March 7

What shall disturb it? "Who," says the apostle triumphantly, "shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth?" So, when those charges occur again, we must plead guilty to them: but the same faith brings the same peace and rest.

3. God is the rest of the soul, as our chief good. Man's chief good was a subject of discussion and dispute for ages; philosophers not agreeing in what it consisted. All, however, acknowledged this,—that in whatever it might consist, the soul could rest in nothing inferior. Here they were right. That chief good is revealed to us. "I am God all sufficient," said the Lord to Abraham. Meditate on this. He is sufficient for himself, and for all others. Like his emblem, the sun, he has a fullness of light in himself, and yet, with regard to the sun, were a thousand millions more creatures to crowd the earth, not one of them should want light and heat; and were a thousand more earths placed in the sweep of space, there are light and vitality sufficient for them all. The same remark applies to God. Here then the Spirit rests. That which prevents rest in the creature is, that there is a degree of desire in us beyond what the creature can gratify. You see and feel the proof of this everywhere. But can you extend your desires beyond what you see in God, or beyond what he can supply? He could make the creature to you far more excellent and satisfying than it is; for all good in the creature is already from him; and one effect of his blessing is, to make the creature more satisfying. If he give, for instance, a thankful heart; if he sanctify, and take the curse from your lawful enjoyments; if he give his grace to your children and friends, and array them with his image; he can thus make them more satisfying to you. In heaven he will make the creature more full and felicitous. What then is he, the Fountain? "Whom have we in heaven but him?" He is all purity, all power, all constancy, all condescension, all fullness. "The Lord is my light and my salvation," says the Psalmist. "The Lord God is a sun and shield: the Lord will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly." It is under these views that the soul rests in him.

4. God is the rest of the soul, as our almighty protector. It is not possible for us seriously to look around at our dangers, without being convinced how much we need a guardianship higher than our own caution and strength. Evil lies in ambush in every circumstance. Satan employs his artifices and malignity; the world its enticements and snares. Sometimes the malice of men assails us. "Let me not fall into the hand of man," says David. He feared THAT more than pestilence. There is sometimes a formidable array of perplexing circumstances, which no human hand can turn, any more than it could prevent the collection of clouds and storms, rising in some dark quarter of the heavens. Great is the disquiet of the soul if it has no hope in God. But God is the refuge of his saints; and, as such, the soul rests in him. "What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee." "But David encouraged himself in the Lord his God." "When my heart is overwhelmed," tossed, agitated, as by waves, "lead me to the Rock that is higher than I." From that Rock the soul sees the swelling of the storm, but is secure. So the prophet rested in God when the Syrian army was about him. His servant saw only the Syrians; he saw the mountain full of horses and chariots of fire. Hence the lofty language of the psalm, "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof."

5. God is the rest of the soul, as our great and ultimate end. We have an object in all things. Some objects are unlawful; others lawful; but when lawful, there ought to be an end beyond and above the objects themselves; and that end is God. We may make success, credit with others, the attaining of some good, the avoidance of some trouble, our ends; and lawfully, if they be subordinate ones. But the soul will not find its rest in them. Nothing but doing, and suffering, and enjoying all to the glory of God, can make them subservient to our rest. "Walk before me," in the sight of me. Then we have the "testimony that we please God." Then the soul rests.

"Return, my soul, unto thy rest; From God no longer roam; His hand hath bountifully blest; His goodness calls thee home."