So that your youth is renewed like the eagle's

“Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things, so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” — Psalm 103:5.

Beloved, there is need of this. Every Christian man has need that his soul should be restored, should be refreshed, re-invigorated, newly quickened. As to those who are saved, there is a constant need restoring them to their first love. This is promised in the words before us. I say there is need of it. There is need of it, first, because of the ordinary wear and tear, which operate upon spiritual life, as well as upon every other form of life. You cannot serve God, you cannot praise, you cannot pray, you cannot do anything without some expenditure of strength; and, therefore, you need to have that strength renewed. Moreover, in such a world as this, combatting with temptations, bearing up against the current of society, and I know not what besides of difficulty, takes away our strength. We need, therefore, to go and drink again of the brook by the way, that we may lift up our head once again. The ordinary wear and tear of spiritual life requires this.

Besides that, we are often the subjects of sinful decline. Backsliding is too common a complaint among Christians. We can ascend to the top of the mountain and dwell with God, but our foot soon begins to descend. There is a gravitation towards sinfulness in the best of men. Oh! that it were not so, but we are very conscious that it is so, and, therefore, we need to have the renewal.

From a sermon entitled "Our Youth Renewed," delivered February 24, 1870.

Photo by Nic McPhee; some rights reserved.