The Sweetest Sounds

“I will behave myself wisely in a perfect way. O when wilt thou come unto me? I will walk within my house with a perfect heart.” — Psalm 101:2.

The hundredth psalm is perhaps the best known song of praise in the word of God. To sing the “Old Hundredth” has been a habit of worshippers from generation to generation — the custom of every succeeding age, as it is our custom still. “Make a joyful noise unto the Lord all ye lands.” Now, it is somewhat significant that the hundred-and-first, which immediately follows it, should be such a practical psalm, — all about how a man should walk in his house, how he should put away sin from his very eyes, and keep himself from evil companionship. What does it seem to teach us but this, that the best praise is purity, and that the best music in the world is holiness?

If we would extol the Lord, the best way to do it is to labor to keep his mind before us, and to walk in his commandments. The sweetest sounds that ever came from the heaving bellows or the organ pipes can never have so much melody in them as a life that is tuned to the example of Christ. If we obey, we praise. He singeth best who worketh best for God. There is no praise that excels that which is like the praise of angels, “who do his commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word.”

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "A Holy And Homely Resolve." Image by Paul Bica on Flickr under Creative Commons License.

Your consecration will break your temptation

Nine out of every ten questions which can possibly come before you in your business are already answered when the grand question is settled. Is such an action dishonest? Then it matters nothing how profitable it might be, it is dismissed as quite beyond consideration. Is such a course necessitated by honesty? Then let it be followed whatever the loss may be. David prayed “lead me in a plain path because of mine enemies,” and the man who has made up his mind by divine grace that he will serve the Lord has that prayer fulfilled.

 This saves many men from temptation. Satan tempts those who can be tempted, but when he finds men sufficiently resolved there is a certain order of temptation with which he never assails them any more. He adapts his devices to our standing, and does not use for lion-hearted minds those petty nets with which he takes small birds. As a giant walks along unconscious of the cobwebs across his path, so does a thoroughly consecrated man break through a thousand temptations, which indeed to him are no longer temptations at all.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Decision - Illustrated By The Care Of Joshua," delivered April 18, 1875. Image by Paul Bica on Flickr under Creative Commons License.

Not relying on my own purity

We differ also from those who place reliance upon moral virtues and spiritual excellencies, and even from those who would have us found our hope upon certain graces supposed to be the works of the Holy Spirit. Had we been the most courageously honest, had we been the most chastely pure, had we never offended against the law of man in any respect whatever, if we could say with the apostle “as touching the law blameless,” and if, like the young man in the gospel narrative, re could say of the commandments, “All these things have I kept from my youth up,” yet would we count our virtues and obediences to be but dross that we might win Christ and be found in him, not having our own righteousness which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.

We dare not hope to be acceptable with God because of anything good that is in us by nature, or may be infused into us by grace: we are accepted in the Beloved, and apart from him we look not to be found acceptable. Even what the Holy Ghost works with us does not furnish us with any merit which we can plead, for it is a gift of grace, and no part of our justifying righteousness. We rest upon Jesus Christ crucified, and not upon our faith, our repentance, our prayers, our conquests of sin, our likeness to Christ. Right away from anything that comes from us or to us we look to Jesus, who is all our salvation, the Alpha and Omega, the author and the finisher of faith.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Salvation By Faith And The Work Of The Spirit," delivered April 11, 1876. Image by wildxplorer on Flickr under Creative Commons License.

Those who appreciate Him

There are some who do appreciate the sweetness of Christ. I would to God I could find such out this morning. Hungry souls, we are brethren. If you are hungry after pardon, mercy, and grace, I remember when I was in your condition. What would you give to have Christ? “I would give my eyes,” says one. Give him your eyes, then, by looking to him, and you shall have him. “What would I give,” saith one, “to be delivered from my besetting sin! I hunger after holiness.” Soul, you may have deliverance from besetting sins, and have it for nothing.

Jesus Christ has come into the world to save his people from their sins, and looking to him he will deliver you from that disease which now makes you love sin, and he will give you a taste for holiness, and a principle of holiness by the Holy Ghost, and you shall henceforth become a saint unto God. He turns lions into lambs, and ravens into doves; nothing is impossible with him. You have but to trust your soul with him and you shall have pardon, peace, holiness, heaven, God, everything.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Spiritual Appetite," delivered April 4, 1875. Image by SteveB in Denver on Flickr under Creative Commons License.

If He strengthens me

It may not please God to lessen the burden, but it comes to the same thing if he strengthens the back. He may not recall the soldier from the battle, but if he gives him a greater stomach for the fight, and increased strength for its toils, it may be better still for him. “The spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity, but a wounded spirit who can bear?” Give a man health in his countenance, and he laughs at that which would have crushed him had he been in another mood. There are times when the grasshopper becomes a burden, and there are other seasons when with undaunted spirit we can say, “Who art thou, O great mountain? Before Zerubabel thou shalt become a plain.”

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Secret Of Health," delivered March 25, 1875. Image by Steve Jurvetson on Flickr under Creative Commons License.