Astronomy Humbles Pride – C.H. Spurgeon

Psalm 8:3–4 – When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, The moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him? And the son of man, that thou visitest him?

At the close of that excellent little manual entitled “The Solar System,” written by Dr. Dick, we find an eloquent passage which beautifully expounds the text:—A survey of the solar system has a tendency to moderate the pride of man and to promote humility. Pride is one of the distinguishing characteristics of puny man, and has been one of the chief causes of all the contentions, wars, devastations, systems of slavery, and ambitious projects which have desolated and demoralized our sinful world. Yet there is no disposition more incongruous to the character and circumstances of man. Perhaps there are no rational beings throughout the universe among whom pride would appear more unseemly or incompatible than in man, considering the situation in which he is placed. He is exposed to numerous degradations and calamities, to the rage of storms and tempests, the devastations of earthquakes and volcanoes, the fury of whirlwinds, and the tempestuous billows of the ocean, to the ravages of the sword, famine, pestilence, and numerous diseases; and at length he must sink into the grave, and his body must become the companion of worms! The most dignified and haughty of the sons of men are liable to these and similar degradations as well as the meanest of the human family. Yet, in such circumstances, man—that puny worm of the dust, whose knowledge is so limited, and whose follies are so numerous and glaring—has the effrontery to strut in all the haughtiness of pride, and to glory in his shame.

When other arguments and motives produce little effect on certain minds, no considerations seem likely to have a more powerful tendency to counteract this deplorable propensity in human beings, than those which are borrowed from the objects connected with astronomy. They show us what an insignificant being— what a mere atom, indeed, man appears amidst the immensity of creation! Though he is an object of the paternal care and mercy of the Most High, yet he is but as a grain of sand to the whole earth, when compared to the countless myriads of beings that people the amplitudes of creation. What is the whole of this globe on which we dwell compared with the solar system, which contains a mass of matter ten thousand times greater? What is it in comparison of the hundred millions of suns and worlds which by the telescope have been descried throughout the starry regions? What, then, is a kingdom, a province, or a baronial territory, of which we are as proud as if we were the lords of the universe and for which we engage in so much devastation and carnage? What are they, when set in competition with the glories of the sky? Could we take our station on the lofty pinnacles of heaven, and look down on this scarcely distinguishable speck of earth, we should be ready to exclaim with Seneca, “Is it to this little spot that the great designs and vast desires of men are confined? Is it for this there is so much disturbance of nations, so much carnage, and so many ruinous wars? Oh, the folly of deceived men, to imagine great kingdoms in the compass of an atom, to raise armies to decide a point of earth with the sword!” Dr. Chalmers, in his Astronomical Discourses, very truthfully says, “We gave you but a feeble image of our comparative insignificance, when we said that the glories of an extended forest would suffer no more from the fall of a single leaf, than the glories of this extended universe would suffer though the globe we tread upon, ‘and all that it inherits, should dissolve.'”

Pride Root of Disdain of Others in their Suffering – Matthew Poole

Galatians 6:3 – For if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself.

It is a general maxim, and the truth of it is obvious to every one that readeth it, for supposing a man to be nothing of what he thinks himself to be, he must needs deceive himself in nourishing and entertaining such an opinion of himself. For the dependence of it upon what the apostle had said before, it is obvious. Pride, and men’s high opinions of themselves above what they ought, are the cause of their censoriousness and morosity in dealing with other offenders; which modesty would not suffer in them, if they apprehended themselves to be as weak, and as much exposed to temptations, as others are. It is pride and over-weening opinions of ourselves, that make us despise or neglect others under their burdens, and so forget the law of Christ; the apostle therefore properly addeth this precept for humility and modesty to those former precepts.

Mstthew Poole’s Commentary. Logos copy. Robert Carter & Brothers. Retrieved 12/01/19.

The Breaking of Jacob’s Thigh, Chastisement for Self-Dependence

From Genesis 32:22 onward. Also see Hosea 12, a spiritual commentary on Israel based on the life of Jacob, and the interpretive key to the passage.

When Jacob knew that Esau was coming with 400 men he feared the worst. The last he heard of his brother, Esau had intended to kill Jacob. That was 20 years earlier. Now in an attempt to reconcile with his brother, Esau is meeting Jacob with what to Jacob looks like a small army. Jacob does not respond the way a man trusting God ought to do. Instead of going right to prayer, trusting the Lord, Jacob does what he has done for so much of his life–get ahead of God by hatching his own plan. So Jacob attempts to send multiplied gifts in droves to appease Esau, in the hopes that each wave might do something more to appeasing Esau.

Finally Jacob is alone, and God has a controversy with him. The pre-incarnate Christ comes to wrestle with Jacob, and to fight him. It’s not merely that Jacob is being taught to wrestle in prayer–it is the Lord’s intention to wear out Jacob, and bring Jacob to the end of himself. They wrestle for hours, meaning that Jacob wrestled himself perhaps beyond exhaustion, yet was driven to overcome. Finally the Lord sees that Jacob is unyielding, so he breaks the thigh of Jacob so that he may no longer wrestle, but must rather beg for help.

And that is when Jacob receives his blessing.

When God looks at our lives, does he see those who are full of themselves, self-sufficient, self-righteous, no need of help? Or does he see those who know they are empty in themselves, are spiritually impoverished, and know and are persuaded that their trust is only in the Lord?

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for their’s is the kingdom of heaven. – Matthew 5:3

Cursed is the man who trusts in man, and makes flesh his strength, and who in his hear departs from the living God. – Jeremiah 17:5

In the words of Richard Owen Roberts, God has a severely restricted inhabitation. In a prideful heart there is no room for him to dwell, but He will make His dwelling with the lowly (Isaiah 57:15).

Based on the sermon “Jacob at Peniel.”