As Thy Days, So Shall Thy Strength Be - Charles Spurgeon
As Thy Days, So Shall Thy Strength Be
Charles Spurgeon
Introduction: The Beauty of Night and Winter
Beloved, it seems a sad thing that every day must die and be followed by a night. When we have seen the hills clad with verdure to their summit, and the seas laving their base with a silver glory; when we have stretched our eyes far away, and have seen the widening prospect full of loveliness and beauty, we have felt sad that the sunlight should ever set upon such a scene, and that so much beauty should be shrouded in the oblivion of darkness. But how much reason have we to bless God for nights! For if it were not for nights, how much of beauty would never be discovered. Never should I have considered the heavens the work of thy fingers, O my God, if thou hadst not first covered the sun with a thick mantle of darkness: the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained, had never been bright in mine eyes, if thou hadst not hidden the light of the sun and bidden him retire within the curtains of the west. Night seems to be the great friend of the stars: they must be all unseen by the eyes of men, were they not set in the foil of darkness. It is even so with winter. We might feel sad that all the flowers of summer must die, and all the fruits of autumn must be gathered into their store-house, that every tree must be stripped, and that all the fields must lose their fair flowers. But were it not for winter, we should never see the glistening crystals of the snow; we should never behold the beauteous festoons of the icicles that hang from the eaves. Much of God’s marvelous miracles of hoar frost must have been hidden from us if it had not been for the cold chill of winter, which, when it robs us of one beauty, gives us another; when it takes away the emerald of verdure, it gives us the diamond of ice; when it casts from us the bright rubies of the flowers, it gives us the fair white ermine of snow.
Well now, translate those two ideas, and you will see why it is that even our sin, our lost and ruined estate, has been made the means, in the hand of God, of manifesting to us the excellencies of His character. My dear friends, if you and I had been without trouble, we never could have had such a promise as this given to us:—”As thy days, so shall thy strength be.” It is our weakness that has made room for God to give us such a promise as this. Our sins make room for a Savior; our frailties make room for the Holy Spirit to correct them; all our wanderings make room for the good Shepherd, that He may seek us and bring us back. We do not love nights, but we do love stars; we do not love weakness, but we do bless God for the promise that is to sustain us in our weakness, we do not admire winter, but we do admire the glittering snow; we must shudder at our own trembling weakness, but we still do bless God that we are weak because it makes room for the display of His own invincible strength in fulfilling such a promise as this.
I. The Self-Weakness Implied in the Text
In addressing you this morning, I shall first have to notice the self-weakness which is implied in our text; secondly, I shall come to the great promise of the text; and then I shall try and draw one or two inferences from it, ere I conclude.
If this promise be like a star, you know there is no seeing the stars in the daytime when we stand here upon the upper land; we must go down a deep well, and then we shall be able to discover them. Now, beloved, as this is daytime with our hearts, it will be necessary for us to go down the deep well of old recollections of our past trials and troubles. We must first get a good fair idea of the great depth of our own weakness, before we shall be able to behold the brightness of this rich and exceeding precious promise. A self-sufficient man can no more understand this promise, than a coal-heaver can understand Greek: he has never been in a position in which to understand it; he has never learned his own need of another’s strength, and therefore he cannot possibly understand the value of a promise which consists in giving to us a strength beyond our own. Let us for a few minutes consider our own weakness.
The Weakness Proven in Duty
Ye children of God, have ye not proved your own weakness in the day of duty? The Lord has spoken to you, and He has said, “Son of man, run, and do such and such a thing which I bid thee;” and you have gone to do it, but as you have been on your way, a sense of great responsibility has bowed you down, and you have been ready to turn back even at the outset, and to cry, “Send by whomsoever thou wilt send, but not by me.” Reinforced by strength, you have gone to the duty, but while performing it, you have at times felt your hands hanging exceedingly heavy, and you have had to look up many a time and cry, “O Lord, give me more strength, for without thy strength this work must be unaccomplished; I cannot perform it myself.” And when the work has been done, and you have looked back upon it, you have either been filled with amazement that it should have been done at all by so poor and weak a worm as yourself, or else you have been overcome with horror because you have been afraid the work was marred, like the vessel on the potter’s wheel, by reason of your own want of skill.
The Weakness Proven in Suffering
I confess in my own position, I have a thousand causes to confess my own weakness every day. In preparing for the pulpit, how often do we discover our weakness when a hundred texts exhibit themselves, and we know not which to choose, and when we have selected our subject, distracting thoughts come in, and when we would concentrate our minds upon some holy topic, we find they are carried hither and thither, driven about like the minds of children by every wind of thought. And when we bow our knees to seek the Lord’s help before we preach, how often does our tongue refuse to give utterance to the earnestness of our hearts. And alas! how frequently too is our heart cold when we are about to enter upon an occupation which requires the heart to be hot like a furnace, and the lip to be burning like a live coal. Here in this pulpit I have often learned my weakness, when words have fled from me, and thoughts have departed too; and when that seal which I thought would have poured itself forth like a cataract, has trickled forth in unwilling drops like a sullen stream, the source of which doth almost fail, and which seemeth itself as if it longed to be dried up and dead. And after preaching, how have I cast myself upon my bed, and tossed to and fro, groaning because I thought I had failed to deliver my message, and had not preached my Master’s Word as my Master would have me preach it. All of you, in your own callings I dare say, have had enough to prove that. I do not believe a Christian man can examine himself without finding every day that weakness is proven even in the doing of his duty. Your shop, however small, will be enough to prove to you your weakness; your business, however little, your cares, however light, your family, however small, will furnish you with enough proofs of the fact: “Without me ye can do nothing;” “He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.
The Weakness Proven in Suffering and Temptation
But, beloved, we prove our weakness, perhaps more visibly, when we come into the day of suffering. There it is that we are weak indeed. I have sat by the side of those who have been exceedingly sick, and have marked their patience; but I do not know that I ever wondered at the patience of a sick man so much as I do when I am sick myself: then patience is an extraordinary virtue. Women suffer, and suffer well; but I do think there are very few men who could bear the tithe of the suffering that many women endure, without exhibiting a hundred times as much impatience. Most of us who are gifted with strong constitutions, and have but little sickness, have to chasten ourselves, that what little sickness we have to contend with is borne with so little resignation and with so much impatience; that we are so ready to repine, so prepared to bow our heads and wish we were dead, because a little pain is rending our body. Here it is that we prove our weakness indeed. Ah! people of God, it is one thing to talk about the furnace; it is another thing to be in it. It is one thing to look at the doctor’s knife, but quite another thing to feel it. You will find it one thing to sip the cup of medicine, but quite another thing to lie in bed a dreary week or month, and to drink on, and on, and on of that nauseating draught.
II. The Great Promise: “As Thy Days, So Shall Thy Strength Be”
Having thus dwelt upon the first point, we shall now come to the second—THE GREAT PROMISE: “As thy days, so shall thy strength be.”
A Well-Guaranteed Promise
In the first place, this is a well-guaranteed promise. A promise is nothing unless I have good security that it shall be fulfilled. It is in vain for men to promise largely unless their fulfillment shall be as large as their promise, for the largeness of their promise is just the largeness of deception. But here every word of God is true. God has issued no more notes for tHe bank of heaven than He can cash in an hour if He wills. There is enough bullion in the vaults of Omnipotence to pay off every bill that ever shall be drawn by the faith of man or the promises of God. Now look at this one—”As thy days, so shall thy strength be.” Beloved, God has a strong reserve with which to pay off this promise; for is He not Himself omnipotent, able to do all things? Believer, till thou canst drain dry the ocean of omnipotence, till thou canst break into pieces the towering mountains of almighty strength, thou never needest to fear. Until thine enemy can stop the course of a whirlwind with a reed, till he can twist the hurricane from its path by a word of his puny lip, thou needest not think that the strength of man shall ever be able to overcome the strength which is in thee, namely, the strength of God.
A Limited Promise
But now I want you to notice it is a limited promise. “What!” says one, “limited? Why, it says, ‘As thy days, so shall thy strength be.'” Yes, it is limited. I know it is unlimited in our troubles, but still it is limited. First, it says our strength is to be as our days are; it does not say our strength is to be as our desires are. Oh! how often have we thought, “How I wish I were as strong as so-and-so”—one who had a great deal of faith. Ah! but then you would have rather more faith than you wanted, and what would be the good of that? It would be like the manna the children of Israel had—if they did not eat it in the day, it bred worms and stank.
An Expansive Promise
Once more, what an expansive promise this is! “As thy days, so shall thy strength be.” Some days are very little things, in our pocketbook we have very little to put down, for there was nothing done of any importance. But some days are very big days. Ah! I have known a big day—a day of great duties, when great things had to be done for God—too great, it seemed, for one man to do; and when great duty was but half done, there came great trouble, such as my poor heart had never felt before.
III. The Inference: Be Rid of Doubts and Fears
And in conclusion, what inference shall I draw except this? Children of the living God, be rid of your doubts, be rid of your trouble and your fear. Young Christians, do not be afraid to set forward on the heavenly race. You bashful Christians, that, like Nicodemus, are ashamed to come out and make an open profession, don’t be afraid, “As your day is, so shall your strength be.” Why need you fear? You are afraid of disgracing your profession, you shall not; your day shall never be more troublesome, or more full of temptation, than your strength shall be full of deliverance.
The Warning to the Unconverted
And as for you that have not God to be yours, I must draw one inference for you. Your strength is decaying. You are growing old, and your old age will not be like your youth. You have strength—strength which you prostitute to the cause of Satan, which you misuse in the service of the devil. When you grow old, as you will do, unless your wickedness shall bring you to an early grave; they that look out of the windows must be darkened, and the grasshopper must be a burden to you; and your strength shall not be as your day. And when you come to die, as die you must, then you shall have no strength to die with; you must die alone; you must hear yon iron gates creak on their hinges, and no guardian angel to comfort you as you go through the dreary vault.
May God give us all grace, so that when days and years are past, we all may meet in heaven.
Conclusion: The Promise for Eternity
There are some people here that I have seen a great many times, and I thought they would have been converted before now. I ask them one question, (there are some of them whom I sincerely respect) and it is this—what will you do in the swellings of Jordan? When death shall get hold upon you? What, what will you do then? May God help you to answer and prepare to meet Him!
Charles Spurgeon