Charles H. Spurgeon (1834-1892)
My meditation of him shall be sweet.—Psalm 104:34
Thou precious Jesus! What can be a sweeter theme for me to think of than Thine exalted being; to conceive of Thee as the Son of God Who…fashioned this round world? To think of Thee as the God Who holds this mighty orb upon Thy shoulders, Thou Who art the King of glory, before Whom angels bow in lowliest homage. And yet to consider Thee as likewise bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh…to conceive of Thee as the Son of Mary, born of a virgin, made flesh like ordinary men, clothed in garments of humanity like mortals of our feeble race; to picture Thee in all T hy suffering life, to trace Thee in all Thy passion, to view Thee in the agony of Gethsemane, enduring the bloody sweat, the sore amazement; and then to follow Thee to the [court], and thence up the steep side of Calvary, bearing the cross, braving the shame; when Thy soul was made an offering for my sins, when Thou didst die the reconciling death amidst horrors still to all but God unknown. Verily, here is a meditation for my soul that must be “sweet” forever. I might, like the psalmist, say, “My heart is inditing a good matter”—the marginal reading is, “it boileth or bubbleth up”—“I speak of the things which I have made touching the king: my tongue is the pen of a ready writer” (Psa 45:1)…
Ah! Take Jesus for the theme of your meditation, sit down and consider Him, think of His relation to your own soul, and you will never get to the end of that one subject.
Think of His eternal relationship to you: recollect that the saints were from all condemnation free, in union with the Lamb, before the world was made. Think of your everlasting union with the person of Jehovah-Jesus before this planet was sent rolling through space and recollect how your guilty soul was accounted spotless and clean even before you fell. And after that dire lapse, before you were restored, justification was imputed to you in the person of Jesus Christ. Think of your known and manifest relationship to Him since you have been called by His grace. Think how He has become your brother, how His heart has beaten in sympathy with yours... and His love has been to you sweeter than wine. Look back upon some happy, sunny spots in your history, where Jesus has whispered, “I am yours,” and you have said, “My beloved is mine” (Song 6:3).
Think of…some pensive moments, when you have had what Paul sets so much store by: fellowship with Christ in His sufferings (Phi 3:10). Think of seasons when the sweat has rolled from your brow, almost as it did from that of Jesus—yet not the sweat of blood (Luk 2:44)—when you have knelt down and felt that you could die with Christ, even as you had risen with Him.
And then, when you have exhausted that portion of the subject, think of your relationship to Christ that is to be developed in heaven… Picture to your mind that moment when Jesus Christ shall salute you as “more than a conqueror” and put a golden crown upon your head, more glittering than the stars! And think of that transporting hour when you will take that crown from off your brow; and climbing the steps of Jesus’ throne, you shall put it on His head and crown Him once more Lord of your soul, as well as “Lord of all.”
Ah! If you come and tell me you have no subjects for meditation, I will answer, “Surely, you have not tried to meditate, or you would say with the psalmist, ‘My meditation of him shall be sweet.’ ”
Suppose you have done thinking of your Savior as He is specially related to you; consider Him, next, as He is related to the wide world. Recollect what Jesus said to Nicodemus, “For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved” (Joh 3:17), and, undoubtedly, He will one day save the world, for He Who redeemed it by price and by power will restore it and renew it from the effects of the fall. Oh, think of Jesus in this relationship as “The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in” (Isa 58:12)! He will come again to our earth one day; and when He comes, He will find this world still defaced with the old curse upon it—the primeval curse of Eden. He will find plague, pestilence, and war here still; but when He comes, He will bid men beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks (Isa 2:4); war shall be obliterated from among the sciences; He shall give the Word and there shall be a great company that will publish it; and “the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea” (Isa 11:9). Jesus Christ shall come!
Christians, be ye ever watching and waiting for the second coming of your Lord Jesus Christ; and whilst ye wait, meditate upon that coming. Think, O my soul, of that august day, when thou shalt see Him with all His glorious train, coming to call the world to judgment, and to avenge Himself upon His enemies! Think of all His triumphs when Satan shall be bound, death shall be crushed, and hell shall be conquered, and when He shall be saluted as the universal Monarch, “who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen” (Rom 9:5). “My meditation of him shall be sweet.”