O God, our Father, as we turn now
to thy holy word, it is with a
prayer in our hearts that we may experience
once again, as we have so often experienced,
thy faithfulness to the promise of thy Son
concerning the ministry of the Holy Spirit, that
he will guide us into all truth.
May he be our teacher now, taking our
minds and thinking through them thy force, taking
my lips and speaking through them thy word,
taking our hearts and our wills and inclining
them in obedience to thy truth.
And this we ask for Christ our Saviour's
sake.
You'll find the words upon which I want
to base our thinking this morning in the
91st Psalm, the psalm that we read together
earlier on, taking a phrase at the beginning
of verse five and linking it up with
a phrase that comes at the end of
verse six.
Thou shalt not be afraid for, verse six,
the destruction that wasteth at noonday.
One of the amazing things about the psalms
is the way in which suddenly, reading through
them, we find one or another aspect of
our spiritual experience suddenly brought into the sharpest
and most brilliant of focus.
And here in the sixth verse of this
91st Psalm, we get an example of where
the psalmist speaks of the destruction that wasteth
at noonday.
And behind the poetry and imagery and imagination
that these words contain, creatures have always sensed
a flashing and a warning light.
So what is the psalmist referring to?
The destruction that wasteth at noonday.
And the verdict of many is that the
noonday of the psalm refers to the midday
of the soul, to that part of life
that is found midway between the dawning of
life at birth and the closing of life
on earth at death.
The dangers of what we might call the
middle years, the destruction that wasteth at noonday.
The dangers not of youth, nor the dangers
of old age, but the dangers of what
we call middle age.
Are there then factors in life that constitute
a threat to our spiritual well-being in
the middle years of life?
I realize of course that a definition of
middle age is not only a difficult and
delicate business, but also a dangerous affair.
I always remember hearing of an old godly
minister warning his assistant.
They had visited an elderly lady and the
senior minister asked the young man to lead
in prayer.
And during the prayer he referred to the
elderly lady as, thine aged servant.
When they got out of the house and
were walking along the road, the older minister
said, I want to give you a piece
of advice.
And that is, when you are praying, never
refer under any circumstances to the age of
the lady for whom you are praying.
The lord may forgive you, but she never
will.
And the assistant minister recalling the incident said,
and that lady was ninety years old.
But what are the years of middle age?
If we take the biblically fixed span of
life as three score years and ten, then
it comes with a sense of shock that
thirty-five stands exactly halfway between the beginning
and the end of life.
And the middle years of a life would
seemingly lie on either side of that halfway
mark.
But we live longer nowadays, I suppose, and
maybe we stay younger longer than in bible
days.
Most people would like to think that they
were young, still, right up to thirty-five.
But in all honesty we cannot claim youth
much beyond.
The earlier years of life may fairly be
taken to cover our days until we reach
the thirty-five mark.
And then we must surely be moving into
the middle years, say until fifty-five or
sixty be reached.
And then, and I'm beyond that stage now,
we surely move into the latter and older
years, the closing years, which may be longer
or shorter as the providence of God determines,
before our life on earth reaches its close.
So I'm not going to define the middle
years precisely in case somebody is upset and
asks for their lines and leaves the church.
But what about these middle years?
We must be middle-aged sometimes.
And some of us, whether we like it
or not, are either entering those years or
in them right now.
The danger of the middle years, for the
psalmist calls the destruction that wastes at noonday.
As I pondered over this line of thought,
I realized in the first place that the
dangers of the middle years would of course
be distinctive.
They would be different, different from those I
face in my younger days, different from those
that I would expect to meet in the
latter days, the days of old age.
In becoming alert to the dangers of the
middle years, I would have to keep in
balance two facets of experience at that time.
And the first has to do with the
kind of person I have now become.
When I enter the middle years of life,
I've passed the formative years.
My life has usually settled into a mold
of my own choosing.
If I'm single, then that will be the
mold of the profession or work of my
choice, with other interests that can be included,
finding their allotted place in the schedule of
my weekly program.
I've become very largely a person of certain
habits, with certain pursuits and interests.
And a slight element of rigidity has maybe
now entered into my life.
A rigidity that usually doesn't like being unduly
disturbed.
If I'm married, then the middle years are
usually the years of maximum responsibility.
I have a home to keep, I have
a family to rear.
And these combine usually to demand most of
my time, both during and outwith my working
hours.
And I find that while life is immeasurably
enriched in certain areas, it tends to become
impoverished in others.
I have neither the time, nor the money,
nor the strength to cope with anything more
beyond the immediate and demanding responsibilities of my
home and my work, which are so closely
linked together.
How different all this is from the younger
years of my life.
I have to take into my reckoning the
kind of person I have now become.
Herein lies a contributive factor which makes the
dangers of the middle years of life distinctive.
The kind of person I have now become,
and this suggests also the kind of perils
I must now resist.
The first peril that came to me was
that of contentment, or becoming content with what
I have included in my life, when there
is still so much more in life waiting
to be enjoyed, waiting to be explored.
Take just one example.
Take what I know of my Bible.
By the time I reach the middle years,
if I've been a Christian for any length
of time, I'm in danger of being content
with what knowledge of the Word of God
I have accumulated.
And all the time there is so much
more awaiting me.
If I'm not a Christian, just a content
with that, and not realizing the incredible new
world of spiritual reality that is just one
step away.
But I'm content with the familiar world I've
built around myself, and I'm settling down.
The other peril I think is that of
early retirement, and I don't mean from a
job.
The peril of withdrawing myself from so much,
when responsibilities are becoming demanding and absorbing.
If I'm not careful, I begin to pull
out of other things, to give all my
time to meet these responsibilities.
I have so little time for the friends
I used to meet, so little time for
the hobbies I used to enjoy, for the
church work I used to do, maybe even
for the Bible I used to read.
I've got so much on my hands, my
responsibilities are so urgent, my home and my
job.
The peril is that I, I'm beginning to
retire.
The dangers of the middle years are distinctive,
they're different.
Because of the kind of person I have
now become, and because of the kind of
perils I must now resist, the destruction that
wasteth at noonday.
The dangers of the middle years of life
are also deceptive.
The whole context in which our text is
found is littered with imagery which speaks of
danger to life.
There's a beat of wings, there's a clash
of battle, but here the imagery is that
of sickness and disease.
And so often disease is deceptive, and that
in two ways.
Deceptive first of all concerning its presence.
The presence of a disease can remain undetected.
We just don't know that we've got it.
In Hosea chapter 7 verse 9, there's a
verse which describes the condition of Israel as
being like that of a person who is
reaching the middle years.
God describes Ephraim as one concerning whom gray
hairs are here and there upon him, and
he knoweth it not.
Some of you ladies remember the first time
you spotted a gray hair?
Suddenly an indication that you weren't quite so
young as you used to, though some folk
turned gray very early, and some either naturally
or artificially never seemed to turn gray at
all.
The dangers of the middle years can so
easily remain undetected because there is nothing obviously
wrong.
Because the danger of the disease belongs not
so much to what we call sins of
commission, things that we do which are wrong.
We may be doing nothing wrong, but to
what we call sins of omission.
We are failing to do things that are
right.
And here there's not the clamor and noise
of battle, but the hidden, silent, unseen, undetected
presence of a disease.
Just as a person can appear to be
perfectly well and yet be suffering from a
disease the effects of which are not yet
apparent so spiritually, things can be far from
what they ought to be in the middle
years.
And yet the person involved may be almost
unaware of what is happening, and the observer
be even less aware.
You see there's so much commendable, highly commendable
about the way of life I'm living.
I'm not doing anything wrong.
I'm living a decent, good, Christian life, but
there is something wrong.
And the dangers of the middle years are
deceptive.
Like a disease, because its presence is undetected
and because its progress is unsuspected, disease can
be progressive.
Sometimes it can go on a long time
and go a long way before it becomes
manifest.
And the destruction that wasteth at noonday is
like that.
The very word wasteth is significant.
Here is a condition that speaks of a
progressive weakening of the strength, of the power,
of the ability that once were there.
Something gradual.
Here is something that is just unsuspected, undetected,
and it's weakening, it's wasting away the health
and the strength.
How subtle it all is.
If sin and failure were to come to
us blatant and obvious, we would recognize it
right away for what it is, and we
would reject it.
If the appeal was to commit some kind
of transgression that was obviously and fragrantly wrong,
we would turn it down.
But if the approach of the tempter was
different, if the suggestion was simply that the
time had come to rest on our laurels,
to ease up, to look around at the
life we're living and be quite content to
settle down.
If the temptation was to drop just one
or two of the things we used to
do, and not to fill their places with
other things, different things, but things of equal
spiritual significance, that would be different.
Nobody could blame us for that.
Nobody could point the finger of accusation and
say, look, the dangers of the middle years
of life are deceptive, because the presence can
remain undetected, the progress unsuspected, and all the
time something at the very, very center of
our spiritual health is wasting away.
So the dangers of the middle years of
life are distinctive, they're deceptive.
And finally, the dangers of the middle years
of life can be destructive.
Our text speaks of the destruction that wastes
us at noonday.
And the dangers of the middle years of
life are dangers which threaten to destroy the
richest years.
The years of greatest potential, the very best
years, are the middle years.
We don't want to get angry because we're
getting old.
Some people fight against it.
They don't want to get old.
They want to remain young.
But the middle years are the richest.
They're the best.
Just because of that, if they're destroyed, then
the severity of the loss is incalculable.
The middle years are the years of the
maximum possibilities.
That's the time when I've got beyond the
foolish blunderings of youth.
Youth has its unspeakable advantages of energy, of
enthusiasm, of decision, of a life normally unspoiled,
stretching ahead.
But there's one thing that youth just cannot
have, never has, and that is experience.
And the result is that youth is the
time when mistakes are made, blunders are made,
some of them with greater effect, some with
lesser effect.
In the middle years then I've got away
from the foolish blunderings of youth, and I
haven't yet reached the weariness of old age,
when I just cannot do what I would
like to do.
The physical resources are not there.
The middle years are the best.
Because of the contribution I can make to
the service of God will be marked with
insights that have been gained through experience.
Insights that youth hasn't got because of the
leadership for which youth unconsciously yearns can be
mine.
If I'm prepared to fit it into my
program, youth is seldom willing to be led
by youth.
More rarely, very occasionally, youth is prepared to
be led by old age.
But youth will still be led by those
who are still in touch with them, those
whose years have not as yet taken them
too far beyond.
The hazards, the emotions, the longings, the ambitions
that fill the awakening hours and years of
life.
How severe the loss if I fail to
do the work I'm now better able to
do than ever before.
How severe the loss if I fail to
give the lead I'm now better able to
give than ever before.
The severity of the loss incalculable.
If the middle years are lost, if the
destruction that wasters at noonday drains my strength
when I should be my strength.
To lose what the middle years hold and
what they offer is the severest loss of
all.
What destruction is this?
The destruction that wasters at noonday.
The severity of the loss incalculable.
The security in the Lord inexhaustible.
The whole thrust of this psalm is that
of confidence in the face of this danger.
The whole of this psalm centers around the
fact that he that dwelleth in the secret
place of the Most High shall abide under
the shadow of the Almighty.
And I will say of the Lord, he
is my refuge and my fortress and my
God.
In him I like trust.
Surely he shall deliver me from the snare
of the fowler.
And so thou shalt not be afraid for
the terror by night, nor for the arrow
that flyeth by day, nor for the pestilence
that walketh in darkness, nor for the destruction
that wasters at noonday.
Where does the security lie?
How can I face this danger of the
middle years with confidence?
The security lies in the closeness of my
walk with my God because of all that
he keeps on meaning to me as I
dwell in the secret place of the Most
High.
Then I can face the dangers of the
middle years without fear.
Thou shalt not be afraid.
How these opening verses recall the words in
Isaiah 40, 31 day that waiteth when the
Lord shall renew their strength.
They shall mount up with wings as eagles.
They shall run and not be weary.
They shall walk and not faint.
Those that wait in the Lord.
If there's ever a time in life when
you need to keep in touch with your
God, it's in the middle years.
I have one vivid memory that lingers in
my mind after reading General Eisenhower's book Crusade
in Europe.
A story of the victorious half, the triumphant
half of the second world war.
When the second front as it was called
was about to be opened, when General Eisenhower
was appointed commander-in-chief of the United
Forces.
And the new word came into my vocabulary.
It just shows how ignorant I was when
he brings out that the importance in warfare
is not the importance of strategy, but of
logistics.
I'd never heard of logistics.
I looked up my dictionary to find out
what logistics are.
Logistics are defined in my dictionary as that
branch of military science relating to the movement
and supplying of armies.
In other words, it's never enough to plan
your strategy.
You must provide for it.
Logistics mean that when you have formed your
strategy, that you then make it possible by
planning your supplies for the strategy to be
implemented.
A constant supply of all needed equipment must
be guaranteed.
The logistics in the spiritual warfare are never
so important as during the middle years.
Those middle years, may I say to all
of you who passed the 35 mark, those
middle years of your life are spiritually the
most potential, the most tremendous, the richest, the
best years of your life.
And just because they're that, the enemy will
do his utmost to see that your life
is subjected to the pressures of the destruction
that wastes us at noonday.
So that all that accumulation of experience through
your mistakes and through your early service, all
the lessons you've learned that are now there,
ready to be applied to life, and as
a result of that to lead others, your
own family to begin with maybe, the young
people you influence, who are looking to you,
all that to be wasted by an insidious
disease that will weaken your strength at the
time you should be strongest.
What's the answer?
Well, it lies in the area not of
strategy but of logistics.
He that dwelleth in the secret place of
the Most High shall abide under the shadow
of the Almighty.
How often those are the very years when
the Bible gets crowded out and prayer and
communion with God become empty.
We're so busy looking after the bairns, and
what a fantastic job that is, that we've
got no time for the Lord.
We used to spend time with our Bibles,
we used to read it meaningfully and prayerfully.
We've stopped that, but there's no need.
There's no need to be afraid of the
dangers of the middle years, says the Word
of God.
He that dwelleth in the secret place of
the Most High, he need not be afraid
for the destruction that wastes us at noonday.
There was one basic difference between World War
I and World War II.
The difference can be seen in the war
memorials throughout our land.
There was a tremendous difference in the casualty
numbers.
World War I exacted a heavy toll.
World War II exacted its own toll too,
but not as heavy.
And the difference wasn't just one of strategy,
it was in the area of logistics.
Montgomery never moved his troops into action until
he was absolutely certain that he got all
that he needed, not only to win the
battle, but to push on.
We never moved until we were ready to
move, and when we moved, we moved in
power.
And I would say to those who are
in the middle years, you're in the best
years of life, the very best.
For me, those middle years have gone.
They'll never come back.
I can never have them again.
They've gone.
For some of you, they've not come.
They will come.
But to those who are in the middle
years of life, remember there is a destruction
that wastes us at noonday.
There's a danger that is distinctive to your
time of life.
There's a danger that's deceptive.
There's a danger that's destructive.
The very best can be destroyed.
There's no need for it to be destroyed.
If you want to make the best in
what you can give and in how you
can lead, then dwell in the secret place,
for the most high, as you've never dwelt
before.
He will renew your strength, and you will
mount up with wings as eagles.
You will run and not be weary.
You will walk and not faint.
You'll find that the middle years are indeed
the best.
Let us sing as we close our morning
act of worship.
423, O Jesus King most wonderful, Thou Conqueror
renowned.
423.
Now may grace, mercy, and peace from Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit rest upon us and
remain with us this day and forevermore.