Why are you still standing?

This is an excerpt from a message preached by Augustus Toplady in May 1774. While we know him today for his hymn Rock of Ages there is so much more to the man who died at the age of 38 years old. He wrote many, many hymns, served as a pastor, and was a very able writer of the truths of grace. He did, by the grace of God "earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints".



This excerpt comes from a message titled, Men Not Their Own Saviors, on this occasion he was speaking from Psalm 115:1 which reads,

"Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy name give glory, for Thy mercy, and for Thy truth's sake".

We will break into the middle of his sixth point where he asked the question; Whom are we to thank for perseverance in holiness and good works, to the end?



Let me address myself to the true believer in Christ. You were called, it may be ten or twenty years ago, or longer, to the knowledge of God; and you still are found dwelling under the droppings of the sanctuary, and walking in Him you have received; following on, to know more of the Lord; sometimes faint, yet always wishing to pursue; tossed, but not lost; occasionally cast down, but not destroyed. How comes all this? How is that many flaming professors, who blazed out for a while, like luminaries of the first lustre, are quenched, extinguished, vanished; while your smoking flax(Isa. 42:3 & Mat. 12:20), and feeble spark of grace, continue to survive, and sometimes afford both light and heat? While more than a few, who perhaps once seemed to be rooted as rocks, and stable as pillars in the house of God, are become as water that runneth apace; why are you standing, though in yourself as weak, if not weaker, than they? A child of God can soon answer it thus: Having obtained help of God, I continue to this day(Acts 26:22). Not by my own might and power, but by the Spirit of the Lord of Hosts (Zec 4:6).