Examine yourself

Lamentations 3:19-42

Verses 40 to 42 in particular, are part of a very powerful chapter. It tells us to examine ourselves as Paul does in 1 Corinthians 11 – before the Lord’s supper to see if we are in the faith. Here, if we seriously look at ourselves we can see we have rebelled. We ought to examine ourselves and our spiritual state. It is not often preached today. It was in the past. Thomas Chalmers wrote a journal of his spiritual state. He had read Hannah Moore.
There is also Tim Shenton’s book on Samuel Walker of Truro who was alive at the time of Wesley and Whitefield. He was a poor curate in Truro. He was in post a long time before his conversion. There was a revival in Truro under his ministry. His advice was sought by the Wesleys, Romaine and others. He was considered wise, especially on self examination. He kept a spiritual diary and examined his in detail. He found sin within. He found much wrong within his soul. He encouraged others to keep such a diary. He considered himself guilty of spiritual sloth within his own heart. He felt this hindered his ministry. He found pride and conceit rose in his heart when men complimented his work. He found it difficult if he offended people so he found it hard to preach. He felt he rested on means not on God’s grace, he felt he did not commit enough to prayer. Do we write life this today? No we do not because we often lack the desire to do it. He examined every part of his life.
Andrew Bonar was another evangelical man – Scottish. He examined his zeal for God. He concluded that he was famous for his zeal, that it was 23% ambition, 19% love of self, 25% pride of denomination, 14% pride of talent 12% love of authority, 10% bigotry, 3 love of God and 4% love of man. We often do not examine ourselves closely. When we do we see sin, no one is righteous, no not one. Our enemies are monsters like Goliath and they often get the better of us.
The World gets the better of us says James, it has been around for thousands of years before us. We are in it. It is polluted and we get polluted by it. The world is a lot bigger. In the past when people lived in villages it was very small, news from England came slowly, from the rest of the world probably not at all. The world is much bigger – education, newspapers, adverts, internet, TV etc. Education moulds people according to the ways of the world. Children are taught that no one can tell them what to do. We want our own way. Today children are deeply worried about the world that is poured out upon them. The world is huge and presses in upon us. What we own is what matters, not what we are.
We also have trouble from the flesh, we cannot escape it, it is part of us, we are body and soul. Under Adam and Eve it was kept in its place. Now it is out of control, the desire for food leads to obesity, for sleep leads to sloth. The flesh is self centred. It is you who must come first. It is a great cause of depression and heartache. When Romaine came to see Walker he wrote of his pride that some one had come so far (from London) just to see him, Satan is a thinking, vastly intelligent enemy. He uses this to bring down the church of God.
David and Bathsheba – the woman is described as being very beautiful, Satan knew how to bait this hook, it was just right for David. He knows the right bait for all of us, he gets us on his hook. Samuel Walker’s best friend could see the Devil’s hook, but he said he could not help nibbling on the hook. Unbelievers see the books of Walker and Chalmers etc and either conclude the books are very gloomy and depressive or see them as being up to a lot of bad on the side, they are quite wrong and do not understand. If they are judged by the standards of the world they are very good, but by the standards of the Word of God (‘be perfect as I am perfect’) they fall short. For Walker the greatest sin was pride. For Chalmers it is anger, but anger inside. He especially found his parents and aunt difficult because they were growing deaf with age. Chalmers became very angry. He had to confess his sin and deal with it. We let this sort of thing go – we pass over it. That is how our society and age deal are.
Was Spurgeon troubled about sin? Yes he was, all of his life. New Years’ Eve l89l (one month before he died), the last time he was heard in public. He looked back over the past year, he felt he dare not admit his sin. He who does not admit he is sinful does not know himself. What did Chalmers, Walker etc do? They tried to fight it, they did not entirely succeed, if you find you sin you must turn to the grace of the Lord Jesus who is the one person who could help us, we must magnify the grace of God.
At the victorious cross, hell is disappointed, sin is dealt a deadly blow. When we cannot see an end to our sin we must look to the cross of the Lord Jesus. When we look at one year of our own lives we must see our paths in the life of the Lord Jesus, he died for the unrighteous, he pleads for transgressors, he died for sinful men when we see our need of him, our sinfulness, we should let our tears fall for our sin and turn to him. We need to see what is really in us and not pass over our sin so we are driven to the cross.