February 16

He hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure. This is all my salvation, and all my desire, although he maketh it not to grow. - 2 Samuel 23:5.

HERE is an all-sufficiency of consolation. Although my house is not so with God as it ought to be, as I wished it to be, as I hoped it would be; though my family is in disorder and distraction; though irreligion has expelled peace and comfort from my home; I can look abroad, and I can look above too, and I can find something in which to wrap my poor troubled Spirit: the gracious engagement of my God holds firm. Here I am prepared, as if he should say, for anything and everything; here I find the shadow of a great rock in a weary land; here I ride at anchor, and say, in the storm,

“A hope so much divine,

May troubles well endure.”

Now let us feast our souls upon this heavenly manna: it is meat to eat which the world knows not of. And first, It tells us that God has entered into a covenant with us to be our God and guide even unto death, and our portion for ever; that this covenant is everlasting, and that its counsels and contrivances bear the most ancient date. “Yea,” says God, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love, therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee.”

Secondly, This covenant is ordered in all things; nothing in it is left to contingency; wisdom presided over mercy in the formation of it; all its parts are arranged with a view to the whole, and with a view to their end.

Thirdly, This covenant is sure. Its promises and performances are absolutely certain; he has sworn as well as promised, and because he could swear by no greater, he sware by himself -“Surely in blessing I will bless thee.”

Observe also the importance he attaches to it: “it is all my salvation;” all that was necessary to its present, full, and final accomplishment and enjoyment is included here. He tells us also of the love he bore to it: it is “all my desire.”

“The Lord my portion is,

I shall be well supplied;

Since he is mine, and I am his,

What can I want beside?”