May 23

The great trumpet shall be blown. - Isaiah 27:13.

HERE let us contemplate the grandeur of the gospel. “The great trumpet:” it is elsewhere called a “great light,” a “great salvation.” “How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation, which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord?” It is called the “glorious gospel.” There is a grandeur in the gospel of God, which soars far beyond all finite excellency and conception. The period of its introduction is called “the fulness of time.” All things from the beginning of the world were designed to prepare the way for it: as the period approached, God said, “Yet, once it is a little while, and I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come.”

The gospel regards immediately the soul and eternity,-the only two things in the world which men despise and neglect. The gospel abounds with exceeding great and precious promises; it unfolds blessings that are incomprehensible in their nature and excellency; for “eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” The apostle does not refer here to the treasures of glory, but to the provisions of the gospel; for he adds, “But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit.” Every thing compared with the gospel is trifling and mean.

True, the world often allures, but it is in the absence of thought; its power over us is derived from delusion. As soon as we can reflect, as soon as we enter into solitude, and when we are on the borders of the grave, oh, how the world diminishes and disappears! How amazed we are that it should ever acquire such influence over us! How surprised at the exertions, the sacrifices, we have made to carry any of its points! But now the gospel rises to an inconceivable value; it appears to our minds as the one thing needful. When a man is awakened and enlightened from above, all else falls in his esteem. Then the cry is not, “What shall I eat, or what shall I drink, or wherewithal shall I be clothed?” but, “What shall I do to be saved?” How shall I bow myself before the most high God? How shall I obtain justification unto life? How shall I obtain a title to heaven, and a meetness for it? No wonder the apostle calls this “the wisdom of God in a mystery.” Here we contemplate God as a God of love; here we see the greatness of his mighty power; here we see the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness to us; here he hath abounded towards us in all wisdom and prudence; here we behold the image of the invisible God; here we see why Paul rejoiced in it, as being the “power of God to salvation to every one that believeth.” The Romans, to whom he addressed these words, delighted in power; and he extols the power of the gospel.

To use the beautiful amplification of these words by Dr. Watts, it is as if he had said, “I am not ashamed to believe it as a man; I am not ashamed to profess it as a Christian; I am not ashamed to preach it as a minister; I am not ashamed to publish it as an apostle; I am not ashamed to die for it as a martyr.”