Spurgeon: August AM
* 08/08/AM
"They weave the spider's web."
--Isaiah 59:5
See the spider's web, and behold in it a most suggestive
picture of the hypocrite's religion. It is meant to catch his
prey : the spider fattens himself on flies, and the Pharisee has
his reward. Foolish persons are easily entrapped by the loud
professions of pretenders, and even the more judicious cannot
always escape. Philip baptized Simon Magus, whose guileful
declaration of faith was so soon exploded by the stern rebuke of
Peter. Custom, reputation, praise, advancement, and other flies,
are the small game which hypocrites take in their nets. A
spider's web is a marvel of skill : look at it and admire the
cunning hunter's wiles. Is not a deceiver's religion equally
wonderful? How does he make so barefaced a lie appear to be a
truth? How can he make his tinsel answer so well the purpose of
gold? A spider's web comes all from the creature's own bowels .
The bee gathers her wax from flowers, the spider sucks no
flowers, and yet she spins out her material to any length. Even
so hypocrites find their trust and hope within themselves; their
anchor was forged on their own anvil, and their cable twisted by
their own hands. They lay their own foundation, and hew out the
pillars of their own house, disdaining to be debtors to the
sovereign grace of God. But a spider's web is very frail . It
is curiously wrought, but not enduringly manufactured. It is no
match for the servant's broom, or the traveller's staff. The
hypocrite needs no battery of Armstrongs to blow his hope to
pieces, a mere puff of wind will do it. Hypocritical cobwebs
will soon come down when the besom of destruction begins its
purifying work. Which reminds us of one more thought, viz., that
such cobwebs are not to be endured in the Lord's house : He
will see to it that they and those who spin them shall be
destroyed for ever. O my soul, be thou resting on something
better than a spider's web. Be the Lord Jesus thine eternal
hiding-place.