Help for the Feeble from Thoughts
of God by John McDuff 1864 How precious are your thoughts unto
me, O God! Do not be afraid, worm Jacob! I will help you, says the Lord
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel. Isaiah 41 14 Worm, Jacob,
what weakness, insignificance, unworthiness! Yet, it is this
helpless groveling worm, which occupies the thoughts of God,
receives his sympathy, and has the assurance of his almighty
aid. Believer, beaten down it may
be with a great fight of affliction or trembling under a sense of
your unworthiness and guilt. Mourning the coldness of your
faith, the lukewarmness of your love, the frequency of your backslidings,
the fitfulness of your best purposes, and the feebleness of your best
services. Your God draws near to you. He
remembers that though you are a worm, still, you are worm Jacob,
his own beloved covenant one. And he tells that the thoughts
which he thinks towards you are thoughts of peace and not of
evil. Mark his message of comfort.
Do not be afraid. Mark his promise. I will help
you. The guarantee which he gives
for the fulfillment of that promise is his own great name. Says the
Lord your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel. By whom shall
Jacob arise? Says the prophet Amos. For he
is small. We have here an answer. he shall
rise by the might of his covenant God, the God who has given Jesus
as a pledge for the bestowment of all other blessings. I myself
will help you. Yes, poor, weak, trembling one,
Jehovah your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel. In other words,
omnipotence, love, righteousness are all embarked on your side
and pledged for your salvation. He loves to draw near to his
people in the extremity of their weakness. He will not break the
bruised reed. He will not quench the smoking
flax. Man would do so. Man would often
crush the writhing worm under his feet, bid the trembling penitent
away. But he whose thoughts are not
as our thoughts says, neither do I condemn you. He shall deliver
the needy when he cries, the poor also, and him that has no
helper. All you descendants of Jacob,
honor him, revere him, all you descendants of Israel. For he
has not despised or disdained the suffering of the afflicted
one. He has not hidden his face from him, but has listened to
his cry for help, listened to the testimony of one such lowly
suppliant. I called upon your name, O Lord,
out of the low dungeon. You drew near in the day that
I called upon you. You said, Do not be afraid. Seek to be humble. It is to the
humble that God gives grace. He perfects strength in weakness. When the high cedars, says Philip
Henry, tumble down, the shrubs are safe. When I am weak, says
the great apostle, then am I strong. Worm Jacob, the halting cripple
of Peniel, was made strong in the moment of his apparent weakness. He received a new name, as a
prince he had power with God and prevailed. Be it mine, to
go in the strength of the Lord God. I will help you, is enough
for all the emergencies of the present, and all the contingencies
of an untried, and it may be, a dark future. But happy are
those who have the God of Israel as their helper, whose hope is
in the Lord their God.