The voice of the Lord is upon the waters.
The voice of Jehovah upon the waters
The very pathway of the Lord’s people is said to be “through the waters”; and they are a people “that do business in deep waters.” How Israel, how Peter, found the truth of our text. But when passing through deep waters we are more inclined--and it is a crying evil--to listen to the roar of the waves than to the voice of my precious Christ.
I. afflictions are compared to “waters,” “billows,. .. deep waters.” And these may come upon the Church at large through hatred of the truth by Papists, Arminians and Socinians and others. And upon private persons, through temporal trials and persecutions. But these are other waters, blessed ones, such as told of in Ezekiel 47:1-23.
II. the Lord’s voice on these waters. It is an overruling and comforting voice, in waters of affliction: of conviction, comfort and direction, in the waters of the sanctuary.
III. the attention demanded to such a voice. Listen for it more than to any other whether persecutor or preacher. Supernatural joy comes from listening to the Lord’s voice. Have you all heard it? If not, may it awaken you now. (Joseph Irons.)
The voice of the Lord is full of majesty.--
The majestic voice
All God’s works praise Him, but there are some which praise Him more than others. There are some of His doings upon which there seems to be graven in larger letters than usual the name of God. Such as the lofty mountains, the thunders and lightnings. The old and universal belief was, that the thunder was the voice of God. But there are spiritual voices of God, and of these we would speak. Samuel on his bed heard it. Saul at his conversion. And God often speaks to man by the Holy Spirit. And the voice of God is ever full of majesty. It is so--
I. essentially; it must be so. Think whose voice it is. How God’s voice is full of majesty because--
1. It is true.
2. Commanding.
3. Very powerful. “Let there be light, and there was light.”
4. And because God’s voice is His Word, and His Word was His Son the Lord Jesus Christ.
II. always. God’s voice, like man’s, has various tones, but it is always full of majesty.
1. Let the tone be what it may, whether harsh as in threatening, or sweet as when consoling, or august as when commanding. “Speak to the children of Israel, that they go forward.” And at the Resurrection of the dead, and at the Judgment Day.
2. And in all the different degrees of its loudness. Some calls of God are loud, others gentle but all majestic.
3. And in all its mediums. The meanness of a speaker for God does not hinder this.
III. in its effects.
1. It is a breaking voice. “The voice of the Lord breaketh the cedars.” The proudest and most stubborn sinner is broken before Him.
2. Moving. “He maketh them (the mountains) also to skip like a calf.” No mountain of error, falsity, or sin can stand unmoved when He speaks.
3. Dividing. “Divideth the flames of fire.” Where God’s Word is faithfully preached it is ever a dividing power.
4. Shaking “shaketh the wilderness.” God’s Word does this in men’s hearts.
5. Bringing forth--“maketh the hinds to calve.” So God’s Word makes the soul bring forth holy desire and joy, and whatever a man has in him it has to come forth.
6. Discovering--“discovereth the forests.” Hypocrites hide, but God discovers them. Oh, listen to His voice bidding you believe and be saved. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Voice of the Lord
This sacred poem from which our text is taken, is one of the most elevated and sublime to which the poetry of inspiration itself has given birth. But the words are capable of other than their primary application.
I. consider the modes in which God speaks to man.
1. Through Nature--see this psalm,
2. Through the dispensations and in the government of Providence.
3. Through His revealed truth, and--
4. Chief of all, through His Son.
II. the attributes by which these communications are prominently distinguished--Power and Majesty. Consider--
1. The glory of His nature from whom they proceed.
2. The contents of the communications themselves. They speak of the Divine perfections and chiefly of God’s method of redeeming sinful man.
3. The issues in which attention to, or neglect of, these communications is to terminate. They are identified with the destinies of man’s deathless soul.
III. THE tribute which these communications made by God to man imperatively require.
1. Faith.
2. Gratitude.
3. Prayer for ourselves and for our fellow-men. How, then, shall you who are despising these communications of God answer it in the great day of Judgment? Oh, come to Jesus now. (James Parsons.)