Signs Seen, and Not Seen 2
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But do they feel any love to the tried, the exercised, the sin-burdened, the distressed, the Satan-harassed? Do they love the faithful, bold, fearless soldiers of the great Captain of our salvation? Do they love those who will deal honestly with them, and strip off the false coverings that are spread over their hearts, and cannot be bought, by favor nor by gold, to say that which they do not feel. Do they love them? No, they are the last persons that they love. The smooth, the amiable, those who never say a word to ruffle them, nor to inflict a wound upon them, they can love; but the upright, the sincere, the straightforward, simple-hearted, living family, who dare not disguise their real sentiments when they are called to express them, these they hate with a total hatred, and account them their enemies.
Then, before you can write yourselves down to be living souls by the love that you feel to God's people, examine who the people are whom you really do love. Are they the broken-hearted, contrite, mourning, sighing, afflicted family? Do you feel soul-union with them, so as to be united to them with bonds of affection and love, feel a sympathy with them in their sorrows and trials, and not merely feel it, but manifest it by your words and conduct? not acting like those hypocrites spoken of by James, who say, "Be warmed and filled, and give them not those things which are needful to the body," but acting upon that which you profess, and manifesting by your words and actions the deep sympathy of your heart.
6. Love to Christ--that is another "sign" of God's special favor. "Whoever loves not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema; Maranatha," that is, let him be accursed; the Lord comes. And what solemn words are these spoken by the mouth of an inspired apostle! He must evidently mean, that he who lives and dies without this love to Christ shed abroad in his heart--for he cannot wish for the curse of God to rest upon the living family, who are not yet brought into the enjoyment of the love of Christ, but he who lives and dies without love to Christ--let him be "Anathema;" and this seems to be confirmed by what follows, "Maranatha," that is, "the Lord comes," to avenge himself on that man. Now, wherever there is a measure of faith toward Jesus, there will be a measure of love toward him. Faith and love are just proportionate. Just so much faith, just so much love; so that he that believes on the Lord Jesus, by the sweet testimony of Jesus to his soul will, just in the proportion of his faith, have a measure of love to that Redeemer who has enshrined himself in his warmest and tenderest affections.
7. Again, another "sign" of God's special favor--indeed, I may say, the grand sign of all--is, the witness of the Spirit to our spirits, that we are born of God. Some signs are immediate, other signs are but mediate, that is, they are seen through a medium. Some signs are like the sun shining upon a man's countenance, or into a man's eyes; he believes that which he sees. Other signs are like the same rays shining upon a mirror. They do not shine directly upon him, but he sees them reflected in that bright mirror which catches those beams. So some "signs" are reflected signs, mediate signs, that is, a man has certain feelings in his heart; he looks at the word of God, the glass and mirror of truth Jas 1:23 , and he see in it the very experience that he is passing through; and thus heavenly light is reflected from the mirror into his soul.
When the Lord the Spirit then shines upon his own truth in the word, and upon his own work in the soul, he stamps, more or less, a living testimony that the experience is genuine and divine. But, after all, nothing can really satisfy the living soul, but some immediate testimony from God himself. He must have the ray shining, not as reflected in a mirror, but streaming directly and immediately into his soul out of the glorious "Sun of righteousness," the Spirit himself bearing his own blessed inward testimony to his spirit, that he is born again, that he is a child of the living God, that he was chosen in Christ before all worlds, has been pardoned by atoning blood, has been called by the quickening Spirit, and is sealed an heir of glory.
8. Another sign is, a life and conversation agreeable to the gospel. Uprightness, sincerity, simplicity, humility, a walk which is manifest to others, though not so to ourselves, as becoming the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, are signs of the grace of God. And though this evidence is often no evidence to us, because we find so much sin mixed up with all that we say or do, that the evidence seems obscure and dim, and at times utterly lost, yet the family of God, whose eyes are opened to see what truth is, can read this evidence, and more than that, where they cannot read this evidence, they are bound, by the word of God, and by conscience, to stand in doubt of a man's religion. Where, then, there is a decided lack of moral honesty, sincerity, simplicity, uprightness, and straight-forwardness; or where there is a manifest absence of the fruits of love to the people of God, or of those plain marks and grand outlines of a Christian walk which the Scripture has traced out, in that case, we are bound, unless a man be in a great state of backsliding, we are bound to say, the life of God is absent.
Not but that there are wintry seasons, as I shall presently show, where the tree remains the same, and the fruits are fallen off; but still we expect the tree to bear fruit at some season of the year. If there are no leaves, no flowers, and no fruit at any one period, or at any one season, we are warranted in pronouncing that tree dead.
II. But we pass on to consider, What is the SEEING of these signs? There is, then, such a thing as "seeing a sign;" for, if there were not, why should the complaint have been poured forth? Why should the prophet have so piteously complained, "We see not our signs," unless they were, at times, to be seen! His complaints would be unfounded, were they never visible; and, therefore, the very lamentation shows, that there are times and seasons when the signs can be seen, as well as times and seasons when the signs cannot be seen.
Now, to revert a little to one of our previous illustrations, the way of life is called in the Scriptures a highway, a path, and similar expressions, indicative of a road. Those, then, that travel along this road will have at different intervals certain landmarks, what the Scripture calls "tokens for good"--Ebenezers--"stones of help." Now, what is requisite to see them? Why, surely the main requisite is LIGHT. The landmarks might still be there, the milestones might be every one in their place, their inscriptions might be perfectly legible, and yet, if it were dark, none of these landmarks could be traced out--none of these milestones could be seen. Light, then, is necessary in the soul, in order to "see our signs;" and this light--such a light as is spoken of in the Psalms--"With you is the fountain of life--in your light shall we see light;" corresponding with the Lord's expression, "The light of life." Then the light wherein we "see our signs," is not the moonlight of speculation, nor the frozen northern light of doctrine, nor the meteor light of delusion--nor the phosphoric light, which faintly glimmers from rotten evidences, nor "the sparks of their own kindling," which are elicited by the striking together of flinty hearts and steeled consciences. All this kind of light would be very insufficient to show us the road, stretched out over mountain and valley. We need some clearer, some brighter, some more powerful light, to show the whole extent of the road, that shall run for miles through a country, than a lantern can afford, or any dim light that we ourselves can create. Nothing less than the light of the sun can show us the whole road stretched out into a far distance, and thus, nothing but the light of God, streaming into our hearts, can ever illumine the road, so that we shall "see our signs."
There are times, then, when the Lord is pleased to revive his work in our souls, to draw forth those graces which he himself has implanted, and to shine upon that which he himself has produced. Sometimes, for instance, the fear of the Lord is acted upon by the blessed Spirit, and it rises up as a fountain of life. Some evidence is then afforded us, and we derive some comfort from the testimony that we have in us--not a dead profession, not a seared conscience, not a hard heart; that we are not abandoned to the power of sin, not given up to utter recklessness; but that we have a fountain of life springing up in contrition, in godly sorrow, in aspirations and breathings after the Lord, to manifest his special blessings.
So again, with respect to the sign of "the spirit of grace and of supplication." When this "spirit of grace and of supplication" is drawn forth into blessed exercise, a man has an inward testimony, that he is "praying in the Spirit," he feels that he is worshiping God "in spirit and in truth"--that he is drawing near to the throne of the Most High; that there is a power--a supernatural power, which is working in his soul, and enabling him to pour out his petitions and desires at God's feet. A man who has received "the spirit of grace and supplications" knows when his soul is favored therewith. If not, there is every reason to believe that he has never received it at all.
So, when a man is brought to loathe himself in "dust and ashes," and mourns, and sighs, and "groans, being burdened" with the sins in which he is entangled, with the snares and traps in which his feet have been caught, and to abhor himself as a beast before God--so far as his soul is humbled and broken within him, he has some evidence, some "sign," that he is not "given over to a reprobate mind"--he has some inward testimony, that he is not one of those, who roll sin as a sweet morsel under their tongues, and have no sorrow for their baseness and vileness before a heart-searching Jehovah; and though it can bring him no ease, nor give him peace of conscience, nor remove the guilt, yet he is, in some measure, brought to a brokenness of heart and tenderness of spirit; and he would a million times sooner be in the dust of humiliation and the posture of confession, than hardened in recklessness, or confident in presumption.
So again, when he has some measure of faith in Christ--when he is able to realize, more or less, according to the Spirit's operation, the blood, the righteousness, and the grace of Immanuel--when faith is drawn forth into exercise, and, spreading her arms, embraces Christ, as he is spiritually made known, there is some evidence, mark, symptom, or "sign," that he has a saving interest in this great redemption; and he has that in his soul, which, more or less, satisfies him and persuades him--not very deeply, perhaps, not very powerfully, not very abidingly--but while it lasts, while the heavenly sensations continue, before the vision is removed, gently and yet sweetly testifies to him of his eternal interest in the blood of the Lamb.
So, when he loves the people of God, and feels his heart burns with affection towards them, experiences a knitting of soul to the poor and tempted and exercised and tried and harassed family, and feels that there is no insincerity in his affection, but that there is a real communion of spirit, and a tender sympathy of soul--when these sensations are experienced, as long as the blessed feeling is in exercise, there is some sweet testimony that he has "passed from death unto life," because he loves God's living family.
But above all, when "the Sun of righteousness" is pleased to shine, and the Spirit himself bears its immediate testimony--then, above all things--then, above all times and seasons, will he have the testimony, will he see his signs, and be able to see his name written among the living; in Jerusalem.
III. "NOT seeing the signs." But we must turn to the other side of the picture. Most ministers are all for the bright side--all for speaking of consolation--of the Spirit's blessed testimony in the soul, and how the children of God walk in light and life and liberty and love. What is the consequence? They build up hypocrites, and they plaster with "untempered mortar" those that are dead in a profession; while they distress and trouble the living family who have tender consciences, and know that matters are usually very different with them. We must have, then, both sides of the question. We read in this Psalm Psalms 74:16,17, and it is a sweet testimony of the Lord, "The day is yours;" "Yes," says the dead Calvinist, "that is plain enough"--"the night also is yours." What do you think of that? "You have made summer;" "Yes," says the dry doctrinal professor, "God makes summer--it in always summer with me." But listen to what the Lord goes on to say, "and winter;" then the Lord "makes winter." Now, if you only know the Lord that made the day, and never knew the Lord that made the night--if you only know the Lord that made the summer, and do not know the Lord that made the winter, you do not know the God of the Bible, you do not know him as he has revealed himself in the Scriptures; then do not think that you know the "only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom be has sent," unless you know him as he has discovered himself in the Scriptures, as making day and night, summer and winter. There is, then, the night and the winter of the soul. When it is brought into this state, "we see not our signs," and the sweet testimonies are lost, not really, but experimentally; not lost out of the heart by the removal of their existence, but lost out of the feelings by a beclouding of them.
But to pursue the figure which I was just employing. What was requisite to see the signs? Day, bright day, the glorious sun in the sky, casting his blessed beams over mountain and dale, and flood and field, was necessary to see the broad landscape. The absence, then, of this, the withdrawal of this glorious orb of day, will produce just the contrary result to us; and when the soul is brought into this state, "we see not our signs." Now, these shades of darkness may be various.
For instance, there may rise up from some deep mine a cloud of pitchy smoke, which, as it rolls forth, shall cover the hemisphere, and so obscure all the path that is stretched out before the eyes. Such is infidelity, that black cloud, that column of murky, pitchy darkness, which rises out of the bottomless pit. When infidelity comes, with its clouds of pitchy darkness, into a man's soul, it obscures, buries, hides all his signs, because it spreads itself over the very foundations of truth; as the Psalmist says, "If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?" Bunyan has a striking expression on this point. Alluding to these feelings of infidelity, he says, "It is as though my belt were taken from me," that is, his garments were no longer in a fit state for him, "to run with patience the race set before him," but all his joints were unloosed, and he was in a state of absolute weakness. So, when this black, murky cloud of infidelity comes from the depths of the bottomless pit, it so darkens and obscures the word of God, and our experience, every outward as well as every inward testimony, that we are utterly unable to see any one sign, either the being of a God, or the existence of Christ, or the teaching of the Holy Spirit, or anything of a divine work upon our hearts and consciences.
But this road of which I was speaking, might be obscured by a fog coming over the face of the sky. Suppose you and I were standing on some lofty mountain, and we were gazing upon the outstretched prospect, and admiring the beautiful valleys, and the fruitful fields, and the flowing rivers, and the mountain lakes, and not only saw these, but saw also the road which we had been traveling, the different elevations over which we had come, the valleys in which we had been hidden, the village spires which we had marked upon our road, and the towns through which we had passed. Well, suppose while we stood looking upon the prospect, clouds gathered round about us, and mists and fogs came down from the upper regions of the sky. Would they not envelope not only the top of the mountain, but envelope us also who were standing there? Where is the road? or rather, where is our sight of the road? Are not all the landmarks gone? Is not the whole landscape obscured and dimmed, and with it the road we have traveled completely lost from our view?
Well, thus it is with the mists and fogs of unbelief that rise in a man's carnal mind, and spread themselves over the whole work of God in his soul. These mists and fogs hide all our evidences, obscure all our testimonies, envelop in deep obscurity the workmanship of God, and thus "we see not our signs." No fear of God in the soul, no godly sorrow for sin, no love to Christ, no love to the people of Christ, no sweet testimony of our interest in the blood of the Lamb can be seen; all are dimmed, obscured, and darkened by these mists and fogs that have spread themselves over our souls.
But there may be a third cause why we cannot see our signs. A man shall have traveled over many miles of country, and after he has journeyed over this long and waste tract, he shall come into a valley, into some deep depression between rising mountains. Can he see his road? Why, no. There are mountains behind and mountains before; and these mountains shut out the road, so that he cannot look back upon the path that he has passed, and can only see just the spot where he is at the present moment. So, when the living soul gets into the valley of trouble, "the valley of Achor," as the Scripture speaks, into the valley of confusion, the valley of darkness, the valley of soul-temptation, the valley of self-abhorrence and self-loathing; why, these mountains behind, and these mountains before, block out his prospect. When he would gladly look behind him to see the road he has traveled, there is a huge, black, desolate, rocky mountain, so that be cannot see the road that he has passed over; it is blocked up, and he only wonders how he got where he is. But he IS there, and he cannot get out. And then the road before him, he cannot see it, for there are mountains before him as well as mountains behind him. Bozez in front, and Seneh in the rear 1Sa 14:4.
Well then, these mountains of trial, of difficulty, and of temptation, these rough and rugged mountains which stretch forth their lofty peaks into the sky, seem impassable for his galled and aching feet, and not merely impassable, but they block out all view of that heavenly country to which he is tending, and where he is dragging his weary and toiling steps. He cannot "see his signs;" the Ebenezers are hidden, the milestones which have tracked his path are altogether out of sight by the obstacles that intervene between him and them.
But we read also that "the sun knows his going down," and that "the Lord makes darkness, and it is night" Psalm 104:19,20. So the child of God sometimes shall lose all sight of his signs by the sun going down upon them. There are different ways of not seeing the landmarks; there is the going down of the sun and the night coming on, as well as the murky clouds of infidelity, the mists and fogs of unbelief, and the high rocky mountains which block in the valley of humiliation. So the child of God sometimes shall come into a state of darkness, and cannot tell how he came there. But he is in darkness because the sun has set, though he has never moved from the spot; for the sun goes down just as much upon one who stands still, as upon one who is traveling. Thus a man might stand upon this mountain that I have been describing, but when the sun went down, the landscape would be lost; it would he all dimmed and obscured from his view. So when the "Sun of Righteousness" goes down, when the Lord "makes it dark," and all the beams and rays out of that glorious fountain of light are removed by the withdrawal of the orb itself; then darkness covers the man's heart, he gropes for the wall like the blind, and he gropes as if he had no eyes, he stumbles in desolate places like dead men. All is dark around him and he is dark to it. He can neither see his signs, nor see the sun which makes these signs visible. And he sits mourning in darkness, until the Lord is pleased, once more, to cause the sun to rise upon his soul.
Such then is, more or less, the chequered path of the Christian--such is a feeble sketch of the way in which the Lord leads his people through this waste wilderness. But God's people cannot be satisfied with "not seeing their signs." It is a subject of mournful complaint with them. The hypocrites in Zion catch up the language of the saints, for there is nothing more easily picked up, than a few of the expressions which are in the mouth of God's tried family. You will find professors, whom God has never quickened into spiritual life, when they are in the company of God's people, hanging down their heads like bulrushes, and imitating and aping the gestures and language of the living family of Zion. "I am so dark, so dead, so carnal, so unbelieving." You are quite right, you are so because you always were so--you never were otherwise. No doubt you are dead, because you are dead in sin; no doubt you are carnal, because you never were spiritual; no doubt you are unbelieving, for God never gave you living faith; no doubt you are cold, for you have never had a ray of warmth out of the Sun of righteousness. It is not, then, being dead and cold and carnal, but it is what we feel in these seasons.
A traveler, who was journeying over and exploring the rocky Alps, if the sun were to go down or fogs were to arise, would not say, "How dark it is here! I am in darkness; surely I am right now. Oh! the sun is gone down, it is an evidence that I am in the right road;" and feel a kind of pleasure at the very darkness which surrounds him, and hides the landscape from his view. Were he thus to congratulate himself; should we not say he was a fool or a madman? So for one professing to stand upon the very brink of eternity to say, "I am dark, I am dead, I am carnal, I am worldly, I am covetous"--to pick up these feelings as so many evidences, gather up this counterfeit money, and spread it abroad as solid gold, go with this base coin in his hand among the family of God, to pass it off as from heaven's mint--why, every living soul should snatch it out of his hand, and strike a nail through it, that it may stand as an evidence on the counter that the money is forged.
The living soul may be, and continually is, barren, dark, stupid, carnal and dead, but he cannot congratulate himself upon his deadness, nor rejoice in his darkness, nor take an evidence from his barrenness. It will be, as the Lord the Spirit works in him, a subject of complaint with him, it will be his grief, his trouble, his plague, his burden; he can no more take comfort from his disease, that a man in a consumption can take comfort from his cough, or a man in a fever from his burning sensations of heat, or a man who has fallen from a building can take pleasure in his broken limb. He will want a cure, a blessed remedy; he will want life instead of death, light instead of darkness, spirituality instead of carnality, heavenly-mindedness instead of worldliness, a heart enlarged to run the way of God's commandments, instead of sluggishness, slothfulness, and carelessness. "We see not our signs," it is the language of lamentation.
Now where are you? Are you there? You never have been there, if you have not had signs. And if there were not any signs to see, why does the prophet who penned this Psalm say, mourning, "we see not our signs!" For the same reason that some of the Jews wept, when they saw the second temple erected upon the ruins of the first. Why did they weep? It was not because the temple was not so large a temple as the preceding; that did not grieve them, for the second temple was, in some respects, a nobler and more beautiful building than the first, but the glory of the Lord had departed--that made them weep. "Ichabod" was written upon the walls. The ark of the covenant, the Shechinah, the Urim and the Thummin, the fire upon the bronze altar, and the Spirit of prophecy had all departed. The Lord had left the house, and that was the reason why the elders wept, while the younger, who had never seen the presence of the Lord, rejoiced.
Apt emblem, striking illustration, of the difference between the living soul and the dead professor! The temple shorn of its glory, and the departure of that which was all its ornament and all its beauty, made the elders mourn and weep. But the younger rejoiced in the external beauty of the temple, for they knew nothing of that inward glory which had departed when the Lord was justly provoked with their iniquities, and gave up the building which he had consecrated by his presence, to be spoiled by the Chaldeans.
So the living soul will be mourning and complaining that he sees not his signs, while the mere empty professor of religion will be looking at the external beauty of the building, admiring the harmony of the doctrines, the grand scheme of salvation, the glorious plan of the covenant, and the fair proportions traced out in God's word, while he knows nothing of the inward glory of the temple in the manifested presence of God. But what avails admiration of the columns and architecture of the building without, if he knows nothing of the ark of the covenant within the temple sprinkled with blood; nor of the fire from heaven on the bronze altar; nor of the Shechinah--the divine presence as a cloud on the mercy seat; nor of the Urim and Thummin, those oracles of God to teach him, and warn him when he turns to the right hand, or to the left; nor of the Spirit of prophecy, whereby he is enabled to pour out his soul in inspired language, and offer up to God those feelings with which the Holy Spirit, "the Spirit of grace and of supplication," indites in his heart.
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