Bible Commentaries
James Nisbet's Church Pulpit Commentary
Psalms 25
THE OPEN SECRET
‘The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him.’
Psalms 25:14
I too would know the secret of the Lord which is with them that fear Him.
I. It is a birth-secret.—Ah, has He quickened me into a new life, me who through the past was unprofitable and sad? Of water and of the Holy Ghost has He regenerated my soul? Has He taught me what conversion means, ‘in the intense and incandescent sense,’ to quote the words of a recent biography? This is a secret, between my soul and Him; and no one else can know it just as I do.
II. It is a life-secret.—Day by day, if I am His child, He guides me, teaches me, humbles me, cleanses me, hallows me. And this, too, is a secret between myself and Him, for one Christian’s experience never reiterates another’s.
III. It is a death-secret.—In front of me the cold deep river rolls its flood, and I must cross it before I can enter the City of God. But, when I come to it, if all my hope is in Him, He will have His own communication of needed grace, His own whisper of satisfying peace, for me. This is why there is a light in dying eyes, a smile on dying lips. And, again, it is a joy with which no stranger, no brother even, nor wife, nor child, can intermeddle.
Illustration
‘The main burden of the psalm, therefore, is the cry for direction, and the certainty that it will be vouchsafed. Even though we be sinners, God will instruct us in the way for His goodness’ sake. If we were more holy and wise, we might not have so strong a claim on Him as we have now. It is just because we are so unworthy and helpless that we can plead with Him to make a plain path before our feet.’
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