“Even to your old age I am he, and even to hoar hairs will I carry you. I have
made, and I will bear; even I will carry, and will deliver you.” Isaiah 46:4
THOSE will be peculiar circumstances under which I shall stand up to
address the people next Tuesday; circumstances which perhaps seldom
occur, — possibly may never have occurred before. It might have been
more in order that the aged minister should himself address the people; but
nevertheless, as it is his own choice, so it must be; and I shall draw my
consolation from the third verse, where it is declared, that though God be
the God of the close of our life, yet he is also the God of its beginning. He
carries us from the very womb; therefore the child may trust in God, as
well as the grey head; and he who giveth special blessings to the hoary
hairs does also crown the head of the young with his perpetual favor, if
they be his children.
“Even to your old age I am he;
and even to hoar hairs will I carry you.”
Will you allow me to expound the doctrine of this text, and then to show
you how it is carried out, especially in the time of old age?
I. THE DOCTRINE OF THE TEXT I hold to be, the constancy of God’s loge,
its perpetuity, and its unchangeable nature. God declares that he is not
simply the God of the young saint; that he is not simply the God of the
middle-aged saint: but that be is the God of the saints in all their ages from
the cradle to the tomb. “Even to old age I am he ;” or, as Lowth beautifully
and more properly translates it, “Even to old age I am the came, and even
to hoary hairs will I carry you.”
The doctrine, then is twofold: that God himself is the same, whatever may
be our age; and that God’s dealings towards us, both in providence and in
grace, his carryings and his deliverings, are alike unchanged.
As to the first part of the doctrine, that God himself is unchanged when we
come to old age, surely I have no need to prove that. Abundant testimonies
of Scripture declare God to be an immutable being, upon whose brow
there is no furrow of old age, and whose strength is not enfeebled by the
lapse of ages; but if we need proof, we might look even abroad on nature,
and we should from nature guess that God would not change during the
short period of our mortal life. Seemeth it unto me a hard thing, that God
should be the same for seventy years, when I find things in nature that have
retained the same impress and image for many more years? Behold the sun!
The sun that led our fathers to their daily labor, lighteth us still; and the
moon by night is unchanged, — the self-same satellite, glittering with the
light of her master, the sun. Are not the rocks the same? And are there not
many ancient trees, which remain well nigh the same for multitudes of
years, and outlive centuries? Is not the earth, for the most part, the same?
Have the stars lost their light? Do not the clouds still pour their rain upon
the earth? Does not the ocean still beat with its one great pulse of ebb and
flow? Do not the winds still howl, or breathe in gentle gales upon the
earth? Doth not the sun still shine? Do not plants grow as heretofore? Hath
the harvest changed? Hath God forgotten his covenant of day and night?
Hath he yet brought another flood upon the earth? Doth it not still stand in
the water and out of the water? Surely, then, if changing nature, made to
pass away in a few more years, and to be “dissolved with fervent heat,”
remains the same through the cycles of seventy years, may we not believe
that God, who is greater than nature, the creator of all worlds, would still
remain the same God, through so brief a period? Does not that suffice?
Then, we have another proof. Had we a new God, we should not have the
Scriptures: had God changed, then we should need a new Bible. But the
Bible which the infant readeth is the Bible of the grey head; the Bible which
I carried with me to my Sunday School, I shall sit in my bed to read, when,
hoary-headed, all strength shall fail save that which is divine. The promise
which cheered me in the young morning of life, when first I consecrated
myself to God, shall cheer me when my eyes are dim with age, and when
the sunlight of heaven lights them up, and I see bright visions of far-off
worlds, where I hope to dwell for ever. The word of God is still the same;
there is not one promise removed. The doctrines are the same; the truths
are the same; all God’s declarations remain unchanged for ever; and I
argue, from the very fact that God’s Book is not affected by years, that
God himself must be immutable, and that his years do not change him.
Look at our worship — is not that the same? Oh, hoary heads! well can ye
remember how ye were carried to God’s house in your childhood; and ye
heard the selfsame hymns that now ye hear. Have they lost their savor?
Have they lost their music? At times, when prayer is offered, ye remember
that your ancient pastor prayed the same petition fifty years ago; but the
petition is as good as ever. It is still unchanged; it is the same praise, the
same prayer, the same expounding, the same preaching. All our worship is
the same. And with many it is the same house of God, where first they
were dedicated to God in baptism. Surely, my brethren, if God had
changed, we should have been obliged to make a new form of worship:; if
God had not been immutable, we should have needed to have sacrificed
our sacred service to some new method; but since we find ourselves
bowing like our fathers, with the same prayers, and chanting the same
psalms, we rightly believe that God himself must be immutable.
But we have better proofs than this that God is still unchanged. We learn
this from the sweet experience of all the saints. They testify that the God
of their youth is the God of their later years. They own that Christ “hath
the dew of his youth.” When they saw him first, as the bright and glorious
Immanuel, they thought him altogether lovely;” and when they see him
now, they see not one beauty faded, and not one glory departed: he is the
self-same Jesus. When they first rested themselves on him, they thought his
shoulders strong enough to carry them; and they find those shoulders still
as mighty as ever. They thought at first his bowels did melt with love, and
that his heart was beating high with mercy; and they find it still the same.
God is unchanged; and therefore they “are not consumed.” They put their
trust in him, because they have not yet marked a single alteration in him.
His character, his essence, his being, and his deeds are all the same; and,
moreover, to crown all, we cannot suppose a God, if we cannot suppose a
God immutable. A God who changed would be no God. We could not
grasp the idea of Deity if we once allowed our minds to take in the thought
of mutability. From all these things, then, we conclude that “even from old
age he is the same, and that even to hoary hairs he will carry us.”
2. The other side of the doctrine is this, not only that God is the same in his
nature, but that he is the same in his dealings; that he will carry us the
same, that he will deliver us the same, that he will bear us the same as he
used to do. And here, also, we need scarcely to prove to you that God’s
dealings towards his children are the same especially when I remind you
that God’s promises are made not to ages, but to people, to persons and to
men. It has been recently declared by some ministers, that certain ages are
more likely to be converted than other ages. We have heard persons state,
that should a man outlive thirty years of life, if he has heard the Gospel, he
is not at all likely to be saved; but we believe a more palpable, bare-faced
lie was never uttered in the pulpit, for we have, ourselves, known
multitudes who have been saved at forty, fifty, sixty, seventy, and even
bordering on the grave at eighty. We find some promises in the Bible made
to some particular conditions; but the main, the great, the grand promises,
are made to sinners as sinners; they are made to the elect, to the chosen
ones, irrespective of their age or condition. We hold, that the man who is
old, can be justified in the same way as the man who is young; that the robe
of Christ is broad enough to cover the strong full-grown man as well as the
little child. We believe the blood of Christ avails to wash out seventy years,
as well as seventy days of sin; that “with God there is no respect of
persons,” that all ages are alike to him, and that “whosoever cometh unto
Christ, he will in nowise cast out,” and sure we are, that all the good things
of the Bible are as good at one time as at another. The perfect robe of
righteousness that I wear, will that change by years? The sanctification of
the Spirit, will that be destroyed by years? The promises, will they shake?
The covenant, will that be dissolved? I can suppose that the everlasting
hills shall melt; I can dream that the eternal mountains shall be dissolved,
like the snow upon their peaks; I can conceive that the ocean maybe licked
up with tongues of forked flame; I can suppose the sun stopped in his
career; I can imagine the moon turned into blood; I can conceive the stars
falling from the vault of night; I can imagine “the wreck of nature and the
crash of worlds;” but I cannot conceive the change of a single mercy, a
single covenant blessing, a single promise, or a single grace, which God
bestows upon his people, for I find every one of them in itself stamped with
immutability, and I have no reason to put this merely upon guess-work. I
find, when I turn over the whole Bible that the experience of the saints, one
thousand, two thousand, three thousand years ago, was just the same as
the experience of the saints now; and if I find God’s mercy is unchanged
from David’s time till mine, can I conceive that God, who lasts the same
for thousands, would change during the brief period of seventy? Nay still
we hold that he will carry us, and he will bear us in old age as well as in
our youth. But, besides that, we have living witnesses, living testimonies. I
could fetch up from the ground floor of this place, and from the galleries,
not one or two, but twenty yea a hundred living witnesses, who, rising up,
would tell you that God doth carry them now, as he did of old, and that he
still doth bear them. I need not appeal to my friends, or they would stand
up in their pews, and with the tears trickling down their cheeks, they would
say, “Young men, young women, trust your God; he hath not forsaken
me!” I find that —
“Even down to old age, all his people do prove,
His sovereign, eternal, unchangeable love
And when hoary hairs do their temples adorn
Like lambs they now still in his bosom are borne.”
Ask yon aged friend, ask any aged Christian, whether he finds God has, in
the least forsaken him, and you will see him shake his head, and hear him
say, “O young man, if I had another seventy years to live, I would trust him
still, for I have not found him fail all the way that the Lord God hath led
me. Not one promise hath failed, but all hath come to pass;” and I think I
see him lifting up his hand in the midst of the assembly, and saying, “I have
nothing to regret but my sin. If I had to live over again, I should only want
to put myself into the hands of the same Providence, to be led and directed
by the self-same grace.” Beloved, we need not prove to you farther, for
living witnesses do testify, that God carried out his promise, “I have made
and will bear; even I will carry and deliver you.
II. But now we come to our real subject, which is, to consider THE TIME
OF OLD AGE AS SPECIAL PERIOD, and to mark, therefore, the constancy of
divine love — that God bears and succors his servants in their later years. I
cannot imagine or dream that I need offer any apology for preaching to
aged people. If I were in sundry stupid circles where people call themselves
ladies and gentlemen, and always want to conceal their ages, I might have
some hesitation; but I have nothing to do with that here. I call an old man,
an old man, and an old woman, an old woman; whether they think
themselves old or not is nothing to me. I guess they are, if they are getting
anyway past sixty, on to seventy or eighty. Old age is a time of peculiar
memories, of peculiar hopes, of peculiar solicitudes, of peculiar
blessedness, and of peculiar duties; and yet in all this, God is the same,
although man be peculiar.
1. First, old age is a time of peculiar memory; in fact, it is the age of
memory. We young men talk of remembering such-and-such things a
certain time ago; but what is our memory, compared to our father’s? Our
father looks back on three or four times the length of time over which we
cast our eyes. What a peculiar memory the old man has! How many joys he
can remember! How many times has his heart beat high with rapture and
blessedness! How many times has his house been gladdened with plenty!
How many harvest homes has he seen! How many “readings of the
vintage! How many times has he heard the laugh run round the ingle fire!
How many times have his children shouted in his ear, and rejoiced around
him! How many times have his own eyes sparkled with delight! How many
hill Mizarehas he seen! How many times has he had sweet banquetting with
the Lord! How many periods of communion with Jesus! How many
hallowed services hath he attended! How many songs of Zion hath he
sung! How many answered prayers have gladdened his spirit! How many
happy deliverances have made him laugh for joy! When he looks back, he
can string his mercies together by the thousand! and looking upon them all,
he can say, though he will think of many troubles that he has had to pass
through, “Surely, goodness and mercy have followed me all the days of my
life.” God hath been with him to hoary hairs, and even to old age he hath
carried him. His joys he looks back upon as proofs of God’s constancy.
And how many griefs hath he had! How many times hath that old man been
to the chamber of sickness! How many times hath that aged sister been
stretched on the bed of affliction! How many diseases can he or she look
back upon! How many hours of bitter travail and pain! How many seasons
of trouble, infirmity, and approachings to the grave? How many times hath
the old man tottered very near that bourne from which no traveler can
return? How many times hath he had the Father’s rod upon his shoulders?
And yet, looking back upon all, he can say, “Even to old age he is the
same; and even to hoary hairs he hath carried me.” How frequently, too,
hath that old man gone to the grave where he hath buried many he has
loved? There, perhaps, he has laid a beloved wife, and he goes to weep
there; or, the husband sleeps, while the wife is yet alive. Sons and
daughters, too, that old man can remember — snatched away to heaven
almost as soon as they were born; or, perhaps, permitted to live until their
prime, and then cut down just in their youthful glory. How many of the old
friends he hath welcomed to his fireside hath he buried? How frequently
has he been forced to exclaim, “Though friends have departed, yet ‘there is
a Friend who sticketh closer than a brother,’ on him I still trust, and to him
I still commit my soul.”
And mark, moreover, how many times temptation hath shattered that
venerable saint! how many conflicts hath he had with doubts and fears!
how many wrestlings with the enemy! how often he hath been tempted to
forsake his faith! how frequently he hath had to stand in the thickest part of
the battle; but yet he has been preserved by mercy, and not quite cut down.
He has been enabled to persevere in the heavenly road. How travel-sore
are his feet! How blistered by the roughness of the way; but he can tell
you, that notwithstanding all these things, Christ hath “kept him till this
day, and will not let him go;” and his conclusion is, “even to old age God
hath been the same, and even to hoary hairs he hath carried him.”
There is one sad reflection which we are obliged to mention when we look
upon the bald head of the aged saint, and that is, how many sins he hath
committed! Ah! my beloved, however pure may have been your lives, you
will be obliged to say, “Oh! how have I sinned, in youth, in middle age, and
even when infirmities have gathered around me! Would to God I had been
holy! How often have I forsaken God! how frequently have I wandered
from him! alas! how often have I provoked him! How frequently have I
doubted his promises, when I had no cause whatever to distrust him! how
frequently has my tongue sinned against my heart! how constantly have I
violated all I knew to be good and excellent! I am forced to say now, in my
grey old age, —
Nothing in my hands I bring,
Simply to thy cross I cling.”
I am still —
“A monument of grace,
A sinner saved by blood”
I have no hope now, save in the blood of Christ, and can only wonder how
it is that Christ could have preserved me so long. Truly, I can say, “Even to
old age he is the same, and even to hoary hairs he hath carried me.”
2. The aged man, too, hath peculiar hopes. He hath no such hopes as I or
my young friends here. He hath few hopes of the future in this world; they
are gathered up into a small space, and he can tell you, in a few words,
what constitutes all his expectation and desire. But he has one hope, and
that is the very same which he had when he first trusted in Christ; it is a
hope “undefiled, that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for them that are
inept by the power of God through truth unto salvation.” Let me talk a
little of that hope, and you will see from it that the Christian is the same as
ever he was; and even down to hoary hairs God deals the same with him.
My venerable brother, what is the ground of thy hopes. Is it not the same
as that which animated thee when thou wast first united with the Christian
Church? Thou saidst then, “My hope is in the blood of Jesus Christ.” I ask
thee, brother, what’s thy hope now, and I am sure thou wilt answer, “I do
not hope to be saved because of my long service, nor because of my
devotedness to God’s cause.”
“All my hope on Christ is staid,
All my help from him I bring:
He covers my defenceless head
With the shadow of his wing.”
And, my brother, what is the reason of thy hope? If thou art asked what
reason thou hast to believe thou art a Christian, thou wilt say, “The selfsame
reason I gave at the Church-meeting.” When I came before it, I said,
then “I believe myself to be a child of God, because I feel myself to be a
sinner, and God has given me grace to put my trust in Jesus.” I think that is
all the reason you have to believe yourself a child of God now. At times
you have some evidence, as you call it; but there are hours when your
graces and virtues are obscured, and you cannot see them; for gloomy
doubts prevail, and you will confess, I am sure, that the only way to get rid
of your doubts will be, to come and say, again, —
“A guilty, weak, and helpless worm,
On Christ’s kind arms I fall.
He’s still my strength and righteousness,
My Savior and my all.”
And the object or end of hope, is not that the same? What was your hope
when you first went to the wicket gate? Why, your hope was that you
might arrive at the land of the Messed. And is it not the same now? Is your
hope of heaven changed? Do you wish for anything else, or for anything
better? “No,” you will say, “I thought when I started I should one day be
with Jesus; that is what I expect now. I feel that my hope is precisely the
same. I want to be with Jesus, to be like him, and to see him as he is.” And
is not the joy of that hope just the same? How glad you used to be when
your minister preached about heaven, and told you of its pearly gates and
streets of shining gold! and has it lost any of its beauty in your eyes now?
Do you not remember, that in your father’s house, at family prayer, one
night, they sang, —
“Jerusalem, my happy home,
Name, ever dear to me I
When shall my labors have an end
In joy, and peace, and thee”?
Cannot you sing that now? Do you want any other city besides Jerusalem?
Do you remember how they used to rise up sometimes in the house of
God, when you were children, and sing, —
“On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand,
And cast a wishful eye!”
Will not that hymn do for you now even better than it did for you then?
You can now sing it, as your old father used to sing it, with a firm heart,
and yet with a quivering lip. The hope that ravished you then ravishes you
now. You start at the same watchword. Heaven is your home still.
“There your best friends, your kindred dwell,
There, God your Savior reigns.”
Does not all this prove, again, that though our hopes are somewhat more
contracted than they were, yet “God is still the same, and even to hoary
hairs he will carry us.”
3. Again, old age is a time of peculiar solicitude. An old man is not
anxious about many things, as we are; for he hath not so many things for
which to concern himself. He hath not the cares of starting in business, as
he once had. He hath no children to launch out in business. He hath not to
cast his anxious eyes on his little family. But his solicitude hath somewhat
increased in another direction. He hath more solicitude about his bodily
frame than he once had. He cannot now run as he used to do; but he must
walk with more sober gait. He fears every now and then that the pitcher
will be “broken at the cistern;” for “the noise of the grinders is low.” He
hath no longer that strength of desire he once possessed; his body begins to
totter, to shake, and to quiver. The old tenement has stood these fifty
years; and who expects a house to last for ever? A bit of mortar has gone
off from one place, and a lath out of another; and when a little wind comes
to shake it about, he is ready to cry out, “The earthly house of my
tabernacle is about to be dissolved.” But I told you before, this peculiar
solicitude is but another proof of divine faithfulness; for now that you have
little pleasure in the flesh, do you not find that God is just the same? and
that, though the days are come when you can say, “I have no pleasure in
them,” yet the days are not come when you can say, “I have no pleasure in
him;” but, on the contrary,
Though all created streams are dry,
His goodness is the same.
With this you still are satisfied,
And glory in his name.”
If he had only been your God when you were a strong young man, you
might have thought that he loved you for what you could do for him; but,
now you have become a poor worn-out pensioner, have you any better
proof that he is an unchanging God, because he loves you when you can do
so little for him? I tell you, even your bodily pains are but proofs of his
love; for he is taking down your old tenement stick by stick, and is building
it up again in brighter worlds, never to be taken down any more.
And remember, too, there is another solicitude — a failure of mind, as well
as of body. There are many remarkable instances of old men, who have
been as gifted in their old age as in their youth; but with the majority the
mind becomes somewhat impaired, especially the memory. They cannot
remember what was done yesterday, although it is a singular fact that they
can remember what was done fifty, sixty, or seventy years ago. They forget
much which they would wish to remember; but still they find that their God
is just the same; they find that his goodness does not depend on their
memory; that the sweetness of his grace does not depend upon their palate.
When they can remember but little of the sermon, they still feel that it
leaves as good an impression on their heart as when they were strong in
their memories; and thus they have another proof that God, even when
their mind faileth a little, carries them down to their hoar hairs, their old
age, and that to them he is ever the same.
But the chief solicitude of old age is death. Young men may die soon. Old
men must die. Young men, if they sleep, sleep in a siege; old men, if they
sleep, sleep in an attack, when the enemy has already made a breach, and is
storming the castle. A greyheaded old sinner is a greybeaded old fool; but
an aged Christian is an aged wise man. But even the aged Christian hath
peculiar solicitudes about death. He knows he cannot be a long way from
his end. He feels that, even in the course of nature, apart from what is
called accidental death, there is no doubt but in a few more years he must
stand before his God. He thinks he may be in heaven in ten or twenty years;
but how short do those ten or twenty years appear! He does not act like a
man who thinks a coach is a long way off, and he may take his time; but he
is like one who is about to go a journey, and hears the post-horn blowing
down the street, and is getting ready. His one solicitude now is, to examine
himself whether he is in the faith. He fears that if he is wrong now, it will
be terrible to have spent all his life dabbling in profession, and to find at last
that he hath got nothing for his pains, except a mere empty name, which
must be swept away by death. He feels now how solemn a thing the Gospel
is; he feels the world to be as nothing; he feels that he is near the bar of
doom. But still, beloved, mark, God’s faithfulness is the same; for if he be
nearer death, he has the sweet satisfaction that he is nearer heaven; and if
he has more need to examine himself than ever, he has also more evidence
whereby to examine himself; for he can say, “Well, I know that on suchand-
such an occasion the Lord heard my prayer; at such-and-such a time he
manifested himself to me, as he did not unto the world,” and, though
examination presses more upon the old, still they have greater materials for
it. And here, again, is another proof of this grand truth. “Even unto old age
I am the same,” says God, “and even to hoar hairs will I carry you.”
4. And now, once more, old age hath its peculiar blessedness. Some time
ago I stepped up to an old man whom I saw when preaching at an
anniversary, and I said to him, “Brother, do you know, there is no man in
the whole chapel I envy so much as you.” Envy me,” he said — “why, I am
eighty-seven.” I said, “I do, indeed; because you are so near your home,
and because I believe that in old age there is a peculiar joy, which we
young people do not taste at present. You have got to the bottom of the
cup, and it is not with God’s wine as it is with man’s. Man’s wine becomes
dregs at the last, but God’s wine is sweeter the deeper you drink of it.” He
said, “That’s very true, young man,” and shook me by the hand. I believe
there is a blessedness about old age that we young men know nothing of I
will tell you how that is. In the first place, the old man has a good
experience to talk about. The young men are only just trying some of the
promises; but the old man can turn them over one by one, and say, “There,
I have tried that, and that, and that.” We read them over and say, “I hope
they are true’” but the old man says, “I know they are true.” And then he
begins to tell you why. He has got a history for everyone, like a soldier for
his medals; and he takes them out, and says, “I will tell you when the Lord
revealed that to me; just when I lost my wife; just when I buried my son;
just when I was turned out of my cottage, and did not get work for six
weeks; or, at another time, when I broke my leg.” He begins telling you the
history of the promises, and says, “There! now, I know they are all true.”
What a blessed thing, to look upon them as paid notes; to bring out the old
cheques that have been cashed, and say, “I know they are genuine, or else
they would not have been paid.” Old people have not the doubts young
people have about the doctrines. Young people are apt to doubt, but when
they get old, they begin to get solid and firm in the faith. I love to get some
of my old brethren, to talk with me concerning the good things of the
kingdom. They do not hold the truth with their two fingers, as some of the
young men do; but they get right hold of it, and nobody can take it from
their grasp. Rowland Hill once somewhat lost his way in a sermon, and he
turned to this text — “Oh, Lord, my heart is fixed.” “Young men,” he said,
“there is nothing like having your hearts fixed. I have been all these years
seeking the Lord; now my heart is fixed. I never have any doubts now
about election, or any other doctrine. If man brings me a new theory, I say,
‘Away with it!’ I stand hard and fast by the truth alone.” An old gentleman
wrote me a little time ago, and said I was a little too high. He said he
believed the same doctrines as I do, but he did not think so when he was as
old as I am. I told him it was just as well to begin right as to end right, and
it was better to be right at the beginning than to have to rub off so many
errors afterwards. An old countryman once came to me, and said, “Ah
young man, you have had too deep a text; you handled it well enough, but
it is an old man’s text, and I felt afraid to hear you announce it.” I said, “Is
God’s truth dependent on age? If the thing is true, it is just as well to hear
it from me as from any one else; and it you can hear it better anywhere
else, you have got the opportunity.” Still, he did not think that God’s
precious truths were suitable to young people; but I hold they are suitable
to all God’s children; therefore I love to preach them. But how blessed it is
to come to a position in life where you have good anchorage for your faith,
— where you can say,
“Should all the forms that hell devise,
Assail my faith with treacherous art.”
I shall not be very polite to them —
“I’ll call them vanity of lies
And bind the Gospel to my heart.”
And I think there are peculiar joys which the old Christian has, of another
sort; and that is, he has peculiar fellowship with Christ, more than we have.
At least, if I understand John Bunyan rightly, I think he tells us that when
we get very near to heaven there is a very glorious land. “They came into
the country of Beulah, whose air was very sweet and pleasant; the way
lying directly through it, they solaced themselves there for a season. Yea,
here they heard continually the singing of birds, and saw every day the
flowers appear on the earth, and heard the voice of the turtle in the land. In
this country the sun shineth night and day; wherefore this was beyond the
valley of the Shadow of Death, and also out of the reach of Giant Despair;
neither could they from this place so much as see Doubting Apostle. Here
they were within sight of the City they were going to: also here met them
some of the inhabitants thereof: for in this land the shining ones commonly
walked, because it was upon the borders of heaven. In this land also the
contract between the Bride and the Bridegroom was renewed; yea, here, as
the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so doth their God rejoice over
them. Here they had no want of corn and wine; for in this place they met
with abundance of what they had sought for in all their pilgrimages. Here
they heard voices from out of the City, loud voices, saying, ‘Say ye to the
daughter of Zion, Behold, thy salvation cometh.’ Behold, His reward is
with him. Here all the inhabitants of the country called them, ‘the holy
people, the redeemed of the Lord.’” There are peculiar communings,
peculiar openings of the gates of paradise, peculiar visions of glory, just as
you come near to it. It stands to reason that the nearer you get to the
bright light of the celestial city, the clearer shall be the air. And therefore
there are peculiar blessednesses belonging to the old, for they have more of
this peculiar fellowship with Christ. But all this only proves that Christ is
the same; because, when there are fewer earthly joys, he gives more
spiritual ones. Therefore, again, it becomes the fact — “Even to old age I
am he; and even to hoar hairs will I carry you.”
5. And now, lastly, the aged saint has peculiar duties. There are certain
things which a good man can do, which nobody else ought to do, or can do
well. And that is one proof or divine faithfulness; for he says of his aged
ones, “They shall bring forth fruit in old age;” and so they do. I will just tell
you some of them.
Testimony is one of the peculiar duties of old men. Now, suppose I should
get up, and say, “I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed
begging bread,” some one would reply, “Why, you are not twenty-two yet;
what do you know about it?” But if an old man gets up, and says, “I have
been young, and now am I old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken,
nor his seed begging bread,” with what power that testimony comes!
Suppose I say to you, “Trust in God, with all thy troubles and trials; I can
bear witness that he will not forsake you;” you will reply, “Oh! yes, young
man, but you have not had man troubles; you have not been a child of God
above these six years; how should you know?” But up gets an old Christian
— and well do I remember an ancient Christian rising up at the sacramental
table, and saying, “Dear brethren, we are met again around this table, and I
think all an old man can do is to bear testimony to his master. These fiveand-
forty years, I have walked in his truth. Young people, hear what I have
to say. He has been my God these five-and-forty years, and I have no fault
to find with him; I have found religion’s ways to be ways of pleasantness,
and her paths to be paths of peace.” You know, if you hear an old man
talk, you pay greater attention to what he says, from the fact that he is old.
I remember hearing the late Mr. Jay. I fancy that if I had heard the same
sermon preached by a young man, I should not have thought so much of it;
but there appeared such a depth in it because is came from an old man,
standing on the borders of the grave; it was like an echo of the past,
coming to me, to let me bear my God’s faithfulness, that I might trust for
the future. Testimony is the duty of old men and women; they should labor
whenever they can to bear testimony to God’s faithfulness, and to declare
that now also, when they are old and gray-headed, their (loaf forsakes them
not.
There is another duty which is peculiarly the work of the aged, and that is,
the work of comforting the young believer. There is no one more qualified
that I know of than a kindhearted old men to convert the young. I know
that down in some parts of the country there is a peculiar breed of old man,
who for the good of the Church I heartily hope will soon become extinct
As soon as they see a young believer, they look at him with suspicion,
expecting him to be a hypocrite; they go off to his house, and find
everything satisfactory; but they say, “I was not so confident as that when I
was young; young man, you must be kept back a bit.” Then there are some
hard questions put, and the poor young child of God gets hardly pressed,
and is looked upon with suspicion, because he does not come up to their
standard, But the men I allude to are such as some I have here, with whom
I delight to speak, who tell you not hard things, but utter gentle words:
who say, “I was imprudent when I was a young man. I know that when I
was a little child I could not have answered these questions; I do not
expect so much from you as from one who is a little older.” And when the
young Christian comes to them they say, “Do not fear: I have gone through
the waters, and they have not overflown me; and through the fire, and have
not been burned. Trust in God; ‘for down to old age he is the same, and to
hoar hairs he will carry you.’”
Then there is another work that is the work of the old, and that is, the
work of warning. If an old man were to go out in the middle of the road,
and shout out to you to stop, you would stop sooner than you would if a
boy were to do it; for then you might say, “Out of the way, you young
rascal,” and go on still. The warnings of the old have great effect; and it is
their peculiar work to guide the imprudent, and warn the unwary.
Now I have done, except the application. And I want to speak to three
classes of persons.
What a precious thought, young men and women, is contained in this text
— “That even to old age God will be the same to you; and even down to
your hoar hairs he will not forsake you!” You want a safe investment; well,
here is an investment safe enough. A bank may break; but heaven cannot A
rock may be dissolved, and if I build a house on that it may be destroyed;
but if I build on Christ, my happiness is secure for ever. Young man! God’s
religion will last as long as you will; his comforts you will never be able to
exhaust in all your life; but you will find that the bottle of your joys will be
as full when you have been drinking seventy years, as it was when you first
began. Oh! do not buy a thing that will not last you: “eat ye that which is
good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness.” Oh! how pleasant it is to
be a young Christian! How blessed it is to begin in the early morning to
love and serve God! The best old Christians are those who were once
young Christians. Some aged Christians have but little grace, for this
reason — that they were not young Christians. Oh! I have sometimes
thought, that if there is any man who will have an abundant entrance into
heaven, it is the man who in early life was brought to know the Lord. You
know, going into heaven will be like the ships going into harbor. There will
be some tugged in almost by miracle, “saved so as by fire;” others will be
going in just with a sheet or two of canvas — they will “scarcely be
saved!” but there will be some who will go in with all their canvas up, and
unto these “an abundant entrance shall be ministered into the kingdom of
their God and Savior.” Young people! it is the ship that is launched early in
the morning that will get an abundant entrance, and come into God’s haven
in full sail.
Now, you middle aged men, you are plunged in the midst of business, and
are sometimes supposing what will become of you in your old age. But is
there any promise of God to you when you suppose about to-morrows?
You say, “Suppose I should live to be as old as so-and-so, and be a burden
upon people, I should not like that.” Don’t get meddling with God’s
business; leave his decrees to him. There is many a person who thought he
would die in a workhouse, that has died in a mansion; and many a woman
that thought she would die in the streets, has died in her bed, happy and
comfortable, singing of providential grace and everlasting mercy. Middle
aged man! listen to what David says, again, “I have been young, and now
am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging
bread.” Go on, then, unsheath thy sword once more. “The battle is the
Lord’s; leave thy declining years to him, and give thy present years to him.
Live to him now, and he will never cast you away when you are old. Do
not lay up for old age and keep back from the cause of God; but rather
trust God for the future. Be “diligent in business;” but take care you do not
hurt your spirit, by being too diligent, by being grasping and selfish.
Remember you will
“Want but little here below,
Nor want that little long.”
And lastly, my dear venerable fathers in the faith, and mothers in Israel,
take these words for your joy. Do not let the young people catch you
indulging in melancholy, sitting in your chimney corner, grumbling and
growling, but go about cheerful and happy, and they will think how blessed
it is to be a Christian. If you are surly and fretful, they will think the Lord
has forsaken you; but keep a smiling countenance, and they will think the
promise is fulfilled. “And even to your old age I am he; and even to hoar
hairs will I carry you; I have made, and I will bear; even I will carry, and
will deliver you.” Do, I beseech you, my venerable friends, try to be of a
happy temperament and cheerful spirit, for a child will run away from a
surly old man; but there is not a child in the world but loves his grandpapa
if he is cheerful and happy. You can lead us to heaven if you have got
heaven’s sunlight on your face; but you will not lead us at all if you are
cross and ill-tempered, for then we shall not care about your company.
Make yourselves merry with the people of God, and try to live happily
before men; for so will you prove to us — to a demonstration, that even to
old age God is with you, and that when your strength faileth, he is still your
preservation. May God Almighty bless you, for the Savior’s sake! Amen.
The foregoing sermon exceeding the limits of the usual Penny
Number, and it being desirous that it should be given in full, it has
been deemed advisable to make the present a double number. The
two appended Tracts have been inserted as a specimen of a series
called “The New Park Street Tracts,” printed in large type, at 1s.
4d. per 100.
THE NEW PARK STREET TRACTS
EDITED BY THE REV. C. H. SPURGEON.
Printed and Sold By the Publishers, ALABASTER & PASSMORE, No. 34,
Wilson Street, Finsbury Square; to be had also of J. Paul, Chapter-house
Court, Paternoster Row, G. J. Stevenson, 54, Paternoster Row; and of all
Booksellers.
THE INFIDEL’S SERMON TO THE PIRATES.
A native of Sweden, who had imbibed infidel views, had occasion to go
from one port to another in the Baltic Sea. When he came to the place
whence he expected to sail, the vessel was gone. On inquiring, he found a
fishing boat going the same way, in which he embarked. After being for
some time out to sea, the men observing that he had several trunks and
chests on board, concluded he must be very rich, and therefore agreed
among themselves to throw him overboard. This he heard them express,
which gave him great uneasiness. However, he took occasion to open one
of his trunks, which contained some books. Observing this, they remarked
among themselves that it was not worth while to throw him into the sea as
they did not want any books, which they supposed were all the trunks
contained. They asked him if he were a priest. Hardly knowing what reply
to make them, he told them he was; and at this they seemed much pleased,
and said they would have a sermon on the next day, as it was the Sabbath.
This increased the anxiety and distress of his mind, for he knew himself to
be as incapable of such an undertaking as it was possible for any one to be,
as he knew very little of the Scriptures; neither did he believe in the
inspiration of the Bible.
At length they came to a small rocky island, perhaps a quarter of a mile in
circumference, where was a company of pirates, who had chosen this little
sequestered spot to deposit their treasures. He was taken to a cave, and
introduced to an old woman, to whom they remarked that they were to
have a sermon preached the next day. She said she was very glad of it, for
she had not heard the Word of God for a great while. His was a trying
case, for preach he must; still he knew nothing about preaching. If he
refused, or undertook to preach and did not please, he expected it would
be his death. With these thoughts he passed a sleepless night, and in the
morning trio mind was not settled upon anything. To call upon God, whom
he believed to be inaccessible, was altogether vain. He could devise no way
whereby he might be saved. He walked to and fro, still shut up in darkness,
striving to collect something to say to them, but could not think of even a
single sen fence.
When the appointed time for the service arrived, he entered the cave,
where he found the men assembled. There was a seat prepared for hhn, and
a table with A Bible on it. They sat for the space of half an hour in
profound silence; and even then the anguish of his soul was as great as
human nature was capable of enduring. At length these words came to his
mind: “Verily, there is a reward for the righteous: verily, there is a God
that judgeth in the earth.” He arose and delivered them; then other words
presented themselves, and so on, till his understanding became opened, and
his heart enlarged in a manner astonishing to himself. He spoke upon
subjects suited to their condition; the reward of the righteous, the
judgments of the wicked, the necessity of repentance, and the importance
of a change of life. The matchless love of God to the children of men had
such a powerful effect upon the minds of these wretched beings, that they
were melted into tears. Nor was he less astonished at the unbounded
goodness of Almighty God, in thus interposing to save his spiritual as well
as his natural life; and well might he exclaim, “This is the Lord’s doing and
marvellous in our eyes.” Under a deep sense of God’s goodness, his heart
became filled with thankfulness, which it was out of his power to express.
What a marvellous change was thus suddenly brought about by Divine
interposition! He who a little while before disbelieved in communion with
God and the soul, became as humble as a little child; and they who were so
lately meditating on his death, now were filled with love and goodwill
towards each other, particularly towards him; manifesting affectionate
kindness, and willing to render him all the assistance in their power.
The next morning they fitted out one of their vessels, and conveyed him
whither he desired. From that time he became a changed man; from being a
slave to the influence of infidelity, he was brought to be a sincere believer
in the power and efficacy of the truth as it is in Jesus.
[How marvellous the providence of God, and the sovereignty of his
grace! Who is he that has stepped beyond the range of Almighty
love? or has sinned too much to be forgiven? Reader! are you an
infidel? What would you do in a similar situation? What other
doctrine than that of Scripture would benefit pirates? Certainly not
your own. What would you like to teach your own children?
Certainly not your own sentiments. You feel that you would not
wish to hear your own offspring blaspheming God. Moreover,
forgive us, if we declare our opinion that thou knowest that there is
a God, though with thy lips thou deniest him. Think, we beseech
thee, of thy Maker, and of his Son, the Savior; and may Eternal
love bring even thee to the Redeemer. — C. H. S.]
NO. 3 — THE ACTRESS.
AN actress, in one of the English provincial or country theatres, was one
day, passing through the streets of the town in which she then resided,
when her attention was attracted by the sound of voices, which she heard
in a poor cottage before her. Curiosity prompted her to look in at an open
door, when she saw a few poor people sitting together, one of whom, at
the moment of her observation, was giving out the following hymn, which
the others joined in singing: —
“Depth of mercy! can there be
Mercy still reserved for me?”
The tune was sweet and simple, but she heeded it not. The words had
riveted her attention, and she stood motionless, until she was invited to
enter by the woman of the house, who had observed her standing at the
door. She complied, and remained during a prayer which was offered up by
one of the little company; and uncouth as the expressions might seem in
her ears, they carried with them a conviction of sincerity on the part of the
person then employed. She quitted the cottage, but the words of the hymn
followed her; she could not banish them from her mind, and at last she
resolved to procure the book which contained the hymn. The more she
read it, the more decided her serious impressions became. She attended the
ministry of the Gospel, read her hitherto neglected and despised Bible, and
bowed herself in humility and contrition of heart before him whose mercy
she felt she needed, whose sacrifices are those of a broken heart and a
contrite spirit, and who has declared that therewith he is well pleased.
Her profession she determined at once, and for ever, to renounce; and for
some little time excused herself from appearing on the stage, without,
however, disclosing her change of sentiments, or making known her
resolution finally to leave it.
The manager of the theater called upon her one morning, and requested her
to sustain the principal character in a new play which was to be performed
the next week for his benefit. She had frequently performed this character
to general admiration; but she now, however, told him her resolution never
to appear as an actress again, at the same time giving her reasons. At first
he attempted to overcome her scruples by ridicule, but this was unavailing;
he then represented the loss he should incur by her refusal, and concluded
his arguments by promising, that if to oblige him she would act on this
occasion, it should be the last request of the kind he would ever make.
Unable to resist his solicitations, she promised to appear, and on the
appointed evening went to the theater. The character she assumed required
her, on her first entrance, to sing a song; and when the curtain was drawn
up, the orchestra immediately began the accompaniment; but she stood as
if lost in thought and as one forgetting all around her, and her own
situation. The music ceased, but she did not sing; and supposing her to be
overcome by embarrassment, the band again commenced. A second time
they paused for her to begin, and still she did not open her lips. A third
time the air was played, and then, with clasped hands, and eyes suffused
with tears, she sang, not the words of the song, but —
“Depth of mercy! can there be
Mercy still reserved for me!”
It is almost needless to add, that the performance was suddenly ended; men
ridiculed, though some were induced from that memorable night to
“consider their ways,” and to reflect on the wonderful power of that
religion which could so influence the heart and change the life of one
hitherto so vain, and so evidently pursuing the road which leadeth to
destruction.
It would be satisfactory to the reader to know, that the change in Miss was
as permanent as it was singular; she walked consistently with her
profession of religion for many years, and at length became the wife of a
minister of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.
[Perhaps, dear reader, you are a great transgressor, then you fear
there is no forgiveness for you; let this remove your fears. You may
be the vilest creature out of hell, and yet grace can make you as
pure as the angels in heaven. God would be just should be damn
you, but he can be just and yet save you. Do you feel that the Lord
has a right over you to do as he pleases? Do you feel that you have
no claim upon him? Then, rejoice, for Jesus Christ has borne your
guilt, and carried your sorrows, and you shall assuredly be saved.
You are a sinner in the true sense of that word, then remember
Jesus came to save sinners, and you among the rest, if you know
yourself to be a sinner. — C. H. S.]
“Lo, th’ incarnate God ascended,
Pleads the merit of his blood:
Venture on him, venture wholly,
Let no other trust intrude;
None but Jesus
Can do helpless sinners good.”
