In the Old Testament the floods are often compared with the rage of the peoples, and the rebellion of man against the Will of God. The floods have lifted up, O Lord, the floods have lifted up their voice. The Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters; yea, than the mighty waves of the sea.' Thou stillest the noise of the waves, and the tumult of the people.' In like manner that symbolic reference surely supplies one chief meaning of Christ's miracle of stilling the tempest; the Peace-bringer bringing to peace the tumults of men. Here, then, the sea stands as the emblem of untamed power. It is lashed into yeasty foam, and drives before it great ships and huge stones like bulrushes, and seems to have a savage pleasure in eating into the slow-corroding land, and covering the beach with its devastation.
There shall be no more sea.' God lets people work against His kingdom in this world. It is not to be always so, says my text. The kingdom of God is in the earth, and the kingdom of God admits of opposition. Strange! But the opposition, even here on earth, all comes to nothing. Thou art mightier than the noise of many waters'; the floods' have lifted up their voice'; but Thou' sittest upon the floods, yea, Thou sittest king for ever.' Yes, it is an experience repeated over and over again, in the history of individuals and in the history of the world. Men, fancying themselves free, resolved to be rebellious, get together and say, mutteringly at first, and then boldly and loudly, Let us break His bands asunder, and cast away His cords from us.' And God sits in seeming silence in His heavens, and they work on, and the thing seems to be prospering, and some men's hearts begin to fail them for fear. The great Armada comes in its pride across the waters--and the motto that our England struck upon its medal, when that proud fleet was baffled, serves for the epitaph over all antagonism to God's kingdom, The Lord blew upon them, and they were scattered.' The tossing sea, that rages against the will and purpose of the Lord, what becomes of all its foaming fury? Wily, this becomes of it--the ark of God moves on the face of the waters,' and though wild tempests howl to beat it from its course, yet beneath all the surface confusion and commotion there is, as in the great mid-ocean, a silent current that runs steady and strong, and it carries the keel that goes deep enough down to rest in it, safely to its port. Men may work against God's kingdom, the waves may rave and rage; but beneath them there is a mighty tidal sweep, and God's purposes are wrought out, and God's ark comes to its desired haven,' and all opposition is nugatory at the last.
But there comes a time, too, when there shall be no more violence of rebellious wills lifting themselves against God. Our text is a blessed promise that, in that holy state to which the Apocalyptic vision carries our longing hopes, there shall be the cessation of all strife against our best Friend, of all reluctance to wear .His yoke whose yoke brings rest to the soul. The opposition that lies in all our hearts shall one day be subdued. The whole consent of our whole being shall yield itself to the obedience of sons, to the service of love. The wild rebellious power shall be softened into peace, and won to joyful acceptance of His law. In all the regions of that heavenly state, there shall be no jarring will, no reluctant submission. Its solemn troops and sweet societies' shall move in harmonious consent of according hearts, and circle His throne in continuousness of willing fealty. There shall be One will in heaven. There shall be no more sea'; for His servants serve Him,' and the noise of the waves has died away for ever.
Before I pass on, let me appeal to you, my friend, on this matter. Here is the revelation for us of the utter hopelessness and vanity of all opposition to God. Oh! what a thought that is, that every life that sets itself against the Lord is a futile life, that it comes to nothing at last, that none hardens himself against God and prospers! It is true on the widest scale. It is true on the narrowest. It is true about all those tempests that have risen up against God's Church and Christ's Gospel, like waves of the sea foaming out their own shame,' and never shaking the great rock that they break against. And it is true about all godless lives; about every man who carries on his work, except in loving obedience to his Father in heaven. There is one power in the world, and none else. When all is played out, and accounts are set right at the end, you will find that the power that seemed to be strong, if it stood against God, was weak as water and has done nothing, and is nothing! Do not waste your lives in a work that is self-condemned to be hopeless! Rather ally yourselves with the tendencies of God's universe, and do the thing which will last for ever, andlive the life that has hope of fruit that shall remain. Submit yourselves to God! Love Christ! Do His will! Put your faith in the Saviour to deliver you from your sins; and when the wild tossing of that great ocean of ungodly power and rebellious opposition is all hushed down into dead silence, you and your work will last and live hard by the stable throne of God.
