When thou goest, it shall lead thee.
The comfort of the thought of God’s guidance in after-life of those brought up in His fear and love
Who is there who has never felt in his heart a wish for some one to advise, direct, and help him? There is an Adviser, a Helper, promised to us, able, powerful to guide and help us with unerring wisdom through any difficulties or troubles--the gracious Father, the redeeming Son, the Spirit that maketh holy. All of us need, daily need, such a Companion, such a Comforter. Those who will meet together and receive God’s blessing from the hand of the bishop in confirmation, where will they all be in a few years, nay, perhaps when another year has passed over their heads? Wherever they may be, this one thing awaits them, temptation--temptation as different as their own circumstances and dispositions, but still temptation. The old fables and monkish legends represent Satan coming in different shapes to one another according to their particular weakness--to one as a gold-finder showing his hidden treasure, to another as a handsome winning man, offering life of pleasure, to another as a beautiful woman enticing to ways of sin. But all these mean the same thing--that the world, the flesh, and the devil shape their temptations so as best to catch each unprotected soul. There is no saying what that temptation will be like; for to each it may be different according to where he is, and what he is. Some may be tempted by getting on in the world, some by not getting on, some by idle follies, some by busy follies. Let their life be what it may, we can comfort ourselves with the thought that they are prepared, that they have had the best kind of preparation, that which cometh from God only, the knowledge of His mercies and promises, the help of His Holy Spirit. Shall we try to look a little more closely down the long avenue of time, and see them as they will be; some we can fancy taking root here, spreading out their branches safely under the shelter of Christ’s Church; some may be found settling far away, some not settling at all, but drifting hither and thither on the changeful tides of life; but what of their souls, which will be bettering or worsening from day to day? We have trained them to know, to fear, and to love the Lord their Saviour, their Comforter, their God; and that God has promised His all-powerful Spirit shall garrison their souls, and strengthen them to fight the life-long fight of faith, if they will not slacken or desert His service. So we will cheer ourselves with the thought that as, like Joseph, they have been bred up in the fear and nurture of the Lord, so they will be able to render as good an account of themselves. (Archdeacon Mildmay.)
When thou awakest, it shall talk with thee.
Man’s counsellor
I. The subject of this statement--what it is that will do this. The commandment and law of religious and well-instructed persons come to be equivalent to the law of God. “It” really stands for God’s book. “Talk” is expressive of that familiarity and friendship which may come to be established between the mind and heart of a young man and the wisdom of God personified and embodied in the book. There is a sacred familiarity, an affectionate friendship, an intercourse of tenderness. Two or three things characterise this sacred converse and intercourse.
1. It will talk with you on the most important subjects.
2. It will talk with you in all sorts of ways.
3. It will talk with authority.
There is nothing harsh, nothing grating in its tone of authority if the heart be right. But it will talk with honest plainness. This friend will speak to you with openness and honesty, and with the plainness of reproof. Two or three things you must carry with you in order that this converse may be fully beneficial.
1. You must be on terms of sincerity with the Bible. You must not come reluctantly, nor with doubt, nor to ridicule; you must not come in an improper spirit of questioning. This book treats a man just as one man treats another. To the “froward it will show itself froward.”
2. There must be serious and earnest prayer for God’s enlightening and guiding Spirit.
3. There must be frequent and sometimes prolonged and deep meditation on the words spoken.
There are three ways in which may be illustrated the time that is here indicated--“When thou awakest.”
1. Take the expression literally. When you come back in the morning to consciousness.
2. Take the expression figuratively. At particular times, through the force of inward thoughts or of outward circumstances, young man may suddenly wake up to his peril, foolishness, sin--to duty, the greatness of life, the past, the future.
3. Youth figuratively is emphatically a time of awakening to the realities of life. The young man wakes up to his personal individuality, to a sense of his obligations, feeling that there are now many things which depend on his own judgment--upon himself.
II. The object of discourse in the chapter. To warn the young man against things which may injure and ruin in a worldly point of view. And there is a far greater connection between the ruin of a man in a worldly respect and the ruin of the soul than people are apt to imagine. Three causes of ruin--
1. Want of caution. Illustrated in giving your name in a bond or guarantee for another. Speculations, hazardous schemes, efforts to get profit without giving sweat. It is God’s law that we shall purchase everything with the sweat of our brow; and all hazardous speculations, all gambling transactions, are, in fact, efforts to evade this law.
2. Indolence. There are some people who seem to be asleep all day long.
3. Profligacy. There is not only the seduction of man by the harlot, but the injury of man by his fellow-man. This last is a more complicated crime than the first. The man who gives way to any impure form of vice is said to “lack understanding,” to “destroy his own soul.”
III. The characteristics of a man who is on the road to ruin. Along with the evil imaginations of the heart, a false tongue, and the love of sowing discord, there is a loss of manliness, of transparency, of sincerity, and the like. Conclusion:
1. Give a spiritual turn to the teaching of the chapter, and see what spiritual thoughts may be educed from it.
2. Invite young men who accept the Christian faith to devote themselves to God’s service in the beginning of life.
3. Being so devoted, see that ye be not led away and seduced from your steadfastness by the world, the flesh, and the devil. Look ahead; always consider consequences. You are living under great moral laws, and you can no more alter those laws, you can no more avoid their working out their results, than you can turn the sun from its course. Beware of doing any one thing, of giving way to any one temptation, from which grievous results may arise. (Thomas Binney.)
The talking book
It is a very happy circumstance when the commandment of our father and the law of our mother are also the commandment of God and the law of the Lord. Happy are they who have a double force to draw them to the right--the bonds of nature and the cords of grace. God’s law should be a guide to us--“When thou goest, it shall lead thee”; a guardian to us--“when thou sleepest”--when thou art defenceless and off thy guard--“it shall keep thee”; and a dear companion to us--“when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee.”
I. We perceive that the world is living. How else could it be said--“It shall talk with thee”?
1. It is living, because it is pure truth. Error is death, truth is life. The tooth of time devours all lies. Truth never dies.
2. It is the utterance of an immutable, self-existing
God. So the Word is sure, steadfast, and full of power. It is never out of date.
3. It enshrines the living heart of Christ. The living Christ is in the book; you behold His face on almost every page.
4. The Holy Spirit has a peculiar connection with the Word of God. The work of the Spirit in men’s hearts is done by the texts which ministers quote rather than by their explanations of them. Take care, then, how you trifle with a book which is so instinct with life.
II. We perceive that the word is personal. “It shall talk with thee.”
1. God’s Word talks about men, and about modern men; about the paradise of unfallen manhood, the fall, the degeneracy of the race, and the means of its redemption.
2. God’s Word speaks to men in all states and conditions before God--to sinners and to the children of God.
3. God’s Word is personal to all our states of mind. It goes into all details of our case, let our state be what it may.
4. God’s Word is always faithful. You never find the Word of God keeping back that which is profitable for you. This suggests a little healthful self-examination. “How does the Word of God speak to my soul?”
III. We perceive that Holy Scripture is very familiar. “Talk with thee.” To talk signifies fellowship, communion, familiarity. Scripture speaks the language of men; it comes down to our simplicity; it is familiar as to all that concerns us; it answers inquiries.
IV. We perceive that the Word of God is responsive. “With thee,” not “to thee.” Talk with a man is not all on one side. To talk with a man means answering talk from him. Scripture is a marvellously conversational book; it talks and it makes men talk.
V. We perceive that Scripture is influential. When the Word of God talks with us, it influences us. All talk influences more or less. This book soothes our sorrows, and encourages us. It has a wonderfully elevating power. It warns and restrains. It sanctifies and moulds the mind into the image of Christ. It confirms and settles us. (C. H. Spurgeon.)