I. ITS BEING THE RESULT OF LOVE TO THE DIVINE LAW.

II. ITS BEING IDENTICALLY THAT PEACE WHICH CHRIST BESTOWS UPON HIS OWN, which He designated His peace, and which none but He can bestow.

III. Whether, therefore, you contemplate the agent or the agency, you behold here a peace so grand and so elevating, that THE POSSESSORS OF IT MUST EMBRACE THE WHOLE LAW WITH THEIR WHOLE SOULS. They can except against none of all the gracious commandments. There is not one thing you can put them on, whether to do or to suffer, which, in the strength of that heavenly love, and by the help of that grace, they will not go into for their Saviour.

(John Bruce, D. D.)

II. WE CAN HAVE NO TRUE PEACE WHILE OUT OF HARMONY WITH LAW. The consciousness of wrong-doing brings a weight upon the soul (Psalm 32:4; Psalm 38:4). An unwillingness to submit creates internal strife (Romans 7:12-24): therefore there is no peace to the wicked.

III. HOW CAN HARMONY WITH DIVINE LAW BE ATTAINED? By pardon through the atonement. By the renovation of our nature, so that the law is written on the heart (Hebrews 8:10) — so that the heart delights in that which the law enjoins (Ezekiel 36:25-27).

IV. GREAT PEACE RESULTS FROM THIS HARMONY.

1. Absolutely perfect peace with and in God: the King is now our friend: loyalty is natural — "perfect love casteth out fear."

2. Peace with ourselves — the internal war is ended. Conscience is at rest, duty is a delight.

3. Peace with all mankind so far as lies in our power.

4. Peace with the universe, for when we are in harmony with law we are in harmony with God, and therefore with the whole God-pervaded universe.

(C. O. Eldridge, B. A.)

I. THE PEACEFULNESS OF A RESTFUL HEART. Such a heart has found an adequate and worthy object for the outgoings of its affections. Base things loved always disturb. Noble things loved always tranquillize. For our hearts are like the creatures in some river, of which they tell us that they change their colour according to the hue of the bed of the stream in which they float and of the food of which they partake. The heart that lives on the will of God will be calm and steadfast, and ennobled into reposeful tranquillity like that which it grasps and grapples.

II. THE CALM OF A SUBMITTED WILL. If you were ever on board a sailing ship you know the difference between its motion when it is beating up against the wind and when it is running before it. In the one case all is agitation and uneasiness, in the other all is smooth, and frictionless, and delicious. So, when we go with the great stream, in not ignoble surrender, then we go quietly. It is God's great intention, in all that befalls us in this life, to bring our wills into conformity with His. Blessed is the ministry of sorrow, and of pain, and of loss, if it does that for us. And disastrous and accursed is the ministry of joy and success if it does not.

III. THE PEACE OF AN OBEDIENT LIFE. When once we have taken it (and faithfully adhere to the choice) as our supreme desire to do God's will, we are delivered from almost all the things that distract and disturb us. Away go all the storms of passion, and we are no more at the mercy of vagrant inclinations. And as thus we may be delivered from all the agitations and cross-currents of conflicting wishes, inclinations, aims, which otherwise would make a jumble and a chaos of our lives, so, on the other hand, if for us the supreme desire is to obey God, then we are delivered from the other great enemy to tranquillity — namely, anxious forecasting of possible consequences of our actions, which robs so many of us of so many quiet days. "I do the little I can do," said Faber, "and leave the rest with Thee." And that will bring peace.

IV. THE PEACE OF FREEDOM FROM TEMPTATIONS. "Nothing shall offend them." The higher love casts out the lower. Which is best, to overcome our temptations, or to live away up in the high regions to which the malaria of the swamps never climbs, and where no disease-germs can ever reach? That elevation is possible for us, if only we keep in close touch with God, and love the law because our hearts are knit to the Law-giver.

(A. Maclaren, D. D.)

1. Doubt and anxiety of mind.

2. Guilt of conscience.

II. RELIGION MINISTERS TO US ALL THE TRUE CAUSES OF PEACE AND TRANQUILLITY OF MIND. Whoever lives according to the rules of religion, lays these three great foundations of peace and comfort to himself: —

1. He is satisfied that in being religious he doth that which is most reasonable.

2. That he secures himself against the greatest mischiefs and dangers by making God his friend.

3. That upon the whole matter he does in all respects most effectually consult and promote his own interest and happiness.

III. THE REFLECTION UPON A RELIGIOUS AND VIRTUOUS COURSE OF LIFE DOTH AFTERWARDS YIELD A MIGHTY PLEASURE AND SATISFACTION.

(Abp. Tillotson.)

II. TAKE THE CHARACTER THUS DECIPHERED, AND EXAMINE WHY IT HAPPENS THAT THERE ARE NOT STUMBLING-BLOCKS TO THOSE WHO POSSESS IT. Suppose we take certain of the hindrances which men meet with in following Christ, and endeavour to show you in each how, through loving the law, the obstacle is surmounted. For instance, the unequal distribution both of good and of evil in this life is often a perplexing thing to the righteous. But now observe — he who loves the law is exactly equipped for surmounting this offence. In being brought to love the law, a man has been brought into acquaintance with each and every attribute of God. Therefore he is quite assured of the justice of God; he is quite assured of the faithfulness of God. Again, when afflictions come thick on the godly man, they have a tendency to stagger him, or to serve as a "stumbling-block." But it will certainly be the man who loves God's law who is best prepared to meet such impediments; for it is required by the terms of the law that we should know God's attributes, and take delight in them all. Knowing each attribute, loving each attribute, he will be meekly confident that the issue must be. right, though the process may be dark. And there are other kinds of offence, or stumbling-blocks, which may be met with by the Christian. Living, as we all must live, in some considerable degree, in association with our fellow-men, we are necessarily exposed to an influence, direct or indirect, excited by their conduct; for you can scarcely find the man of whom it can be truly said, that he is independent of the behaviour of others; that is, in the sense that his own moral character is not likely to be either advantaged or prejudiced by the deportment of those about him. Look, for example, at the faults and inconsistencies of religious professors. The faults of any one religious professor — covetousness, for example — ambition — the love of show — the ready association with the world — the facility in keeping piety out of sight, when it is likely to keep him out of favour — all these inconsistencies, put forth in the name of one professor of godliness, are calculated to damp the ardour of a hundred others, and bring into disrepute all those realities of religion, which, being removed, there remains nothing but the skeleton of Christianity. Who, we want to know, is best prepared to meet this offence? He who is a lover of the law. If I have reached the point of loving the law, if I love God because He hates sin, if I love God because He will punish sin, if I love God because He requires "holiness in the inward parts" — and all this, yea, and a vast deal more is love of God's law — then I have such an acquaintance with God as puts me far beyond the reach of accidents or contingencies. I know God — if the expression may be allowed — thoroughly; I know Him too well, under those very aspects with which the generality of Christians are least familiar, to render it necessary that I should infer His properties from what is done by others, or from what happens to others; and thus my love of the law gives me practically independence on the conduct or intercourse of my fellow-Christians; and I can overleap the obstacles which their failures may have thrown in my way; and thus I can verify the assertion "Nothing shall offend" those who "love the law of their God."

(H. Melvill, B. D.)

1. There may be peace without great peace. But Christians have great peace. It appertains to a great subject, the soul; it eases great anxieties, those which have to do with our relation to God, and it has an abiding greatness of power, for no man taketh it away.

2. This peace is connected with obedience. The renewed spirit is under the law of the spirit of life. A living Christ rules as truly as a code! He says, "thou shelf not" more successfully. Take the spirit of true love. If I really love, shall I injure in thought, word, look, deed? Not

I. The law will rule me everywhere; it will be the law of the spirit of life.

3. Love will be the affectional bond. Here is the strength of the Christian man l Sin becomes distasteful to him — its bread bitter, its waters brackish. In fact, duty is like drawing a triumphal ear; and wearing the thorn-crown is like bearing some insignia of highest order.

II. AN EXEMPTION. "Nothing shall offend them."

1. Circumstances do not hurt them, or are not a stumbling-block to them. They are not too careless to despise them, or too heartless, in a human sense, to refuse to extract all the honey out of life's flowers that they can. Things present, as well as "things to come," are theirs.

2. Temptations do not hurt them. Arrows glance harmlessly aside from the impenetrable shield of the Christ-filled soul.

3. Death does not hurt them. How can it? They surely have been meetening for it. It is not always longed for, but it is prepared for.

(W. M. Statham.)

     5058   rest, spiritual
     5186   stumbling
     5362   justice, believers' lives
     6703   peace, divine OT
     8322   perfection, human

Psalm 119:165-167

     6705   peace, experience

Life Hid and not Hid
'Thy word have I hid in my heart.'--PSALM cxix. 11. 'I have not hid Thy righteousness in my heart.'--PSALM xl. 10. Then there are two kinds of hiding--one right and one wrong: one essential to the life of the Christian, one inconsistent with it. He is a shallow Christian who has no secret depths in his religion. He is a cowardly or a lazy one, at all events an unworthy one, who does not exhibit, to the utmost of his power, his religion. It is bad to have all the goods in the shop window; it is just …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

A Cleansed Way
Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed thereto according to Thy word.'--PSALM cxix. 9. There are many questions about the future with which it is natural for you young people to occupy yourselves; but I am afraid that the most of you ask more anxiously 'How shall I make my way?' than 'How shall I cleanse it?' It is needful carefully to ponder the questions: 'How shall I get on in the world--be happy, fortunate?' and the like, and I suppose that that is the consideration …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

'Time for Thee to Work'
'It is time for Thee, Lord, to work; for they have made void Thy Law. 127. Therefore I love Thy commandments above gold, yea, above fine gold. 128. Therefore I esteem all Thy precepts concerning all things to be right; and I hate every false way.' --PSALM cxix. 126-128. If much that we hear be true, a society to circulate Bibles is a most irrational and wasteful expenditure of energy and money. We cannot ignore the extent and severity of the opposition to the very idea of revelation, even if we would; …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

A Stranger in the Earth
'I am a stranger in the earth: hide not Thy commandments from me.... 64. The earth, O Lord, is full of Thy mercy: teach me Thy statutes.' --PSALM cxix. 19, 64. There is something very remarkable in the variety-in-monotony of this, the longest of the psalms. Though it be the longest it is in one sense the simplest, inasmuch as there is but one thought in it, beaten out into all manner of forms and based upon all various considerations. It reminds one of the great violinist who out of one string managed …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

May the Fourth a Healthy Palate
"How sweet are Thy words unto my taste." --PSALM cxix. 97-104. Some people like one thing, and some another. Some people appreciate the bitter olive; others feel it to be nauseous. Some delight in the sweetest grapes; others feel the sweetness to be sickly. It is all a matter of palate. Some people love the Word of the Lord; to others the reading of it is a dreary task. To some the Bible is like a vineyard; to others it is like a dry and tasteless meal. One takes the word of the Master, and it …
John Henry Jowett—My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year

Inward Witness to the Truth of the Gospel.
"I have more understanding than my teachers, for Thy testimonies are my study; I am wiser than the aged, because I keep Thy commandments."--Psalm cxix. 99, 100. In these words the Psalmist declares, that in consequence of having obeyed God's commandments he had obtained more wisdom and understanding than those who had first enlightened his ignorance, and were once more enlightened than he. As if he said, "When I was a child, I was instructed in religious knowledge by kind and pious friends, who …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII

A Bottle in the Smoke
First, God's people have their trials--they get put in the smoke; secondly, God's people feel their trials--they "become like a bottle in the smoke;" thirdly, God's people do not forget God's statutes in their trials--"I am become like a bottle in the smoke; yet do I not forget thy statutes." I. GOD'S PEOPLE HAVE THEIR TRIALS. This is an old truth, as old as the everlasting hills, because trials were in the covenant, and certainly the covenant is as old as the eternal mountains. It was never designed …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 2: 1856

The Dryness of Preachers, and the Various Evils which Arise from their Failing to Teach Heart-Prayer --Exhortation to Pastors to Lead People Towards this Form Of
If all those who are working for the conquest of souls sought to win them by the heart, leading them first of all to prayer and to the inner life, they would see many and lasting conversions. But so long as they only address themselves to the outside, and instead of drawing people to Christ by occupying their hearts with Him, they only give them a thousand precepts for outward observances, they will see but little fruit, and that will not be lasting. When once the heart is won, other defects are …
Jeanne Marie Bouvières—A Short Method Of Prayer And Spiritual Torrents

Of Deeper Matters, and God's Hidden Judgments which are not to be Inquired Into
"My Son, beware thou dispute not of high matters and of the hidden judgments of God; why this man is thus left, and that man is taken into so great favour; why also this man is so greatly afflicted, and that so highly exalted. These things pass all man's power of judging, neither may any reasoning or disputation have power to search out the divine judgments. When therefore the enemy suggesteth these things to thee, or when any curious people ask such questions, answer with that word of the Prophet, …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ

Seven-Fold Joy
"Seven times a day do I praise Thee because of Thy righteous judgments."--Ps. cxix. 164. Mechthild of Hellfde, 1277. tr., Emma Frances Bevan, 1899 I bring unto Thy grace a seven-fold praise, Thy wondrous love I bless-- I praise, remembering my sinful days, My worthlessness. I praise that I am waiting, Lord, for Thee, When, all my wanderings past, Thyself wilt bear me, and wilt welcome me To home at last. I praise Thee that for Thee I long and pine, For Thee I ever yearn; I praise Thee that such …
Frances Bevan—Hymns of Ter Steegen and Others (Second Series)

And in Jeremiah He Thus Declares his Death and Descent into Hell...
And in Jeremiah He thus declares His death and descent into hell, saying: And the Lord the Holy One of Israel, remembered his dead, which aforetime fell asleep in the dust of the earth; and he went down unto them, to bring the tidings of his salvation, to deliver them. [255] In this place He also renders the cause of His death: for His descent into hell was the salvation of them that had passed away. And, again, concerning His cross Isaiah says thus: I have stretched out my hands all the day long …
Irenæus—The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching

The Christian Described
HAPPINESS OF THE CHRISTIAN O HOW happy is he who is not only a visible, but also an invisible saint! He shall not be blotted out the book of God's eternal grace and mercy. DIGNITY OF THE CHRISTIAN There are a generation of men in the world, that count themselves men of the largest capacities, when yet the greatest of their desires lift themselves no higher than to things below. If they can with their net of craft and policy encompass a bulky lump of earth, Oh, what a treasure have they engrossed …
John Bunyan—The Riches of Bunyan

Excursus on the Choir Offices of the Early Church.
Nothing is more marked in the lives of the early followers of Christ than the abiding sense which they had of the Divine Presence. Prayer was not to them an occasional exercise but an unceasing practice. If then the Psalmist sang in the old dispensation "Seven times a day do I praise thee" (Ps. cxix. 164), we may be quite certain that the Christians would never fall behind the Jewish example. We know that among the Jews there were the "Hours of Prayer," and nothing would be, à priori, more …
Philip Schaff—The Seven Ecumenical Councils

The Daily Walk with Others (I. ).
When the watcher in the dark Turns his lenses to the skies, Suddenly the starry spark Grows a world upon his eyes: Be my life a lens, that I So my Lord may magnify We come from the secrecies of the young Clergyman's life, from his walk alone with God in prayer and over His Word, to the subject of his common daily intercourse. Let us think together of some of the duties, opportunities, risks, and safeguards of the ordinary day's experience. A WALK WITH GOD ALL DAY. A word presents itself to be …
Handley C. G. Moule—To My Younger Brethren

The Talking Book
In order that we may be persuaded so to do, Solomon gives us three telling reasons. He says that God's law, by which I understand the whole run of Scripture, and, especially the gospel of Jesus Christ, will be a guide to us:--"When thou goest, it shall lead thee." It will be a guardian to us: "When thou sleepest"--when thou art defenceless and off thy guard--"it shall keep thee." And it shall also be a dear companion to us: "When thou awakest, it shall talk with thee." Any one of these three arguments …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 17: 1871

How to Read the Bible
I. That is the subject of our present discourse, or, at least the first point of it, that IN ORDER TO THE TRUE READING OF THE SCRIPTURES THERE MUST BE AN UNDERSTANDING OF THEM. I scarcely need to preface these remarks by saying that we must read the Scriptures. You know how necessary it is that we should be fed upon the truth of Holy Scripture. Need I suggest the question as to whether you do read your Bibles or not? I am afraid that this is a magazine reading age a newspaper reading age a periodical …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 25: 1879

The Obedience of Faith
"Is there a heart that will not bend To thy divine control? Descend, O sovereign love, descend, And melt that stubborn soul! " Surely, though we have had to mourn our disobedience with many tears and sighs, we now find joy in yielding ourselves as servants of the Lord: our deepest desire is to do the Lord's will in all things. Oh, for obedience! It has been supposed by many ill-instructed people that the doctrine of justification by faith is opposed to the teaching of good works, or obedience. There …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 37: 1891

Faith
HABAKKUK, ii. 4. "The just shall live by faith." This is those texts of which there are so many in the Bible, which, though they were spoken originally to one particular man, yet are meant for every man. These words were spoken to Habakkuk, a Jewish prophet, to check him for his impatience under God's hand; but they are just as true for every man that ever was and ever will be as they were for him. They are world-wide and world-old; they are the law by which all goodness, and strength, and safety, …
Charles Kingsley—Twenty-Five Village Sermons

What the Truth Saith Inwardly Without Noise of Words
Speak Lord, for thy servant heareth.(1) I am Thy servant; O give me understanding that I may know Thy testimonies. Incline my heart unto the words of Thy mouth.(2) Let thy speech distil as the dew. The children of Israel spake in old time to Moses, Speak thou unto us and we will hear, but let not the Lord speak unto us lest we die.(3) Not thus, O Lord, not thus do I pray, but rather with Samuel the prophet, I beseech Thee humbly and earnestly, Speak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth. Let not Moses …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ

That the Body and Blood of Christ and the Holy Scriptures are Most Necessary to a Faithful Soul
The Voice of the Disciple O most sweet Lord Jesus, how great is the blessedness of the devout soul that feedeth with Thee in Thy banquet, where there is set before it no other food than Thyself its only Beloved, more to be desired than all the desires of the heart? And to me it would verily be sweet to pour forth my tears in Thy presence from the very bottom of my heart, and with the pious Magdalene to water Thy feet with my tears. But where is this devotion? Where the abundant flowing of holy …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ