THE MESSENGER.
Well now, what next? Ah, here is the halting place where G.o.d brings His next agency. Providence stops for a moment, and now grace comes in. "If there be a messenger with him"....... if there be somebody who understands G.o.d"s way, that his end is always mercy and His purpose always blessing, "to show unto man His uprightness," G.o.d"s uprightness, to show him what G.o.d"s purpose is, to help him to understand G.o.d, to submit to G.o.d, to listen to G.o.d, to put himself in G.o.d"s hands; if there is only somebody there with a gentle, loving hand, and a faithful touch to press through all the films and help him to get to the heart of G.o.d, then, oh, what a change!
THE ATONEMENT.
"Then He is gracious unto him, and saith, Deliver him from going down to the pit; I have found a ransom." So here in the very heart of the patriarchal age we have this word. He has been all wrong, but G.o.d has a way of making it right, through the very blood of Christ"s redemption. Jesus has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. We see this all through the Mosaic teaching. We saw it on a previous page when we were talking about the leper and the two little birds that were used for his cleansing.
We saw it in the brazen serpent that was raised on the pole. We have it in the censer of Aaron swinging between the living and the dead. So here we have it, right in the beginning of the Old Testament, the Ransom, Jesus Christ, making settlement on account of our body, subst.i.tuting His stripes for our sickness and healing us by them.
THE HEALING.
So this intercessor sits down by Job and tells him about G.o.d and then comes the healing. There is no waste of words, but just one sentence: "His flesh shall be fresher than a child"s-He shall return to the days of his youth." It is not merely healing; it is regeneration, it is "a converted body," it is life given back in all its freshness. It is not an old man made well, but it is a new heart put into his being and new blood into his veins.
It is a renewing of life; it is the deeper teaching of the resurrection life, not the repair shop tinkering you up and letting you go on a little longer in the old break-down way, but it is that something which He is bringing to us in these days, the childhood of nature, it is that deep, sweet love-life of the Lord which He wants to pour into all our being and make us young again.
There is something about this picture of healing that is delightful-"fresher than a child," a buoyant freshness that makes you return to the days of your youth. G.o.d wants to make you like a happy, trusting child, and make it so delightful both to Him and you that you will feel it is joy to have Him heal you. He now brings you to a place of closer communion: "He shall pray unto G.o.d, and He will be favorable unto him; and he shall see His face with you." You will be brought into a new, sweet place. "He will deliver his soul from going into the pit, and his life shall see the light."
And he tells us that G.o.d often deals thus with men. His real purpose is to make them understand Him, to get them right with Him, and then bless them outwardly as well as inwardly. It is the twelfth chapter of Hebrews, the third epistle of John. It is the soul and body prospering and being in health conjointly. And so shall we not look into our own lives, our own needs, and understand our Father"s love? How stupid we have been, how slow and how often we have tried to run from Him!
G.o.d ALWAYS TEACHING.
And then when G.o.d is dealing with His children He usually has some deeper lesson for each time. Perhaps you have learned the former lesson and He is now teaching you something more, and the process may be a little slow and a little long. G.o.d has something to say that you have not yet heard.
The whole key to this pa.s.sage seems to be, G.o.d speaking and man not understanding. "Man perceiveth not." Perhaps you have learned the lesson of your first and second healing, and now He has something else to teach you. There is a strange, sweet reluctance upon His part here. He speaks once, or even twice, before He brings sickness, and then He is so quick to remove it if we will open our ears and turn our hearts to Him. Never let us lose confidence in His perfect love. He does not want to break our spirit, or let it get hard, resentful or discouraged. He loves us, forevermore, and He wants us to trust His love and through His love to get hold of His life.
CHAPTER VII.
SAMSON, AN OBJECT LESSON IN DIVINE HEALING.
Judges 13: 7, 24, 25 "Behold, thou shalt conceive, and bear a son; and now drink no wine nor strong drink, neither eat any unclean thing: for the child shall be a Nazarite to G.o.d from the womb to the day of his death."
"And the woman bare a son, and called his name Samson: and the child grew, and the Lord blessed him. And the Spirit of the Lord began to move him at times in the camp of Dan between Zorah and Eshtaol."
And then again in the next chapter and the sixth verse, "The Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and he rent him as he would have rent a kid, and he had nothing in his hand."
And yet again in the nineteenth verse, "And the Spirit of the Lord came upon him, and he went down to Ashkelon, and slew thirty men of them, and took their spoil."
SEPARATION.
In the dark days of the Judges, G.o.d brings out this striking object lesson of divine life for the body. Just as He had linked the principle of sickness with sin in the case of the leper, so here he links purity and strength, physical power with right living and separation to G.o.d. The first principle brought out here is that the foundation of strength is separation unto G.o.d.
He was a Nazarite from his mother"s womb. And so, in order to be separated from every unclean thing, his mother must not even eat anything unclean. Then she must, and he must also, abstain from wine and strong drink. This seems to have special reference to earthly pa.s.sion and desire. The spirit of true restraint and moderation is closely connected with a sound and healthy condition.
Therefore, it was not only a life of purity, but a life of true victory over self-the crucified life, the life that died to earthly things. G.o.d wants you to be pure, and G.o.d wants you to be subdued, to be self-restrained, not that there is any gospel of asceticism, but the true principle of life is, "All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any." I will not allow myself unduly to care for any thing, for as soon as it gets the mastery over me then it becomes wrong. The thing that might be right for you at one time is not best at another time. And so before the strong physical life of Samson could be developed he had to be a Nazarite in the true sense of the word. Then the simplicity of his life appears in the fact that no razor was to touch him; he was not to think of personal adornment.
STRENGTH.
Next we find in Samson, not only the principle of purity, but the principle of supernatural strength, the physical life that simply comes from a source outside of his physical organism. Men look for evolution by natural laws; they do not expect any more to come out of a thing than they see go in. Here is a kind of strength that is unaccountable, that has no philosophy back of it; there is no reason why it should exist. Whence does it come? We are told again and again in these Old Testament records, that there may be no mistake, "the Spirit of the Lord," the breath of G.o.d, came upon this man. This ought not to be entirely new, for that was the way it was in the beginning: "G.o.d breathed into man"s nostrils the breath of life."
The Spirit of G.o.d began to move him. There came manifestations, paroxysms of supernatural energy, and he would do things that were even a wonder to himself, and after a while the consciousness settled down upon him, and he knew that he had in him a strange secret of physical energy that others did not possess, and when the lion came upon him, he just rent him asunder as if he were a kid; he took the gates of Gaza and bore them off on his shoulders; and before his life was over, he tore down the colossal temple of the Philistines upon the heads of his enemies. There was nothing in bone or muscle that could explain it, it was just a paroxysm of force that swept into him from a divine source.
SPIRITUAL FORCE.
What G.o.d once did He can do again. He does not do these things for play. He does not bring out a character like Samson so that we may gaze at him like a star. G.o.d"s highest method of working still is to put into human bodies a kind of physical energy for which there is no way of accounting apart from the Holy Ghost. It is G.o.d"s normal idea for us that the Spirit of G.o.d should move upon us and stir us with physical forces that take away the disease and give us powers of endurance that even we cannot understand. This is why Samson lived this strange supernatural life. G.o.d raised him up to show you that if a man will clear the way for G.o.d by keeping out of unwholesome influences, by getting on the ground of purity, G.o.d will just pour through him celestial dynamite. It is not so much better machinery that you want as more power to run it.
The other day we found our office in a state of collapse, and everything suspended because downstairs in a dark cellar an engine had gone to pieces and the power that turned the printing presses was all still; the machinery would not go, the engine had refused to work. Power, power, power was all we wanted. Then everything went all right. And so in your life and mine.
Do not try to fix up your heart and your joints, and your indigestion, but get power, get the engine going. Let the heavenly current charge you and everything will go; you want a supernatural addition to the force you have. You have natural power when things are all regular, but when they begin to get irregular you must have twice as much power. Get G.o.d into the machinery, and even if it is a little rusty and a little stiff, it will become sufficient if the power is there.
That is the idea of Samson. I do not want to exaggerate the picture, but there it looms, a great gigantic figure in the darkest ages of history, G.o.d"s example of a body charged with the life of the Holy Ghost by a divine battery.
Beloved, have you received a physical baptism of the Holy Ghost? Your mind has been baptized with the Spirit; your affections have been baptized with the Spirit. Do you know what it is for your physical consciousness just to breathe in the rest and quietness of this divine inspiration? Have you received the Holy Ghost into your body? You have been in the third chapter of I Corinthians; have you ever definitely entered into the sixth chapter of I Corinthians?
Take it to your hearts; ask G.o.d to make it real to you, and, oh, when it comes to pa.s.s, you can understand the mystery of Samson"s life; it will not be a mystery any more. You will say a hundred times a day, is it not wonderful, is it not blessed to have something inside of you that you cannot explain; but it moves you, it makes you run for G.o.d and almost fly for G.o.d.
That is the second principle then in the history of Samson. First, it means a separated life from every evil thing that could hurt you, and then it means a strong life deriving energy from a source outside and above.
UNSEEN FORCES.
We might show this through the natural world; that force and power, even in the universe, is not in matter, but it is in a principle behind matter. You cannot see it; you cannot feel it. Take the subject of gravitation. I need not tell you that the law of gravitation is the greatest force we know; but you cannot see it, you cannot take it in your hand. You can take electricity and bottle it up; you cannot do this with gravitation, but it is the greatest force there is. Those particles of granite cling together by an unseen force, a kind of spiritual or ethereal force.
Well, the most advanced science is unable to tell anything about it; n.o.body knows what gravitation is. It is a power you cannot see, but it is the greatest power of nature. And so we might follow all through the natural world, and find it is not the visible things, but the invisible things that are strong. G.o.d has just given us parables all through nature to show us that He wants to raise us above the material, He wants us to see the thing behind the thing we see; He wants us to get to G.o.d Himself.
Perhaps when they find out the secret of nature, they will find that it is the living G.o.d, "for by Him all things consist," or, as it is better translated, all things "hang together." He is wanting us to learn that in our bodies, He wants us to glorify these earthly temples by filling them with something grander and better.
NOT IT, BUT HIM.
So many people are wanting the "thing" to go; wanting "it," whatever that "it" is, inside or outside. There are all sorts of "its." You want something that will make you feel better. I do not believe that is what G.o.d wants. G.o.d wants you to get your eye off of these things and place it on Him; and soon you will have so much of Him you will not have time to watch "it." And if G.o.d wants you to live a year with something hurting you, and all that time be so strong that n.o.body will understand it, all right, let it stay. Just get your thoughts centered on the Holy Ghost, on G.o.d Himself, and let things go, let the devil fight, let all be upside down; never mind, if you and G.o.d are right.
What does this lesson mean? It means, first, clear the way for G.o.d. If you had a wire overhead that was partly wire and partly hemp, you would not get any electricity; it must be all wire. So if you let your body be partly G.o.d"s and partly the flesh"s, partly the world"s, why, it will hinder. The first thing is right of way for G.o.d.
USE HIS POWER.
The second thing is, perhaps, to be fully persuaded, intelligently persuaded of the glorious ministry of the Holy Ghost for the body as well as the soul. And then the next thing is to do as the scientist does, as the intelligence of our modern age does with the hidden forces of nature. They used to let the lightning kill men, but now they take it and harness it and use it. Today men have found out that lightning is the most beneficent power of the universe and they use it.
Now, get to work and study the laws of the Holy Ghost; find out all the modes of His operation, the things that help to bring Him, and then adjust yourself to Him, and you will find out that the Spirit of G.o.d will fit into your life as perfectly as the power fits into our machinery. Finally, do not get it all in theory, but go ahead and practice it, and the Holy Ghost will teach you how to use it, and after a while you will have it all in experience, and you will find what an all-round Friend He is.
There is not a thing in your life-work to which He cannot adjust Himself--social life, brain work, everything; He will just be the G.o.d of your life. Study Him, find out the laws of His working, adjust yourself to Him, and then use His glorious resources.
CHAPTER VIII.
DIVINE HEALING IN THE PSALMS.
The Hebrew Psalter is the manual of religious experience for the children of G.o.d in every age. We may therefore expect that its rich devotional pages will express the physical conflicts and blessings of the trusting heart as well as the deeper and more spiritual states. We are not disappointed.
A SEDATIVE.
What is more necessary to physical health and comfort than sleep? And so we find the Psalmist like a tired and trusting child leaning upon his Father"s bosom and often echoing the sentiment of Psalm 127:2, "So He giveth His beloved sleep." This is better than all the sedatives and narcotics of medical science and we have not learned far in the blessed Gospel of healing if we have not yet learned the secret of going to sleep in the arms of our Lord. How finely this is expressed in these two pa.s.sages in the early Psalms of David, "I will both lay me down in peace and sleep, for Thou, Lord, only maketh me dwell in safety" (Ps. 4:8). And the other is but the echo of it, "I laid me down and slept. I awaked, for the Lord sustained me" (Ps. 3:5).
A PRAYER FOR HEALING, PSALM SIX.
Our next reference is a prayer for healing, "Have mercy upon me, 0 Lord, for I am weak. 0 Lord, heal me, for my bones are vexed. I am weary with my groanings. Every night I make my bed to swim. I water my couch with tears." This is indeed a bitter cry, but it is soon changed into a joyful song of praise, "Depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity, for the Lord hath heard the voice of my weeping, the Lord hath heard my supplication. The Lord will receive my prayer" (Ps. 6:2, 3, 8, 9).
PSALM EIGHTEEN.
We turn over a few pages and we come to the eighteenth Psalm, which is a sublime record of answered prayer. "It is G.o.d," he cries, "that girdeth me with strength and maketh my way perfect. He teacheth my hands to war so that a bow of steel is broken in mine arms" (vs. 32, 34). David"s physical prowess and victorious strength in battle were not due to the practiced muscles of the athlete, but to the supernatural power that fired his veins with divine strength and made his battles the battles of the Lord. The same strength is still available for those who trust in Him, and in the consciousness of His power our lives may be multiplied tenfold.
PSALM TWENTY-SEVEN.
Here is a fine burst of praise for physical life and deliverance from danger and from death, "I had fainted unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living" (Ps. 27: 13). It was not in the land of the hereafter but in the land of the living that he believed to see the goodness of the Lord, and he saw it.
PSALM THIRTY.
In the thirtieth Psalm we have again the double side of prayer and praise, "0 Lord, my G.o.d, I cried unto Thee and Thou hast healed me. Thou hast kept me alive that I should not go down to the grave. Weeping may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning. Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing. Thou hast put off my sackcloth and girded me with gladness" (vs. 2, 3, 5, II).
PSALM THIRTY-TWO.
The thirty-second Psalm is also a testimony of pardon and healing. "When I kept silence my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night Thy hand was heavy upon me. My moisture is turned into the drought of summer. I acknowledged my sin unto Thee and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord, and Thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Thou art my hiding place. Thou shalt preserve me from trouble. Thou shalt encompa.s.s me about with songs of deliverance" (vs. 4, 5, 7).
PSALM THIRTY-FOUR.
The thirty-fourth Psalm, it is needless to say, is one of the favorite Ebenezers of every victorious life. It tells of deliverance both from troubles and from fears, there is one precious promise in it that some of us have literally proved in hours of peril, "He keepeth all his bones, not one of them is broken. The Lord redeemeth the life of His servants and none of them that trust in Him shall be desolate" (vs. 20, 22).
PSALM THIRTY-NINE.
Here is a humbler and more sorrowful prayer that sometimes fits into the hour of deep depression (Ps. 39: 10-13). "Remove Thy stroke away from me: I am consumed by the blow of Thine hand. When Thou with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity Thou makest his beauty to consume away like a moth. Surely every man is vanity. Oh, spare me that I may recover strength before I go hence and be no more." But the next Psalm very soon turns the prayer into praise. "I waited patiently for the Lord and He inclined unto me and heard my cry. He bath put a new song in my mouth even praise unto our G.o.d."
PSALM FORTY-ONE.
We have come to one of the sweetest of the Psalms, and one that ought to be hung up in every chamber of sickness and pain. "The Lord will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing. Thou wilt turn all his bed in his sickness" (Ps. 41 : 3). How gentle His care! How paternal His nursing! How thoughtful His provision for the turning of our very couch, when, as sometimes happens, the trial lingers.
PSALM FORTY-TWO.
The forty-second Psalm has a fine expression in the eleventh verse, "Hope thou in G.o.d, for I shall yet praise Him who is the health of my countenance and my G.o.d." It is repeated in the following Psalm and it may well suggest the bright and shining face which G.o.d"s health gives to the countenance, and which we should ever wear as our testimony to Him.
PSALM FIFTY.
"Call unto Me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me" (Ps. 50: 15). This is a promise which may well cover every day of trouble and every case of sickness, need and pain.
PSALM FIFTY-ONE.
"Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which Thou hast broken may rejoice" (Ps. 51:8). Here we see that spiritual trouble brings on us physical prostration and distress and that forgiveness and blessing bring healing and comfort to the mortal frame.
PSALM FIFTY-FIVE.
Where shall we find a darker picture of the sinking life than in the fifty-fifth Psalm, verses 4-6? "My heart is sore pained within me: and the terrors of death are fallen upon me. Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me and horror hath overwhelmed me. And I said, Oh that I had wings like a dove, for then would I fly away and be at rest." But soon we hear once more the sweeter notes of praise, "As for me, I will call upon G.o.d; and the Lord shall save me. He hath delivered my soul in peace from the battle that was against me. Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee: he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved" (vs. 16, 18, 22).
PSALM FIFTY-SIX.
Again in the fifty-sixth Psalm, verse thirteen, we have another testimony of G.o.d"s deliverance from death. "I will render praises unto Thee, for Thou hast delivered my life from death." "Wilt Thou not deliver my feet from falling that I may walk before G.o.d in the light of the living?"
PSALM SIXTY-THREE.
There is a fine expression in the sixty-third Psalm, first verse, "My flesh longeth for Thee." There is such a thing as the crying out of our physical being to G.o.d for quickening and strength. Just as the babe lives on the life of its mother, so G.o.d is the supply of all our life and "man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of G.o.d." David had learned this deep secret of the divine life, and it is because of this that Christ has become for us the Living Bread, that he that eateth Him shall live by Him.
PSALMS SIXTY-EIGHT, SEVENTY-ONE AND SEVENTY-THREE.
"Blessed be the Lord who daily loadeth us with His benefits, even the G.o.d of our salvation. He that is our G.o.d is the G.o.d of salvation; and unto G.o.d the Lord belong the issues from death" (Ps. 68: 19, 20). "I will go in the strength of the Lord G.o.d. I will make mention of thy righteousness and of Thine only. Thou which hast shown me great and sore troubles shall quicken me again and shall bring me up again from the depths of the earth. Thou shalt increase my greatness and comfort me on every side" (Ps. 71: 16, 20, 21). "My flesh and my heart faileth: but G.o.d is the strength of my heart, and my portion forever. I am continually with Thee. Thou hast holden me by the right hand" (Ps. 73: 26, 23). All these are testimonies of the healing and strengthening touch of G.o.d.
GENERAL PROMISES.
There are general promises in the Scriptures and in the Psalms which cover all our needs, including the healing of our bodies. Such a promise is Psalm 84:II, "For the Lord G.o.d is a sun and shield: the Lord will give grace and glory: no good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly."
PSALM NINETY-ONE.
But it is needless to say the richest and fullest of the Psalms of help and healing is the ninety-first, and with this we may well pause for the present in our series of Psalm studies. It almost reads like a Psalm of Moses; the drapery of it reminds one of the tabernacle and the Holy of Holies, the secret place of the Almighty. Our s.p.a.ce will only permit us to call attention to three things in this beautiful Psalm.
I. What G.o.d Himself is.
1. He is the Most High, above all other power and therefore above all adversaries and evils, 2. He is the Almighty. This is the mighty Shaddai, the G.o.d who is sufficient.
3. He is a refuge, and fortress, that is, the One to whom we fly in times of danger, either for offensive or defensive warfare.
4. He is our habitation, for having found Him a shelter in danger we learn to dwell there as our abiding home when the danger is past.
II. What G.o.d will be to us and do for us.
1. He will deliver us from Satan and from sickness.
2. He will deliver us from fear as well as harm and keep our hearts in perfect rest.
3. He will guard us from all evil by angelic protection and ceaseless providence.
4. He will answer our prayers and honor and bless us.
5. With long life will He satisfy us and show us His salvation.