John Kitto Morning Bible Devotions: November 5

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John Kitto Morning Bible Devotions: November 5


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The Way of Help

2Ch_14:11

O Lord, Thou art our God, let not man prevail against Thee!” These were the words with which king Asa, full of faith, marched against the Cushite host. Great words they are, and deserve to be well considered. Observe the root of the idea from which they spring. At the first view it might seem more obvious and natural to say, “Let not man prevail against us;” but he says, “Let not man prevail against Thee.” This is a bold word. It assumes that the Lord’s cause and theirs was so much identified, his honor so much involved in theirs in this matter, that man’s triumph over them would be triumph over him—would compromise the glory of his great name even more than it would compromise theirs. If this notion rested not on strong foundations, it were egregious presumption; but if it were well founded, it was faith. On what, then, was it founded? We are left at no loss in this matter, for Asa himself declares the grounds of this strong, we may almost say daring, claim upon the Lord’s assistance.

It was the conviction of his utter helplessness, and therefore of the absolute necessity of the Lord’s deliverance, and that all the glory must therefore be his. “Lord, it is nothing with thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no power. Help us, O Lord our God.” This is something. This goes a great way. It is indispensable that we should feel our own helplessness, in order to estimate at its true value the help that maybe given to us. The claim to help is not with him who thinketh that he has need of nothing, or only of a little help just to make out the “possible insufficiency of his own resources; but with him who feels that he has need of everything—that in himself he has no resources whatever—no works, no worthiness, no strength that may, so to speak, somewhat help the Lord to help him—that old delusion, that old snare, which has in all time kept so many souls from the help they might else have had from God. See that man drowning in the waters, and see that other coming forth from the shore with a strong stroke to save him. See the vain efforts of the first to help himself. He kicks, he struggles, be beats the waters, he rears aloft his arms, he will not be still. He thinks he is helping himself; but all the while he is only doing his utmost to aid his own submersion. If he would be but quiet, in the conviction of the utter impotency of all such attempts to save himself, he might float quietly upon the water until the deliverer came near. Note: A fact, that if a man lie still with his arms below the water, he may float any length of time with his face above the water. Men are drowned by their blind struggles in the effort to save themselves. He is near—he grasps the sufferer by the hair, he holds his head above the wave, and propels him gently on towards the shore. Let not the thought of helping his helper cross his mind, or he is again undone. Let him lie still in the hands of his preserver—let him have faith in his power to save, and that strong arm shall bear him triumphantly through; but if he yet struggles to help himself, and lifts himself up to catch convulsively at every floating straw, there is no help for him—down he goes.

Asa knew he was in himself helpless, and he knew where to seek an all-sufficient Helper, and he desired to know no more. In this he rested—“We rest on Thee.” This resting on God was both a cause and an effect. That he was enabled so to rest with undisturbed mind on God, was one of the grounds on which he expected help—“for we rest on Thee;” and so far it was a cause. But the capacity of enjoying this rest, in leaning so entirely upon the Lord, was an inevitable effect of the previous convictions which he had reached of his own helplessness, and of the boundless sufficiency of his Helper. These things belong to the life of faith, and are essentially the same, whether they have regard to our defence against the innumerable adversaries who disturb or threaten our bodily repose—or the spiritual enemies, within us and without us, that bring danger to our souls. In either case, perfect love to God, and perfect trust in Him, which trust is essential to love, gives rest—casts out all fear and doubt. “He that feareth is not made perfect in love;” and therefore he has not yet attained to perfect rest. To enjoy this rest, which is the result of perfect love and perfect faith, is a state of inconceivable blessedness, infinitely greater than that of those whom the multitude look up to with envy and admiration. It is the state of the man who can say, in the quaint language of an old poet—

“The God that made my heart is He alone

That of himself both can and will

Give rest unto my thoughts, and fill

Them full of all content and quietness;

That so I may possess

My soul in patience,

Until He find it time to call me hence.

In Thee, as in my centre, shall

The lines of all my longings fall,

To Thee, as to mine anchor, surely tied,

My strip shall safely ride.

On Thee, as on my bed

Of soft repose, I’ll rest my weary head.

Thou, Thou alone, shall be my whole desire

I’ll nothing else require

But Thee, or for thy sake.

In Thee I’ll sleep secure; and, when I wake,

Thy glorious face shall satisfy

The longing of my looking eye.

I’ll roll myself on Thee, as on my rock,

When threatening dangers mock.”—School of the Heart.

A man who has realized these convictions, and who has attained that state of rest, of reliance, of perfect freedom from all anxiety and care, who is fully clad in the armor of God—his hands are fit for war and his fingers for fight—he goes forth conquering and to conquer all the enemies of his peace, as well those who lurk in the corners of the soul’s dark cottage, as those that beset him round in his open walk, and prowl, and grin, and gibber about his path. He is fearless. Nothing can harm him; for he has that peace with him which all the world’s armies could not wrest from him, which the world’s terrors cannot disturb, which its foul breath cannot sully, and which the raging of its utmost storms can as little ruffle, as it can the “sea of glass” before the throne of God.

It is because that Asa had attained to the state of “rest on God,” by which all these privileges became his—that he could say, “In thy name we go against this multitude.” This was his might. In this might he went, and he overcame. And it was because, feeling his own weakness, knowing where help was to be found, relying, resting upon that help and in that reliance, and in no other, going forth to oppose the Cushean host, that he was entitled and authorized to regard the cause as the Lord’s own, and to say—“O Lord, Thou art our God, let not man prevail against Thee.”