Awake, awake
The essential elements of a Church’s strength
I. THE CONSTITUTIONAL ELEMENTS OF STRENGTH. I use the word constitution in a legitimate sense, as including both the creed and the polity of a Church.
1. The creed. As a man’s life is the outcome of what he believes, or does not believe, precisely so is the Church’s. But is not the Bible the acknowledged creed of all the Churches? No; no more than the stars are astronomy, or the flowers botany. The Bible is the source of the creed of all, but it is the creed of none, for the simple reason that the Bible, like every other writing, must be construed; and on many points it cannot be construed in the same way by all.
2. The government. Hers also that which is true of man is true of the Church. An army is stronger than a mob.
II. ADMINISTRATIVE ELEMENTS. But a Church is not only obliged to have certain constitutional and other laws, it is also obliged to administer them for the twofold purpose--
1. Of protecting itself against corruption and disintegration.
2. In order that it may efficiently fulfil its mission of witnessing for Christ, whereunto it was Divinely called.
III. SPIRITUAL ELEMENTS OF STRENGTH.
1. Peace. There must be battles with the common enemy, but no battles with itself.
2. Unity.
3. Co-operation.
4. Purity.
5. The Holy Spirit. (R. V. Foster, D.D.)
God’s call to a sleeping Church
1. This chapter is a trumpet-call to holiness. Jerusalem is called the holy city, and yet the passage is full of her sins. She was holy in the intention of God. So we are called not to be famous or wealthy but to be holy.
2. Her condition was characterized by--
(1) Unhallowed intercourse with the world (Isaiah 52:1). The uncircumcised and unclean in her midst.
(2) Slavish subserviency to the world (Isaiah 51:23). The moment the world sees Christians turning to it for pleasure or patronage, It becomes a very tyrant, over them.
(3) Utter helplessness and impotence. The figure of a “wild bull in a net” means strength reduced to helplessness by little things. Satan forged fetters of persecutions in early days, now he tries the “net business.” Many Christians are worthless because caught in a net of little compromises with the world and with conscience. The “fainting” (verse 20) points to the helplessness of the Christian Church in the presence of the moral and social evils of the day.
(4) They were asleep to it all.
3. The man who called “Awake” to Zion, had previously cried “Awake” to Isaiah 51:9).
4. To be awakened is not enough. If we go no further we shall go back either into indifference, or into rebellion, or into despair. The call is “put on thy strength, put on thy beautiful garments.” Garments of praise, cloth of zeal, beautiful covering of humility. In this the Christian must be always arrayed, for we are children of a King, and God wants us always to appear in Court dress. (C. Inwood.)
Awake, O Zion
“O Zion!” This is a case in which a place is named for the inhabitants. Leaving what is local and temporary and particular in the reference of these words, we proceed to consider them as addressed by the redeeming God to His Church now, and as calling upon.Christians to arouse themselves and revive, to bestir themselves, and to rise into a state of intelligent and Godlike activity. These words assume the presence of life in the people addressed. Those called to awake are not dead, but they sleep; and they sleep, so far as inactivity is concerned, as though they were dead.
I. CERTAIN OBJECTS OF VISION ARE IMPORTANT TO THE CHURCH OF GOD, and that these may be kept in view, God saith, “Awake awake!” Among the objects which we need to see are things behind us; and things before us; such things as are presented by sacred history and by inspired promise and prophecy. But the objects which I would now emphatically name, are ever-existent and ever-present spiritual objects--God our one Father, the Son of God our only Saviour, and the Comforter, who proceedeth from the Father and the Son--especially the Son of God, as the brightness of the Father’s glory, and as the propitiation which God has set forth. The things we need to see are the wondrous things contained in God’s Word, things of God and of man, things which accompany salvation, things of angels and of devils, things of Christ, things of the world around us and above us and beneath us. The Church of God maybe awake to lower and inferior things, and may be asleep to these highest things, or, if not asleep, but half awake, so that men seem like trees walking.
II. CERTAIN SOURCES OF SUPPLY AND FOUNTAINS OF PLEASURE AND MEANS OF HELP ARE IMPORTANT TO THE CHURCH OF GOD, and that these may be possessed and enjoyed and used, God saith, “Awake, awake!”
III. THERE IS GOOD AND GODLY WORK TO BE DONE BY ZION, therefore God saith, “Awake, awake.” Zion is like a nursing mother, with her heart full of cares and her hands full of work. Zion is a worshipper, and she has the incense of prayer and the sacrifices of thanksgiving to provide and to offer; Zion is an intercessor, and it is expected that in ceaseless prayer she will keep no silence, nor give the hearer of prayer rest; Zion is an almoner, and it is expected that having freely received she will freely give; Zion is a servant of the most high God, and she is bound to do all that her hands find to do with all her might. Her work is so various that Zion is as a husbandman, and as a builder, and as a vine-dresser. For work and service Zion is Divinely endowed, taught of God that she may teach godliness, consoled by God that she may comfort others, guided by God that she may lift up her voice with strength, and cry to the bewildered and the lost, “This is the way, walk ye in it.” There are two objects in the sphere of our present thought, toward which the Church of God requires to be faithful and therefore wakeful.
1. Her own endowments.
2. Her opportunities.
IV. THERE ARE BATTLES WHICH ZION IS CALLED TO FIGHT, AND VICTORIES TO BE WON WHICH ZION ALONE CAN WIN; therefore God bids Zion awake. Having interpreted the voice, let us note some of its features and characteristics--
1. The voice that would awaken us is Divine. It is the voice of a Ruler to His subjects, of a Master to His servants, of a Parent to His sons, of a Redeemer to His Redeemed.
2. The voice that would awaken us is powerful and full of majesty, a voice therefore that stirs, and that strengthens while it stirs him who listens to it.
S. The voice that would awaken us has in it a tone of reproach. It seems tosay, “What! Zion asleep! Zion, already and recently quickened from the death of sin? Zion, who can see God, and the things that are eternal? Zion, who can possess the exceeding riches of God’s grace? Zion, who can handle as her own the things which angels desire to look into? Zion asleep in the day of her work, and in the hour of her conflict?”
4. Yet this is a gracious voice. It is a voice that woos and wins while it stimulates and arouses.
5. The voice that cries, “Awake, awake,” is the voice of Zion’s God. There are degrees of wakefulness; and regarding the text as calling us to the most complete open-eyedness and watchfulness, let us arouse ourselves at God’s bidding. (S. Martin.)
The Church asleep
Look at this solemn fact--the Church of the living God asleep! Here are they who have been quickened from the death of sin into newness of life, and who have been called to walk with the living God, asleep. The people who are summoned to work in the field of the world, and to labour in the vineyard of the kingdom of heaven, asleep. The only people who can reasonably be expected to be awake and wide-awake, are asleep. Asleep, not in healthful, seasonable, necessary slumber, but asleep in the slumber of the sluggard, or the sleep of the drunkard, or the torpor of one smitten by atrophy or by apoplexy, or of one in a fatal swoon. (S. Martin.)
What sends the Church to sleep?
The intoxicating draught of some sinful carnal pleasure, or the opiate of some false doctrine, or the quietude of sinful inertness, or the darkness of cherished ignorance, or the monotony of formality, or the syren music of false teaching, hath sent Zion to sleep. (S. Martin.)
The sleeping Church
Thus sleeping, Zion doth not sympathize with the circumstances by which she is surrounded, she does not see the objects within range of her vision, she does not feel the influences which are moving and working around her, she does not meet the claims made for exertion, she does not enjoy her mercies, or take possession of her lawful inheritance. (S. Martin.)
The Church: its strength and its weakness
I. The text is a forcible reminder of the fact that THE CHURCH OF GOD, IN ALL AGES, MAY HAVE ITS TIMES OF WEAKNESS AS WELL AS ITS TIMES OF POWER. When the Church first went forth from Jerusalem, a little flock, scattered hither and thither by the storm of persecution, it was a time of power. It was then but an infant of days, but it sprang into a giant of strength. It was a day of power when the Church of Christ, as Paul Richter has said, “lifted empires off their hinges, and turned the stream of centuries out of its channel. But a thousand years roll on, and a time of weakness follows this era of power. The giant sleeps; his strength is put off; he reposes amidst the scarlet trappings and gilded blazonry of the Papacy, and seems to have wilted into a senile imbecility. But again there came a time of power when, on the morning of the Reformation, the Church heard the cry, “Awake, awake!” and, springing up with renewed youth, it put on its strength. There was a time of weakness when the chill of formalism followed in the track of the Reformation, and the Church sank into the coma of a widespread paralysis; again, when a disguised Romanism riveted her fetters; and still again when the Socinian apostasy spread its blight over Great Britain. But then came times of power when the Church arose in quickened majesty to smite the tyrant with the broken fetters which had eaten into its own soul; and still again, times of wondrous spiritual revival, when the call sounded by Wesley and Whitefield, like the voice of the prophet in the valley of vision, seemed to awake the dead. Why these periods of weakness? The principle is plain: Divine power and human strength must work together, each in its appropriate sphere. As the terror of the iron chariots of the enemy paralyzed the strength of Judah, so that, the human part being wanting, the victory was lost; so, in the Church, if any cause supervenes to weaken, or render ineffective, the strength which God expects us to put forth, He will not depart from His plan, or interpose to save us from the results of our own weakness, or to hide us from the scorn and derision of the world.
II. WHAT IS THE STRENGTH OF THE CHURCH, AND WHEN IS IT PUT OFF? In other words, what causes may supervene to weaken or render it ineffective?
1. The first element of power is the Gospel, the Word, the truth of God. If the truth of God is the instrument of power, and the human part of the work is simply its manifestation, then the strength of the Church must be weakened whenever the Gospel is subordinated to human themes.
2. Let us pass to the second element of the Church s power--the ministry. The Church is a giant; the Gospel is the instrument of his work--the weapon of his warfare. But what wields the weapon? The giant’s arm--this is the ministry. It is not an original power inherent in itself, but adelegated power. This is the power that, beginning at Jerusalem, went forth upon its mission of conquest--that made the heathen cry: “These men that have turned the world upside down are come hither also!”
(1) The ministry, as an arm of power, may be withered by a perfunctory education.
(2) The ministry may be ineffective from misdirected effort.
(3) The ministry must be a source of weakness instead of power to the Church, if it is not in sympathy with the hearts of the people, and the souls of perishing men.
3. The third and principal element of the Church’s power is the Holy Ghost. Since, then, the Spirit s power is the strength of the Church, the want of the Spirit is the weakness of the Church. If the Church is not an effective, aggressive power in the world, it is because it puts off or puts away the strength of the Spirit. This is done when we subordinate the Divine Spirit to human agency; when, by organization or by human eloquence, or by methods and appliances, or by running the Church on business principles, we seek to effect that which it is the special office of the Spirit to accomplish. It is greatly to be feared that we put away the strength of the Spirit when the Church--the whole Church, the ministry and the people, fail to realize our profound and absolute dependence upon the power of the Spirit for success in all work.
III. Let us listen to GOD’S CALL TO THE CHURCH TO PUT ON AND TO PUT FORTH HER STRENGTH. How shall we put on this strength? Power with God, in its first element, is the sense of our own weakness. How, then, shall we put on strength?
1. On our knees.
2. Let us put on the strength of the Word, as the apostle did, when he shunned not to declare the whole counsel of God.
3. Let us put on the strength of the ministry, as Paul did when he went forth in the fulness of the blessing of the Gospel of peace.
4. Let us put on the strength of the Spirit, as the early Church did when it was endued with power from on high. Then shall our work be “mighty, through God, to the pulling down of strongholds.” (W. M. Paxton, D. D.)
“Awake, Awake!”
Let us take the central paragraph first (Isaiah 51:17). There Jerusalem is addressed as stupefied by some intoxicating potion. But her drunkenness is not of wine, nor of strong drink; she has drunk at the hand of the Lord “the cup of His fury.” Such imagery is often used by the prophets, of the cup of God’s wrath drunk down by those on whom it descends, and inflicting on them the insensibility and stupefaction with which we are but too familiar as the effect of excessive drinking. The whole city has succumbed under the spell. Her sons have fainted, and lie strewn in all the streets, like antelopes snared in the hunters’ nets, from which their struggles have failed to extricate them. Amid such circumstances, the servant of Jehovah is introduced, crying, “Awake, awake! stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the Lord the cup of His fury.” There are other soporifics than the wrath of God: the air of the enchanted ground; the laudanum of evil companionship; the drugs of worldly pleasure, of absorption in business, of carnal security. The army of the Lord is too apt to put off the armour of light, and resign itself to heavy slumbers, till the clarion voice warns it that it is high time to awake.
I. ZION S APPEAL TO GOD. “Awake, awake! put on strength, O arm of the Lord.”
1. The first symptom of awaking is a cry. It is so with a child. It is so with the soul. When Saul of Tarsus was converted, the heavenly watchers said, “Behold, he prayeth.” It is so with the Church.
2. The cry in this case was founded on a mistake. If there are variations in our inner life, it is because our rate of reception differs from time to time. It is not God who sleeps, but we. It is not for God to awake, but for us. It is not necessary for the Divine arm to gird on strength, but for the human to take that which is within its easy reach.
3. The cry is short and earnest. Earnestness is good, even though at first it may be in a wrong direction.
4. The best basis for our cry is memory of the past. “Art thou not it that cut Rahab (i.e., Egypt)
in pieces, that pierced the dragon” (i.e., of the Nile)
? It is well to quote past experiences as arguments for faith.
5. The arm of God is strong (Isaiah 51:13).
6. The arm of God is far-reaching. However low we sink, underneath are the everlasting arms.
7. The arm of God is tender (Isaiah 51:12).
II. THE APPEAL TO ZION. It is blessed to be awaked out of sleep. Life is passing by so rapidly; the radiant glory of the Saviour may be missed unless we are on the alert, or we may fail to give Him the sympathy He needs, and an angel will be summoned to do our work. Besides, the world needs the help of men who give no sleep to their eyes nor slumber to their eyelids, but are always eager to help it in its need. Being awake, we shall discover two sets of attire awaiting us. The first is strength, the other beauty; and each has its counterpart in the New Testament (Ephesians 6:1-24; Colossians 3:1-25). Put on the whole armour of God. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ--His temper, spirit, and character.
1. We must put on our beautiful garments. We cannot weave these. We are not able to spin such a cocoon out of our own nature, nor are we required to do so. They are all prepared for us in Jesus; we have only to put them on, by putting Him on. This can only be done when the heart is at leisure.
2. We must put on strength. We are not bidden to purchase strength, or generate it by our resolutions, prayers, and agonizings: but to “put it on.” It is already prepared, and only awaits appropriation.
3. We must expect to be delivered from the dominion of sin. Babylon had been bidden to descend from her throne and sit in the dust; Jerusalem is commanded to arise from the dust and sit on her throne. (F. B. Meyer, B.A.)
A call to exertion
I. THE CONSIDERATIONS WHICH JUSTIFY THIS APPEAL.
1. It is obvious that the passage assumes the possession of sufficient strength for accomplishing the end designed. As to effectual agency, all things are of God. With respect to our own province, that of instrumental action--our strength is ample, though the conversion of the world be the object of it. But wherein does our strength for the reconciliation of the world consist? Strength, in all cases, is the possession of adapted and sufficient means. Now the means of converting a sinner is the truth of the Gospel. Is Divine truth adapted and sufficient to this end? To this point inspired testimony is most direct and express. Matters of fact bring us to the same point. If any attempt should be made to evade the argument, by referring to the necessity of Divine influence, we reply that Divine influence is undoubtedly necessary to give the Gospel success. But it is also necessary to give success to the use of means in every other case. If there be in our hands adapted and sufficient means for bringing about the universal triumphs of the Gospel, there is manifest justice in the stirring appeal by which we are roused into action. “Awake, awake, put on thy strength, O Zion!” Persons who would reply to such a call, “What is the use of telling me to labour?--it is God who must do everything,” would merely subject themselves to a severe reproof, and a direct charge of making their pretended want of power a pretext for their love of sloth.
2. The text assumes the existence of inadequate exertion. It is appropriate only to a state of comparative indolence and slumber. The language calls not for a partial, but for an entire employment of our resources. “Put on thy strength.” The meaning cannot be less than this: The scenes which are in prospect will require your utmost efforts; the victory will be quite as much as you will be able to win; put into requisition, therefore, all your powers, and exert your whole strength.
II. THE TOPICS BY WHICH THIS CALL MAY BE ENFORCED.
1. Notice the interesting character of the object to be attained. The end contemplated in the text was personally and directly interesting to the parties addressed. Zion was called to exert herself for her own triumphs. It was for their restoration to the land of their fathers that the slumbering exiles were summoned to awake. We also should remember that the triumphs of Christianity are our triumphs, and the increase of the Church is our enlargement. Are we willing that the Church should continue to be small and despised, or do we really wish to see her arrayed in celestial beauty, and the joy of the whole earth? The interests of Zion are identified with those of a guilty and perishing world. The advancement of Zion is identified with the glory of her Lord.
2. The proximity of the most blessed results. Triumphs, and even our ultimate triumphs are at hand. The prospect of success is one of the most natural stimulants to exertion.
3. The necessity of exertion in order to the expected results.
4. The actual suspension of the issue upon our obedience. It suggests the animating sentiment, that the final glories of the Church are waiting for her awaking, and for that alone. (J. H. Hinton, M.A.)
The Church’s duty towards the world
In Isaiah 52:9, of the former chapter, the Church prays God to interfere on her behalf, to exert His omnipotent arm. In the seventeenth verse He calls upon the Church to do something to gain this object. And in my text, which is connected with, that exhortation, He repeats it: “Awake, awake, put on thy strength, O Zion,” etc. If then, we would have the arm of the Lord with us in anything we do for His cause, we must do more than pray.
I. THE SPIRIT WHICH GOD ENJOINS HIS CHURCH TO EVINCE. The language of the text is metaphorical, and highly poetical; but it inculcates upon us, that we put on--
1. A spirit of wakefulness. Wakefulness is opposed to indifference and sloth.
2. A spirit of agression. “Put on thy strength, O Zion.” For what purpose? Certainly to oppose her foes; to make aggressions on the territory of the master spirit of evil. And what is the Church’s “strength,” which she is to put on! It consists in a large measure of Divine influences. The Church’s “strength” consists in spiritual wisdom and spiritual courage. The “strength” of the Church consists in the cheerful assurance of God’s love to us individually--in having it “shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.” “The joy of the Lord is your strength.” And it consists in daily communion with God. Come with me back to Pentecostal days, and see how the Church acted when thus equipped. She “put on her strength,” anal went forth in a spirit of aggression.
3. A spirit of piety. “Put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city.”
(1) What are the “beautiful garments” of the Church? Let the prophet expound his own language (Isaiah 61:10). These they are to “put on,” as on marriage days, as on holy-days, as on days of rejoicing.
(2) As garments are for dignity and beauty, so the Church is only beautiful when thus clothed. They are for defence and protection also, and in them as in a movable garrison we go about, resisting the inclemency of the weather; and these guard us against the curses of God’s law, and all the evils resulting from our misery and wretchedness; They distinguish between the sexes, and denote the station, and so the Church s garments distinguish her from the world.
(3) The Church puts on these garments, when she applies to Christ by faith and exhibits the fruits of His salvation in her life and conduct. Our Lord so interprets it: “Thou hast a few names even in Sardis, which have not defiled their garment.” And when holiness and faith meet in the character, how beautiful is it, and how fit for action!
II. THE EFFECTS WHICH WILL NECESSARILY AND CERTAINLY RESULT IF THE CHURCH OBEYS THE INJUNCTION OF HER LORD.
1. The conversion of souls. “There shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean;” metaphors descriptive of pollution arising from an unconverted state. Unregenerate souls shall not be found within her borders. This has been the result everywhere.
2. The union of the ministers of the Gospel. “Thy watchmen shall lift up the voice; with the voice together shall they sing.
3. The renovation of the world (Isaiah 52:10). (J. Sherman.)
The Church’s strength
Strength is that which resides in a man, but is not exhibited save in so far as it is exercised and produces results. His garments, on the other hand, are visible to those who look at him; they constitute his outward appearance. So that this text refers both to the inward powers and capabilities of Christ’s Church, and to the visible aspect which it presents to the world. Zion has strength. The Church has sufficient means and power at its disposal to effect the purposes for which the Lord founded it. Those purposes are various in form, but perhaps they may be all summed up in the phrase--to impart to men the knowledge of their Saviour.
I. Let me mention one or two THINGS WHICH ARE GOOD AND USEFUL FOR THEIR PROPER WORK, BUT OF WHICH IT CANNOT BE SAID THAT ZION’S STRENGTH LIES IN THEM.
1. The recognition of religion by the State and its establishment by law. We find, as a matter of history, that in many cases when the favour of the governing powers has been most decided, the efficacy of the Church in converting sinners and spreading the Gospel has been feeble and languid; while, on the other hand, some of Zion’s most energetic and successful efforts have been made without any support at all from the secular authority, and even in spite of its opposition.
2. An active ministry. There are two aspects of this activity--by activity I understand diligence in preaching, in visiting the sick, in holding services, and so on. If the clergy are active because the people are zealous, then it is altogether well: it is a mark of strength. But if the clergy are active because no one else is, then it is a mark of weakness.
3. The multiplication of religious societies and other machinery. They are good, useful, necessary things. But they are too often made the excuse for serving God by proxy. The strength of the Church lies in the zeal for Christ of its individual members.
II. “Put on the garments of thy dignity,” continues the prophet, “O Jerusalem, the Holy City.” THE OUTWARD APPEARANCE OF THE CHURCH OUGHT TO BE SUCH AS TO COMMAND THE ADMIRATION EVEN OF THOSE WHO DO NOT BELONG TO IT. We may instance--
1. The garment of righteousness. The people of God ought to present unmistakably the aspect of a righteous people.
2. The garment of unity. It must be confessed that the servants of God do not present to the world the aspect of a united people. It is not simply difference of opinion that separates them: but there are slanders, mutual recriminations, misrepresentations of motives and conduct, suspicions, jealousies, party-spirit in all its hideous forms, combining to rend and ruin the beautiful garment of brotherhood in which Jerusalem ought to be clad.
3. The garment of worship. The Church ought to appear before all men as a city wherein the Lord is worshipped, where He receives the honour due unto His name. The true beauty of holiness is the sincere devotion of the people, and the natural result of such devotion, viz a really united offering of prayer and praise ascending to the throne of the heavenly grace. (J. C. Rust, M.A.)
Relapses in the history of the Church
Only two or three centuries after the death of the last of the apostles, history informs us, Christians were scarcely distinguishable from pagans. The golden-tongued and spiritually-minded Chrysostom would go home on Sundays from his pulpit in Antioch in Syria only to weep bitterly over the indifference of the Church and its defection from its first love. One has only to glance at the history of the Church during the Middle Ages to see that, through all those dark centuries, the Church was about as dark as the world, and but little less corrupt. The common people universally were forbidden to read the Bible, and would not have been able to read it had they been permitted to do so. Popes and cardinals, archbishops and bishops and all the lower orders of clergy had but little more hesitancy in committing murder, and all the sins in the decalogue, than they had in attending mass. The Savonarolas who stood up here and there and preached a better morality and a purer Gospel may be counted on the fingers of one hand. And the Church manifested its gratitude to them by burning them at the stake. (R. V. Foster, D.D.)
The Church tenacious of its life
The Church, by reason of the heavenly element in it, like a tree of the forest--tenacious of its life; when the old trunk dies a fresh twig springs from its roots; and when this decays another fresh twig aprils up in its turn. So Luther and his collaborators, by the grace of God, evoked from the dead Church of the Middle Ages a fresh and vigorous Protestantism. So Wesley and his co-workers evoked from the deadness of the later Anglicanism a still fresh and vigorous Methodism. The Presbyterian Church of John Knox also grew old, and has had its athletic offshoots. “Awake, awake, put on thy strength, O Zion”--and Zion after the awakening is never the Zion of the pro-awakening. (R. V. Foster, D. D.)
Zion’s awakening
Is the injunction obsolete? By no means. And the Church-catholic to-day is in the set of obeying it. Let us notice two or three significant indications--
1. Never in any period of the world’s history has the Bible been more universally and intensely studied than it is now. And the study of it is far, very far, from being prevailingly hostile.
2. As another indication of this fact I quote the old saying, “In union there is strength;” especially is it true when other essential elements of strength are not wanting. In this day there is a visible tendency towards union.
3. Another indication is the rapid progress in mission work. (R. V. Foster, D. D.)
Put on thy strength, O Zion
Zion’s strength
What is the strength of Zion? The strength of any community is primarily in the individuals who constitute it; so that the strength of the Church of God is, not entirely, but first of all, in the separate members of that body. The strength of Zion is also the power of every religious principle. It is the power of faith and hope and love; the power of patience and perseverance and courage and meekness. There is strength in all life, and Zion lives with the rich and full and eternal life of God within her. Knowledge is power, and the Church of the living God has the highest kind of knowledge. A settled faith is power, and Zion has a fixed and positive belief. Confidence and trust are power, and the Church of God relies upon God. Hope is power, and the hope of the Church is as an anchor sure and steadfast. Love is power, and godly charity never faileth. Patience, perseverance and courage are powers, before which obstacles yield and dangers flee away, and the Church of God is trained to be patient and steadfast and brave. The strength of Zion is the power of certain agencies and influences. The Church has power in her testimony to truth, in her intercession before God, and in her character as the leaven of society and the salt of the nations. Union is strength where alliance is wise and entire; where heart sympathizes with heart and hand joins in hand. We proceed to state reasons why God should thus speak to His Church.
I. GOD BIDS ZION PUT ON HER STRENGTH FOR SELF-MANIFESTATION. Not for self-magnification. Self-magnification is disloyal, traitorous and impious; self-manifestation is a plain duty (Matthew 5:16). The Church of God can walk and work and endure; then why appear impotent and helpless? Strong winds make themselves heard. Strong sunshine makes itself felt. Strong life shows itself, whether in the animal or vegetable kingdom. And the Church, to be heard and seen and felt and known, must be strong.
II. GOD BIDS ZION PUT ON HER STRENGTH THAT HE MAY BE GLORIFIED. A redeemed man is a new creation and a Divine workmanship. A congregation of believing men, and the whole visible Church, are of God s founding. Ye are God’s husbandry; ye are God s building. Now if the husbandry appear as the field of the slothful, and as the vineyard of the man void of understanding; if it be all grown over with thorns, and nettles cover the face thereof, and the stone wall thereof be broken down; if the building appear to be defective in foundation, imperfect in construction, and framed together with bad material--the name of God, instead of being honoured, will be blasphemed (1 Peter 2:9-10; Isaiah 43:21).
III. GOD REQUIRES ZION TO PUT OUT HER STRENGTH FOR THE SAKE OF HER OWN WELL-BEING. If the powers of the Church be inactive, they will decline. The staff faith, if never used, will decay, etc.
IV. ZION IS REQUIRED TO PUT ON HER STRENGTH IN ORDER TO MEET THE CLAIMS OF A SINFUL AND SUFFERING WORLD.
V. GOD DIRECTS ZION TO PUT ON HER STRENGTH BECAUSE STRENGTH HAS BEEN GIVEN HER TO PUT ON.
VI. IS NOT THIS PUTTING ON OF STRENGTH AS ESSENTIAL TO ZION’S PEACE AND JOY AS TO HER OUTWARD PROSPERITY? (S. Martin.)
Thy strength of Zion
Thy strength of Zion is the strength of human nature. It is masculine energy, feminine susceptibility, the vivacity of childhood, the buoyancy of youth, and the force of maturity. It is the power of body, soul and spirit, it is intellectual power, emotional force, and moral strength. It is the strength of regenerated humanity, therefore spiritual and religious power; the strength of man redeemed unto God, and as redeemed, allied to God, dwelt in by God, and made strong by union with God. The strength of Zion is the strength of all that redeemed humanity is, and of all that is within human nature when regenerated and sanctified by the grace of God. (S. Martin.)
Strength put on by being put out
If a man put out his strength, he puts on strength, he appears clothed with strength as with a garment. Virgil furnishes us with an illustration: AEneas visits Drepanum in Sicily, and them by various games celebrates the anniversary of his father’s death. The combatants with the cestus are described. Dares first shows his face with strength prodigious, and rears himself amid loud murmurs from the spectators. He uplifts his lofty head, presents his broad shoulders, brandishes his arms and beats the air with his fists. And Entellus accepted his challenge, flung from his shoulders his vest, bared his huge limbs, his big bones and sinewy arms, and stood forth of mighty frame in the middle of the field. Forthwith each on his tiptoes stood erect, and undaunted raised his arms aloft in the air. Dares and Entellus, as they put out strength, put on strength. A working-man and a trained athlete, when asleep or otherwise in repose, appear clothed with weakness. All the muscles are relaxed, and the limbs are motionless and apparently powerless, as the parts of a marble statue. But when the athlete is engaged in some bodily exercise, or the working-man is handling his tools and lifting his materials, his appearance is that of one arrayed with power. As he puts out strength he puts on strength, nor can he put it out without putting it on. Adapting the expression of the idea to common utterance, we may read our text, “Put out thy strength, O Zion.” (S. Martin.)
Injunctions to be strong
My text harmonizes with words frequently addressed to Zion and to her sons (1 Kings 2:2; Isaiah 35:4; Isaiah 40:9; Isaiah 40:31; Haggai 2:4; Zechariah 8:9-13; 1 Corinthians 16:13; Ephesians 6:10; 2 Timothy 2:1). (S. Martin.)
God’s call to be strong
It is interesting to observe by how many voices God speaks as in our text. By the smarting of the conscience when the strength is withheld, and by the glowing of the conscience when the strength is consecrated; by the breadth of love which God’s law requires, and by the depth of privilege which the Gospel provides; by the correction administered when we are inactive and inert, and by the blessedness experienced when we abound in the work of the Lord, God is continually saying, “Put on thy strength, O Zion.” (S. Martin.)
Some elements of Church strength
1. Soundness in doctrine.
2. Purity of life among the members of the Church.
3. Thoroughness of organization for Church work.
4. Faithfulness in individual effort to do good.
5. Regularity of attendance upon the services of the Church.
6. Pecuniary liberality.
7. Unity among the members.
8. A prayerful spirit.
9. An abiding faith in the presence of God with the Church. Where these are to be found the Church will be strong. (D. Winters.)
The elements of the Church’s strength
I. THE GREATNESS OF HER AIMS. Great aims enthused great souls, and the Church proposed the conquest of the world for Christ.
II. THE MATCHLESS POWER OF CHRISTIAN TRUTH, which may be illustrated by the distinctively Christian doctrines of our moral ruin, redemption through a Divine-human Saviour, the possibility of a regenerate life, and the blessedness of an immortal hope.
III. But these doctrines needed a voice; hence another element of the Church’s strength is A WITNESSING MEMBERSHIP. All Christians may witness for the truth by the testimony of the lips, and also by the silent but potent ministry of the life.
IV. Another mighty force in the service of the Church is A CO-OPERATIVE PROVIDENCE.
V. THE ENDOWMENT OF THE HOLY GHOST. (Bp. W. X. Winde.)
The supreme point of energy
Men can rouse themselves to action. We cannot live continuously in ecstasy; we must live under ourselves, so to speak, or life will become a pain and a failure. We are, however, to have periods of special effort, hours of rapture, times of inspiration and sense of mightiness beyond all that is ordinary. There is more power in man than he may be aware of, and he should inquire what objects and pursuits are worthy of his enthusiastic devotion. Drive a horse from home, and in the course of the day he will show weariness which you may regard as a sign of utter exhaustion; but turn his head homeward, and see what a change takes place! How willingly he runs! How swiftly! He has “put on his strength”! Work for a person who is not a favourite, and the hands soon tire: every effort is a weariness to the flesh, every thought wears the mind; on the other hand, serve a person who is beloved, etc. Undertake any engagement which does not excite the interest of the heart, and how soon it becomes irksome. The mother waits upon her sick child, and wonders how she can endure so much. The mystery is in the love. We are strong when we work in the direction of our will. Where the will is right, the strength will assert itself. The question is not one of muscle but of purpose. What objects, then, are worthy of “all our strength, all our mind, and all our heart”? We may get at the answer negatively as well as positively.
I. NO OBJECT WHICH BEARS UPON THIS WORLD ONLY IS WORTHY OF THE SUPREME ENERGY OF MAN. Even in secular affairs we work by laws of proportion and adaptation. If a man employed a steam-engine to draw a cork, we should justly accuse him of wasting power. If a man spent his days and nights in carving cherry-stones, we should say he was wasting his life. We have a common saving--“the game is not worth the candle”--showing that in common affairs we do recognize the law of proportion, and the law that results do determine the value of processes. If, then, in the lower, how much more in the higher! Think of a being like man spending his lifetime in writing his name in the dust! There is a success which is not worth securing. Suppose a man should get all the money he can possibly accumulate; all the fame; all the luxury--what does it amount to?
II. SPIRITUAL OBJECTS ARE ALONE WORTHY OF THE SUPREME ENERGY OF MAN. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,” etc.
1. They are akin to his own nature.
2. They touch every point of his being.
3. They prepare him for the solemnity and service of the future. Boundless are the prospects of the spiritual thinker! His library, the universe! His companions, the angels! His Teacher, God! In view of such prospects, how time dwindles, and how earth passes as a wreath of smoke! The spiritual thinker is independent of all the influences which make up the small world of the materialist--his citizenship is in heaven.
III. THE FACT THAT SPIRITUAL OBJECTS ALONE ARE WORTHY OF THE SUPREME ENERGY OF MAN SHOULD IMPEL TO DECISIVE ACTION. Put on thy strength--
1. For the time is short.
2. For the enemy is on the alert.
3. For the Master is worthy. The text addresses a call to the Church. The call is to activity. He who gives the call will give the grace. The Church is not to be feeble and tottering; it is to be strong, valiant, heroic. He who can do without the help of the strongest is graciously pleased to accept the service of the meanest. (J. Parker, D.D.)
Effort gives strength
I. PUT ON STRENGTH BY WAKEFULNESS. A slumbering life results in moral death.
II. PUT ON STRENGTH BY ACTIVITY. Activity imparts physical strength. We have only to look, at the compact and knotted lump of muscle on the blacksmith s forearm. The rower s chest is expanded by his exertions. The practised wrestler grips with an ironlike grasp the limbs of his opponent. Even a Samson is divested of his prowess by lolling in the lap of a Delilah. We put on intellectual strength by keeping the brain forces constantly moving. But most of all the moral and spiritual nature is strengthened by exercise. Great is the power of habit. It is a kind of second nature, and is the grand resultant of repeated acts.
III. PUT ON STRENGTH BY DEVELOPMENT. Art thou but a bruised reed, put on thy strength! Hast thou but one talent, put it out to usury. Moral and spiritual strength may be developed to the latest hour of a Methuselah’s life, and eternity will be but an ampler sphere for the enlargement of the soul’s vast powers.
IV. PUT ON STRENGTH BY JOYFULNESS. Joy begets strength, and strength increases joy.
V. PUT ON STRENGTH BY HOPEFULNESS. The despairing are weak; but the hopeful are strong. I will endeavour, is the inspiring language of the hopeful. The Church may well be hopeful, for God’s promise is given for her encouragement.
VI. PUT ON STRENGTH BY UNITED PRAYER. The Church’s prosperous times are the praying times. The praying man is the strong man. (W. Burrows, B.A.)
Strength increased by use
A lady was watching a potter at his work, whose one foot was kept with “never-slackening speed turning at swift wheel round,” while the other rested patiently on the ground. When the lady said to him, in a sympathizing tone, “How tired your foot must be!” the man raised his eyes and said, “No, ma’am; it isn’t the foot that works that’s tired; it’s the foot that stands. That s it.” If you want to keep your strength, use it; if you want to get tired, do nothing. (Christian Budget.)
The danger of inaction
A magnet is sometimes seen in a chemist’s laboratory, suspended against a wall, and loaded heavily with weights. We ask the reason, and the scientist replies, “The magnet was losing power, because it had not been used for some time. I am restoring its force by giving it something to do.” (Sunday School Chronicle.)