“And before the throne there was a sea of glass like unto crystal.” I find hereof seven several expositions.
1. Some expound this glassy and crystal-like sea, of contemplative men.
2. Some conceive it to be an abundant understanding of the truth, a happy and excellent knowledge given to the saints, and that in a wonderful plenitude.
3. Some understand by this glassy sea like crystal, the fulness of all those gifts and graces which the Church derives from Christ.
4. Some intend this glassy sea like to crystal to signify the crystalline heaven, where the eternal God keeps His court and sits in His throne.
5. Some expositions give this sea for the gospel. And their opinion is probably deduced from the two attributes, glassy and crystalline.
(1) The first expresseth a bright and clear matter. Which sets a difference betwixt that legal and this evangelical sea. That was duskish and shadowy matter, not penetrable to the sight. This is a sea of glass, more clear and transparent.
(2) Crystalline is the other attribute. Now as the other attribute takes from the gospel all obscurity, so this takes from it all impurity.
6. Some by this glassy and crystal sea conceived to be meant baptism, prefigured by that Red Sea (Exo_14:1-31.). The accordance of the type and antitype stands thus: as none of the children of Israel entered the terrestrial Caanan but by passing the Red Sea, so, ordinarily, no Christian enters the celestial Caanan but through this glassy sea. The laver of regeneration is that sea, wherein we must all wash.
7. Lastly, others affirm that by this glassy sea is meant the world. This being the most general and most probable opinion, on it I purpose to build my subsequent discourse. A special reason to induce me I derive from Rev_15:2, where the saints, having passed the dangers of the glassy sea--all the perils of this slippery world--and now setting their triumphant feet on the shores of happiness, they sing a victorious song. Now for further confirmation of this opinion, in thethird verse, the exultation which they sing is called the song of Moses the servant of God. So that it seems directly to answer in a sweet allusion to the delivery of Israel from the Egyptians. Our adversaries like theirs, our dangers like theirs, our warfare like theirs; but the country we sail to far transcends that earthly Caanan.
Against this construction it is objected--
(1) This sea is before the throne; how can the world be so said? Properly, to show that all things in the world are not subject to fortune, but governed by Him that sits on the throne.
(2) The world is rather thick and muddy; how can it be called crystal? Fitly, not in regard of its own nature, for so it is polluted; but in regard of God that beholds it, who sees all things done in it so clearly as in crystal.
I. A sea.
1. The sea is an unquiet element, which none but the Maker’s hand can bridle (Mat_8:27). The world is in full measure as unruly. The Psalmist matcheth roaring waves androaring men; the raging of the sea with the madness of the world. And yet God is able to still them both (Psa_65:7). The prophet calls the sea a raging creature, and therein yokes it with the wicked (Isa_57:20). The world is full o| molesting vexations no less than the sea.
(1) Sometimes it swells with pride, as the sea with waves.
(2) Vain-glory is the wind that raiseth up the billows of this sea.
(3) The world, like the sea, is blue with envy, livid with malice.
(4) Sometimes it boils with wrath: and herein the world and the sea are very similar.
(5) The sea is not more deep than the world. A bottomless subtilty is in men’s hearts, and an honest man wants a plummet to sound it.
(6) There is foaming luxury in this sea; a corrupt and stinking froth, which the world casts up. The steam of lust fumes perpetually.
(7) The world, as the sea, is a swallowing gulf. There are four great devourers in the world, luxury, pride, gluttony, covetousness.
2. The sea is bitter. The waters thereof are salt and brinish. All demonstrates the world to have an unsavoury relish. So it bath truly, whether we respect the works or the pleasures of it. But how bitter, saltish, and unsavoury soever the sea is, yet the fishes that swim in it exceedingly like it. The world is not so distasteful to the heavenly palate as it is sweet to the wicked.
3. The sea is no place to continue in. No man sails there to sail there; but as he propounds to his purpose a voyage, so to his hopes a return. The world in like sort is no place to dwell in for ever. Self-flattering fools that so esteem it (Psa_49:11).
4. The sea is full of dangers.
II. A sea of glass.
1. There is a glassy colour congruent to the sea. All the beauty of glass consists in the colour; and what in the world, that is of the world, is commendable besides the colour? A cottage would serve to sleep in as well as sumptuous palace, but for the colour. Russets be as warm as silks, but for the glistering colour.
2. Glass is a slippery metal. The wisest Solomon, the strongest Samson, have been fetched up by this wrestler, and measured their lengths on the ground. How dangerous, then, is it to run fast on this sea, where men are scarce able to stand.
3. This glass denotes brittleness. A fit attribute to express the nature of worldly things; for glass is not more fragile. “The world passeth away and the lust thereof,” saith St. John. Man himself is but brittle stuff, and he is the noblest part of the world (Job_14:1). Now, since the world is a sea, and so brittle, a sea of glass, let us seek to pass over well, but especially to land well. A ship under sail is a good sight; but it is better to see her well moored in the haven. Be desirous of good life, not of long life; the shortest cut to our haven is the happiest voyage. Who would be long on the sea?
III. Thus far we have surveyed this glassy sea, the world, in regard of itself. The other two attributes concern almighty God’s holding and beholding.
1. That God may most clearly view all things being and done in this world; it is said to be in His sight as clear as crystal. As in crystal there is nothing so little but it may be seen; so there is nothing on earth, said or done, so slight or small, that it may escape His all-seeing providence (Heb_4:13). God beholds, as in a clear mirror of crystal, all our impurities, impieties, our contempt of sermons, neglect of sacraments, dishallowing His sabbaths. Well, as God sees all things so clearly, so I would to God we would behold somewhat. Let us open our eyes and view in this crystal glass our own works.
2. Lastly, this glassy sea is not only as crystal for the transparent brightness that the Almighty’s eye may see all things done in it, but it lies for situation before His throne; generally for the whole, and particularly for every member, subject to His judgment and governance. His throne signifies that impartial government which He exerciseth over the world (Psa_9:7-8). (T. Adams.)
Four beasts full of eyes before and behind.--
The ideal of intelligent creatureship
I. It stands in immediate contact with the presence and government of god.
1. It is the ideal of intelligent creatureship to live in the immediate presence of God.
2. It is the ideal of intelligent creatureship to serve in connection with the celestial government of all things.
II. It has numerous inlets of knowledge which aid in a vigilant conduct of life.
1. They have a power to understand history: eyes behind.
2. They have a power to comprehend prophecy: eyes before.
3. They have power to interpret self: eyes within.
III. It is gifted with a combination of varied and well-balanced abilities.
1. Great courage.
2. Enduring industry.
3. True intelligence.
4. Sublime aspiration.
5. Swift service.
IV. It is ever ascribing devout praise to the great God. Lessons:
1. There are in the unseen universe intelligent creatures vastly superior to man.
2. As these creatures find the highest joy in the service of God, so should man.
3. Man should seek to enter into the vigour of an ideal creatureship. (J. S. Exell, M. A.)
Full of eyes within.
Spiritual introspection
I. A few thoughts respecting these awful intelligences of whom we read in the text. Every manifestation of the glory of God has usually been accompanied with the presence of these living creatures. In the column of fire at the gate of Eden were seen the mystic forms and evolutions of these wondrous beings. In after times, God was addressed as dwelling between the cherubim. In the holiest of all, there was the ark of the covenant, and the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. The symbol of the Divine presence seems associated with them. It is to be remembered that the Oriental court was framed on the principle that it was the pattern of the Divine. The monarch was the visible representative of God. His laws, like those of God, were immutable. No one without permission could see his face and live; and the highest princes of the realm stood in his presence. In the court of our sovereign the most exalted personages--the highest in title, rank, and wealth--minister to royalty. Their very greatness is necessary to qualify them for service, and thus they manifest the glory of the monarch. Those created beings who stand before God in an official character are represented as possessing all possible perfections. They are the highest order of created intelligences; they are the ministers of the great King--and yet between them and God how great, how inconceivable the distance! The impropriety of terming these living creatures “beasts” has been admitted by every writer--the term is utterly at variance with their character and perfections. They areevidently official personages. All their acts are official. That these living creatures possess the highest capacities may be presumed from their dignified station. Their penetrating and comprehensive knowledge is intimated by their being “full of eyes, before and behind.” They see the past as well as the present; they can look all ways and see all things. They have, in its perfection, the faculty of introspection, for they have “eyes within.” This singular statement is but the symbol of their knowledge of themselves, as well as of outward things.
II. A few suggestions relative to the faculty of introspection. Man is related to the outward and to the spiritual world to the things that are seen and to the things that are unseen--to the things that are temporal and to the things that are eternal. He has an outward and an inward life--the sense of sight and the faculty of introspection. Man is “fearfully and wonderfully made”; he has the faculty of introspection, but through disuse it becomes dimmed, or paralysed, and dead. Christ comes., that men may see. “He opens blind eyes.” The regenerated men is the spiritual man, with the full use of spiritual powers, with the faculty of spiritual discernment. But more particularly--
1. Man does not recognise his own spiritual nature. He does not know how awful and mysterious that nature is. His outward life overshadows his inner life. His body is the prison-house of his soul. The spiritual man has “eyes within.” He communes with his own heart; helistens to the utterances of his spirit; he is familiar with the sorrows and joys of his soul. We may well pray, each for himself, Open Thou my eyes that I may see myself.
2. Man does not study the phenomena of his own mind. He thinks, but he thinks about his calling, about his trade; his thoughts are like his tools, his implements, he does not employ the powers of his mind on spiritual realities, or make his thoughts the chariot in which he can ascend to God. If we had eyes within we should see that there is nothing more wonderful than thought. We should see “that as a man thinketh in his heart so is he”; that if he thinks worldly thoughts, he is worldly; that if he thinks sensual thoughts, he is sensual; that if he thinks spiritual thoughts, he is spiritual; that thoughts are of moment and of the utmost importance.
3. Men do not know their own hearts. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?” There is only one Being who knows it. If our eyes were opened, we should cry out, “Create in me a clean heart, O God.”
4. Men do not form a correct estimate of their own capabilities. “Man,” says Pascal, “is the scorn and the glory of the universe.” You have a nature that can only find its completeness in God, and therefore you can only find your satisfaction in Him. You have capabilities that you do not conceive of, for joy or for misery. You can become a partaker of a Divine nature, or you can sink into the most fearful degradation and infamy. (H. J. Bevis.)
The seeing eye
Full of eyes they are, these living creatures, not only before and behind, but within and without. Within every living creature perceives itself, scrutinises its own inner mysteries, and knows its own instincts and feelings and passions and ambition and hope and purpose. All these it has eyes to see in their manifold combinations even as it moves on and acts. And eyes without, not absorbed in introspection, but rather, and at the same moment at which it searches the deep things of the spirit, and by the same act it has eyes without, eyes that see so far away into the heart of things, eyes that gaze upon all the amazing scenery of the world about it, eyes that look upon the face of the eternal God. Full of eyes! What a surprising characteristic of nature for us! Our modern feeling about nature, derived from unphilosophic popularised science of the day, pronounced that nature is eyeless, that it works in the dark, that its laws are blind to its issues and action. Nature crushes and ruins the distinction between good and bad and right and wrong, and knows not what it does. Rivers run blindly down in their grooved channels; the seas beat blindly against blind rocks; the winds moan in blindness round the blind walls of the hills. The whole earth is blind. The heavens are vacant of any vision; they tell us we have put out their eyes. And this has happened, we know, because we have dropped God and His Christ out of their own creation. We have tried to look at it as if they were not there. We arecompelled, in order to accomplish certain analytical issues essential to scientific investigation, to omit the spiritual factors of the universe from our immediate calculations. But then this abstraction is confessedly only for a purpose that is partial and incomplete in itself, and the danger lies in this, that when once this partial purpose of science issatisfied we forget to restore what our abstraction had eliminated. And then we look up and out and are appalled--for lo, God has vanished out of the natural scene! It is all empty of His presence of His will! It is purposeless, it is mechanical, it is blind--so we cry in our dismay! How could God be expected to appear in the shape of a material phenomenon, and yet only so could our scientific methods of research come upon Him. So it is that the world is blind, is godless to this pseudo-science. Look at nature with the eyes of a spirit, according to the rules and methods of spiritual vision; bring into play the organs that belong to a spiritual world, and lo! it is no longer sightless and meaningless and dark; it has become full of eyes within and without. In every portion of it there is a light, a purpose, a hope. The soul of man becomes conscious of a spirit that is abroad and about him on every side, and which fills his earthly house with the presence of Him he knows and who knows him. On all sides of him in this natural life here on earth he dimly perceives by the inspiration of a fellow feeling the living creatures full of eyes within and without, who unite with him in uttering the one phrase, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty! Full of eyes within and without. Our common humanity--that too should become full of eyes. Every faculty, every capacity in us which before had passed under Christ’s sway while it was of the earth earthy was always blundering into the dark, should discover that the quickening power of the Spirit has brought out one great boon--the gift of eyes--the capacity to see. That is the triumph of grace--that it enables this natural gift of man, his reason, to see where before he could not see. Grace gives it eyes, and reason henceforward can join in the hymn of adoration. It looks within and it looks without, and everywhere it now recognises the triple law of the spiritual life, the triple evidence of the threefold God! And thus made full of eyes to see, it, too, sings its song, Holy, holy, holy! And not reason only, but conscience gains eyes; the natural conscience lifted and transfigured perceives what it had never seen hitherto. It sees, for instance, the higher possibility of purity to which it had been wholly dark; it sees that purity holds the secret of true growth, for man and for woman all alike and both equally, which was never suggested to it until Christ opened its eyes. It detects the powers inherent in humiliation, in self-sacrifice, and in brotherly service. Therefore, where before it expected only weakness, it now perceives strength; the glories that lay concealed in virtues that it deemed passive and petty and effeminate are now disclosed to it. The darkness should always be turning into light as the fulness of grace spreads throughout the dim surface of human life, and touches it all with glory. Full of eyes! A question appropriate to Trinity Sunday for each one of us is, Do we use our human capacities with better precision than we did? Do we use them over the larger surface of life? Do we see more than we used to of God’s counsels for us here, of man’s obligations, of our own possibilities and calls and duties? Grace should be for ever raising our ordinary capacities to a higher power, enriching their insight, fertilising their judgment. Is it so? Ask yourselves. Your imagination, for instance, is it more full of eyes than before? Does your imagination bring the sorrow of the world before you as if it were your own case, as a bitter sorrow, as a personal disgrace, for which you abhor yourself in dust and ashes? And your sympathies, are they more alert, quicker than once they were? Ah, the sins! They, too, stand out, now that you have eyes to see them, with a worse ugliness and a more rooted, stubborn repugnance. You had not thought yourself so bad, so base, so selfish, but now the light is thrown on you. You have eyes to see all the black wrong. (Canon Scott Holland.)
They rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy.--
Labour and rest
God has affixed certain peculiarities to our present state of being. It can be shown that there are portions even of the visible creation in which there can be no succession of day and night such as there is on earth--regions far removed in space from us, where clusters of suns must of necessity make perpetual sunshine. And we know from Scripture that the peculiar relation between rest and labour which is characteristic of earth, at all events as it is, is local, or temporary, or both; and that in another state of things the words of our text take the place of it, and “they rest not day and night.”
I. In Eden there was rest without labour. Eden in its innocence gave no trouble to its inhabitants. They trimmed its roses, and trod itsvelvet lawns, and ate its fruits, and drank its transparent rivers, and enjoyed the tranquillity of unbroken rest. And this is the reason why, though man now cannot be really happy without employment, he naturally turns in imagination to such a state as one of perfect enjoyment. It was his primary condition before sin entered into the world.
II. We turn to labour and rest--the relation which exists on earth as it is. That in this state of things there should be labour is expressly declared after the fall. “In the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat bread.” That there must be rest is expressly taught: “Man goeth forth to his work and to his labour until the evening.” And we know, in practice, that within certain limits there may be a change in the relation subsisting between the two, but that if these limits are exceeded either way, the result is ruin to man’s moral and physical constitution. It degrades him to be without labour; it destroys him to be without rest. There is but one who has lived in this ruined world without sin. Christ, as man, is the model of what man ought to be in a world which is as it ought not to be. In Christ’s example we see what ought to be man’s state in the present world, as it respects labour and rest: that the two should interchange--that because it is paradise no longer there must be toil, and because it is still earth there must be rest--rest for bodily refreshment, rest for the friendly intercourse of one with another, rest for communion with Him whose presence alone can give the soul of mantrue rest.
III. There is another solution of the problem of the relation between labour and rest--labour without rest. And this is only to be found in hell. Satan himself is always represented as a being of restless activity: “going about,” “walking up and down.” There is a faint reflection of hell in the bosom of each unconverted man; and of such we read (Isa_57:20). And let me say that whatever makes earth approximate to a state of restlessness, so far makes it approach to a resemblance to the place of everlasting misery.
IV. We come to the last and best relation between rest and labour, that which exists in heaven, where they “rest not day and night,” because they rest in labour. In heaven employment is unceasing--for those who are there are freed from the weariness of the flesh. Free from all infirmity, they rest not day and night. And employment is unceasing in heaven--for the employments of heaven are restoring instead of exhausting. They have life in them. (S. Garratt, B. A.)
True worship a foretaste of heaven
Now, what are the characteristic features, so to call them, of the perfect worship of heaven, which are touched on in the text?
1. It will be a continuous service. There will be no break or intermission on the part of those who join in it. The now that is there is always.
2. It will be united worship--all join and all join alike.
3. The character of the worship will be one and the same.
4. The worship will be “before the throne,” i.e., in the conscious immediate presence of Almighty God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, with all the surroundings of visible glory.
5. The worship will be all-absorbing in contemplation of the Divine glory and perfections. No thought of personal doings or deservings can find place there. There is only the acknowledgment that all are His gifts--all has come from Him--and there is the humble tendering back of everything. “The crowns are cast before the throne” in adoring thankfulness to Him who is the Giver of them all. Worship, as distinct from prayer and praise and thanksgiving, is the conscious lifting up of the soul to God in contemplation of Him, in His Being and acts, whether towards ourselves in particular, or towards our whole race, or in all His works, according to our knowledge of them. We cannot really worship without knowledge--we cannot worship a blank; we must have knowledge of Him to whom we pay homage; and that knowledge must be received into ourselves from without. Thus worship is both a taking in and a giving out: taking in, i.e., receiving, and following out, and expanding, and setting forth before ourselves, who that great Being is with whom we have to do, whose works encompass us, and to whom we desire to draw near, to know better and to hold communion with; and then giving back, as it were, this knowledge at which we have arrived, in acts of adoration and praise, expressed in different ways according to the subject matter as regards Almighty God, in which we may be engaged. The two must go hand in hand: you cannot rightly worship except you have acquaintance with Him whom you worship, and you cannot have this acquaintance without worship. You cannot come at a right knowledge of Almighty God, much less of Almighty God as revealed under the Christian dispensation, except the knowledge acquired and the spirit in which that knowledge is dwelt on and followed up, be with a mind of adoration and worship. And the two (the knowledge and the worship) grow and advance together. Increased knowledge of God carries us on in worship, and fuller worship leads up to fuller knowledge. What is set before us in the text is the type of the perfect worship of heaven, and it is toward this that our life on earth should lead. For man’s eternal joy will be in praising God. The power of fully appreciating the love of God towards us will prompt the unceasing praise, and in that unceasing praise will be the joy of heaven. The Divine love, which receives the praises of that innumerable blessed company, will ever fresh inspire their song, will pour into it new depth and richness, and will receive it into the fulness of the Divine life. There is no intermission, there is no end; for God’s glory cannot be known in its eternity except by the gift of an eternal power of contemplation and of union with Him. People talk a great deal about places of worship and forms of worship. But do they consider what worship means? They think perhaps of edification by sermons, or of instruction out of God’s Holy Scriptures, or of joining in prayers and hymns, or of the good they may feel, or of the things they need to ask, but these are not worship. In all these we look for something for ourselves, something to get. But worship does not mean getting anything, but it means giving something. And what? Money, costly offerings, such things as come by birth, high station, or intellect? Not so; not so, in the truest sense of giving. For these things are not our own. It is of them that the man after God’s own heart said, “Of Thine own have we given Thee.” Wherein, then, consists that offering which we may more truly call our own than all such things without, though in a sense, and for a time at least, they do belong to us? Something there is, more nearly and more truly our own, which we are to give. That more costly offering, that in which God has delight, is ourselves. We make an offering of our mind, when we withdraw our thoughts from the business of the world, from those things which engross our thoughts and make any lengthened devotion wearisome and distasteful; when we calmly and resolutely set ourselves to mediate on God and things of God; when we try to shut out the distractions of things, and to fix our thoughts upon God, andupon God only, for the time. Again, we make an offering of our heart, which is the seat of the affections, in earnestness of devotion, calling up before us His goodness, His love, His bounties towards us, as well in respect of His gifts in this life as still more for all His gracious and abundant promises for the life to come. Again, as God made the mind, He requires an offering of that; and as He made the heart, He demands an offering of that also; so, too, as He made the body, He requires that the body shall bear part in worshipping Him. This we do by outward acts of worship, bowing, kneeling, singing, and joining in the services of His house. Thus the whole man, body and soul, may take part in worship; after this manner here below preparing for the perfect worship of heaven. And He who invites us thus to worship here will be with us, and make that worship approach little by little towards the perfect worship of heaven. (R. F. Wilson.)
Celestial worship
I. The worship of heaven will engage the activities of all celestial creatureship.
1. Universal.
2. Ceaseless.
3. Perfect.
II. The worship of heaven will be inspired by clear views of the divine character.
1. Holy.
2. Omnipotent.
3. Eternal.
III. The worship of heaven is rendered with the greatest humility of soul.
1. This humility is inspired by a true sense of the Divine majesty.
2. This humility is awakened by a due estimate of the unworthiness of self.
3. This humility is manifested by the external attitudes of worship. The crown of an adoring soul gains its worth and brightness by being cast before the throne of God.
IV. The worship of heaven is celebrative of the creative pleasure of God.
1. Celestial worship ascribes the plan of creation to the creative power of God.
2. Celestial worship recognises the creative power of God as calling for the highest worship of intelligent creatures.
They ascribe to God--
1. Glory.
2. Honour.
3. Power.
Lessons:
1. It is the privilege and duty of all intelligent creatures to worship God.
2. In praise we should seek to have clear views of the Divine character.
3. We should endeavour to approach God with a becoming sense of unworthiness. (J. S. Exell, M. A.)
Earnest devotion
In the apostle’s vision of heaven, he is struck with the glowing devotion of the spirits before the throne. It is pure, fervent, and exalted; it is subject to no changes of rising and falling emotions; it is always as great as the perfections of the Infinite require, and as the nature of the hearts from which it proceeds permits it to be. Do you ask, “How can it be sustained at such a height, when all human devotion is so easily brought down--how can their minds be kept fixed on the object of their adoration when human thoughts so readily wander away?” The explanation is found in the words, “They rest not day and night”; their hearts are always engaged in the service; the night suspends it not, for there is no night there. It is because they are thus devoted--in a word, it is because they rest not--that their devotion maintains itself so fervent, and towers so high. This, then, illustrates the great truth which ought to be impressed on every heart; religious improvement, the chief object of existence, requires the steady devotion of all our powers to secure it. In proportion as man rests from that labour does he surrender the hope and power of ever securing that prize. Consider the effect of inaction upon the physical nature. The frame which is regularly exercised, if not urged beyond its strength, grows in firmness and energy, and expands in full and fair proportion. But let the frame be given over to rest, let the man have no steady employment that requires interest and exertion, and it is not long before disease begins to spread through the system. Consider the effect of inaction upon the mind of man. There is a strong analogy between the wants of the body and the mind; exertion is indispensable to the health of each; and though one who lives without exercising either may not yet perceive the injury he is doing to himself, it is not less certain that the day of recompense and sorrow must come. Disease is as sureto follow the inactive mind as the inactive body. Its effects are not open to the eye, or rather they are not noticed by careless observers, though they may be seen in the incapacity for serious reflection, in the depraved intellectual taste which can relish only miscellaneous novelty or intoxicating fiction. When the body dies, its pains and sorrows are over; not so, not so with the mind, which dieth not; when coldness wraps the suffering clay, the mind still lives and must live for ever. Consider the effect of inaction on the spiritual nature of man. It is common to meet with those who neither look forward to eternity nor up to God; and the consequence is, not only that their devotion, if they ever had any, dies, but also that they lose the power of devotion. They lose all power of spiritual discernment, so that the great realities of another world have no presence nor life to the soul. This is the darkest and most fearful thought that can be presented to the human mind--the death and ruin of the soul. There is a time when “ye cannot do the things that ye would.” The same is true of love to men, that other great duty which God so intimately associated with devotion. This feeling can be strengthened into a principle by the common sympathy of life--that sympathy which is never so strong and sure as when sanctified by religious feeling. But if ourbenevolent impulses are not followed, we lose not only the opportunity of the moment, but we lose the power of exertion. They are like the wayfarer in the polar regions; after suffering awhile with the cold, he feels a sleep stealing over him; it comes without pain, it gives no warning of danger; unable to resist the persuasive influence, he sinks into slumber, from which he never wakes in this world again. It is in the same way that hearts are frozen; they feel no danger, they suspect not that the sleep which is stealing over them is the sleep of death. Having thus endeavoured to show what law we are under, let us take a more practical view of the subject. Love to God and love to man are the great elements of that character which we are sent into this world to form, and it is practising on these principles which gives them power and increases their power within us. It is because the seraphs rest not day and night that their hearts become living flames in the service of their God. We are to remember, then, that God has so arranged the present life that all things favour the growth of love to man in those who really determine to possess it, while all things seem to hinder it in those who hold it in slight regard. Whenever an opportunity of benevolence is offered--whenever God’s providence makes an appeal, as it often does, to our kind feeling--we should feel that to resist it or reject it is wrong. It is so much done to injure and destroy the principles and affections which form the only treasures of heaven; they are all the wealth we can carry from this world into another, and without them we shall be poor indeed. So, if we have the least desire to possess the spirit of devotion, we shall take advantage of every time and every service that can awaken the spirit of devotion. (W. B. O. Peabody, D. D.)
The celebration of the Trinity
In the understanding of this place, what, or who these four creatures are, there is difficulty. And so we shall well do if we interpret these four creatures to be first and principally the four evangelists, and then enlarge it to all the ministers of the gospel. So, then, the action being an open and a continual profession of the whole Christian religion, in the celebration of the Trinity, which is the distinctive character of the Christian, the persons that do this are all they that constitute the hierarchy and order of the Church. And before we come to their qualification in the text, first, as they are said to have six wings, and then as they are said to be full of eyes, we look upon them as they are formed and designed to us inthe verse immediately before the text, where the first of these four creatures hath the face of a lion, the second of a calf, or an ex, the third of a man, the fourth of an eagle. Now, says St. Ambrose, these four creatures are the preachers of the gospel; that we had established afore, but then we add with St. Ambrose, all these four creatures make up but one creature; all their qualities concur to the qualification of a minister; every minister of God is to have all that all four had--the courage of a lion, the laboriousness of an ox, the perspicuity and clear sight of the eagle, and the humanity, the discourse, the reason, the affability, the appliableness of a man. All must have all, or else all is disordered--zeal, labour, knowledge, gentleness. Now besides these general qualifications, laid down as the foundation of the text, in the verse before it, in the text itself these four creatures have also wings added unto them; wings, first for their own behoof and benefit, and then, wings for the benefit and behoof of others. They have wings to raise themselves from the earth, that they do not entangle themselves in thebusiness of this world; but still to keep themselves upon the wing in a heavenly conversation, ever remembering that they have another element than sea or land, as men whom Christ Jesus hath set apart, and in some measure made mediators between Him and other men as His instruments of their salvation. And then as for themselves, so have they wings for others too, that they may be always ready to succour all in all their spiritual necessities. And then, their wings are numbered in our text: they have six wings. For by the consent of most expositors, those whom St. John presents in the figure of these four creatures here, and those whom the prophet Isaiah calls seraphim, are the same persons. The Holy Ghost sometimes presents the ministers of the gospel as seraphim in glory, that they might be known to be the ministers and dispensers of the mysteries and secrets of God, and to come from His council, His cabinet. And then on the other side, theft you might know that the dispensation of these mysteries of your salvation is by thehand and means of men, taken from amongst yourselves, and that therefore you are not to look for revelations, nor ecstasies, nor visions, nor transportations, but to rest in God’s ordinary means, He brings those persons down again from that glorious representation as the seraphim to creatures of an inferior, of an earthly nature. These winged persons, then have eyes as well as wings; they fly, but they know whither they fly. God gives them wings, that is, means to do their office; but eyes too, that is, discretion and religious wisdom how to do it. And this is that which they seem to need most, for their wings are limited, but their eyes are not; six wings, but full of eyes, says our text. But then, especially, says our text, they were full of eyes within. All my wings shall do me no good, all mine eyes before and behind shall do me no good, if I have no prospect inward, no eyes within, no care of my particular and personal safety. If the Lord open thy lips, let it be to show forth His praise. That they speak, declare the glory of God. For this is that ingenuity, that alacrity, which constitutes our first branch. And then the second is the assiduity, the constancy, the incessantness, “They rest not day nor night.” But have the saints of God no vacation? Do they never cease? Nay, as the word imports, they have no rest. God Himself rested not till the seventh day; be thou content to stay for thy sabbath till thou mayst have an eternal one. If we understand this of rest merely, of bodily rest, the saints of God are least likely to have it in this life; for this life is a business, a warfare, a voyage, and a tempestuous voyage. If we understand this rest to be cessation, intermission, the saints of heaven have none of that in this service. It is a labour that never wearies, to serve God there. To conclude all, this eternally of our God is expressed here in a phrase which designs and presents the last judgment, that is, “Which was, and is, and is to come.” And, therefore, let us reverently embrace such provisions, and such assistances as the Church of God hath ordained, for retaining and celebrating the Trinity, in this particular contemplation, as they are tocome to judgment. And let us at least provide so far, to stand upright in that judgment, as not to deny, nor to dispute the power, or the persons of those judges. (John Donne, D. D.)
