A PECULIAR PEOPLE

“But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of Him Who hath called you out of darkness into His marvellous light” -I Peter 2:9 [KJV]

  

The Lord has set this “peculiar people” apart for Himself, in a particular and special way.  Yea, He has so set them apart for Himself as to bid defiance to all the roarings and dreadful powers of hell, and all the bubblings and workings-up of sin and pollution both within and without, to separate this people from God’s bosom and God’s heart.  His solemn Majesty has said, when speaking of them, “This people have I formed for Myself; they shall shew forth My praise” (Isaiah 43:21).  

“O yes,” says free-will; “they shall have a chance to do it, if they will.”  But God says “they shall.”  Unbelief says “you shan’t;” carnal reason says “you can’t;” and inbred corruption says “you won’t.”  But when God says, “you shall,” when He speaks the Divine “shall,” it comes with an invincible energy to the conscience, and that blessed truth is made manifest, that “He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill” (I Samuel 2:8).  

God could not possibly do this unless men were first in the dust and on the dunghill.  Now what is this dunghill?  Why it is the horrible depravity and the cursed corruption of our filthy nature.  And what is the dust?  It is the working up and the manifestation of the loathsome particles of the guilt and filth of this dunghill.  And when God suffers Satan to stir up this dunghill in the conscience of a poor sinner, he finds the dust so overpowering that the poor soul thinks he shall really be suffocated with it and never expects to breathe again.  

Yet, all the while God has set these humble souls apart for Himself; and He will raise them from the dust, and off the dunghill, and will set them among princes, even the princes of His people; and will make them inherit the throne of glory.                                                     

                                                                                                                                   

-preacher William Gadsby (1773-1884 A.D.)

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