Tender Comfort
God's comfort is a tender and loving comfort that invites us to holy familiarity and unreserved confidence.
C.H. Spurgeon emphasizes the profound comfort that a mother provides, illustrating how God mirrors this tenderness in His role as our Comforter. He invites us to approach God with unreserved confidence, knowing that just as a mother empathizes with her child's grief, God understands our sorrows and weaknesses. Spurgeon reassures us that we can share our troubles with God without fear of judgment, as He is compassionate and gentle. The sermon encourages us to begin and end our days in the presence of our loving God, who never tires of comforting us.
Text
As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you. (Isaiah 66:13)
A mother's comfort! Ah, this is tenderness itself. How she enters into her child's grief! How she presses him to her bosom and tries to take all his sorrow into her own heart! He can tell her all, and she will sympathize as nobody else can. Of all comforters the child loves best his mother, and even full-grown men have found it so.
Does Jehovah condescend to act the mother's part? This is goodness indeed. We readily perceive how He is a father; but will He be as a mother also? Does not this invite us to holy familiarity, to unreserved confidence, to sacred rest? When God Himself becomes "the Comforter," no anguish can long abide.
Let us tell out our trouble, even though sobs and sighs should become our readiest utterance. He will not despise us for our tears; our mother did not. He will consider our weakness as she did, and He will put away our faults, only in a surer, safer way than our mother could do. We will not try to bear our grief alone; that would be unkind to one so gentle and so kind. Let us begin the day with our loving God, and wherefore should we not finish it in the same company, since mothers weary not of their children?
Sermon Outline
- God's Comfort as a Mother
- God's Condescension
- Unreserved Confidence in God
- We should tell out our troubles to God
- He will not despise us for our tears
Key Quotes
“As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you.” — C.H. Spurgeon
“We will not try to bear our grief alone; that would be unkind to one so gentle and so kind.” — C.H. Spurgeon
Application Points
- You should not try to bear your grief alone, but instead, come to God with your troubles.
- God will consider your weakness and put away your faults, so you can have unreserved confidence in Him.
- You can have holy familiarity with God by recognizing His comfort and willingness to be involved in your life.