The Everlasting Arms
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One of the sweetest passages in the Bible is this one: "Underneath are the everlasting arms." It is not often preached from; perhaps because it is felt to be so much richer and more touching than anything we ministers can say about it. But what a vivid idea it gives of the Divine support! The first idea of infancy is of resting in arms which maternal love never allows to become weary. Sick-room experiences confirm the impression, when we have seen a feeble child lifted from the bed of pain by the stronger ones of the household. In the case of our Heavenly Father, the arms are felt—but not seen. The invisible support comes to the soul in its hours of weakness or trouble; for God knows our feebleness, He remembers that we are but dust.
We often sink very low under the weight of sorrows. Sudden disappointments can carry us, in an hour, from the heights—down to the very depths! Props which we leaned upon—are stricken away. What God means by it very often—is just to bring us down to "the everlasting arms." We did not feel our need of them before. We were "making flesh our arm," and relying on human comforts or resources.
When my little boy dashes off to his play, brimful of glee, he does not stop to think much about his parents; but let him be taken suddenly sick, or an accident befall him—and his first thought is to run to his mother! God often lays His hand heavily upon us—to remind us that we have a FATHER. When my neighbor broke in business, and twenty-four hours made him a bankrupt, he came home, saying to himself, "Well, my money is gone—but Jesus is left!" He did not merely come down to reality—he came to something far more solid—to the everlasting arms!
When another friend laid her godly boy in his coffin, after the scarlet-fever had done its worst—she laid her own sorrowful heart upon the everlasting arms. The dear little sleeperwas there already. The Shepherd had His lamb.
There is something about deep sorrow which tends to wake up the child-feeling in all of us. A man of giant intellect becomes like a little child—when a great grief smites him, or when a grave opens by his fireside. I have seen a stout sailor, who laughed at the tempest, come home when he was sick, and let his old mother care for him—as if he were a baby. He was willing to lean on the arms which had never failed him. So a Christian in the time of trouble is brought to this child-feeling. He needs to lean somewhere, to talk to somebody, to have somebody love him and hold him up. His extremity becomes God's opportunity. Then his humbled, broken spirit cries out,
"O Lord, a little helpless child
Comes to You this day for rest;
Take me, fold me in Your arms,
Hold my head upon Your breast."
One great purpose in all affliction—is to bring us down to the everlasting arms. What new strength and peace it gives us—to feel them underneath us! We know that, as far as we may have sunk—we cannot sink any farther. Those mighty arms can not only hold us, they can lift us up. They can carry us along. Faith, in its essence, is simply a resting on the everlasting arms. It is trusting them—and not our own weakness. The sublime act of Jesus as our Redeemer was to descend to the lowest depths of human depravity and guilt, and to bring up His redeemed ones from that horrible pit—in His loving arms. Faith is just the clinging to those arms—and nothing more.
This first lesson in conversion, is to be practiced and repeated all through the subsequent Christian life. To endeavor to lift our own souls by our own strength—is as absurd as to attempt to lift our bodies by grasping hold of our own clothes. The lift must come from God. Faith cries out, "O my Lord, You have a mighty arm—hold me up-and I shall be safe!" The response from heaven is, "I have found you—My arm shall strengthen you—on My arm shall you trust." Here lies the very core of the doctrine of "Assurance." It simply means that every true Christian can feel perfectly sure—that the everlasting arms will never break and never fail us.
I am not so sure that in some moment of waywardness, or pride, or self-sufficiency, I may not forsake those arms, and trust to my own wretched weakness. Then the curse which God has pronounced on those who depart from Him and "make flesh their arm" is certain to come upon me. I learn from bitter experience what a pitiable object even a Christian can be—when he has forsaken the Living Fountain, and has nothing left but his own broken cistern!
God's Word is full of precious encouragement to faith—but it contains terrible warnings against presumption and self-confidence. And while Presumption is swinging on its spider's web over the perilous precipice, Faith calmly says—
"All my trust on You is stayed,
All my help from You I bring."
While Unbelief is staggering through the darkness, or sinking in the waves of despair, Faith triumphantly sings—
"Safe in the arms of Jesus,
Safe on His gentle breast,
Here, by His love o'ershadowed,
Sweetly my soul does rest."
This is the theology for times of temptation. Such times are sure to come. They are the testing processes. A recent violent storm tested every tree in the forest; only the rottenones came down. When we read or hear how some professed Christian has turned back to the world, or lapsed into drunkenness, or slipped into open disgrace—it simply means that a human arm has broken. The man had forsaken the everlasting arms. David did it once—and fell. Daniel did not do it—and he stood. "The Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptation."
This is a precious theology, this theology of trust—for the sick-room. This week we visited one of Christ's suffering flock. We talked for a time about the ordinary consolations for such cases as hers. Presently we said, "There is a sweet text which has been running in our mind recently— Underneath are the everlasting arms!" The tears came in a moment; that precious passage went to the right spot; it did good like a medicine; and our suffering friend lay more comfortable on that bed of pain from feeling that underneath her were the everlasting arms! Reader, may they be under your head in the dying hour!
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