lm cxix. 89-96. For ever, O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven.
Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the
earth, and it abideth. They continue this day according to thine
ordinances: for all are thy servants. Unless thy law had been my
delight, I should then have perished in mine affliction. I will
never forget thy precepts: for with them thou hast quickened me. I
am thine, save me; for I have sought thy precepts. The wicked have
waited for me to destroy me: but I will consider thy testimonies.
I have seen an end of all perfection; but thy commandment is
exceeding broad.

The Psalmist is in great trouble. He does not know whom to trust,
what to expect next, whom to look to. Everything seems failing and
changing round him. His psalm was most probably written during the
Babylonish captivity, at a time when all the countries and kingdoms
of the east were being destroyed by the Chaldean armies.

Then, he says, Be it so. If everything else changes, God cannot.
If everything else fails, God's plans cannot. He can rest on the
thought of God; of his goodness, his faithfulness, order,
providence. God is governing the world righteously and orderly.
Whatever disorder there is on earth, there is none in heaven. God's
word endures for ever there.

Then he looks on the world round him; all is well ordered--seasons,
animals, sun, and stars abide. They continue this day according to
God's ordinances. The unchangeableness of nature is a comfort to
him; for it is a token of the unchangeablenes of God who made it.

Now, I do beg you to think carefully over this verse; because it is
quite against the very common notion that, because the earth was
cursed for Adam's sake, therefore it is cursed now; that because it
was said to him, Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee,
therefore that holds good now. It is not so, my friends; neither is
there, as far as I know, in any part whatsoever of Scripture, any
mention of Adam's curse continuing to our day. St. John, in the
Revelations, certainly says, 'And there shall be no more curse.'
But if you will read the Revelation, you will find that what he
plainly refers to is to the fearful curses, the plagues, the vials
of wrath, as he calls them, which were to be poured out on the
earth; and then to cease when the New Jerusalem came down from
heaven.

St. Paul, again, knows nothing about any such curse upon the earth.
He says that death ca