FAITH AMONG MOCKERS – Charles Spurgeon
FAITH AMONG MOCKERS
“He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver Him: let Him deliver Him, seeing He delighted in Him.” Psalm 22:8.
Introduction to Mockery and Faith
DAVID experienced what Paul afterwards so aptly described as “cruel mockings.” Note the adjective, cruel—it is well chosen. Mockings may not cut the flesh, but they tear the heart. They may shed no blood, but they cause the mind to bleed internally. Fetters gall the wrists, but the iron of scorn enters into the soul. Ridicule is a poisoned bullet which goes deeper than the flesh and strikes the center of the heart. David in the wilderness, hunted by Saul and on the throne abused by Shimei, knew what it was to be the butt of scorn, the football of contempt. Many a time and often he was the song of the drunk and the byword of the scoffer.
But what have I to do with the son of Jesse? My heart remembers the Son of Man. What if David suffered despising and scorn? He knew it but in small measure compared with our blessed Lord! Well is it said, “The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his Lord.” It is not amazing that such an one as David should have to cry, “My soul is among lions,” when the Lord of All, the perfectly pure and Holy One, was driven to utter the same cry, saying, “All they that see Me laugh Me to scorn: they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver Him: let Him deliver Him, seeing He delighted in Him.”
Reproach as a Common Heritage
My Brothers and Sisters in Christ, if you have to pass through a like painful experience, count it no strange thing, for a strange thing it is not! Reproach is the common heritage of the godly. Do not think that this fire which you suffer is the first that ever burned a saint. Others have had to bear the enmity of the world long before you! Remember that, of old, from the first moment when sin came into the world, there were two seeds, the Seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent—and between these two seeds there is an enmity of the most deadly kind which will never cease! It may assume different forms and it may be held in check by many forces, but it will always continue, forever the same, while men are men, sin is sin—and God and the devil are opposed.
It was so, you know, in the house of Abraham—he was a man that walked before God and was perfect in his generation— and yet in his family there were the two opposing powers. Ishmael, born after the flesh, mocked him that was born after the Spirit. When Rebekah had brought forth twin sons, yet the fact of their being twins of holy Isaac did not prevent the enmity that arose between Jacob and Esau. Nothing will prevent the seed of the serpent from exhibiting its spite towards the Seed of the woman! Even kinship and brotherhood go for little in this strife. In fact, a man’s foes full often are they of his own household.
Trust in God is Known
Count it no marvel, then, if you are derided! It seems to be a necessity of the holy Nature of God that it should incur the enmity of the evil nature of fallen man and that this evil nature should show itself by direct and bitter attack. Remember “Him that endured such contradiction of sinners against Himself, lest you be wearied and faint in your minds.” Henceforth, bow your shoulders to the yoke! Expect that if you follow the Crucified, you will have to bear the Cross, for so it will be. I trust that our present meditation may be useful to any of God’s servants who are feeling the sharp lash of envious tongues, that they may not, thereby, be driven from their steadfastness.
A Gracious Man’s Trust in God is Manifest
The first thing to which I shall call your attention at this time is that a truly gracious man is like David and like the Lord Jesus, in that HIS TRUST IN GOD IS KNOWN. Even the enemies of this holy man who is mentioned in the text, and, as I interpret it, even the enemies of our Divine Lord and Master, never denied that He trusted in God. This, indeed, is the commencement of their scoff—“He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver Him.” From which I gather that every gracious man should have an apparent, manifest, public trust in God. He should not merely trust Him in his heart, alone, but that trust should so enter into his entire nature that he does not conceal it nor think of concealing it.
He should be so open in the avowal of his confidence, that his enemies, before whom he is naturally restrained and on his guard, nevertheless are able to spy out this precious thing within him and are forced to bear their witness, though it is mockingly and jestingly, that, “He trusted on the Lord.” Such a testimony is all the more valuable as coming from an enemy! You know our character is not likely to be drawn too prettily by those who hate us—the utmost will be sure to be said against us! But if even our enemies say of us, “He trusted on the Lord,” we may be very thankful that we have so lived as to extort this testimony from their lips.
A Calm Belief and Open Avowal of Faith
What, then, ought a child of God to do in order to show that he really does trust in the Lord? How did Jesus do this? Well, I think that in our Lord’s case it was His wonderful calmness which compelled everybody to see that “He trusted on the Lord.” You never find Him in a flurry. He is never worried nor confused. He is beset behind and before with men who try to catch Him, but He is as self-possessed as if He spoke among friends.
He does not appear to be the least upon His guard and yet, instead of their catching Him, before long He either catches them, or else they retire, saying, “Never man spoke like this Man.” He was always cool, peaceful, ready, self-composed. You notice His inward quietude not only when enemies are round about Him, but when He is surrounded by a great mob of people all hungry, starving, famishing—He breaks the bread and multiplies it—but not before He has made them all sit down on the green grass by hundreds and by fifties.
Trust in God as a Way of Life
Brethren, this ought, also, to come out not merely in our calm and quiet manner, but also by our distinct avowal. I do not think that any man has a right to be a secret believer in the Lord Jesus Christ at this time. You will tell me that Nicodemus was—that Joseph of Arimathaea was—and I answer, “Yes,” but therein they are not our exemplars. These weak Brothers were forgiven and strengthened—but we may not, therefore, presume.
Times, however, are different now—by the death of Christ the thoughts of many hearts were revealed—and from that day those secret disciples were among the foremost to avow their faith! Nicodemus brought the spices and Joseph of Arimathaea went in boldly and begged for the body of Jesus. Since that day when Christ was openly revealed upon the Cross, the thoughts of other men’s hearts are revealed, too, and it is not now permissible for us to play hide and seek with Christ.
Faith and Confidence in All Circumstances
So, then, I say, first, a calm belief and, secondly, an open avowal should cause even our adversaries to know that we have trusted in the Lord. And, then, I will add to that, that our general conduct should reveal our faith. The whole of our life should show that we are men who rejoice in the Lord, for trusting the Lord, as I understand it, is not a thing for Sundays and for places of worship, alone—we are to trust in the Lord about everything!
The Mockery of the Ungodly
It is a great honor to a man to trust in God and so to have his name written upon the Arch of Triumph which Paul has erected in the 11th Chapter of Hebrews where you see name after name of the heroes who served God by faith. It is a glorious thing to mingle our bones with those who are buried in that mausoleum which bears this epitaph, “These all died in faith.” It is an honorable thing to be a believer in God, but there are some who think the very reverse and these begin to scoff at the Believer.
Sometimes they scoff at faith itself. They count faith itself to be a folly of weak minds. Or else they insult over one particular Christian’s faith. “Oh,” they say, “he professes to trust in God. This man talks after this mad fashion! Why, he is a working man like other people—works in a shop along with me! What has he to do with trusting God any more than I have? He is conceited and fanatical.” Or in other circles they cry, “This is a man of business! He keeps a shop and I dare say he knows as much of the tricks of the trade as we do, and yet he talks about trusting in God! No doubt He pretends to this faith to win religious customers.” Sometimes the mockery comes from one of your family, for Faith’s foes live in the same house with her. The husband has been known to say to his wife, “Ridiculous nonsense, your trusting in God!”
Faith in God as Rational and Wise
Yes, and parents have said the same to holy children and, alas, children have grown up to speak in the same fashion to their parents to the wounding of their hearts. As if faith in God were a thing that could be scoffed at, instead of being the most wise, proper and rational thing under Heaven! Faith in God is a thing to be reverenced rather than reviled! True religion is sanctified common sense! It is the most commonsense thing in the world to put your trust in One that cannot lie! If I trust myself, or trust my fellow man, I am thought to be in the first case, self-reliant, and in the second case I am judged to have a charitable disposition. Yet in either case I shall, sooner or later, prove my folly! But if I trust God, who can bring a reason against my confidence? What is there to be ridiculed in a man’s trusting his Maker? Can HE fail that created the blue heavens, that settled the foundations of the earth and poured out the waters of the great sea? Can the Almighty retract His promise because He is unable to fulfill it? Can He break His cord because circumstances master Him and prevent His performance of it? “Trust you in the Lord forever: for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength.”
The Justification of Faith
The day shall come when it will be known by all intelligent beings that unbelief of God is folly, but that faith in the Eternal is essential wisdom. God give us more faith in Himself! No doubt we may expect to have all the more of the laughter of the ungodly who will make a spectacle of us for our faith—but what of that? We can bear mockery and much more for His sake who died for us. And then men scoff at the very idea of Divine interposition. They judge the Lord’s deliverance to be the main point of our faith. “He trusted God that He would deliver Him.” “Look,” they say, “he fancies that God will deliver him, as if the Creator had not something else to do besides looking after him, poor miserable creature that he is! He is nothing to God—a mere speck—the insect of an hour, and yet he trusts in God to interfere on his behalf.”
Conclusion: The Future Justification of Faith
The philosophers laugh whenever you speak of Divine interposition and figure that we must be in the last stage of lunacy to expect anything of the kind! They believe in laws, they say—irreversible, immutable laws, that grind on like the great cogs of a machine which, when once they are set in motion, tear everything to pieces that comes in their way. They do not believe that God fulfils promises, or answers prayers, or delivers His people. Their God is a dead force, without mind, or thought, or love, or care.
He, who in Nature acts according to law is yet believed to have no power to carry out His own Word which must always be Law to a truthful being. Why, some of us are as sure that God has interposed for us as if He had rent the heavens and thrust forth His right hand visibly before the eyes of all beholders! The wise ones laugh at us for this, but we are not abashed—rather do we reply, “Laugh if you like, and as long as you like; but we daily receive unnumbered blessings from God in answer to our cries! And your laughter no more affects us than the noise of the dogs by the Nile disturbs the flow of the river. We shall believe in spite of all your merriment and if it please you to go on with your laughter, we, also, will go on with our faith.”
The Future Vindication of Faith
The object of the ungodly man’s scorn is the idea that God should ever interfere to help His people in human affairs, but you stand to it, O true Believers, for He does still show Himself strong on the behalf of them that trust in Him. Let them say and laugh at you as they say it, “He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver him,” but let none of these things move you. Further, we have known this mockery to extend to all kinds of faith in the Divine Love. “Let Him deliver Him,” they say, “seeing that He delighted in Him.” Perhaps you have unwisely told out the tale of God’s special love to those who are now making fun of you—you have cast your pearls before swine and they turned against you. They say, “This man says God loves him above others! That He chose him before the world began! That He redeemed him from among men with the blood of Christ! He says that God has called him by His Holy Spirit; that He has admitted him into His secrets and made him His child!” And then they laugh right lustily, as if it were a rare jest!
Conclusion: The Vindication of God’s People
How the world rages against electing love! It cannot endure any specialty in Grace. The idea that one man should be more Beloved of Heaven than another, it declares as horrible. The heathen could not understand a certain brave saint because he called himself, Theophorus, or, “Godbearer.” But he stuck to it, that he was so, and this made his foes the more wrathful. God dwelt in him, he said, and he would not give up his happy belief and, therefore, they ceased not to mock. It was a carrying out of our text, “Let Him deliver him, seeing He delights in him.”
Well, well! We can afford to bear these mockings, for if we are beloved by a King—it will not much matter if we are sneered at by His subjects! If we are beloved by God, it is a small concern though all men should make us the subject of their jest! Ungodly men are exceedingly apt to find amusement in the trials involved in the life and walk of faith. Their cry of “Let Him deliver Him” implies that their victim was in serious difficulty from which He could not extricate Himself. This is no novelty to the Believer, but it makes rare fun for the ungodly.
What is the good of faith if the Believer suffers like others, endures the same pains, losses and diseases as others? So the men of the world argue. They would be Believers, too, if it would bring them a fortune, or a handsome salary, or at least a loaded table and a full cup! But when they see a saint on the dunghill with Job, or in the pit with Joseph, or in the dungeon with Jeremiah, or among the dogs with Lazarus, they sneer and cry, “Is this the reward of piety? Is this the recompense of godliness?” They like to spy us out in our time of trouble and taunt us with our confidence in God and, alas, there is so much unbelief in us that we are all too prone, in such seasons, to question the justice and faithfulness of the Lord and to say with David, “Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocence.” It seems hard for us to be mocked by the base ones of the earth—to become the song and the byword of the ungodly—yet this has happened to the excellent of the earth and will happen yet again. Set your account that this is a part of the covenanted heritage and accept it with joy for Christ’s sake!
The Justification of Faith
Now, I must close with this point (though there is much more to be said)—THE TIME SHALL COME WHEN THE FAITH OF THE MAN WHO HAS TRUSTED IN GOD SHALL BE ABUNDANTLY JUSTIFIED. I think it is no small thing to have the ungodly bearing witness that, “He trusted in God that He would deliver Him.” I have known what it is to be exceedingly grateful to ungodly men for helping me to believe that I am truly a child of God. Somebody, years ago, uttered an atrocious lie against me—an abominable slander. I was very low and heavy of spirit at the time, but when I read it, I clapped my hands for joy, for I felt, “Now I have one of the marks and seals of a child of God, for it is written, ‘Blessed are you, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for My sake.’” The love of the Lord’s Brethren and the hatred of the Lord’s enemies are two things to be desired! We may gather that we are not of the wicked when they will not endure us in their company—when our very presence irritates them— and they begin to rail and jeer. It has happened to us even as Jesus said—“If you were of the world, the world would love his own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” So that there is justification, as it were, of our faith even from the lips of adversaries—and we ought to be thankful for it instead of being downcast about it. Another justification awaits us and in due season it will come. Brothers and Sisters, the day will come when God will deliver His people. You will be brought out of your trouble—it may not be immediately, but it will be seasonably. You may most wisely, in the meantime, learn to glory in your tribulation! Your bitters shall turn into sweets and your losses into gains. Your sorrows shall be your joys, your struggles your triumphs—perhaps in this life this transformation may occur, even as the Lord gave to Job twice as much as he had before—but certainly in the life to come you will find the tables turned. Then, what will the ungodly say? They say now, “He trusted on God that He would deliver him,” but they will be compelled to say as they gnash their teeth, “God has delivered him.” Whereas the ungodly ridicule the idea that God delights in His people, the day shall come when they shall be made to see that He does delight in them. When the Lord appears on behalf of His people and gives them “beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning,” the wicked shall gnash their teeth and be filled with confusion! When the Lord shall turn, again, our captivity, even our most desperate foes shall be made to say, “The Lord has done great things for them.” They shall wonder and be sorely vexed to see how the Lord has such favor to His chosen. If they do not see it in this life, oh, what an exhibition ungodly men will see of His delight in His people in the world to come! Dives sees Lazarus in Abraham’s bosom—what a sight for him! They that scoff at God’s poor people, here, shall see them exalted to be kings and priests to reign with Christ forever and ever! And what will they say, then? What can they say but be compelled to bear witness that their faith was justified! Brethren, at the Last Great Day, ungodly men will be witnesses on behalf of the saints. If any doubt whether the saints trusted in God, the wicked will be compelled to come forward and say, “They did trust, for we laughed at them for it.” Of this and that man they shall say, “He trusted on God that He would deliver him.” In that day the unbelieving will be swift witnesses against themselves, for as they ridiculed the children of God here, they will have it read out before them as evidence of their enmity against the Lord—and how will they answer it? A man is generally much grieved with anyone who injures his children. I have known a man behave patiently to his neighbors and put up with a great deal from them. But when one of them has struck his child, I have seen him incensed to the last degree. He has said, “I cannot stand that! I will not look on and see my own children abused.” The Lord says, “He that touches you, touches the apple of My eye.” Jesus rises from His Throne in Glory and stands up indignantly while His servant Stephen is being stoned. If I had no other amusement whatever, I would not, for merriment sake, mock the people of God, for it will go hard with those who make unhallowed mirth out of the saints of the Host High! If any of you have ever done so—if you have done so ignorantly—may the Lord forgive you and bring you to be numbered among His people, as was Saul of Tarsus. And if any of you have done so knowingly, be humble and penitent, and the Lord will forgive you and receive you among His people. But whether you revile or flatter, it is all one to us. We are at a pass with you—we trust in God that He will deliver us—and we cannot be removed from this confidence. O you mockers, we will not be fooled out of our hope, nor jested out of our peace! We cannot find anyone like our God to trust to, and so we will not depart from Him in life or death, but will rest in Him, by His Grace, come what may, even till we see Him face to face!