained; and a description of the children of the Covenant as predestinated …
John Cunningham—The Ordinance of Covenanting A Plain Description of the Essence and Attributes of God, Out of the Holy Scripture, So Far as Every Christian must Competently Know, and Necessarily Believe, that Will be Saves.
Although no creature can define what God is, because he is incomprehensible (Psal. cxliii. 3) and dwelling in inaccessible light (1 Tim. vi. 16); yet it has pleased his majesty to reveal himself to us in his word, so far as our weak capacity can best conceive him. Thus: God is that one spiritual and infinitely perfect essence, whose being is of himself eternally (Deut. i. 4; iv. 35; xxxii. 39; vi. 4; Isa. xlv. 5-8; 1 Cor. viii. 4; Eph. iv. 5, 6; 1 Tim. ii. 5; John iv. 24; 2 Cor. iii. 17; 1 Kings …
Lewis Bayly—The Practice of Piety The Unity of God
Q-5: ARE THERE MORE GODS THAN ONE? A: There is but one only, the living and true God. That there is a God has been proved; and those that will not believe the verity of his essence, shall feel the severity of his wrath. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord.' Deut 6:6. He is the only God.' Deut 4:49. Know therefore this day, and consider it in thy heart, that the Lord he is God in heaven above, and upon the earth beneath, there is none else.' A just God and a Saviour; there is none beside …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity Spiritual Hunger Shall be Satisfied
They shall be filled. Matthew 5:6 I proceed now to the second part of the text. A promise annexed. They shall be filled'. A Christian fighting with sin is not like one that beats the air' (1 Corinthians 9:26), and his hungering after righteousness is not like one that sucks in only air, Blessed are they that hunger, for they shall be filled.' Those that hunger after righteousness shall be filled. God never bids us seek him in vain' (Isaiah 45:19). Here is an honeycomb dropping into the mouths of …
Thomas Watson—The Beatitudes: An Exposition of Matthew 5:1-12 Thy Name: My Name
'I have called thee by thy name.'--ISAIAH xliii. 1. 'Every one that is called by My name.'--ISAIAH xliii. 7. Great stress is laid on names in Scripture. These two parallel and antithetic clauses bring out striking complementary relations between God and the collective Israel. But they are as applicable to each individual member of the true Israel of God. I. What does God's calling a man by his name imply? 1. Intimate knowledge. Adam naming the creatures. Christ naming His disciples. 2. Loving friendship. …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture The Extent of Messiah's Spiritual Kingdom
The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ, and He shall reign for ever and ever! T he Kingdom of our Lord in the heart, and in the world, is frequently compared to a building or house, of which He Himself is both the Foundation and the Architect (Isaiah 28:16 and 54:11, 12) . A building advances by degrees (I Corinthians 3:9; Ephesians 2:20-22) , and while it is in an unfinished state, a stranger cannot, by viewing its present appearance, form an accurate judgment …
John Newton—Messiah Vol. 2 Its Nature
Justification, strictly speaking, consists in God's imputing to His elect the righteousness of Christ, that alone being the meritorious cause or formal ground on which He pronounces them righteous: the righteousness of Christ is that to which God has respect when He pardons and accepts the sinner. By the nature of justification we have reference to the constituent elements of the same, which are enjoyed by the believer. These are, the non-imputation of guilt or the remission of sins, and second, …
Arthur W. Pink—The Doctrine of Justification The Theology of St. Hilary of Poitiers.
This Chapter offers no more than a tentative and imperfect outline of the theology of St. Hilary; it is an essay, not a monograph. Little attempt will be made to estimate the value of his opinions from the point of view of modern thought; little will be said about his relation to earlier and contemporary thought, a subject on which he is habitually silent, and nothing about the after fate of his speculations. Yet the task, thus narrowed, is not without its difficulties. Much more attention, it is …
St. Hilary of Poitiers—The Life and Writings of St. Hilary of Poitiers Gifts and Talents.
"And the Spirit of the Lord came upon him."--Judges iii. 10. We now consider the Holy Spirit's work in bestowing gifts, talents, and abilities upon artisans and professional men. Scripture declares that the special animation and qualification of persons for work assigned to them by God proceed from the Holy Spirit. The construction of the tabernacle required capable workmen, skilful carpenters, goldsmiths, and silversmiths, and masters in the arts of weaving and embroidering. Who will furnish Moses …
Abraham Kuyper—The Work of the Holy Spirit Putting God to Work
"For from of old men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen a God beside thee who worketh for him that waiteth for him."--Isaiah 64:4. The assertion voiced in the title given this chapter is but another way of declaring that God has of His own motion placed Himself under the law of prayer, and has obligated Himself to answer the prayers of men. He has ordained prayer as a means whereby He will do things through men as they pray, which He would not otherwise do. Prayer …
Edward M. Bounds—The Weapon of Prayer Extent of Atonement.
VI. For whose benefit the atonement was intended. 1. God does all things for himself; that is, he consults his own glory and happiness, as the supreme and most influential reason for all his conduct. This is wise and right in him, because his own glory and happiness are infinitely the greatest good in and to the universe. He made the atonement to satisfy himself. "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." …
Charles Grandison Finney—Systematic Theology Messiah's Innocence vindicated
He was taken from prison and from judgment, and who shall declare his generation? For he was cut off out of the land of the living; for the transgression of my people was he stricken. L et not plain Christians be stumbled because there are difficulties in the prophetical parts of the Scriptures, and because translators and expositors sometimes explain them with some difference, as to the sense. Whatever directly relates to our faith, practice, and comfort, may be plainly collected from innumerable …
John Newton—Messiah Vol. 1 Nature of Covenanting.
A covenant is a mutual voluntary compact between two parties on given terms or conditions. It may be made between superiors and inferiors, or between equals. The sentiment that a covenant can be made only between parties respectively independent of one another is inconsistent with the testimony of Scripture. Parties to covenants in a great variety of relative circumstances, are there introduced. There, covenant relations among men are represented as obtaining not merely between nation and nation, …
John Cunningham—The Ordinance of Covenanting Links Isaiah 45:19 NIV
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