Sermons of the Rev. C. H. Spurgeon, Series 6

Perhaps there are no stories that strck by us so long as those which we hear in our childhood, those tales which are told us by our fathers, and in our nurseries. It is a sad reflection that too many of these stories are idle and vain, so that our minds in early infancy are tinctured with fables, and inoculated with strange and lyhig narratives. Now, among the early Christians and the old believers in the far-ofl” times nursery tales were flir different from what they are now, and the stories with which their children were amused were of a flir different class from those which fascinated us in the days of our babyhood. No doubt Abraham would talk to young children about the flood, and tell them how the waters overspread the earth, and how Noah alone was saved in the ark. The ancient Israelites, when they dwelt in their own land, would all of them tell their children about the Red Sea, and the plagues which God wrought in Egypt when he brought his people out of the house of bondage. Among the early Christians we know that it was the custom of parents to recount to their children every thing concerning the life of Christ, the acts of the Apostles, and the like interesting narratives. Nay, among our puritanic ancestors, such wepe’ the stories that regaled their childhood. Sitting down by iJie fireside, before those old Dutch tiles with the quaint ecccixtric drawings upon them of the history of Christ, mothers i/ould teach their children about Jesus walking on the water, orf his multiplying the loaves of bread, or of his marvellous transfiguration, or of the crucifixion of Jesus. Oh, how I that the like were the tales of the present age, that the stories of our childhood would be again the stories of Christ, and that we would each of us believe that, after all, there can be nothing so interesting as that which is true, and nothing more striking than those stories which are in sacred writ; nothing that can more truly move the heart of a child than the marvellous works of God which he did in the olden times. Now, it seems that the psalmist who wrote this most musical ode had heard from his flither, handed to him by tradition, the stories of the wondrous things which God had done in his day; and afterwards, this sweet singer in Israel taught it to his children, and so was one generation after another led to call God blessed, remembering his mighty acts.

Now, my dear friends, this morning I intend to recall to your minds some of the wondrous things which God has done in the olden time. My aim and object will be to excite your minds to seek after the like, that, looking back upon what God has done, you may be induced to look forward with the eye of expectation, hoping that he will again stretch forth his potent hand and his holy arm, and repeat those mighty acts he performed in ancient days.

First, I shall speak of the marvellous stories which our fathers have told us, and which ive have heard of the olden time; secondly, I shall mention some disadvantages under which these old stories labor u’ith regard to the effect upon our minds; and, then, I shall draw the proper inferences from those marvellous things which we have heard that the Lord did in days of yore.

I. To begin, then, with the wonderful stories we have

HEARD OP THE Lord’s ANCIENT DOINGS.

We have heard that God has at times done very mighty acts. The plain every-day course of the world hath been disturbed with wonders at which men have been exceedingly amazed. God hath not’ always permitted his church to go on climbing by slow degrees t-p victory, but he hath been pleased at times to smite one terrible blow, and lay his enemies down upon the earth, and bid his chilK-^en march over their prostrate bodies. Turn ye back, then, to lancient records, and remember what God hath done. Will ye not remember what he did at the Red Sea, how he smote Egypt and all its chivalry, and covered Pharaoh’s chariot and horse in the Red Sea? Have ye not heard tell how God smote Og, king of Bashan, and Sihon, king of the Amorites, because they withstood the progress of his people 1 Have ye not learned how he proved that his mercy endureth for ever, when he slew those great kings and cast the mighty ones down from their thrones 1 Have you not read, too, how God smote the children of Canaan, and drove out the inhabitants thereof, and gave the land to his people, to be a possession by lot for ever? Have you not heard how when the hosts of Jabin came against them, the stars in their courses fought against Siseral The river of Kishon swept them away, “that ancient river, the river Kishon,” and there was none of them left 1 Hath it not been told you, too, how by the hand of David, God smote the Philistines, and how by his right hand he smote the children of Amnion? Have you not heard how Midian was put to confusion, and the myriads of Arabia were scattered by Asa in the day of his faith’? And have ye not heard, too, how the Lord sent a blast upon the hosts of Sennacherib, so that in the morning they were all dead men? Tell — tell ye these, his wonders! Speak of them in your streets. Teach them to your children. Let them not be forgotten, for the right hand of the Lord hath done marvellous things, his name is known in all the earth.

The wonders, however, which most concern us, are those of the Christian era; and surely these are not second to those under the Old Testament. Have you never read how God won to himself great renown on the Day of Pentecost 1 Turn ye to this book of the record of the wonders of the Lord and read. Peter the fisherman stood up and preached in the name of the Lord his God. A multitude assembled, and the Spirit of God fell upon them; and it came to pass that three thousand in one day were pricked in their hearts by the hand of God, and believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. And know you not how the twelve apostles with the disciples went everywhere preaching the Word, and the idols fell from their thrones? The cities opened wide their gates, and the messenger of Christ walked through the street and preached. It is true that at first they were driven hither and thither, and hunted like partridges upon the mountains: but do ye not remember how the Lord did get unto himself a victory, so that in a hundred years after the nailing of Christ to the cross the gospel had been preached in every nation, and the isles of the sea had heard the sound thereof? And have ye yet forgotten how the heathen were baptized, thousands at a time, in every ^iiver 1 What stream is there in Europe that cannot testify to t’le majesty of the gospel? What city is there in the land that cannot tell how God’s truth has triumphed, and how the heathen has forsaken his false god, and bowed his knee to Jesus the crucified? The first spread of the gospel is a miracle never to be eclipsed. Whatever God may have done at the Red Sea, he hath done still more within a hundred years after the time when Christ first came into the world. It seemed as if a fire from heaven ran along the ground. Nothing could resist its force. The lightning shaft of truth shivered every pinnacle of the idol temple, and Jesus was worshipped from the rising of the sun to the going down of the same.

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