Bible Heaven/Bible Heaven.iso/spurgeon/ps17.15

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                           EXPOSITION.

        "_As for me_." "I neither envy nor covet these men's
happiness, but partly have and partly hope for a far better." To
behold God's face and to be changed by that vision into his
image, so as to partake in his righteousness, this is my noble
ambition; and in the prospect of this I cheerfully waive all my
present enjoyments. My satisfaction is to come; I do not look for
it as yet. I shall sleep awhile, but I shall wake at the sound of
the trumpet; wake to everlasting joy, because I arise in thy
likeness, O my God and King! Glimpses of glory good men have here
below to stay their sacred hunger, but the full feast awaits them
in the upper skies. Compared with this deep, ineffable, eternal
fulness of delight, the joys of the worldling are as a glowworm
to the sun, or the drop of a bucket to the ocean.

              EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS.

        Verse 15.--"_I will behold thy face_." I look upon the
face of a stranger and it moves me not; but upon a friend, and
his face presently transforms mine into a lively, cheerful
aspect. "As iron sharpeneth iron, so doth the face of a man his
friend" (#Pr 27:17|), puts a sharpness and a quickness into his
looks. The soul that loves God, opens itself to him, admits his
influences and impressions, is easily moulded and wrought to his
will, yields to the transforming power of his appearing glory.
There is no resistant principle remaining when the love of God is
perfected in it; and so overcoming is the first sight of his
glory upon the awaking soul, that it perfects it, and so his
likeness, both at once.--^John Howe.

        Verse 15.--"_I will behold_," etc. In the words we have,
1. The time of his complete and consummate happiness--"_When I
awake_." 2. The matter of his happiness, and the manner of
enjoying it; the matter and object--"_God's face, or likeness_;"
the manner of enjoying--"_I will behold thy face_." 3. His
perfect disposition and condition in the state of happiness--"_I
shall behold in righteousness_," having my heart perfectly
conformed to the will of God, the perfect and adequate rule of
righteousness. 4. The measure of his happiness--"_I shall be
satisfied_;" my happiness will be full in the measure, without
want of anything that can make me happy; all my desires shall be
satisfied, and my happiness in respect of duration shall be
eternal, without a shadow or fear of a change.--^William Colvill.

        Verse 15.--He doth profess his resolution, yet
notwithstanding all the danger he was in, to go on in the ways of
God, and expects a gracious issue; _but I_, saith he, "_will
behold thy face in righteousness_;" indeed, I cannot behold the
face of the king without danger to me; there are a great many
that run to kill me, and they desire his face; but though I
cannot see his face, yet, Lord, I shall behold _thy_ face; "_I
will behold thy face_," and it shall be "_in righteousness_;" I
will still keep on in the ways of righteousness, and "_when I
awake_"--for I believe that these troubles will not hold long--I
shall not sleep in perpetual sleep, but _I shall awake_ and be
delivered, and then "_I shall be satisfied with thy likeness_:"
there shall be the manifestation of thy glory to me, that shall
satisfy me for all the trouble that I have endured for thy name's
sake, that my soul shall say, I have enough.--^Jeremiah
Burroughs.

        Verse 15.--"_I shall be satisfied_," etc. The fulness of
the felicity of heaven may appear if we _compare it with the joys
and comforts of the Holy Spirit_. Such they are, as that the
Scripture styles them strong consolations (#Heb 6:17|); _full
joys_ (#Joh 15:11|); _joy unspeakable and full of glory_ (#1Pe
1:8|); _abounding consolations_. (#2Co 1:5|). And yet all the joy
and peace that believers are partakers of in this life is but as
a drop to the ocean, as a single cluster to the whole vintage, as
the thyme or honey upon the thigh of a bee to the whole hive
fully fraught with it, or as the break and peep of day to the
bright noontide. But yet these tastes of the water, wine, and
honey of this celestial Canaan, with which the Holy Spirit makes
glad the hearts of believers, are both far more desirable and
satisfactory than the overflowing streams of all earthly
felicities. And there are none who have once tasted of them, but
say as the Samaritan woman did, "Lord, give me that water, that I
thirst not, neither come hither to draw_." #Joh 4:15|. So also
the first and early dawnings of the heavenly light fill the soul
with more serenity, and ravish it with more pure joy, than the
brightest sunshine of all worldly splendour can ever do. I have
read of a devout person who but dreaming of heaven, the
signatures and impression it made upon his fancy were so strong,
as that when he awake he knew not his cell, could not distinguish
the night from the day, nor difference by his taste, oil from
wine; still he was calling for his vision and saying, _Redde mihi
campos floridos, columnam auream, comitem Hieronymum, assistentes
angelos_: give me my fresh and fragrant fields again, my golden
pillar of light, Jerome my companion, angels my assistants. If
heaven in a dream produce such ecstacies as drown and overwhelm
the exercises of the senses to inferior objects, what trances and
complacencies must the fruition of it work in those who have
their whole rational appetite filled, and their body beautified
with its endless glory?--^William Spurstow, 1656.

        Verse 15.--"_I shall be satisfied_." Have you never seen
how when they were finishing the interior of buildings they kept
the scaffolding up? The old Pope, when he had Michael Angelo
employed in decorating the interior of that magnificent
structure, the Sistine Chapel, demanded that the scaffolding
should be taken down so that he could see the glowing colours
that with matchless skill were being laid on. Patiently and
assiduously did that noble artist labour, toiling by day, and
almost by night, bringing out his prophets and sibyls and
pictures wondrous for their beauty and significance, until the
work was done. The day before it was done, if you had gone into
that chapel and looked up, what would you have seen? Posts,
planks, ropes, lime, mortar, slop, dirt. But when all was
finished, the workmen came, and the scaffolding was removed. And
then, although the floor was yet covered with rubbish and litter,
when you looked up, it was as if heaven itself had been opened,
and you looked into the courts of God and angels. Now, the
scaffolding is kept around men long after the fresco is commenced
to be painted; and wondrous disclosures will be made when God
shall take down this scaffolding body, and reveal what you have
been doing. By sorrow and by joy; by joys which are but bright
colours, and by sorrows which are but shadows of bright colours;
by prayer; by the influences of the sanctuary; by your pleasures;
by your business; by reverses; by successes and by failures; by
what strengthened your confidence, and by what broke it down; by
the things that you rejoiced in, and by the things that you
mourned over--by all that God is working in you. And you are to
be perfected, not according to the things that you plan, but
according to the divine pattern. Your portrait and mine are being
painted, and God by wondrous strokes and influences is working us
up to his own ideal. Over and above what you are doing for
yourself, God is working to make you like him. And the wondrous
declaration is, that when you stand before God, and see what has
been done for you, you shall be "_satisfied_." Oh, word that has
been wandering solitary and without a habitation ever since the
world began, and the morning stars sang together for joy! Has
there ever been a human creature that could stand on earth while
clothed in the flesh, and say, "I am satisfied"? What is the
meaning of the word? Sufficiently filled; filled full; filled up
in every part. And when God's work is complete, we shall stand
before him, and, with the bright ideal and glorified conception
of heavenly aspiration upon us, looking up to God, and back on
ourselves, we shall say, "I am satisfied;" for we shall be like
him. Amen. Why should we not be satisfied?--^Henry Ward Beecher,
in "Royal Truths," 1862.

        Verse 15.--"_When I awake, I shall be satisfied with thy
likeness_." He speaks here of the resurrection; he calls it an
awaking, for you know death is called a sleep. "Those that are
asleep in the Lord shall rise first." He had spoken before of
those that had put their happiness in the comforts of this life,
suitable to their bodies, to the animal state of their bodies;
that is clear by verse (#14), "Deliver me from the men that are
thine hand, O Lord, who have their portion in this life, whose
belly thou fillest with thy treasure: they are full of children,
and leave to them outward things," bodily things. "But as for
me," said he, "I will behold thy face in thy righteousness"
(there is the vision of God which is his happiness in his soul):
"and I shall be satisfied when I awake" (when I rise again),
"with thine image." It is not the image of God only upon himself
that he means here. Why? Because that doth not satisfy a holy
heart, but it is that image of the invisible God which the human
nature of Jesus Christ is, who, in opposition to all these
outward pleasures! will be all in all to us; he is a spiritual
creature, his human nature is spiritualised, made glorious, and
our bodies shall be made spiritual likewise. "The body is made
for the Lord, and the Lord for the body," and this when they are
both raised up; Christ is raised up already, and because he hath
ordained the one to be serviceable to the other, he will also
raise up our bodies; and when he doth raise me up, saith David,
though other men have their bellies full here, and have animal
pleasures they delight in; yet when I shall awake at latter day,
and shall see this image of thine, shall see thy Son, I shall be
satisfied: "When I awake, I shall be satisfied with thine
image."--^Thomas Goodwin.

        Verse 15.--"_I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy
likeness_." In this Psalm holy David's afflictions are neither
few nor small; his _innocency_ that is wounded by malicious
slanderers, his _life_ that is in jeopardy by deadly enemies that
compass him about; his _present condition_ that is embittered
unto him by the pressing wants of a barren wilderness, while his
foes live deliciously in Saul's court. And yet under the weight
and combination of so many sore evils, David carries himself as
one that is neither hopeless nor forsaken, yea, lays his estate
in the balance against theirs, and in this low ebb of his, vies
with them for happiness; and at last shutting up the Psalm with a
triumphant _epiphonema_, concludes himself to be by far the
better man. "_As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness:
I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness_." They,
'tis true, enjoy the face of their king, whose favour is as a
cloud of latter rain promising a fruitful harvest of many
blessings, "_but I_," saith he, "_shall behold the face of God_
in righteousness," whose lovingkindness is better than life,
clothed with all its royalties. They have their bellies filled
with hidden treasure, having more than a common hand of bounty
opened unto them; but I have more gladness put into my heart,
more than in the time that their corn and wine increased. They
have their portion in hand, and as being men of this world; but I
have mine laid up in the other: "_I shall be satisfied, when I
awake, with thy likeness_." In these words we have his and every
believer's eternal happiness in the other life, set forth in
three particulars as a most effectual antidote against present
troubles and temptations that arise from the malice of wicked men
against them.--^William Spurstow.

        Verse 15.--"_I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy
likeness_." The saints in heaven have not yet awaked in God's
likeness. The bodies of the righteous still sleep, but they are
to be satisfied on the resurrection morn, when they awake. When a
Roman conqueror had been at war, and won great victories, he
would return to Rome with his soldiers, enter privately into his
house, and enjoy himself till the next day, when he would go out
of the city to re-enter it publicly in triumph. Now, the saints,
as it were, enter privately into heaven without their bodies; but
on the last day, when their bodies wake up, they will enter into
their triumphal chariots. Methinks I see that grand procession,
when Jesus Christ first of all, with many crowns on his head,
with his bright, glorious, immortal body, shall lead the way.
Behind him come the saints, each of them clapping their hands, or
pouring sweet melody from their golden harps; all entering in
triumph. And when they come to heaven's gates, and the doors are
opened wide to let the King of glory in, how will the angels
crowd at the windows and on the housetops, like the inhabitants
in the Roman triumphs, to watch the pompous procession, and
scatter heaven's roses and lilies upon them, crying, "Hallelujah!
hallelujah! hallelujah! the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth." "I
shall be satisfied" in that glorious day when all the angels of
God shall come to see the triumphs of Jesus, and when his people
shall be victorious with him.--^Spurgeon's Sermons.

        Verse 15.--"_I shall be satisfied ... with thy
likeness_." Let a man who is thirsty be brought to an ocean of
pure water, and he has enough. If there be enough in God to
satisfy the angels, then sure there is enough to satisfy us. The
soul is but finite, but God is infinite. Though God be a good
that satisfies, yet he does not surfeit. Fresh joys spring
continually from his face; and he is as much to be desired after
millions of years by glorified souls as at the first moment.
There is a fulness in God that satisfies, and yet so much
sweetness that the soul still desires. God is a delicious good.
That which is the chief good must ravish the soul with pleasure;
there must be in it rapturous delight and quintessence of joy.
_In Deo quadam dulcedine delectatur anima immo rapitur_: the love
of God drops such infinite suavity into the soul as is
unspeakable and full of glory. If there be so much delight in
God, when we see him only by faith (#1Pe 1:8|), what will the joy
of vision be, when we shall see him face to face! If the saints
have found so much delight in God while they were suffering, oh,
what joy and delight will they have when they are being crowned!
If flames are beds of roses, what will it be to lean on the bosom
of Jesus! What a bed of roses that will be! God is a
_superlative_ good. He is better than anything you can put in
competition with him; he is better than health, riches, honour.
Other things maintain life, he gives life. Who would put anything
in balance with the Deity? Who would weigh a feather against a
mountain of gold? God excels all other things more infinitely
than the sun the light of a taper. God is an _eternal_ good. He
is the Ancient of days, yet never decays, nor waxes old. #Da
7:9|. The joy he gives is eternal, the crown fadeth not away.
#1Pe 5:4|. The glorified soul shall be ever solacing itself in
God, feasting on his love, and sunning itself in the light of his
countenance. We read of the river of pleasure at God's right
hand; but will not this in time be dried up? No. There is a
fountain at the bottom which feeds it. #Ps 36:9|. "With the Lord
is a fountain of life." Thus God is the chief good, and the
enjoyment of God for ever is the highest felicity of which the
soul is capable.--^Thomas Watson.

        Verse 15.--"_When I awake_," etc. The sincere Christian
is progressive, never at his journey's end till he gets to
heaven; this keeps him always in motion, advancing in his desires
and endeavours forward: he is thankful for little grace, but not
content with great measures of grace. "_When I awake_," saith
David, "_I shall be satisfied with thy likeness_." He had many a
sweet entertainment at the house of God in his ordinances. The
spirit of God was the messenger that brought him many a covered
dish from God's table, inward consolations which the world knew
not of. Yet David has not enough, it is heaven alone that can
give him his full draught. They say the Gauls, when they first
tasted of the wines of Italy, were so taken with their
lusciousness and sweetness, that they could not be content to
trade thither for this wine, but resolved they would conquer the
land where they grew. Thus the sincere soul thinks it not enough
to receive a little now and then of grace and comfort from
heaven, by trading and holding commerce at a distance with God in
his ordinances here below, but projects and meditates a conquest
of that holy land and blessed place from which such rich
commodities come, that he may drink the wine of that kingdom in
that kingdom.--^William Gurnall.

        Verse 15.--"_When I awake_." How apt and obvious is the
analogy between our awaking out of natural sleep, and the holy
soul's rising up out of the darkness and torpor of its present
state into the enlivening light of God's presence? It is truly
said so to _awake_ at its first quitting these darksome regions,
when it lays aside its cumbersome night-veil. It doth so more
perfectly in the joyful morning of the resurrection-day when
mortality is swallowed up in life, and all the yet hovering
shadows of it are vanished and fled away. And how known and usual
an application this is of the metaphorical terms of sleeping and
awaking in Holy Writ, I need not tell them who have read the
Bible. Nor doth this interpretation less fitly accord to the
other contents of this verse; for to what state do the sight of
God's face, and satisfaction with his likeness, so fully agree,
as to that of future blessedness in the other world? But then the
contexture of discourse in this and the foregoing verse together,
seems plainly to determine us to this sense: for what can be more
conspicuous in them, than a purposed comparison, an opposition of
two states of felicity mutually to each other? That of the wicked
whom he calls _men of time_ (as the words _cheled_ <02465> _math_
<04962> are rendered by Pagninus--_Homines de tempore_--and do
literally signify) and whose portion, he tells us, is in this
life: and the righteous man's, his own; which he expected not to
be till he should awake, that is, not till after his life.--^John
Howe.

        Verse 15.--There is a sleep of deadness of spirit, out of
which the shining of God's loving countenance doth awake a
believer and revive the spirit of the contrite ones; and there is
a sleep of death bodily, out of which the loving-kindness of the
Lord shall awake all his own in the day of the resurrection, when
he shall so change them into the similitude of his own holiness
and glorious felicity that they shall be fully contented for
ever: and this first and second delivery out of all trouble may
every believer expect and promise to himself. "I shall be
satisfied when I awake with thy likeness."--^David Dickson.

        Verse 15.--There is a threefold meaning in this verse,
inasmuch as it is in Christ alone, the firstborn from the dead,
the express image of Jehovah's glory, that the saints will rise
immortal, incorruptible, and be like the angels in heaven. 1.
They will greatly delight in the glorious state in which they
will rise. 2. They will greatly delight in Jesus, in whom, and by
whom, resurrection and immortality are brought to light; and 3.
They will delight greatly in beholding the blessed and reconciled
countenance of Jehovah, the Father, whom no eye of flesh can see.
This is the difference between the appearance of God to Israel on
Mount Sinai, and the happy state in which the saints will behold
him in the resurrection. Glorious as the scene on Sinai was, yet
the Lord said to Israel, "You have seen no _temûwnâh_ <08544>, no
manner of similitude," or likeness, or countenance; but David
speaks of the spiritual glory of the triumphant saints in the
resurrection, when they shall see Jehovah as he is, and rejoice
in his beatific presence for ever and ever.--^Benjamin Weiss, in
loc, 1858.

        Verse 15.--Everlasting life and salvation in heaven, is
not a truth revealed only by the gospel, but was well known,
clearly revealed, and firmly believed, by the saints of old. They
had assurance of this, that they should live with God for ever in
glory. "_When I awake, with thy likeness_." #Ps 17:15|. "Thou
wilt receive me to glory." #Ps 73:24|. "_In thy presence is
fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for
evermore_." #Ps 16:11|. They looked for another country, whereof
Canaan was but a type and shadow, as the apostle shows in the
epistle to the Hebrews, #Heb 11:16|. They knew there was an
eternal state of happiness for the saints, as well as an eternal
state of misery for the wicked; they did believe this in those
days.--^Samuel Mather on the "Types," 1705.

                       HINTS TO PREACHERS.

        Verse 15.--This is the language (1) of a man whose mind
is made up; who has decided for himself; who does not suspend his
conduct upon the resolution of others. (2) Of a man rising in
life, and with great prospects before him. (3) It is the language
of a Jew.

        Verse 15.--_The beholding of God's face_ signifies two
things. I. The enjoyment of his favour. II. Intimate communion
with him.--^William Jay.

        Verse 15.--See "Spurgeon's Sermons," No. 25. Title, "The
Hope of Future Bliss." Divisions. I. The Spirit of this
utterance. II. The matter of it. III. The contrast implied in it.

        Verse 15.--To see God and to be like him, the believer's
desire.--^J. Fawcett.