I Took the Cup of Salvation and I Called upon the Name of the Lord

He first time we meet with a cup in the Scriptures is in the story of Pharaoh’s chief butler. ‘ In my dream ’ — so he told it to Joseph — ‘behold a vine was before me. And in the vine w’ere three branches. And the clusters thereof brought forth ripe grapes. And I took the grapes, and I pressed them into the king’s cup, and I gave the cup into the king’s hand.’ And from that the word cup came to mean the portion of drink, whatever the drink was, that was set down beside every man’s trencher at table. And then, as the Scriptures proceed, and as the sense of the word in question enlarges and deepens and enriches, what¬ ever there is of true good in any man’s personal life it is called his cup. The Psalmist more than once employs the word in this experimental and spiritual sense, as in the sixteenth Psalm: ‘ The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance, and my cup; thou maintainest my lot.’ And in the twenty-third

Psalm: ‘ Thou anointest my head with oil, and my cup runneth over.’ But again a man’s cup is some¬ times taken for the sorrow and the sadness of his life, as thus: ‘ Therefore His people return hither, and waters of a full cup are wrung out to them.’ And again: ‘ O Jerusalem! thou hast drunk at the hand of the Lord the cup of trembling, and hast drained it to its dregs.’ And then, in something of the same sense, we have our Lord saying to certain of his more ambitious disciples: ‘ Are ye able to drink of the cup that I am to drink? ’ And then there comes the supreme instance of this so expressive word: ‘ Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me! ’ And then after that and out of that there comes to us this crowning sense of this so expressive word; ‘ This cup is the new Covenant in my blood, which is shed for many for the remission of sins; drink ye all of it.’

‘I will take the cup of salvation,’ says David, ‘ and will call on the Name of the Lord.’ The circumstances of that morning on the Mount, when the Lord descended and proclaimed His Name for the first time to Moses, were these: Moses had climbed the mount that morning with groanings in his heart that he could not utter. O wretched man that I am! Moses had cried to the God of his salvation, long before Paul took up the same lament in his New Testament experience. For by this time everything had gone wrong with Moses. Every¬ thing had gone into sin and misery with Moses. A whole world of sin and misery lies hidden behind the scene in Moses’ tent when Zipporah cried out.

‘ Surely a bloody husband art thou to me! ’ And as if that were not enough to break Moses’ heart, his sister Miriam, who had watched so faithfully over her little brother when he lay in his ark of bulrushes in the river, and who had worked so wisely as to get the outcast child put back again into his mother’s arms; Miriam, the prophetess, who had led the women of Israel in their songs and their dances on the shore of the Red Sea: even Miriam had lived to break her brother’s heart with her envies and her jealousies and her treacherous plots against him till God struck her with leprosy for her wages. And then, to crown all, Aaron, his brother, the high priest of Israel, had but yesterday fallen so far as to make a golden calf, and to lead the dissolute-minded people in songs and dances, so very different from the songs and the dances in which he had taken a leading part with his sister on the hither shore of the Red Sea. And then Moses himself, under all these private and public crosses, humiliations, and heart-breaks, had given way to an unbelieving and a rebellious mind, till he was the most heavy-laden and the most heart-broken man in all the tents of Israel. But Moses’ extremity was God’s opportunity, as it always is. And the Lord said to Moses, Behold there is a place by Me, and thou shalt stand upon a rock. And I will put thee in a cleft of that rock, until I have passed by. And the Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with Moses there, and proclaimed the Name of the Lord: The Lord, the Lord God, merciful to the miserable, and gracious to the sinful, and long-suffering to the old, and abundant in goodness and truth to all, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. And Moses made haste and bowed his head toward the earth and worshipped. And ever after that morning, as often as Moses was in any sin or any misery of any kind, he again made haste and called upon the Name of the Lord, and especially on every Passover Day. And so did all the psalmists and all the prophets and all the saints of God in ancient Israel, till every psalm and every sermon and every upper room in all Israel, down to the time of Christ, was made melodious with the Name of the Lord. Let the 103rd Psalm stand for a specimen of a thousand such psalms and sermons: —

‘ His ways to Moses, He His acts
Made known to Israel’s sons.

The Lord our God is merciful,

And He is gracious;

Longsuffering, and slow to wrath.

In mercy plenteous.’

All which is written for our learning, for our example, and for our encouragement, in whatsoever sin and misery our communion cup may find us this morning on our holy mount.

And then each several communicant this morning will select and will appropriate to himself that special Name of the Lord which best answers to his own case and to all his own circumstances. And, just as it was in Israel, so will it be with ourselves. Some communicants this morning will take the cup and will call upon God’s long-suffering. Not only upon His mercy and His grace, but upon His lio long-sufFering also. ‘ I have been in a great trespass from my youth up,’ sobbed a great saint, as often as he again took the cup. Now, though I have read that saint’s recorded life again and again, and with great attention and with great sympathy, I have not the least idea what his lifelong trespass was. But I know some of my own. Do you know any of yours? If you do, the moment when the elder puts the cup into your hand, lift up your heart and say, ‘ O God, Thou art my God, and Thy Name to me, up to this day, has been Thy great long-sufFering toward me. And with the cup of salvation in my hand will I once again seek Thy face and Thy long-suffering.’ All you who are no longer young communicants, call upon your God in some such way as that. And who can tell but this very day He will arise and will break your lifelong bonds and set you free; set you free to a few years of holiness and of peace of mind and heart before you finally leave this table for the table above.

And all you who are old communicants might do this also. When you are in close communion with God at the table, you might ask in a holy confidence just what it is that He has in His mind in so lengthen¬ ing out your unsanctified life on earth. He must have something special in His mind toward you, and with the cup of His salvation in your hand. He may deign to open His mind to you on this subject; the secret of the Lord has often been laid open to His saints as they sat near Him and were taken into His confidence at His table. And this has been one of His secrets with some of our old communicants. He told them that He was sparing them so long in order to teach them what sin is, and what their own besetting sin is; to teach them by a long experience the unspeakable bondage and curse and pollution of sin. A holy message that so few, old or young, ever seem to learn. Then again. He spares some old saints of His to give them all possible time to do some good work for Him that He would like to ac¬ knowledge and to praise them for and to reward them for, both on earth and in heaven. And in some cases He spares them long that they may give more back again to Him out of the abundance that He has given them. But most of all, and best of all, and as including all. He lengthens out the life of some of His saints in order that Jesus Christ His Beloved Son may get something of His right place in their thoughts and in their affections before they are summoned up to take their seat in His presence at His table above. But no man can guess, or has any business to attempt to guess, what God will confide to you when you take the cup and call upon His proper Name for you, whether that name is merciful, or gracious, or long-suffering, or abundant in goodness and in truth. ‘ Here,’ says that old scholar, William Gouge, ‘here the psalmist useth the plural number, and says, “I will take the cup of salvations,” whereby, after the Hebrew elegancy, he means many salvations, many deliverances, one after another, and passover after passover. Or, as the Bible style sometimes is, he may mean some great and extraordinary deliverance, which contains in itself a multitude of deliverances and of salvations.’

So that as God has many great Names, so every communicant is free to plead them all, if he needs them all; to say in all the plurality and fulness of God’s great Name, ‘ Be merciful to me, and be gracious to me, and be long-suffering to me, and where sin has abounded, let Thy grace much more abound unto me.’

And then, lift up your heavy hearts, O all you who faint with your great thirst to drink the cup of your full and final salvation. Lift up your heavy hearts, for your full and final salvation draweth nigh. It is far nearer now than it was when you first believed and first began to take the cup and to call on God’s Name. The day cannot be far away from some of you when your Saviour will put the cup into your hand for your last communion on earth, and when He will say to you that He will no more drink of the fruit of the vine with you, till He drinks it new with you in His Father’s heavenly kingdom. Yes, lift up your whole heart in strong faith and in assured hope to the Table above! For, amid all the inconceivably blessed occupations and enjoyments of your Father’s House, there will be returning communion seasons, so to call them, when your Saviour will have His Table spread, from time to time, and will say to you,

‘ Come and do this in everlasting remembrance of Me.’ And as in grace here, so in glory there, you will take the cup of your salvation, and will call Him by all His Names! O my soul! what a communion day that will be! O what holiness! O what happiness! O what adoration! O whatever-increasing and everlasting love to God and man!

And then there will be this also; in order to kindle your love more and more, and in order to enrich your song more and more, there will be this at every returning season of such communion in heaven. You remember what their Master said to His disciples in the upper room in Jerusalem? So when He had taken His garments, and was set down again. He said to them: ‘ Know ye what I have done to you? ’ It is not recorded what they said in answer to that question. But in our upper room in the New Jerusalem David will lead us in our answer, as he has so often led us in this house, and he will say, ‘ He sent from above. He took me, and He drew me out of many waters. He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, and out of the miry clay, and He set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. And He hath put a new song into my mouth, even praise to our God,’ and all the Table from head to foot will say Amen! And after David Job will say, ‘ He took me from my dunghill, and He set me among the princes of His people, and He clothed me also with His spot¬ less righteousness, and it was, and it will ever be, for a robe and for a diadem to me! ’ And after Job the evangelical prophet will rise up with the cup of salvation in his hand, and will proclaim and say, as he looks up to the Lamb: ‘ Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. For He was wounded for our transgressions, and was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and with His stripes we are healed.’ And all the Table will believe his report, and will add that the arm of the Lord has been revealed to them also. And we will all turn and attend to Paul when he takes into his hand the cup of his salvation. For he will stand forth and will repeat his debt to Christ in the seventh chapter of his sanctification, and then will seal it up for ever with this evangelical seal: ‘ I thank God through Jesus Christ my Lord. For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord.’ When he, and all who hear him, will cast down their crowns before the throne of God and the Lamb. ‘ And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth were for ever passed away. And I, John, saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. F’er the marriage of the Lamb is come. And I heard a great voice out of heaven, saying. Behold, the Tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for all the former things are passed away.’ And best of all, the Lamb of God shall then see of the travail of His soul and shall be satisfied. And ever blessed will be Flis Name!