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‘A perfect heart.’
1Ch_29:19
I. Turn to the Old Testament, and consider the heyday of Israel’s prosperity and devotion.—The sun of David, the man of war, is setting with all the mellowed radiance of peace. The king, the rulers, and the people offered willingly to the Lord, with a perfect heart, a sum as large, probably, as was ever spent upon any one sacred edifice at any one time. Both parties did so with sincerity. The king and his people had each all they desired, in the peace which had come at last, and in the enlarged territory and the universal prosperity of Israel. Each was sincere; there was no ‘behind thought’ as the French would say. The scene in to-day’s evening lesson changes from the reign of the father to that of the son, and shows us Solomon pleading ‘as a little child’ for ‘an understanding heart.’ And the answer comes back, ‘Behold, I have done according to thy words’ (1Ki_3:7; 1Ki_3:9; 1Ki_3:12). The sequel showed that Jehovah was as good as His word. Yet no failure in all history is more sudden, more mysterious, more hopeless, than that of Solomon. God appeared to him twice, yet he fell. Yet clearly there was hope even for Solomon, who grew old in wickedness. The Old Testament stands or falls with the truth that perfectness of heart was possible and could be attained. The yearnings of David and Solomon and others were natural for man to have and possible for God to satisfy. But many failed, and the ‘perfect hearts’ in each generation were a very small remnant, or were wanting altogether.
II. And so the dispensation went down before the bringing in of some better thing to take its place.—The old law is to give way not only to a new law, but one which shall be obeyed by a new creation. The hearts of men underwent no organic change, but only a change in their aspirations. Hitherto the best of them had desired to acquire a certain blamelessness by conformity to statutes, which when they had performed, they were still unprofitable servants. They had desired to be perfect in themselves and for themselves. They were to qualify for the friendship of the Son of Man by obedience, not to their own will, but to Another’s. ‘Ye are My friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you.’ The ‘perfect heart,’ under the New Covenant, will belong only to him who can say ‘Abba, Father,’ in any language, and who can say it, not on the strength of what he himself has done, but because of something which Another has done, and which he has received.
III. Observe the contrast between the Old and the New.—(a) David’s verdict upon himself and his doings (1Ch_29:2-3). St. Paul’s verdict: ‘Ye have received the Spirit of adoption’ (Rom_8:15). The one has given to God what was God’s before. The other has received as a free gift the ‘adoption,’ which no deed, no sacrifice of his could claim in return. (b) How fleeting the satisfaction of obedience and sincerity and ‘perfection’ under the Old Dispensation! ‘We are strangers before Thee, and sojourners’ (1Ch_29:15). The gold and other offerings outlast the ‘perfect heart’ that offered them; the givers go their way, the gifts remain. But under the New Covenant the sons are joint-heirs for eternity with Him ‘Who only hath immortality,’ and from Whose love neither ‘things present nor things to come’ shall separate them. (c) Once more the ‘perfect heart’ finds a standard for its perfection even in ‘this present time.’ Its sincerity will appear not only in its dependence upon its Author, in being led by His Spirit rather than going its own way, but in its ‘works.’ By our ‘fruits’ men shall know us. ‘He that doeth … shall enter into the kingdom of Heaven.’
—
Rev. E. H. Pearce.
Illustration‘Above all, the strength of David’s character was his piety. That piety was altogether practical and real. It was a joy in God in times of good; a quenchless thirst for God in times of declension, never failing to bring him back in contrition; a chastened submissiveness to God in times of trouble; and at all times a clear trust in God, which grew in power and beauty as years and experience grew on him. But, indeed, David’s character is so extraordinarily rich and varied that historians and poets alike have tried in vain to describe it worthily.’