Psalms 127:2

Psalms 127:2

We take the "sleep" in our text as denoting death, and confine ourselves to an illustration of the passage under this one point of view. Here we have an idea which it would be well to work out in detail. God values death. He must value that which He reserves for the objects of His love. There are two great reasons to be given why death should be regarded as a gift to the believer, and why, therefore, as being a gift, it should be called precious or valuable in God's sight.

I. Regard the believer as testifying to the finished work of Christ. What evidence of the complete success of the scheme of redemption can exceed or equal that which is furnished by the death of God's saints? That which they could never have learned from natural theology the Gospel has taught them: they have learned how to die. Thus the Gospel is put, as it were, to the greatest possible trial; and the trial does but issue in full evidence of its sufficiency.

II. Regard the believer as admitted in and through death into final security. Having fought the good fight and kept the faith dying as well as living, the righteous are henceforward placed beyond the reach of danger. Nothing can put their salvation in peril. If they be not crowned till the morning of resurrection, a crown is laid up for them which "no thief can rifle and no moth corrupt." The death is a precious gift because the life is perilous; and God bestows a benefit on His people when He has gathered them into the separate state, because then they can be no more tempted to the forsaking of His law, no more exposed to the assaults of the Evil One, no more challenged to a battle in which, if victory be glorious, there is all the risk of a shameful defeat.

H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit,No. 1666.

References: Psalms 127:3. F. Tholuck, Hours of Devotion,p. 425.Psalms 127:3. H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit,vol. ix., p. 323.Psalms 127:4. A. P. Stanley, Good Words,1877, p. 82; J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes,2nd series, p. 100. Psalms 127:1. J. Baldwin Brown, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xxiii., p. 136. Psalms 128:5. W. M. Statham, Ibid.,vol. xviii., p. 360. Psalms 128 S. Cox, The Pilgrim Psalms,p. 177. Psalms 129:8. V. M. Statham, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xxv., p. 29. Psalms 129 S. Cox, The Pilgrim Psalms,p. 199.