Saviour’s blood’s a full discharge;
At his dear feet my soul I lay,
A sinner saved, and homage pay.
And oh! my heart pants for you. Oh that you who never knew him could taste his love now. Oh that you who have never repented might now receive the Holy Spirit who is able to melt the heart! And oh that you that are penitents would look to him now! And I repeat that solemn assertion — I am God’s hostage this morning; you shall feed me on bread and water to my life’s end, indeed, and I will bear the blame for ever, if any of you seek Christ, and Christ rejects you. It must not, it cannot be. “Whoever comes,” he says, “I will in nowise cast out.” “He is able to save to the uttermost those who come to God by him.” May God Almighty bless you; and may we meet again in heavenly paradise; and there we will sing more sweetly of redeeming love and dying blood, and of Jesus’ power to save —
When this poor lisping, stammering tongue,
Lies silent in the grave.
Israel In Egypt
No. 136-3:233. A Sermon Delivered On Sunday Morning, June 14, 1857, By C. H. Spurgeon, At The Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.
And they sing the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and marvellous are your works, Lord God Almighty; just and true are your ways, oh King of saints. {Revelation 15:3 }
1. At the outset, let us remark the carefulness of the Holy Spirit in guarding the honour of our blessed Lord. This verse is often quoted as if it says thus — “They sing the song of Moses and the Lamb.” This mistake has led many weak minds to wonder at the expression, for they have imagined that it divided the honour of the song of heaven between Moses and the Redeemer. The clause — “the servant of God” — is doubtless inserted by the Holy Spirit to prevent any error upon this point, and therefore it should be carefully included in the quotation. I take it that the song of Moses is here united with the song of the Lamb, because the one was a type and picture of the other. The glorious overthrow of Pharaoh in the Red Sea foreshadowed the total destruction of Satan and all his host in the day of the great battle of the Lord; and there was in the song of Moses the expression of the same feelings of triumph which will pervade the hearts of the redeemed when they shall triumph with their Captain.
2. May God the Holy Spirit enable me to exhibit the parallel which exists between the condition of Israel when passing through the sea, and the position of the church of Christ at the present day. Next, we shall compare the triumph of the Lord at the Red Sea with the victory of the Lamb in the great and terrible day of the Lord. And lastly, I shall point out certain prominent features of the song of Moses, which will doubtless be as prominent in the song of the Lamb.
3. I. First, it is our business to regard THE POSITION OF THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL AS EMBLEMATIC OF OUR OWN. And here we observe, that like the church of God the vast host of Israel had been delivered from bondage. We, my brethren, who constitute a part of the Israel of God, were once the slaves of sin and Satan; we served with hard bondage and rigour while in our natural state; no bondage was ever more terrible than ours; we indeed made bricks without straw, and laboured in the very fire; but by the strong hand of God we have been delivered. We have come forth from the prison house; with joy we behold ourselves emancipated — the Lord’s free men. The iron yoke is taken from our necks; we no longer serve our lusts, and pay obedience to the tyrant’s sin. With a high hand and an outstretched arm, our God has led us forth from the place of our captivity, and joyfully we pursue our way through the wilderness.
4. But with the children of Israel it was not all joy; they were free, but their master was at their heels. Pharaoh was loathe to lose so valuable a nation of servants; and therefore with his chosen captains, his horsemen, and his chariots, he pursued them in angry haste. Frightened Israel beheld her infuriated oppressor close at her rear, and trembled for the issue — the hearts of the people failed them while they saw their hopes blighted and their joys ended by the approach of the oppressor; even so it is with some of you; you think you must be driven back again like dumb cattle, into Egypt, and once more become what you were. “Surely,” you say, “I cannot hold on my way with such a host seeking to drive me back; I must again become the slave of my iniquities.” And thus dreading apostasy, and feeling that you would rather die than become what you were; you this morning are filled with trepidation. You are saying, “Alas! for me! Better that I had died in Egypt than that I should have come out into this wilderness to be captured again.” You have tasted for a moment the joys of holiness and the sweets of liberty; and now again to go back to endure the bondage of a spiritual Egypt, would be worse than before. This is the position of the sacramental host of God’s elect; they have come out of Egypt, and they are pursuing their way to Canaan. But the world is against them; the kings of the earth stand up, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his people, saying, “Let us scatter them; let us utterly destroy them.” From the fiery days of the stakes of Smithfield {a} even until now, the world’s black heart has hated the church, and the world’s cruel hand and laughing lip have been for ever against us. The host of the mighty are pursuing us, and are thirsty for our blood, and anxious to cut us off from the earth. Such is our position to this hour, and such must it be until we are landed on the other side of Jordan, and until our Maker comes to reign on the earth.
5. But once more: the children of Israel were in a position more terrible than this. They came to the edge of the Red Sea; they feared their enemies behind; they could not flee on either hand, for they were flanked by mountains and stupendous rocks; one course only was open to them, and that course was through the sea. God commands them to go forward. The rod of Moses is outstretched, and the frightened waters divide; a channel is left while the floods stand upright, and the waters are congealed in the heart of the sea. The priests, bearing the ark, march forward; the whole host of Israel follow. And now behold the wondrous pilgrimage. A wall of alabaster is on either side, and myriads are in the pebbly depths. Like a wall of glass the sea stands on either side of them, frowning with overhanging cliffs of foam; but still on they march; and until the last of God’s Israel is safe the water stands still and firm, frozen by the lips of God. Such, my hearers, is the position of God’s church now. You and I are marching through a sea, the floods of which are kept upright only by the sovereign power of God. This world is a world which is suddenly to be destroyed; and our position in it is just the position of the children of Israel, for whose sake the floods refused to meet until they were safely landed. Oh church of God! you are the salt of the earth: when you are removed this earth must putrify and decay. Oh living army of the living God! you, like Israel, keep the floods of providence still standing fast; but when the last of you shall be gone from this stage of action, God’s fiery wrath and tremendous anger shall dash down upon the ground in which you now are standing, and your enemies shall be overwhelmed in the place through which you now walk safely. Let me put my thoughts as plainly as I can. Naturally, according to the common order, the Red Sea should have flowed on in a level and even manner, constant in its waves and unbroken in its surface. By the might of God the Red Sea was divided into two parts, and the floods stood back. Now notice. Naturally, according to the common course of justice, this world, which groans and travails until now, ought, if we only consider the wicked, to be utterly destroyed. The only reason why the Red Sea afforded a safe passage for the host was this — that Israel marched through it; and the only reason why this world stands, and the only reason why it is not destroyed by fire, as it is to be at the last great day, is because God’s Israel are in it; but when once they shall have passed through, the parted floods shall meet their hands, and embrace with eager joy to clasp the adverse host within their hands. The day is coming when this world shall reel to and fro and stagger like a drunken man. Every Christian may say, with due reverence to God, “The earth is dissolved; I bear up its pillars.” Let all the Christians that are in this world die, and the pillars
