Multiplied Blessings: Eighteen Short Readings

Transcribed from the 1907 Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org
BY THE LATE REV. CANON HOARE VICAR OF HOLY TRINITY, TUNBRIDGE WELLS
published under the direction of the tract committee
LONDON SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE NORTHUMBERLAND AVENUE, W.C. 43, QUEEN VICTORIA STREET, E.C. BRIGHTON: 129, NORTH STREET New York: E. S. GORHAM 1907
These short readings, now published for the first time, are extracts from the written sermons of the late Rev. E. Hoare, Vicar of Holy Trinity, Tunbridge Wells from 1853 to 1894, and Hon. Canon of Canterbury. They are taken, word for word, from his original MSS., and have been selected with a view to giving practical help in the Christian life. Many of them were written long ago, but the hindrances and difficulties that meet the Christian continue much the same, and it is hoped that the following pages may be used of God to bring before the reader the Lord Jesus Christ as the Saviour, Guide, and Helper.
K. A. H.
“Thou art my hiding-place; Thou shalt preserve me from trouble; Thou shalt compass me about with songs of deliverance. “I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye.”—Ps. xxxii. 7, 8.
“Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.” These were the words with which David commenced his Psalm, and in these words he said that to which every forgiven soul will most heartily add, “Amen.”
What was the peculiar character of that blessedness? We learn from verses 3 and 4 the awful misery of sin unrepented and unforgiven. We find how David’s tears were dried up by the burning heat of a guilty conscience, and how the dreadful burden weighed day and night upon his soul. Then in the next verse we are taught the secret of the great transition from misery to peace. We find how he made up his mind to make no further efforts to conceal his guilt. He resolved to confess it before God, and no longer attempt to hide it from man. The result was a complete, assured, and most merciful forgiveness. “Thou forgavest,” he said, “the iniquity of my sin.” He was assured of the gift, but what was the unspeakable blessedness to which, when forgiven, he was admitted?