I. THE DERIVATION OF AUTHORITY AND LAW FROM GOD. (Ver. 10.) The true ruler is the representative of God. Royal decrees and legal statutes profess to rest, and must rest ultimately, if they are to be binding, upon the moral Law itself. Hence the reverence in old days for "the Lord's anointed," though in the person of a Charles Stuart, was the popular witness to a deep truth, which lies at the foundation of society.
II. PRINCIPLES OF STABLE RULE. (Ver. 11.) The pair of scales have ever been viewed as the emblems of justice, and so the expressions, symbolically, of the nature of God. The second allusion is to the stone weights which the Oriental merchant carries in his bag, serving the purpose the more exactly, as not liable to rust. The exact balance and the just weight, then, if symbols of Jehovah, must be the symbols of every righteous human government.
III. THE PRINCIPLES OF ROYAL FAVOUR AND DISFAVOUR. (Vers. 12-15.)
1. The ruler must be of pure sentiment, abhorring all kinds of immorality, keeping his court pure, "rearing the white flower of a blameless life in the fine light that beats upon the throne." How much we owe in these respects to the example of our sovereign and her husband is written on the thankful heart of every religious Englishman.
2. Strong moral convictions. That the throne securely rests, not upon might, but right; not upon bayonets, but upon the Word of God. The influence proceeding from such a mind will be constantly felt as antipathetic to falsehood and corruption, and the other eating mildews of high places.
3. Sympathy with honest policies. How common is it to assume that politics have little or nothing to do with morality! No one who believes in the teaching of his Bible can accept such a dogma. He who acts upon it is already a traitor to his country and his God. As Greece had its Demosthenes, who has been called a "saint in politics," so we have had, thank God, in our time Inca of eloquent tongue and true heart in the national councils. May their line and tradition never become extinct!
4. Their dread judicial power. (Ver. 14.) The authorities who represent the penal powers of law are a terror to evil doers. There must be the power to punish. And a measured and well tempered severity does in a sense "reconcile" numbers, not to be affected otherwise, to a course of law-abiding and just conduct.
5. The attractions of their smile. (Ver. 15.) Ever, while human nature continues what it is, the smile of the sovereign, the tokens of his favour - the star, the medal, the garter, the uniform - will be sought after with eagerness and worn with pride. There may be a side of idle vanity in this, yet equally a side of good. It is good to seek association with greatness, though the ideal of greatness may often be mistaken. Only let us see that there is no real greatness which does not in some way reflect the majesty of God. - J.
For the throne is estaabished by righteousness.
I. RIGHTEOUSNESS MOST EFFECTUALLY ANSWERS THE END AND DESIGN OF GOVERNMENT. Religion consists in an acknowledgment of God as Governor of the world. Though the power be lodged in earthen vessels, there is no power but of God. This religious sense of a providential government will incline the subject to pay due reverence to the prince, because it reaches farther than his own person, and is ultimately referred to that Divine Original, whose image and representative he is. Religion fixes our duty to our sovereign upon a certain basis and derives our obedience from the noblest motives, not from a slavish fear, not from an occasional humour, not from a mercenary regard to temporal interest, but from a filial love and respect to the Lord of glory. An awful regard to God and a prevailing sense of religion possesses the subject with that justice and fidelity which cannot be shaken by any temptation, but stands unmoved against the assaults of danger and the allurements of interest. The fear of God is so powerful a principle of action that it necessarily produces happy effects, and is so mighty a restraint from sin that it almost supersedes the necessity of any other restraint.
II. GUARD AGAINST THOSE PERNICIOUS PRINCIPLES THAT SUBVERT THE THRONE AND ARE DESTRUCTIVE OF GOVERNMENT.
1. Those that remove the foundations of religion and deny the being of a God. Could these opinions prevail, fidelity and justice would cease and the distinction between right and wrong would be lost in confusion. It is the interest of every prince and people to put a stop to these fatal principles, and not only to discourage atheism itself, but every approach towards it.
2. A scornful neglect of God the Son, and an avowed denial of His divinity, may produce as dreadful effects as even the denial of God the Father. If we renounce the authority of Jesus Christ, the authority of revealed religion is absolutely cancelled.
3. Those republican doctrines which derive all power from the people.
4. The principle that makes an absolute allowance to the sincerity of every man's persuasion and places the whole of religion and the great affair of eternal salvation upon the authority of every private judgment. This is contradictory to an article of our creed; it is fruitful of erroneous sects and impious heresies, and it has a pernicious influence upon the State. If the sincerity of men's present persuasions will justify them in all their consequences, the more strongly they are persuaded so much the more abundantly will they be justified. And if they are hurried on to the commission of any evil action the strength of the impulse will sanctify the crime. Let us, then, show our regard to government by discharging our duty to God.
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People
SolomonPlaces
JerusalemTopics
Abomination, Acts, Based, Commit, Detest, Disgusting, Established, Evil, Evil-doing, Kings, Righteousness, Ruler, Seat, Throne, Wicked, Wickedness, Wrong, WrongdoingOutline
1. The Plans of the heartDictionary of Bible Themes
Proverbs 16:12 5053 responsibility, for world
5953 stability
8243 ethics, social
Proverbs 16:12-13
5361 justice, human
5366 king
Library
April 27. "The Sweetness of the Lips" (Prov. xvi. 21).
"The sweetness of the lips" (Prov. xvi. 21). Spiritual conditions are inseparably connected with our physical life. The flow of the divine life-currents may be interrupted by a little clot of blood; the vital current may leak out through a very trifling wound. If you want to keep the health of Christ, keep from all spiritual sores, from all heart wounds and irritations. One hour of fretting will wear out more vitality than a week of work; and one minute of malignity, or rankling jealousy or envy …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth June 13. "The Sweetness of the Lips Increaseth Learning" (Prov. xvi. 21).
"The sweetness of the lips increaseth learning" (Prov. xvi. 21). Life is very largely made up of words. They are not so emphatic, perhaps, as deeds. Deeds are more deliberate expressions of thought. One of the most remarkable authors of the New Testament has said, "If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man." It is very often a test of victory in Christian life. Our triumph in this often depends on what we say, or what we do not say. It is said by James of the tongue, "It is set on …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth
April 17. "He that Ruleth his Spirit is Better than He that Taketh a City" (Prov. xvi. 32).
"He that ruleth his spirit is better than he that taketh a city" (Prov. xvi. 32). Temperance is true self-government. It involves the grace of self-denial and the spirit of a sound mind. It is that poise of spirit that holds us quiet, self-possessed, recollected, deliberate, and subject ever to the voice of God and the conviction of duty in every step we take. Many persons have not that poise and recollected spirit. They are drifting at the impulse of their own impressions, moods, the influence of …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth
What I Think of Myself and what God Thinks of Me
'All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes; but the Lord weigheth the spirits.'--PROVERBS xvi. 2. 'All the ways of a man'--then there is no such thing as being conscious of having gone wrong, and having got into miry and foul ways? Of course there is; and equally of course a broad statement such as this of my text is not to be pressed into literal accuracy, but is a simple, general assertion of what we all know to be true, that we have a strange power of blinding ourselves as to what is wrong …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture
A Bundle of Proverbs
'Understanding is a wellspring of life unto him that hath it: but the instruction of fools is folly. 23. The heart of the wise teacheth his mouth, and addeth learning to his lips. 24. Pleasant words are as an honeycomb, sweet to the soul, and health to the bones. 25. There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death. 26. He that laboureth laboureth for himself; for his mouth craveth it of him. 27. An ungodly man diggeth up evil: and in his lips there is as a …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture
Unsound Spiritual Trading
A sermon (No. 849) delivered on Lord's Day morning, January 10th, 1869, at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, by C. H. Spurgeon. "All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes; but the Lord weigheth the spirits."----Proverbs 16:2. During the last two years some of the most notable commercial reputations have been hopelessly destroyed. Men in the great world of trade who were trusted for hundreds of thousands of pounds, around whose characters there hovered no cloud of suspicion nor even the …
C.H. Spurgeon—Sermons on Proverbs
Trust in God --True Wisdom
A sermon (No. 392) delivered on Sunday Morning, May 12th, 1861, at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, by C. H. Spurgeon. "He that handleth a matter wisely shall find good: and whoso trusteth in the Lord, happy is he."--Proverbs 16:20. Wisdom is man's true path--that which enables him to accomplish best the end of his being, and which therefore gives to him the richest enjoyment and the fullest play for all his powers. Wisdom is the compass by which man is to steer across the trackless waste …
C.H. Spurgeon—Sermons on Proverbs
A Wise Desire
I remember once going to a chapel where this happened to be the text, and the good man who occupied the pulpit was more than a little of an Arminian. Therefore, when he commenced, he said, "This passage refers entirely to our temporal inheritance. It has nothing whatever to do with our everlasting destiny: for," said he, "We do not want Christ to choose for us in the matter of heaven or hell. It is so plain and easy that every man who has a grain of common sense will choose heaven; and any person …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 1: 1855
Of Predestination
Eph. i. 11.--"In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will."--Rom. ix. 22, 23.--"What if God, willing to show his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction, and that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy which he had afore prepared unto glory." In the creation of the world, it pleased the Lord, …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning
Conflict.
"Therefore let us also, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the Author and Perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the Cross, despising shame, and hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him that hath endured such gainsaying of sinners against themselves, that ye …
Thomas Charles Edwards—The Expositor's Bible: The Epistle to the Hebrews
Of Self-Surrender
Of Self-Surrender We should now begin to abandon and give up our whole existence unto God, from the strong and positive conviction, that the occurrence of every moment is agreeable to His immediate will and permission, and just such as our state requires. This conviction will make us resigned in all things; and accept of all that happens, not as from the creature, but as from God Himself. But I conjure you, my dearly beloved, who sincerely wish to give up yourselves to God, that after you have made …
Madame Guyon—A Short and Easy Method of Prayer
Abandonment to God --Its Fruit and Its Irrevocability --In what it Consists --God Exhorts us to It.
It is here that true abandonment and consecration to God should commence, by our being deeply convinced that all which happens to us moment by moment is the will of God, and therefore all that is necessary to us. This conviction will render us contented with everything, and will make us see the commonest events in God, and not in the creature. I beg of you, whoever you may be, who are desirous of giving yourselves to God, not to take yourselves back when once you are given to Him, and to remember …
Jeanne Marie Bouvières—A Short Method Of Prayer And Spiritual Torrents
The Providence of God
Q-11: WHAT ARE GOD'S WORKS OF PROVIDENCE? A: God's works of providence are the acts of his most holy, wise, and powerful government of his creatures, and of their actions. Of the work of God's providence Christ says, My Father worketh hitherto and I work.' John 5:17. God has rested from the works of creation, he does not create any new species of things. He rested from all his works;' Gen 2:2; and therefore it must needs be meant of his works of providence: My Father worketh and I work.' His kingdom …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity
Epistle xx. To Mauricius Augustus.
To Mauricius Augustus. Gregory to Mauricius, &c. Our most pious and God-appointed lord, among his other august cares and burdens, watches also in the uprightness of spiritual zeal over the preservation of peace among the priesthood, inasmuch as he piously and truly considers that no one can govern earthly things aright unless he knows how to deal with divine things, and that the peace of the republic hangs on the peace of the universal Church. For, most serene Lord, what human power, and what strength …
Saint Gregory the Great—the Epistles of Saint Gregory the Great
The Sovereignty of God in Reprobation
"Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God" (Rom. 11:22). In the last chapter when treating of the Sovereignty of God the Father in Salvation, we examined seven passages which represent Him as making a choice from among the children of men, and predestinating certain ones to be conformed to the image of His Son. The thoughtful reader will naturally ask, And what of those who were not "ordained to eternal life?" The answer which is usually returned to this question, even by those who profess …
Arthur W. Pink—The Sovereignty of God
God's Glory the Chief End of Man's Being
Rom. xi. 36.--"Of him and through him, and to him, are all things, to whom be glory for ever." And 1 Cor. x. 31--"Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." All that men have to know, may be comprised under these two heads,--What their end is, and What is the right way to attain to that end? And all that we have to do, is by any means to seek to compass that end. These are the two cardinal points of a man's knowledge and exercise. Quo et qua eundum est,--Whither to go, and what way to go. …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning
Reprobation.
In discussing this subject I shall endeavor to show, I. What the true doctrine of reprobation is not. 1. It is not that the ultimate end of God in the creation of any was their damnation. Neither reason nor revelation confirms, but both contradict the assumption, that God has created or can create any being for the purpose of rendering him miserable as an ultimate end. God is love, or he is benevolent, and cannot therefore will the misery of any being as an ultimate end, or for its own sake. It is …
Charles Grandison Finney—Systematic Theology
How the Rude in Sacred Learning, and those who are Learned but not Humble, are to be Admonished.
(Admonition 25.) Differently to be admonished are those who do not understand aright the words of the sacred Law, and those who understand them indeed aright, but speak them not humbly. For those who understand not aright the words of sacred Law are to be admonished to consider that they turn for themselves a most wholesome drought of wine into a cup of poison, and with a medicinal knife inflict on themselves a mortal wound, when they destroy in themselves what was sound by that whereby they ought, …
Leo the Great—Writings of Leo the Great
The Consolation
Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received at the LORD 's hand double for all her sins. T he particulars of the great "mystery of godliness," as enumerated by the Apostle Paul, constitute the grand and inexhaustible theme of the Gospel ministry, "God manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on …
John Newton—Messiah Vol. 1
Epistle ii. To Anastasius, Bishop of Antioch.
To Anastasius, Bishop of Antioch. Gregory to Anastasius, Patriarch of Antioch. I have received the letters of your most sweet Blessedness, which flowed with tears for words. For I saw in them a cloud flying aloft as clouds do; but, though it carried with it a darkness of sorrow, I could not easily discover at its commencement whence it came or whither it was going, since by reason of the darkness I speak of I did not fully understand its origin. Yet it becomes you, most holy ones, ever to recall …
Saint Gregory the Great—the Epistles of Saint Gregory the Great
How the Impatient and the Patient are to be Admonished.
(Admonition 10.) Differently to be admonished are the impatient and the patient. For the impatient are to be told that, while they neglect to bridle their spirit, they are hurried through many steep places of iniquity which they seek not after, inasmuch as fury drives the mind whither desire draws it not, and, when perturbed, it does, not knowing, what it afterwards grieves for when it knows. The impatient are also to be told that, when carried headlong by the impulse of emotion, they act in some …
Leo the Great—Writings of Leo the Great
Effects of Messiah's Appearance
The eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped: Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing. H ow beautiful and magnificent is the imagery, by which the Prophet, in this chapter, represents the effects of MESSIAH'S appearance! The scene, proposed to our view, is a barren and desolate wilderness. But when He, who in the beginning said, Let there be light, and there was light, condescends to visit this wilderness, the face of nature is …
John Newton—Messiah Vol. 1
A Preliminary Discourse to Catechising
'If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled.' - Col 1:23. Intending next Lord's day to enter upon the work of catechising, it will not be amiss to give you a preliminary discourse, to show you how needful it is for Christians to be well instructed in the grounds of religion. If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled.' I. It is the duty of Christians to be settled in the doctrine of faith. II. The best way for Christians to be settled is to be well grounded. I. It is the duty of Christians …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity
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