cried, how I groaned before him; and he has pardoned me, and blessed be his name for it. But I cannot estimate the value of his pardon today as well as I could when I was seeking it — almost driven to despair. Oh, remember soul, when you asked for pardon you were asking for what worlds could not buy; you were asking for what could only be procured through the lifeblood of the Son of God. Oh! what a boon was that! And yet he did not look you in the face and say, “You have asked for too much.” No, but he gave it freely. He did not upbraid you; he blotted out all your sins, and washed you at once in the river of the Saviour’s blood. Since that time what large things have you asked for! You were in trouble once; it seemed as if bankruptcy must overtake you, and you cried to him. If the world heard it, it would have said, “What a fool are you to ask this from your God — he will never deliver you!” Unbelief, like Rabshakeh, wrote a blasphemous letter, and you laid it before the Lord; but even when you were in prayer, your heart said, “The Lord will not deliver you this time. The lion will surely devour you. The furnace will most certainly burn you up.” But you did put up a poor, groaning prayer, and you dared to ask great things, namely, that God would put his hand out of heaven and save you from the waters, that the flood might not overflow you. Are you not surprised at this time that you dared to ask for so much? You would not dare to ask so largely from any of your friends; you would not have gone to one and said, “I must have a thousand pounds by such and such a day, will you lend it to me?” — you knew you would not get it. Yet you asked for it from your God. It came, and here you are, among the living to praise his name; and if this would be the right place you would stand up and testify that God heard you, that in the day of sorrow and tribulation he delivered you. Now do you not love him for giving you such great things as these? God’s mercies are so great that they cannot be magnified; they are so numerous they cannot be multiplied, so precious they cannot be over estimated. I say, look back today upon these great mercies with which the Lord has favoured you in answer to your great desires, and will you not say, “I love the Lord because he has heard my voice and my supplications?”
12. V. Another aspect of this case, perhaps, will touch our hearts more closely still. HOW TRIVIAL HAVE BEEN THE THINGS WHICH WE HAVE OFTEN TAKEN BEFORE GOD, AND YET HOW KINDLY HAS HE CONDESCENDED TO HEAR OUR PRAYERS. It is a singular thing, that our hearts are often more affected by little things than by great things. You may feed a child all the year around, and never get his thanks, but give it a desert or a treat, and you may have his heart and his gratitude. Strange that the bounties of a whole year should seem to be lost, while the gift of a moment is greatly prized. A little thing, I say, may often touch the heart more than a great thing. Now, how often have we, if we have acted rightly, taken little things before the Lord. I believe it is the Christian’s privilege to take all his sorrows to his God, whether small or great. I have often prayed to God about a matter at which you would laugh if I should mention it. In looking back I can only say it was a little thing, but it seemed great at the time. It was like a little thorn in the finger; it caused much pain, and might have brought forth, at last, a great wound. I learned to lay my little troubles at the feet of Jesus. Why should we not? Are not our great ones little? and is there, after all, much difference between great troubles and little ones in the sight of God? The queen will stand for one hour listening to her ministers, who talk with her about public business, but does she seem less a queen when, afterwards, her little child runs to her as its mother, because a bee has stung it? Is there any great condescension in the matter? She who was a right royal queen when she stood in the privy chamber is as right royal a queen and as well beloved a mother of the nation, when she takes the little child upon her knee, and gives it a maternal kiss. Her ministers must not present trifling petitions, but her children may. So the worldling may say this morning, “How absurd to think of taking little troubles to God.” Ah! it might be absurd to you, but to God’s children it is not. Though you were God’s prime minister, if you were not his child, you would have no right to take your private troubles to him; but God’s lowest child has the privilege of casting his care upon his Father, and he may rest assured that his Father’s heart will not disdain to consider even his lowly affairs. Now let me think of the innumerable little things God has done for me. In looking back, my unbelief compels me to wonder about myself, that I should have prayed for such little things. My gratitude compels me to say, “I love the Lord, because he has heard those little prayers, and answered my little supplications, and made me blessed, even in little things which, after all, make up the life of man.”
13. VI. Once more, let me remind you, in the sixth place, of THE TIMELY ANSWERS WHICH GOD HAS GIVEN TO YOU FOR YOUR PRAYERS, and this should compel you to love him. God’s answers have never come too soon or too late. If the Lord had given you his blessing one day before it came, it might have been a curse, and there have been times when if he had withheld it an hour longer it would have been quite useless, because it would have come too late. In the life of Mr. Charles Wesley, there occurs a memorable scene at Devizes. When he went there to preach, the curate of the parish assembled a great mob of people, who determined to throw him into the horse pond, and if he would not promise that he would never come into the town again they would kill him. He escaped into the house and hid himself upstairs. They besieged the house for hours, battering at the doors, breaking every pane of glass in the windows, and at last to his consternation, they climbed onto the roof, and began to throw the tiles down into the street, in order to enter the house from above. He had been in prayer to God to deliver him, and he said, “I believe my God will deliver me”; but when he saw the heads of the people over the top of the room where he was hiding, and when they were just about to leap down he very nearly gave up all hope, and he thought surely God would not deliver him, when in rushed one of the leaders of the mob, a gentleman of the town who did not wish to incur the guilt of murder, and proposed to him that he would get him away if he would only promise that he would never come back again. “No,” said he, “I will never promise that.” “But,” said the man, “Is it your intention that you will not return immediately?” “Well” he said, “I do not say I shall come back just yet, I do not see any use in it. Since you drive me away, therefore I shall shake off the dust of my feet against you, but I mean to come back again before I die.” “Well,” said the man, “that will do, if you only promise you will not come back immediately, I will get you out.” And so, by a great deliverance, he was saved from the jaw of the lion and the paw of the bear. His prayer was answered at the right time. Five minutes afterwards he would have been dead. Now can you not say that the answer has come to you punctually at the very tick of the clock of wisdom; not before nor after.
14. VII. Now, the seventh remembrance with which I would inspire you is this — will you not love the Lord, when you remember the special and great instances of his mercy to you? You have had times of special prayer and of special answers. Let me picture a man. There was one who did not fear God, nor regarded man. He was engaged in business, and his affairs were not propitious, but rather everything went against him. He went against God, and kicked the more because God kicked against him. He had employees working for him who feared God and worshipped him; but as for himself, he had no thought or regard for religion. His affairs became more and more perplexing and involved. One day he passed by the house of one of his employees, where prayer was accustomed to be made, and listening, he heard words uttered in supplication that touched his heart. Though he was the employer, he went inside and listened to his employee while he preached. God touched that man’s heart, and made him feel his need for a Saviour. He went home, and he had now double cause for prayer. He went to the Lord, and told him he was a poor, wretched undone sinner, and that he needed mercy; and then besides that he told the Lord (though he did not make it very prominent,) that he was a poor, almost bankrupt merchant; and that if God did not help him, he knew that he must be driven out of house and home. These two cases were laid before God. First of all, God heard his prayer for his soul. He gave him joy and peace in believing; and poor as he was at that time, he found enough to assist in erecting a house where the gospel might be preached. The Lord who had delivered him spiritually, now came to his assistance temporally. His affairs took a different turn; floods of prosperity rolled in upon him, and he is to this very day a living witness of the power of God to answer man’s prayer for spiritual and for temporal things too. And if it would be needed, he could bear his willing witness of special answer in that special time of necessity. And
