Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayer for attention to Psalm 102, reading from our
text, the first part of verse 23. Psalm 102, verse 23. He weakened my strength in the
way. The whole verse adds, he shortened
my days. In the beginning of this psalm,
the psalmist in his affliction is praying unto the Lord, and
the first verses, the verses right through to verse 11, we
have a complaint of a heart that is smitten, bones burned as an
hearth, One is a sparrow alone upon the housetop, and one that
is brought down in strength. My days are like a shadow that
declineth, and I am withered like grass. But then the language
changes, and the psalmist, looking away from himself and his afflictions
and weakness, He looks to the Lord. What a contrast. But thou, O Lord, shalt endure
for ever, thy remembrance unto all generations. It speaks of
the Lord's time to favour Zion. When the Lord shall build up
Zion, he shall appear in his glory. Now it's intimated here. that this was written for the
generation to come. Many, many of the Psalms, many
of the prophecies, they did not fully understand them, but knew
what was being written was for a future generation. When we
think of this as being the prophecy of the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ and building up Zion and blessing of Zion, We think what
stands between this psalm and that being brought to pass. All the kingdoms of Judah and
Israel, their sins, the Lord weakening them for their sins,
dealing with them, bringing them into Babylon, which looked as
if they were completely weakened and finished as a nation. But
God brought them up out of Babylon. And in His time and in His way,
He blessed them. And Christ did come. And what
a picture we have of that. When we look at the nation of
the Lord's people, you might say, in the way to blessing. In God's providence, in the history
of the world, In the appointed way, and we see in Matthew chapter
one, the beautiful pattern of those 14 generations from Abraham
to David, from David to the carrying away into Babylon. Yes, even
that was a marker in history. And then from the carrying away
into Babylon until Christ, another 14 generations. The Lord's appointed
way, but in that way, the nation itself was greatly weakened,
brought down as if it was dead, as if it was finished. And so
when we read the words of our text, He weakened my strength
in the way, we can see that regarding not just the psalmist here, but
we see that with the nation of Israel, and we see it also as
that pattern that is repeated in the lives and experience of
God's dear people as well. In the way. In the way. I like to speak of that first. We read that there is a way. that seemeth right unto a man,
but the end thereof are the ways of death. Our Lord sets before us in Matthew
7 the exhortation that we are enter ye in at the straight gate,
for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction
and many there be which go in their ant, because straight is
the gate and narrow is the way which leadeth unto life, few
there be that find it. Now remember there's only two
ways. There's a way that is to destruction,
a way that is to life. We come into this world and we're
on the broad road that leads to destruction. And it is by
the Lord's grace and mercy, if we are brought to enter in through
Christ, who is that straight gate, into the narrow way, which
also is Christ, that which we have sung of in our middle hymn. And that we be kept in that way
by the Lord's grace and mercy, and be brought to heaven at last. is good for us if we have some
knowledge of what to expect in that way, to be concerned that
we are in it, and to have some markers as to the way. Sometimes
I go for walks through the woods that are near to us, and quite
often you come across markers of specific walks through the
woods. There's a major path that goes
right round and that is some 12 foot wide. You can't mistake
that way. It's a very broad way, loops
right round. Now very often you see the markers
and they're pointing to go from that broad way into very much
different ways, narrow ways, and yet that is actually the
appointed path and way that you can actually walk from Cranbrook
here right through to Gouthurst, and no doubt further still, just
by following those markers. But if we were told at the beginning,
well, you've just got to expect a nice wide clear path, then
it would come as a great shock to us to find parts of that as
very narrow. Sometimes I've come across groups
that are doing some navigating, they've got their maps, they're
trying to find out which way to go, and they're standing at
this post and this marker, very reluctant to turn out of what
is a very clear path into something that's very narrow. It's only
because they can really see from the map, see from the marker,
be persuaded actually that is the way, though it is narrow,
though it may have obstacles in it, they venture along that
way. It is so in the things of God. We need to know from the scriptures
what to expect to be in the way that leads to life. What we would
expect in the way that leads to death. some tokens, some evidences of
it, and some knowledge so that we're not discouraged in the
way, and feel that we are completely out of it, or mistaken the way. And so when we read in our text
about being in the way, what we're reading in context with
this, He weakened my strength in the way, is that which has
happened to one of the Lord's people, or if we take the nation
of Israel as a whole, what has happened to them in actually
the way, the right way, God's way, God's appointed way. Sometimes the Lord's people have
been greatly, greatly tried because of it. Dear Jacob, Even while
his son Joseph was in Egypt, he is saying, all these things
are against me. And yet God had said to Abraham
that his seed should be a stranger in a strange land. They should
afflict them 400 years, and then they should be brought out. Well,
those things came to pass, but walking it out, Dear Jacob, got to that point,
these things not for me, but against me. And what is before
us here this evening is about being weakened, our strength
weakened in the way. By the Lord Himself, He weakened
my strength in the way. Now I want to look then secondly
at some of those in the scripture where this truth is so clearly
shown. And we'll see not only how the
Lord weakened their strength in the way, but why he did so. The first one that I mention
is that of Abraham and Sarah, and we would include with them,
going into the New Testament, Elizabeth, the mother of John
the Baptist. God had given promises to Abraham
that it should be his seed that should be the promised seed.
the seed of the woman that should bruise the serpent's head. The
line was going to go through Abraham, through Sarah, his wife. But God gave that promise, and
then as time went on, they got older, and Sarah got past bearing
of a child. We have the same with Elizabeth
as well. She was past bearing. by reason
of the delay of bringing about of the promise. It had got into
a position which with man, it was impossible. It could not,
it would not be brought to pass. And in that way, God weakened
their strength in the way. Abraham took matters into his
own hand sought to have a child by Hagar, Sarah's maid, had Ishmael,
but God said no. No, it wasn't to be. The promise running through that
line, it's through Sarah, but that line was so weakened that
man could not bring it about. when the angels appeared to Abraham
just before Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed, one of them being
pre-incarnation appearances of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord said again to Abraham
that at about that season, in the coming year, that Sarah should
bear a son. And Sarah, in the tent behind,
she laughed. that God said that that which
was impossible with man was not impossible with God. His promise
would come to pass. And so we see with Abraham, Sarah
and Elizabeth, because Elizabeth was beyond bearing, and she bared
John the Baptist, we have in those cases They were in the
way. They were the Lord's people.
They had a promise. But God so ordered it that instead
of it looking like the promise was to be fulfilled, it got less
and less likely, in fact impossible, by natural means. And then the
Lord appeared. Why? Why was it so that they
would know That which was impossible with man is not impossible with
God. God was to have the glory. He
was the one to bring it to pass. We could join in the same way
with how Samuel was born, with Hannah as well, that could not
have children. We could even join Rachel, Rachel
said to Jacob, give me children or I'll die. Jacob was angry with her. He
says, am I? Am I in God's stead? As God has
withheld thee from bearing. But she did have children. The
Lord did open her womb, gave her Joseph and Benjamin. But in each of these cases, The
Lord saw fit to weaken before he blessed, and it marked out
the blessing even more clearly to be from the Lord and his hand. Then we have the case of Jacob
in the Old Testament and Paul in the New, where they were given
a physical infirmity When Jacob wrestled with the angel, I will
not let thee go, except thou bless me when Esau was coming. The Lord touched the hollow of
Jacob's thigh, and his hollow thigh was out of joint. And either
Jacob went on his way, or he halted upon his thigh. The Lord
gave him a physical, you might say, injury. The Apostle Paul
was given a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet
him again. That which was in the flesh.
And with the Apostle it was very clearly told as to why that was
so. My strength is made perfect in
weakness. My grace is sufficient for thee. And he was given that which weakened
him, so that he wasn't exalted above measure by the blessings
and the visions that he'd had. He said, much more rather than
would I glory in my infirmities, for when I am weak, then am I
strong. We are told then why the Lord
did this. And we see a people that you
might say could be healthy and strong, but God saw fit to give
them some affliction, some infirmity, something that we would look
upon as greatly hindering the work that they could do. Many
of the Lord's dear people have these afflictions, some even
paraplegic and more than that. And yet the Lord greatly uses
them. Our natural thought would be
they'd be much more useful if they had all of their strength
and the use of all of their limbs. But God weakens their strength
in the way. Satan might come in and say,
well, these things happen because you're not in the way. who are
not one of God's children, might come like the scribes and the
Pharisees did concerning the man born blind, who did sin,
this man or his parents, that he is born blind. But it was
for the glory of God that he was weakened in that way until
he came of age. And then the Lord blessed him. Then we have the cases of Joseph
and Jonah. Both of them the Lord saw fit
to cause that they lost their liberty. Joseph, who had the expectation
of being so blessed that his brethren should all bow down
before him, was found languishing in a prison and no way of changing
that state. The butler who he had entreated
to remember him and speak well for him and forgotten him, and
there he is in that prison. Jonah, who has run away from
the Lord, he is in the depths of the sea. He is shut up in
the whale's belly. There he's crying out. unto the
Lord in that position. He says, My prayer came unto
thee, into thy holy temple. Salvation is of the Lord. The Lord spake unto the fish,
it vomited him out and onto the dry land. And with Joseph, Pharaoh
had a dream. The butler remembers him, speaks
to Pharaoh. and in a very short period of
time is plucked out of that prison and in the presence of Pharaoh
and next unto Pharaoh. The thing done very suddenly,
but it's done from a position of complete helplessness and
weakness in the way. Are we weakened in that way?
We don't have liberty, don't have freedom. I'm shut up and
cannot come forth in bondage, in darkness. We have this picture with Joseph
and Jonah. He weakened my strength in the
way he weakened their strength. He made them powerless. They
couldn't move. They couldn't do a thing. They
couldn't change their circumstances. They couldn't order their path,
they couldn't take any advice to do this or that or to change
where they were. Then we have the case of Gideon.
The Lord appeared to Gideon and said that he would by him deliver
Israel. They were under the hand of the
Midianites at the time who'd come as a great multitude filling
the earth and taking all of the plenty of the land. And yet when God brought Gideon
to do this work, he told him that his army was too big. So the first step was that he
had to tell all of those that were fearful and afraid to go
home. And they went home. And it was still too big. So
then they were brought down to the waters and told to drink
of the waters of the stream. Some they put their faces down
and just lapped the water straight. Others put the water into their
hands and lapped out of their hands. Only 300 did that. And the Lord said He would save
Israel by that 300. And He told the reason why. And it was so that Israel didn't
take the glory to themselves. So it was with Gideon a numerical
weakening. He weakened them in numbers so
that they reduced and brought very low. Naturally speaking,
we would say, well, if you're going to achieve a victory, you
need numbers. There's power, there's strength
in numbers. No, says the Lord. Reduce them,
bring them down low. And with that small number, they,
they shall be used. They shall be a blessing, and
I will have the honor and glory, not man. Then we have the case of Hezekiah
and Job. health, their health was taken
away. Of course, Job, his wealth as
well. But Hezekiah was told that he
was to put his house in order because he would die and not
live. It brought such crying unto the
Lord. And the Lord heard him, answered
him, gave him again 15 years. But we read in Isaiah 38 of all
that Hezekiah said when he was afflicted, when he was brought
right down so low. He says, I said in the cutting
off of my days I shall go to the gates of the grave. I am
deprived of the residue. of my years." And we think of
the words of our text in that respect. He weakened my strength
in the way he shortened my days. And Hezekiah says this. But he says, by these things
men live. and in all these things is the
life of my spirit. So wilt thou recover me and make
me to live. With Hezekiah he was the king
of Judah. He was the captain of their armies.
Assyria was attacking at that very time. You would think that
the best thing would be to have a healthy and a strong king.
But the Lord saw fit to meet at that very time affliction
that he had the prospect of death in. And yet at the end of the matter,
the Lord had delivered Judah out of the hand of Assyria, and
he'd given to Hezekiah 15 years. He gave him the son that he didn't
have, the line to Christ in Manasseh. He blessed him in his soul, by
these things men live, in all these things is the life of my
spirit. The end of the matter was to
the Lord's honour and glory, but what a painful path to walk,
and a path at such a time when you think, Lord, if I am in the
right way, if I am in thy way, why this? Why this weakness? Why this affliction? Why brought
down like this? And yet the Lord saw fit To bring
about that Word, He weakened my strength in the way. As Ikaiah says, the Lord was
ready to save me. Indeed He was. He knew what He
was doing. He knows what He does with His
people. It doesn't happen by chance that
they're weakened. It doesn't happen by chance that
they have affliction. that they are laid aside for
a season, that they are afflicted with pain and weakness. The Lord's people are an afflicted
and poor people, but they shall trust in the name of the Lord. So we have those throughout Scripture
that we see this word is fulfilled in them, He weakened my strength
in the way. Abraham would say it. Sarah would
say it. Elizabeth, Jacob, Paul, Joseph,
Jonah, Hezekiah, Job, they all would say amen. He weakened my
strength in the way. Now it's for these same reasons.
that the Lord deals with his people in these gospel days. You and I also have a way to
walk, and blessed be God if we are found in Christ, the living
way, and that we are walking by faith in Christ alone. We're not walking in the ways
of sin. that we're not walking after
the course of this world, that we're not walking after the law,
seeking to obtain salvation by the deeds of the law, by which
no man living shall be justified, but that we are walking after
Christ, running the race that is set before us, looking unto
Jesus, being found in the right way, and when we are in that right
way. For the same reasons as the Lord
dealt with the saints of old, He will deal with us as well. Sometimes it will be in a way
that is bound up with chastening and correction. Sometimes it
will be just instruction and teaching. Other times it will
be so that he alone has the glory, the might and the power. Those
ways that the Lord weakens his people are in different ways. Sometimes it is through illness,
sickness. Sometimes it is through tribulation,
things happening in their lives. Losses in their family, things
like Job had to go through. Sometimes it is where the expectation
of having the ability to do something is taken away from them. Might be weakened in wealth,
might be weakened in strength, in circumstances. may be weakened in the way that
the Apostle Paul found it in his experience. I was alive without the law once,
but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. Right at the beginning of the
way, the Lord brought him from a trust in his own parasaical
pride and religion, to realize that that would not save him
at all. And then he had to look alone to Christ, and look there
alone for salvation. So it is in that way, in a spiritual
way, where we are perhaps trusted in our wisdom, our understanding,
our own prayers, and the Lord brings us to, as it were, utter
confusion or darkness of mind and trouble of soul, so that
we cannot know the way and cannot choose out our own path. And
the reason why the Lord does it is so he will have the honour
and glory. Our Lord says that no man can
come unto the Father but by me, and no man can come to me except
the Father which sent me, draw him, and I'll raise him up at
the last day. Impossibilities without the Lord's
doing, that is the salvation of the Lord, that no flesh might
glory in His presence. The way of the Lord is to be
a following way, The Lord is a shepherd, he puts forth his
sheep, he goeth before them, the sheep they hear his voice
and follow him. We mentioned dear Jacob. God didn't tell him. His son
was alive for 20 years, he didn't know that. And he had to walk
out that path in providence, you might say in quite darkness. Very seldom does the Lord tell
his dear children. Look, this is the path you're
going to have to walk, you're going to have this sickness and
this trouble and this trial, but I'm going to bring you through
that and this is going to be the end of it. Him says, why
through darks and paths we go, we may know no reason, yet we
shall hereafter know each in his due season. And it is a dependence
upon the Lord. I will instruct thee. and teach
thee in the way which thou shalt go, I will guide thee with mine
eye. And for that to be so, the Lord
make sure his people don't run before him. He that believeth
shall not make haste. The Lord shall make sure they
be not going before the Lord, but be following after the Lord. The apostle was very clear on
this, he said, be followers of me, even as I also am of Christ. As if he would say, the path
in the right way is a following way. I am following Christ. If you follow me, you'll be doing
the same thing. When we run the race, we run
it looking unto Jesus. When the Thessalonians believed,
it was said of them, that the Word came unto them, not in word
only, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, and
ye became followers of us and of the Lord. A disciple is a
follower, one that really doesn't have the control of the way in
their own hand, but the Lord is the way, and we are to follow
after Him. He weakened my strength in the
way, and the Lord does it for good reasons, for His honour
and glory, so that we don't put our hands to things, so that
we don't choose and do our own way. And it is the Lord's wisdom
that guides it and that directs it. And yes, there are those
things that you might say are contributing factors to it, and
especially our own sin. And that again is a way the Lord
weakens us, stains our pride and humbles us. When the children
of Israel were to remember all the way the Lord had led them
those 40 years in the wilderness, it was to humble thee, to prove
thee, to know what was in thine heart. When the children of Israel
were to look back, even in the time of Christ, over their history,
what a solemn history it was. How many times they'd persecuted
the prophets, even slain them with the sword. How many times
they'd been brought into captivity in bondage. They weren't a good
people. There are people that need the
chastening, correcting hand of God, the mercy of God, the forgiveness
of God, the grace of God, and you and I will be exactly the
same. There's not going to be. The Lord's dear people, when
they get to the end of their journey, they look back and they
say, what a good Christian I've been. Never made a mistake, always
made right choices. mapped out my way really well? No. There'll be those things
you think, I wish I'd never made that decision. Wish I'd never
made that path. How I'm ashamed of those years
that seem just wasted years. And you know, we must be very
careful in this, because there is an aspect where we weaken
our own way, we weaken ourselves in the way. It doesn't make us
not God's children, but we are weakened. When we neglect prayer,
we weaken ourselves, because we are not laying hold upon the
power of God, the strength of God. Satan trembles, says the
hymn writer, when he sees the weakest saint upon his knees. Call upon me in the day of trouble,
I will deliver thee and thou shalt glorify me. But when we
restrain prayer, we cease to fight, then we haven't strength. We think of Moses in the time
of Amalek, Joshua fighting with Amalek. Moses, Aaron and Hur
holding up his hands as he held up the rod. But when the rod
fell down, symbolising prayer, then Amalek prevailed. How we
need not be weakened because we are restraining prayer. How
we use the means of grace, the word of God, surprising how many. How many Christians, even the
Lord's dear people that know the Lord, don't read the Word
of God much? Or even if they do, it's taking
a bit out of here and a bit there. Very few read the Word of God
consecutively, methodically through, so you're getting the full account
in its context right through. In the back of the TBS Bibles
is the reading schemes of which the Bible is read through once
every two years, the Gospels twice and the Psalms twice. And
in doing that you make sure every two years you have read all the
Word of God. Otherwise you can be sure there
will be books, there will be parts of the Word that you've that you've never had put in
context or never put together. It is a way that we weaken ourselves
when we are not men, women, of the Book, of the Word of God. The Word is to dwell in us richly. We weaken ourselves when we do
not search it like the Bereans did. They searched it after they'd
heard it preached. Therefore many of them believed. And we weaken ourselves when
we are hearers but not doers of the word, deceiving our own
selves. Be you doers of the word and
not hearers only. The Lord's parable of the one
that built his house on the sand and house on the rock was to
that very end. It's one of the things that we're
most prone to do. Hear, give a scent, say it's
a good word, a good sermon. Our Lord says, you call me Lord,
Lord, and you say, well, for so I am, but you do not the things
that I say. And we weaken. We weaken ourselves
instead of He weakened my strength in the way. We actually weaken
ourselves in neglecting the word of meditation and practising
that word in attendance and to the preached word as well. The
children of Israel again and again had the Lord's servants
speak to them in the name of the Lord, but they didn't hear,
they didn't obey. And it was the means that they
were weakened. The Lord dealt with them. The
Lord brought them into bondage. The Lord did that. But you could
trace it back to their own actions, how they had sowed and then how
they had reaped. And so there is an intermingling.
The Lord is in control. But may we search our hearts
as to whether we ourselves are actually weakening ourselves
in the way. That we are undermining what
we testify as being seeking after the Lord and desiring a blessing
of the Lord, but at the same time, by the things we do or
do not do, we are weakening ourselves. When we don't take heed to our
own heart, When we look at things that bring sin through eye-gate,
when we listen to things that bring sin through ear-gate, when
we learn the ways of the heathen, the children of Israel in this
way were weakened through their idolatry, through their wanting
the ways of the heathen, and even in the requesting of a king,
that they should be just like the other nations, and that was
to be their weakening. He weakened my strength in the
way, to may we be searched in this, as to whether part of our
weakness is actually because we are not heeding the Lord,
and not following Him, and not heeding His directions as to way for a soul. If ye do these
things, ye shall never fail. The fear of the Lord, a beginning
of wisdom, and a walking in the ways of the Lord. If we are in
the way, may we walk as if we were in the way. But may we remember
that there is no man that sinneth not And the Lord chastens every
son whom he receiveth. And in that chastening there
is a weakening, there is a bringing down, the same as the children
of Israel and Ewan, but there is for the exercised soul a nevertheless
afterward. It yieldeth the peaceable fruits
of righteousness to them that are exercised thereby. But may we remember the truth
of the word here, the Lord in control, he weakened my strength
in the way. With dear Job, though his friends
pointed to something wrong in him, God said he dealt with him
because Satan moved him against him without cause. With the apostle
Paul, The reason for the weakness was told, lest he be exalted
above measure. The reason for the reduction
for Gideon was told, so that it was not them but God that
got the glory. So may we be encouraged if we
are in a weakened condition this evening, whether it be in affliction
or numerically, When our souls, whatever it is, the Lord has
brought us low, may we be encouraged with the thought that as the
Lord had those purposes of strengthening to his honour and glory for those
gone before us, that he'd yet do it for us as well. And that
we look to him. Our strength is to be from the
Lord and the Lord only. and he alone will have the honour
and glory. He is the Lord that brings down,
he is the Lord that lifts up, he is the Lord that weakens,
and the Lord that strengthens, but not strengthened in our own
mind, but strengthened in the Lord. May the Lord bless this
word. Remember, the whole key, the
whole strength of the Gospel is in that Christ hath died,
they rather have risen again. In Christ's death, you might
say, the Scriptures say, he was crucified through weakness. He laid down his life, submitted
himself to death, and then was raised again for our justification. It is his sin atoning blood. It is his satisfying the demands
of the broken law. that gives strength to sinners
that have no strength. When we were yet without strength
in due time, Christ died for the ungodly. And it is then,
in what Christ has done at Calvary, that the strength of the people
of God is. We cannot look for anything in
ourselves, but everything in what Christ has done. May that
be our plea and our plea alone, that we'll point to His redeeming
blood, that is the way to God. We'll point to that which He
has promised and He has set before us and that our hope is solely
in the Lord and in the precious blood of our Lord and Saviour,
Jesus Christ. That is why the Lord in these
Gospel days brings the people low that their salvation must
be of Christ alone, not of works, lest any man should boast. By
grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It
is the gift of God. Again and again we're pointed,
this is not an Arminian doctrine, it is not. Save yourselves, help
yourselves to salvation. The Lord says, no, I'll bring
you low. and I will bless you with grace.
I will save you. His name shall be called Jesus,
for he shall save his people from their sins. And each one
that is saved will know that they are saved because Christ
has saved them. They won't be able to say to
another, I'm saved, you're lost, because I did this, did that. this was my work, no. Each one
will know that it is Christ alone that has saved them. For may
that be our language as well and the crown we put on his head
alone. Amen.