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Isaiah Chapter
Forty-four
Isaiah 44
Chapter Contents
Here are promises of the influences of the Holy Spirit.
(1-8) An exposure of the folly of idolatry. (9-20) Also the deliverance of
God's people. (21-28)
Commentary on Isaiah 44:1-8
(Read Isaiah 44:1-8)
Israel is here called Jeshurun, which means "the
upright one." Such only are Israelites indeed, in whom is no guile. Those
that serve God he will own. He will help them over difficulties, and in their
services. Water is the emblem of the Holy Spirit; as water refreshes, cleanses,
and makes the earth fruitful, so do his influences the soul. This gift of the
Holy Ghost is the great blessing, the plentiful pouring out of which God kept
for the latter days. Where God gives his Spirit, he will give all other
blessings. Hereby shall be a great increase of the church; thus it shall be
spread to distant places. Was there any other Rock, or Protector, that could
defend them? None besides could foretell these things to come, of which God by
his prophets gave notice. All was set in order in the Divine predictions, as
well as in the Divine purposes. Could any other have done so? Who can compare
with Israel's Redeemer and King?
Commentary on Isaiah 44:9-20
(Read Isaiah 44:9-20)
Image-making is described, to expose the folly of
idolaters. Though a man had used part of a log for fuel, he fell down before an
image made of the remainder, praying it to deliver him. Man greatly dishonours
God, when he represents him after the image of man. Satan blinds the eyes of
unbelievers, causing absurd reasonings in matters of religion. Whether men seek
happiness in worldly things, or run into unbelief, superstition, or any false
system, they feed on ashes. A heart deceived by pride, love of sin, and
departure from God, turns men aside from his holy truth and worship. While the
affections are depraved, a man holds fast the lie as his best treasure. Are our
hearts set upon the wealth of the world and its pleasures? They will certainly
prove a lie. If we trust to outward professions and doings, as if those would
save us, we deceive ourselves. Self-suspicion is the first step towards
self-deliverance. He that would deliver his soul, must question his conscience,
Is there not a lie in my right hand?
Commentary on Isaiah 44:21-28
(Read Isaiah 44:21-28)
Return unto me. It is the great concern of those who have
backslidden from God, like the Jews of old, to hasten their return to him. The
work of redemption wrought for us by Christ, encourages to hope for all
blessings from him. Our transgressions and our sins are as a thick cloud
between heaven and earth: sins separate between us and God; they threaten a
storm of wrath. When God pardons sin, he blots out, he dispels this cloud, this
thick cloud, so that the way to heaven is open again. The cloud is scattered by
the Sun of righteousness; it is quite gone. The comforts that flow into the
soul when sin is pardoned, are like clear shining after clouds and rain. Let
not Israel be discouraged; nothing is too hard for God: having made all, he can
make what use he pleases of any. Those that learn to know Christ, see all
knowledge to be foolishness, in comparison with the knowledge of him. And his
enemies will find their counsels turned into foolishness, and themselves taken
in their craftiness. The exact fulfilling the prophecies of Scripture confirms
the truth of the whole, and proves its Divine origin. The particular favours
God designed for his people in captivity, were foretold here, long before they
went into captivity. Very great difficulties would be in the way of their
deliverance; but it is promised that by Divine power they should all be
removed. God knew who should be the Deliverer of his people; and let his church
know it, that when they heard such a name talked of, they might know their
redemption drew nigh. It is the greatest honour of the greatest men, to be
employed as instruments of the Divine favour to his people. In things wherein
men serve themselves, and look no further, God makes them do all his pleasure.
And a nobler Shepherd than Cyrus does his Father's will, till his work is fully
completed.
¢w¢w Matthew Henry¡mConcise Commentary on Isaiah¡n
Isaiah 44
Verse 2
[2] Thus
saith the LORD that made thee, and formed thee from the womb, which will help
thee; Fear not, O Jacob, my servant; and thou, Jesurun, whom I have chosen.
Formed thee ¡X
From the time that I first took thee to be my people, I have been forming and
fashioning thee.
Jesurun ¡X
Another name of Jacob or Israel, given to him, Deuteronomy 32:15.
Verse 3
[3] For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry
ground: I will pour my spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine
offspring:
Water ¡X
Upon him that is destitute of it.
Verse 5
[5] One
shall say, I am the LORD's; and another shall call himself by the name of
Jacob; and another shall subscribe with his hand unto the LORD, and surname
himself by the name of Israel.
Israel ¡X
The blessing of God upon the Jews shall be so remarkable, that the Gentiles
shall join them, and accept the Lord for their God.
Verse 7
[7] And
who, as I, shall call, and shall declare it, and set it in order for me, since
I appointed the ancient people? and the things that are coming, and shall come,
let them shew unto them.
Who ¡X
Which of all the Heathen gods.
Declare ¡X
Shall by his powerful word cause it to be, and by his fore-knowledge declare
that it shall be.
Set in order ¡X
Orderly relate all future events in the same manner as they shall happen.
Since ¡X
Since I first made man upon earth.
The things ¡X
Such things as are near at hand, and such as are to come hereafter.
Verse 8
[8] Fear ye not, neither be afraid: have not I told thee from that time, and
have declared it? ye are even my witnesses. Is there a God beside me? yea,
there is no God; I know not any.
Ye ¡X Thee, O Israel, whom
he bids not to fear.
Told thee ¡X
Even from the first ages of the world.
Declared ¡X
Have published it to the world in my sacred records.
Witnesses ¡X
Both of my predictions, and of the exact agreeableness of events to them.
Verse 9
[9] They
that make a graven image are all of them vanity; and their delectable things
shall not profit; and they are their own witnesses; they see not, nor know;
that they may be ashamed.
Delectable things ¡X
Their idols, in which they take so much pleasure.
They ¡X
They that make them, are witnesses against themselves, and against their idols,
because they know they are the work of their own hands. See not|-Have neither
sense nor understanding, therefore they have just cause to be ashamed of their
folly, in worshipping such senseless things.
Verse 11
[11]
Behold, all his fellows shall be ashamed: and the workmen, they are of men: let
them all be gathered together, let them stand up; yet they shall fear, and they
shall be ashamed together.
Men ¡X
They are of mankind, and therefore cannot possibly make a god.
Together ¡X
Tho' all combine together, they shall be filled with fear and confusion, when
God shall plead his cause against them.
Verse 12
[12] The
smith with the tongs both worketh in the coals, and fashioneth it with hammers,
and worketh it with the strength of his arms: yea, he is hungry, and his
strength faileth: he drinketh no water, and is faint.
Faint ¡X
This is mentioned as an evidence of great zeal and industry in carrying on this
work; so that they forget or neglect to eat and drink.
Verse 13
[13] The
carpenter stretcheth out his rule; he marketh it out with a line; he fitteth it
with planes, and he marketh it out with the compass, and maketh it after the
figure of a man, according to the beauty of a man; that it may remain in the
house.
According to ¡X In
the same comely shape and proportions which are in a living man.
House ¡X In
the dwelling-house of him that made it.
Verse 14
[14] He
heweth him down cedars, and taketh the cypress and the oak, which he strengtheneth
for himself among the trees of the forest: he planteth an ash, and the rain
doth nourish it.
Oak ¡X
Which afford the best and most durable timber.
Strengtheneth ¡X He
plants, and with care and diligence improves those trees, that he or his
posterity may thence have materials for their images, and those things which
belong to them.
Verse 15
[15] Then
shall it be for a man to burn: for he will take thereof, and warm himself; yea,
he kindleth it, and baketh bread; yea, he maketh a god, and worshippeth it; he
maketh it a graven image, and falleth down thereto.
Fallen down ¡X
Having related the practices of idolaters, he now discovers the folly of them,
that he makes his fire and his god of the same materials, distinguished only by
the art of man.
Verse 17
[17] And
the residue thereof he maketh a god, even his graven image: he falleth down
unto it, and worshippeth it, and prayeth unto it, and saith, Deliver me; for
thou art my god.
He eateth ¡X He
dresses flesh for his eating.
Seen ¡X I
have felt the warmth of it.
Verse 18
[18] They
have not known nor understood: for he hath shut their eyes, that they cannot
see; and their hearts, that they cannot understand.
Not known ¡X
This shews that they have not the understanding of a man.
For he ¡X
God. Not as if God did make men wicked; he only permits them so to be, and
orders, and over-rules their wickedness to his own glorious ends.
Verse 20
[20] He
feedeth on ashes: a deceived heart hath turned him aside, that he cannot
deliver his soul, nor say, Is there not a lie in my right hand?
Ashes ¡X An
unprofitable and pernicious food, and no less unsatisfying and mischievous is
the worship of idols.
Deceived heart ¡X A
mind corrupted and deceived by deep prejudice, gross error, and especially by
his own lusts.
Turned ¡X
From the way of truth.
Deliver ¡X
From the snares and dangers of idolatry.
Is there not ¡X
What is this idol which I set at my right-hand, as the true God is said in
scripture to be at the right-hand of his people; which I highly honour, for the
most honourable place was on the right-hand; to which I look for relief and
assistance, which God in scripture is said to afford to his people, by being at
and holding their right-hand. What, I say, is this idol? Is it not a lie, which
tho' it pretends to be a god, yet, in truth is nothing but vanity and
falsehood?
Verse 21
[21]
Remember these, O Jacob and Israel; for thou art my servant: I have formed
thee; thou art my servant: O Israel, thou shalt not be forgotten of me.
These ¡X
These things, the deep ignorance and stupidity of idolaters.
Forgotten ¡X I
will not forget nor forsake thee; therefore thou shalt have no need of idols.
Verse 22
[22] I
have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy
sins: return unto me; for I have redeemed thee.
As a cloud ¡X So
that there is no remnant of it left.
Verse 23
[23]
Sing, O ye heavens; for the LORD hath done it: shout, ye lower parts of the
earth: break forth into singing, ye mountains, O forest, and every tree
therein: for the LORD hath redeemed Jacob, and glorified himself in Israel.
Sing ¡X By
such invitations to the senseless creatures, he signifies the transcendent
greatness of this mercy, sufficient to make even the stones, if it were
possible, to break forth into God's praises.
Verse 25
[25] That
frustrateth the tokens of the liars, and maketh diviners mad; that turneth wise
men backward, and maketh their knowledge foolish;
Liars ¡X Of
the magicians, and astrologers, who were numerous, and greatly esteemed in
Babylon, and who had foretold the long continuance and prosperity of the
Chaldean empire.
Mad ¡X
With grief for the disappointment of their predictions, and their disgrace
which followed it.
Turneth ¡X
Stopping their way, and blasting their designs.
Verse 27
[27] That
saith to the deep, Be dry, and I will dry up thy rivers:
That saith ¡X
That with a word can dry up the sea and rivers, and remove all impediments.
Verse 28
[28] That
saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure: even
saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be built; and to the temple, Thy foundation
shall be laid.
Cyrus ¡X
Whom God here mentions by his proper name, two hundred years before he was
born, that this might be an undeniable evidence of the exactness of God's
fore-knowledge, and a convincing argument to conclude this dispute between God
and idols.
Shepherd ¡X
Then will I set up to be the shepherd of my people, to rescue them from wolves
or tyrants, to gather them together, to rule them gently, and to provide
comfortably for them.
¢w¢w John Wesley¡mExplanatory Notes on Isaiah¡n
44 Chapter 44
Verse 1
Verses 1-28
Verses 1-5
Yet now hear, O Jacob, My servant
e
the people of God called by the name of Jacob?
Have you never wondered why the people of God should be called by
the name of the third of the ancient patriarchs in preference to the first two?
We often, indeed, find them called the seed of Abraham, and we should easily
understand what was meant if we read of the children of Isaac: but, as far as I
remember, they are nowhere called simply Abraham or Isaac, whereas it is
perfectly common to hear them called Jacob or Israel, the name of the third
patriarch being directly transferred to his descendants. Not only so: this
usage has passed over into the New Testament, and we still sometimes call the
whole body of living Christians the Israel of God. This is a somewhat
surprising circumstance; for of the three patriarchs the third is certainly not
the favourite. Why, then, is it that the name of the third patriarch is
attached to God¡¦s people, as if he were more directly their progenitor than the
other two? Is it because they are liker him than they are to Abraham or Isaac?
Is the average Christian an imperfect, stumbling mortal, a compound of obvious
vices and struggling virtues, as Jacob was? It would be harsh to say so. But we
may come nearer the mark if we put this suggestion in a different form. Jacob
was the progressive character among the patriarchs. His beginnings were
ignoble, and the vices of his nature long clave to him; yet by degrees he
surmounted them: he lived down the evil which was in him; and his end was that
of one who, after many defeats, had at last obtained the victory. Abraham is a
much grander figure than Jacob, but he has far less history. He may almost be
said to be perfect from the first. If in him there was a slow development from
small beginnings, we have no record of it. Isaac, again, was, as far as the
records inform us, a back-going rather than a progressive character. The
opening scenes of his history are beautiful and noble; but his character lacked
back-bone, and we see him sinking into physical grossness and moral flaccidity.
Jacob¡¦s life, on the contrary, in spite of great defects to begin with and many
faults by the way, was a developing and ascending one. This is shown by the
names he bore: he was first Jacob and then Israel. And it may be to recommend
such a life of progress that his names are given to God¡¦s people. (J.
Stalker, D. D.)
Biography in three words:
I. JACOB.
1. This was the name of the natural man. After he had received his
new name the very mention of the old one must have reminded him of the evil
time when he was an unbrotherly brother and an unfilial son. It is true that,
while he was still Jacob, he went through the experience of Bethel, where he
saw the vision of the ladder reaching up to heaven. This is usually regarded as
his conversion, but, if it was, he was afterwards a backslider, for his subsequent
life in Padan-aram was far more guided by selfish cleverness than by the law of
God. The name Jacob, in short, was a memorial of a youth of sin and of a
manhood of worldliness. But is it not, thus understood, an appropriate name for
the people of God? Is there not for them also a bad past to remember? It is
well sometimes to go back to what we were, because the old habits may still
spring up and trouble us; though we may now have received a new name, the old
Jacob is in us still. Above all, we ought to go back on that old time, because
it helps to magnify the grace which brought us out of it.
2. But there is another idea inseparably connected with the name of
Jacob: it is that of Divine choice. In our text this is very
prominent--¡§Israel, whom I have chosen, ¡§Jesurun, whom I have chosen.¡¨ It is,
indeed, connected with the other two names here, because these indicate that to
which he was chosen. But he was the choice of God, in preference to Esau, while
he was still Jacob. As He chose Jacob, while he was still Jacob, so He loved us
while we were yet sinners.
II. ISRAEL.
1. The patriarch received a new name because he had become a new man.
God does not trifle with such things. A change of name among, us may be a mere
freak of caprice; but when God deliberately changed a man s name, it was an
outward monument of an inward change. If it did not mean that the natural man,
which the name Jacob designated, was entirely exterminated, it meant that it
was so far overcome that the complexion of the life would henceforth be
different. The reign of selfishness and worldliness was over, and a new spirit
had entered in and taken possession If we ask how this came about, it may have
been a slower and more complex process than we have any record of; for what
appears a sudden spiritual change is often only the culmination of movements
going on for a long time before. But what we are permitted to see clearly in
the records of the patriarch¡¦s life is the midnight scene on the bank of the
Jabbok. It is far away, and it is evidently concealed under forms of speech
which are now alien to us; but this at least is evident, that the patriarch was
that night, if a homely phrase may be allowed, at cross grips with God. That
night God was not to him vague and far-off, but intensely real and very near;
and Jacob had transactions with Him face to face--ay, hand to hand. Is not this
what the religion of many people lacks? To a certain extent they are religious.
Yet somehow it never comes to close quarters between them and God. What they
need is Christ, the reconciler.
2. But the new name of Israel denoted more than this. It was
expressly said to him, as he received it, ¡§As a prince hast thou had power with
God and hast prevailed,¡¨ and this was what the name meant--the possession of
power with God. Evidently a great crisis had come in Jacob¡¦s experience, in
which his will came into collision with the will Divine. But what an unequal
struggle! The mysterious man had only to touch Jacob in the seat of his
strength, and it yielded in a moment; the sinew shrank, and he could struggle
no more. Yet in the moment when he appeared to be thoroughly beaten, it turned
out that he had gained the victory and won the blessing. This is not so
mysterious as it looks. It is repeated in every great spiritual crisis. It is
through such experiences that men and women enter into the secret of the Lord,
become mighty in prayer, are endowed with spiritual power, and if they do not
receive new names on earth, yet obtain a stamp and a signature of character
leaving no doubt that they have new names in heaven.
III. JESHURUN. There
is no evidence that this name belonged to the third patriarch, though it may
have done so. But there can be little doubt that, standing where it does,
alongside of the other two, it was meant, like them, for a symbol of character.
The root from which it appears to be derived means straight or upright, and
this is its most probable meaning. This was precisely the development of
character which the third patriarch needed, after he had received the new name
of Israel. What happened the very next morning after the great midnight scene
on which we have been looking? He went forth to meet his brother Esau; and this
is the account of how he behaved: ¡§Jacob lifted up his eyes and looked, and
behold Esau came, and with him four hundred men;. . . and he bowed himself to
the ground seven times, until he came near to his brother.¡¨ Bowed himself--to
the ground--seven times! This to his own brother! What was he bowing for?
Whycould he not stand up straight on his feet and look his brother in the face?
Read the whole account of the preparations and dispositions which he elaborated
before meeting Esau, and of the sly, suspicious way in which he met and managed
his rough but generous brother, and you will feel inclined to sneer: Is this
the man who was called last night a prince who had power with God? There is far
too much bowing and becking, twisting and turning. This man is not straight; he
is not upright. It seems to me that sometimes in people who have had their
Bethels and Hahanaims and Peniels, and can speak to you about experiences of
struggle and emptying, and of being filled with the Holy Spirit, there is a
defect of a similar kind. Although they have had dealings with God, and feel
themselves on a footing of reconciliation with Him, they are not right in their
dealings with men. There are few things which so injure the cause of religion
in the world as these defects of men of God. On the contrary, how noble and
God-honouring a sight it is when one who is a prince with God is acknowledged
on earth also to be a princely man; and when one who has power with God has at
the same time influence with men through his manliness, uprightness, and
charity. Our text is a message of hope. It speaks of the possibilities of
spiritual transformation and development. (J. Stalker, D. D.)
Jacob, Israel, Jeshurun:
I take these three names in their order as teaching us--
I. THE PATH OF
TRANSFORMATION. Every ¡§Jacob¡¨ may become a ¡§righteous one¡¨ if he will tread
Jacob¡¦s road. We start with that first name of nature which, according to
Esau¡¦s bitter etymology of it, meant ¡§a supplanter,¡¨--not without some
suggestions of craft and treachery in it. It is descriptive of the natural
disposition of the patriarch, which was by no means attractive. All through his
earlier career he does not look like the stuff of which heroes and saints are
made. But in the mid-path of his life there came that hour of deep dejection
and helplessness when, driven out of all dependence on self, and feeling round
in his agony for something to lay hold upon, there came into this nightly
solitude a vision of God. In conscious weakness, and in the confidence of
self-despair, he wrestled with the mysterious Visitant in the only fashion in
which He can be wrestled with. ¡§He wept and made supplication to Him,¡¨ as one
of the prophets puts it, and so he bore away the threefold gift-blessing from
those mighty lips whose blessing is the communication, and not only the
invocation of the mercy, a deeper knowledge of that Divine and mysterious Name,
and for him self a new name. That new name implied a new direction given to his
character. Hitherto he had wrestled with men whom he would supplant, for his
own advantage, by craft and subtlety; henceforward he strove with God for
higher blessings, which, in striving, he won. All the rest of his life was on a
loftier plane. That is the outline of the only way in which, from out of the
evil and the sinfulness of our natural disposition, any of us can be raised to
the loftiness and purity of a righteous life. There must be a Peniel between
the two halves of the character if there is to be transformation. How different
that path is from the road which men are apt to take in working out their own
self-improvement! How many forms of religion, and how many toiling souls in
effect just reverse the process, and say practically--first make yourselves
righteous, and then you will get communion with God. That is an endless and a
hopeless task! This sequence, too, may very fairly be used to teach us the
lesson that there is no kind of character so debased but that it may partake of
the purifying and ennobling influence.
II. THE LAW FOR THE
CHRISTIAN LIFE. There are some religious people that seem to think that it is
enough if only they can say: ¡§Well! I have been to Jesus Christ, and I have got
my past sins forgiven; I have been on the mountain and have held communion with
God.¡¨ Now, the order of these names here points the lesson that the apex of the
pyramid, the goal of the whole course, is--righteousness. God does not tell us
His name merely in order that we may know His name, but in order that, knowing
it, we may be smitten with the love of it, and so may come into the likeness of
it. Take, then, these three names of my text as preaching, in antique guise,
the same lesson that the very Apostle of affectionate contemplation uttered
with such earnestness: ¡§Little children! let no man deceive you. He that doeth
righteousness is righteous, even as He is righteous.¡¨
III. THE MERCIFUL
JUDGMENT WHICH GOD MAKES OF THE CHARACTER OF THEM THAT LOVE HIM. Jeshurun means
¡§the righteous one.¡¨ How far beneath the ideal of the name these Jewish people
fell we all know, and yet the name is applied to them. Although the realisation
of the ideal has been so imperfect, the ideal is not destroyed. And so we
Christian people find that the New Testament calls us ¡§saints.¡¨ All wrong-doing
is inconsistent with Christianity, but it is not for us to say that any
wrong-doing is incompatible with it; and therefore for ourselves there is hope,
and for our estimate of one another there is the lesson of charity, and for all
Christian people there is a lesson--live up to your name. Noblesse oblige! Fulfil
your ideal. Be what God calls you, and ¡§press toward the mark for the prize.¡¨
IV. THE UNION
BETWEEN THE FOUNDER OF THE NATION AND THE NATION. The name of the patriarch
passes to his descendants, the nation is called after him that begat it. In
some sense it prolongs his life and spirit and character upon the earth. That
is the old-world way of looking at the solidarity of a nation. There is a New
Testament fact that goes even deeper than that. The names which Christ bears
are given to Christ¡¦s followers. Is He a King, is He a Priest? He makes us
kings and priests. Is He anointed the Messiah? God ¡§hath anointed us in Him.¡¨
Is He the light of the world? ¡§Ye are the light of the world.¡¨ His life passeth
into all that love Him in the measure of their trust and love. (A. Maclaren,
D. D.)
The Church comforted and revived:
I. AN ADDRESS MOST
GRACIOUS AND COMFORTING. ¡§Yet now hear, O Jacob, My servant; and Israel, whom I
have chosen,¡¨ &c. The persons to whom these words were spoken are
represented--
1. As the servants of God. How great the honour to be acknowledged as
a servant of the King of kings!
2. As the people of His special choice.
3. As the objects of His wonderful interpositions. The words, ¡§Thus
saith the Lord that made thee, and formed thee from the womb,¡¨ refer to them in
their national character. The relationship He sustained to them, and the great
things He had done for them, are employed as arguments to inspire them with
confidence, and lead them to be of good courage.
II. A PROMISE
EMINENTLY CHEERING. ¡§For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty,¡¨ &c.
They are evidently spiritual blessings which are here promised, of which water
is frequently employed as an emblem. In this passage we are reminded of the
following particulars.
1. Their nature. In some places the cleansing property of water is
intended. At other times its quality of quenching the thirst is set forth. But
it is to be understood here in connection with its refreshing and fertilising
influences.
2. Their value. We have but a faint conception of the importance of
water, on account of its being so common with us. But, in those countries where
it is scarce, its worth is very differently estimated.
3. Their seasonableness. When the soil is parched through
long-continued drought, how welcome are the genial showers. And to the dry and
barren soul, how cheering are the waters of life and salvation!
4. Their abundance. ¡§I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and
floods upon the dry ground.¡¨ Nor are they ample in quantity alone, but in their
range they are most extensive. Besides embracing the people of God themselves,
they also embrace their offspring.
III. A RESULT TRULY
REFRESHING. ¡§One shall say, I am the Lord¡¦s; and another shall call himself by
the name of Jacob; and another shall subscribe with his hand unto the Lord, and
surname himself by the name of Israel.¡¨ We have here--
1. An important principle indicated. It is that God¡¦s own people must
be first revived before large accessions can be expected to the Church from
without.
2. The blessed truth declared. (Anon.)
A promise for us, and for our children:
¡§Yet.¡¨ What an ominous word as to the past! What a cheering word
as to the future! ¡§Yet.¡¨ What black words are those which come before it! God¡¦s
people were represented as being in a sadly backsliding state. Consequently God
gave them up ,to the curse and the reproach. It may be that such is our case,
though we be God s people. ¡§Yet,¡¨ says the text--though you have fallen into
this state, do not despair; I love you; you are My chosen; yet will I return
unto you in favour. Come then, if we have wandered never so far, let this word
sound like the shepherd¡¦s call to bring us back.
I. THE LORD
COMFORTS HIS PEOPLE BY THE REMEMBRANCE OF WHAT HE HAS DONE FOR THEM. Taking the
text as our guide, let us notice--
1. The grace we have experienced in its practical effect. To make us
God¡¦s servants--¡§Yet now hear, O Jacob, My servant.¡¨ We may be unfaithful
servants: we certainly are unprofitable odes, but, if not awfully deceived, we
are His true servants. We were once the servants of sin and the slaves of our
own passions, but He who made us free has now taken us into His own family and
taught us obedience to His will.
2. This grace is peculiar, discriminating and distinguishing. ¡§My
chosen.¡¨
3. Reflect again upon the ennobling influence of grace. The people
are first called Jacob, but only in the next line they are styled Israel. You
and I were but of the common order. If we had boasted of anything we should
have been called Jacobs, supplanters, boasting beyond our line; but as Jacob at
the brook Jabbok wrestled with the angel and prevailed, and gained the august
title of prince--prevailing prince--even so has grace ennobled us!
4. The text conducts us onward to notice the creating and sustaining
energy of that grace. ¡§Thus saith the Lord that made thee, and formed thee from
the womb.¡¨ Men might as well claim the honour of creation or resurrection as
boast of commencing their own spiritual life.
5. This¡¨ grace has the characteristic, of intense,, affection in it.
God gives to His people the title of Jeshurun, which means the righteous
people,¡¨ according to some translators, but most interpreters are agreed that
it is an affectionate title which God gives to His people. Perhaps it may be
considered to be a diminutive of Israel. Just as fathers and mothers, when they
have great affection for their children, will frequently give them an endearing
name--shorten their usual name, or call them by a familiar title only used in
the family--so, in calling Israel Jeshurun, the Lord setteth forth His near and
dear love. God¡¦s grace to us is not merely the mercy of the good Samaritan
towards a poor stranger whom he finds wounded by the way, but it is the love of
a mother to her sick child; the fondness of a husband towards a weeping wife;
the tenderness of the head towards the wounded members.
II. WE ARE
ENCOURAGED BY THE PROMISE OF WHAT GOD WILL DO. ¡§Fear not; I will help thee.¡¨
You cannot pray as you desire--¡§I will help thee.¡¨ You feel unable to overcome
sin--¡§I will help thee.¡¨ You are engaged in service too heavy for you--¡§I will
help thee.¡¨ Then comes a promise, fuller in words and as rich in grace, ¡§I will
pour water on him that is thirsty.¡¨ You shall be refreshed; your desires shall
be gratified. Water quickens sleeping vegetable life: your life shall be
quickened by fresh grace. Water swells the buds and makes the fruits ripe: you
shall have fructifying grace; you shall be made fruitful in the ways of God.
Whatever good quality there is in Divine grace, you shall enjoy it to the full
You shall be, as it were, drenched with it.
III. AS A VERY GREAT
COMFORT TO HIS MOURNING PEOPLE, THE LORD NOW PROMISES A BLESSING UPON THEIR
CHILDREN. They must get the blessing for themselves first. ¡§I win pour water
upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground,¡¨--that is first; and
then afterwards--¡§I will pour My Spirit upon thy seed.¡¨ We must not expect to
see our children blessed unless we ourselves grow in grace. It is often the
inconsistency of parents which is the outward obstacle to the conversion of
their children. But now, if we have had faith to receive much grace from God,
here comes a blessed promise for our children--¡§I will pour My Spirit upon thy
seed,¡¨ in which observe--
1. The need. To give a new heart and a right spirit is the work of
the Holy Spirit, and of the Holy Spirit alone.
2. The source of the mercy which God will give. ¡§My Spirit.¡¨
3. The plenty of grace which God gives. ¡§Pour¡¨: not a little of
it--but abundance.
4. The blessedness of all this. And My blessing upon thine
offspring.¡¨ What a blessing it is to have our offspring saved! What a blessing
to have our children enlisted in Christ¡¦s army!
5. Notice the vigour with which these children shall grow. ¡§They
shall spring up as among the grass, as willows by the water courses.¡¨ Close by
the water¡¦s edge the grass grows very green, and the willow is a well-known
tree for speedily shooting forth its branches. Our farmers lop their willows
often, but they very soon sprout again. The willow grows fast, and so do young
Christians.
6. The manifestation of this in public. Not only are our children to
have the Spirit of God in their inward parts, but they are to make a profession
of it. One shall say, ¡§I am the Lord¡¦s,¡¨--he shall come out boldly and avow
himself on the Lord¡¦s side; and another shall so ally himself to God¡¦s Church
that he ¡§shall call himself by the name of Jacob¡¨; and then another who can
hardly speak quite so positively, but who means it quite as sincerely, ¡§shall
subscribe with his hand unto the Lord¡¨; and a fourth ¡§shall surname himself by the
name of Israel.¡¨ (C. H. Spurgeon)
The Spirit promised to the seed of Jacob:
The text contains one of those interesting passages in which the
Holy Spirit is promised in the Old Testament. Consider--
I. THE PEOPLE TO
WHOM THE PROMISE IS MADE.
II. THE PROMISE
ITSELF.
III. THE EFFECTS
ATTENDING ITS FULFILMENT. (D. Rees.)
Jesurun,
Jesurun, or Jeshurun, is supposed to be derived from a word which
literally means ¡§straight¡¨ or ¡§even.¡¨ The symbolic meaning is therefore upright
or ¡§righteous.¡¨ St. Jerome renders it ¡§most upright.¡¨ In the Septuagint it is
translated ¡§most beloved,¡¨ a term of endearment. A German commentator gives it
the quaint and familiar rendering of ¡§gentleman,¡¨ or ¡§one of gentlemanly or
honourable mind¡¨ (Delitzseh),--a noble epithet alike for the individual or the
nation. Taking it in connection with the only other two places in Scripture
where the word is used, Isaiah, in employing it here, has probably reference to
the primitive virtues which characterised the patriarchal ages--the faith and
purity and rectitude of the old founders of the nation--those to whom Israel
pointed with something of the same pride and glory as we do to our covenanting
forefathers. (Deuteronomy 33:5; Deuteronomy 33:26-29.) (J. R. Macduff,
D. D.)
Verses 3-5
For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty
God¡¦s Spirit as water and floods
The double figure is expressive of copiousness, abundance, variety
(both the ¡§water¡¨ and the ¡§floods¡¨), the rain from heaven and the mountain
torrents to refresh the parched land.
(J. R.Macduff, D. D.)
The Holy Spirit For both Jews and Gentiles:
If these expressions are intended to signify different classes of
people, the former may denote, in a figurative sense, the Jews, who had not yet
received the Holy Spirit in that plentiful measure which they earnestly
desired, and, unsatisfied with present enjoyments, were ardently longing for
further communications of Divine grace, and the salvation of the Lord. The
latter may signify the Gentiles, who had not been favoured with Divine
ordinances and Divine influences, whose condition had been exhibited in
preceding passages of these prophecies as uncultivated and barren, resembling a
wilderness. (R. Macculloch.)
Revival:
A work of revival almost always begins with the children of God.
God pours water first on ¡§him that is thirsty,¡¨ and then on ¡§the dry ground.¡¨ (R.
M. M¡¥Cheyne.)
The influences of the Holy Spirit:
I. THE HOLY SPIRIT
IS A DISTINCT AGENT IN THE SCHEME OF REDEMPTION.
II. THE PROMISE OF
THE DIVINE SPIRIT TO SECURE THE GRAND PURPOSES OF REDEMPTION FORMS A PROMINENT
AND INTERESTING PART OF REVELATION.
III. EVERY PERSON
WHO BELIEVES THE GOSPEL RECEIVES THE DIVINE INFLUENCE WHICH IT PROMISES.
IV. THE HAPPINESS
AND USEFULNESS OF BELIEVERS REQUIRE THEM TO SEEK A MOST COPIOUS EFFUSION OF THE
INFLUENCES OF THE SPIRIT. The Spirit promotes the happiness of believers
1. By gradually advancing their sanctification.
2. By making them increasingly the objects of Divine complacency.
3. By preserving them from temptation, and habitually disposing them
to seek communion with God.
V. EVERY BELIEVER
HAS REASON TO EXPECT THAT THE INFLUENCES OF THE HOLY SPIRIT WILL RE MOST
COPIOUSLY IMPARTED TO HIM.
VI. THERE IS AN
APPOINTED ORDER OF MEANS WITH WHICH THE BESTOWMENT OF DIVINE INFLUENCE IS
CONNECTED, and in the constant observance of which its most copious effusion
should be sought.
VII. IF WE HAVE NOT
THE INFLUENCES OF THE HOLY SPIRIT, OR IF WE DO NOT POSSESS THEM IN AN EMINENT
DEGREE, WE ARE NOT MERELY UNFORTUNATE BUT GUILTY. (L. Forster.)
Water an emblem of the Holy Spirit:
1. Water is a blessing universally necessary.
2. A blessing universally diffused.
3. An abundant blessing.
4. A cheap blessing. (D. Rees.)
The Spirit acts through believers:
The Spirit must first show forth His virtue in us according to our
faith before He can act upon our neighbours. He must be a Spirit of revealing
truth in us before He can go forth from us to illuminate the world. He must be
a Spirit of conviction in us, making us mindful of our errancies, before He can
lead the world to penitence. He must be a Spirit of assurance in us before He
can chase the fears and dry the tears of a mourning world. He must be a Spirit
of holy, tender, undefiled charity in us before He can assimilate the world to
Christ¡¦s great law of love. And all these things the Spirit becomes to us
through faith. Some districts are riverless, not because the rain never falls,
but because the soil for a great depth down is so porous that the rainfall
passes through it like a sieve. The district that cradles rivers must have a
soil and underlying foundation that will hold the rain like a sponge. And the
graces and virtues present in the character whose root-principle is unfeigned
faith hold the benign influences of the Spirit as in hidden fountains and
storehouses, so that the world may be blessed by the steadfast outflow. (T.
G.Selby.)
The essential diffusiveness of spiritual religion:
These words remind us of the essential diffusiveness of the
religion which has faith for its ruling principle and the presence of the Holy
Ghost for its daily heritage. The scale according to which we receive the
Spirit must not be that of our own personal necessities only or the demands of
the passing opportunity. As the Spirit dwelt in Christ with inexhaustible
spontaneity for the sake of the larger humanity He had come to bless, as well
as for Himself, so must it be with us. However narrow the visible measurements
of our life, if we receive the fulness of the Spirit we shall touch the entire
world through those subtle and expansive forces which brood within us. We are
sometimes humbled because our sphere of action seems so cramped and
circumscribed. We long for wider fields. We should like to be the instruments
of Divine activities which will affect continents and live through centuries.
But into what a little space our aspiring natures seem to be shut up! There are
Christians, excellent in character and rich in mental gifts, whose influence
seems to go no further than the home, the shop, the office, a select coterie of
friends. If the Spirit is in us, however, these mystic rivers will flow forth,
and for the honour of Him whose name we trust the Spirit will see to it that
our opportunities are imperial in their magnitude. We shall affect for good the
fortunes of many lands, and our destiny shall be large and resplendent as our
best aspirations. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred we will not let our
influence take wings and pass through its appointed realms and latitudes. The
panting springs can find no outlet, and the Spirit is restrained because those
are so narrow who give to Him an earthly home. Our religious toleration, for
instance, we carry to an extent that is simply sinful. We see men in process of
being ruined, and, forsooth, we do not wish to interfere with their ¡§religious
convictions,¡¨ as we call them,--just as if any man¡¦s convictions were worthy of
respect when they do not keep him from sin! We think of ourselves as wells to
which our neighbours may come if they wish; but the murmuring streams are
forced back into the fountain-head, and wells become little better than
cesspools. There must be an onward-pushing force in our religious life. (T.
G.Selby.)
Vitalising power in Spirit filled men:
There are souls around us so arid, scorched, and desolate that it
seems almost impossible to educe within them a single grace or morality. Races
are to be found--at least such is the testimony of the white men who are
anxious to supplant them--which lack the rudimentary aptitudes for virtue,
humanity, religion. They have received a prodigious endowment of appetite,
passion, blood-thirstiness from the beast-world below them; but the
spirit-world above them seems to have failed to filter down into their lives a
single principle of light, truth, tenderness. Even these may be vitalised with
a new ethic and fitted for a higher destiny than that of the dust-heap. But it
must be by the Spirit in Christ¡¦s disciples. The trader who is a nominal
Christian and a practical savage goes into their borders, and is an emissary of
swift and complete destruction. They are touched by European commerce, and
deteriorate and die off m swarms. They are forced into contact with Western
civilisation, and they resent its restraints and perish from the lands of their
forefathers. All these secondary influences are but as rivers of poison flowing
through their borders, and a strange fate compels them to drink what they know
to be the cup of death. The streams which can make this human desert, without a
hint of verdure and land-marked with whitened bones, into a paradise, and keep
it shaded with foliage, glorious with fruit, thick-set with holy homes and
song-filled temples, must go out from the souls of men and women who have
received the Holy Ghost. (T. G. Selby.)
Encouragement for parents and children:
In its relation to the Jews, there was a partial and very
interesting fulfilment of this promise on the day of Pentecost, in the
remarkable effusion of the Holy Spirit which then took place, and the blessed
effects by which this was followed: but there is a still more striking and
illustrious accomplishment to be realised, when, as the result of Divine
influence, the Jews, as a nation and people, shall be brought back to God, and
become incorporated with the Gentiles in that ¡§one fold,¡¨ of which Christ shall
be acknowledged the true and only Shepherd. As a promise pertaining to Gospel
times, it is one in which we have a clear and direct interest. As to the
particular design of the promise, the very terms in which it is expressed show
that it is intended to refer, not perhaps exclusively, but still most
emphatically, to the children and posterity of those who have themselves loved
and feared God. Consider the promise,--
I. IN ITS
APPLICATION TO CHRISTIAN PARENTS. It should be regarded--
1. As an encouragement to the faithful exercise of parental
discipline and instruction.
2. As a warrant for believing application at the throne of grace.
3. As a satisfactory ground for hope and encouragement, even under
the most unpromising appearances.
II. IN ITS
APPLICATION TO THE DESCENDANTS, AND MORE ESPECIALLY THE CHILDREN OF PIOUS
PARENTS.
1. This promise affords you no security, apart from your personal
acceptance of Christ and submission to His authority.
2. This promise supplies you with the richest encouragement in
seeking your salvation and an interest in the Divine favour.
3. This promise should encourage the pious descendants of godly
ancestors to aim at more than ordinary eminence in their personal devotedness
to God. The imagery of the text seems to imply that a special decision and
fixedness of purpose may be expected: ¡§One shall say, I am the Lord¡¦s,¡¨ &c.
It indicates, too, great vigour and rapidity of growth: they shall grow ¡§as
willows by the water-courses.¡¨
4. This promise will leave you doubly without excuse, and greatly
aggravate your guilt, if you persist in neglecting salvation. How pleasing to
perceive that while the promise applies more especially to the posterity of
believers, it does not exclude others! Not only will God give His Spirit and
impart His blessing to the seed and offspring of His people, but He will pour
water upon every one who is thirsty and floods upon the dry ground. (Essex
Remembrancer.)
The Church and the children:
These ¡§exceeding great and precious promises¡¨ are ¡§unto us and our
children.¡¨
I. GOD¡¦S PROMISE
OF BLESSING UPON THE CHURCH.
1. Its import. Refers to the effusion of the Spirit.
2. Its participants. God¡¦s ancient people--in a sadly backsliding
state. How deeply they needed the effusion of the Spirit! Two facts prove this
to be our great want.
3. Its abundance. God gives what He promises only in answer to
prayer. His promise cannot fail. ¡§I will.¡¨
II. GOD¡¦S PROMISE
OF BLESSING UPON THE CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.
1. Our children need the Holy Spirit. Religion is not hereditary. No
natural goodness can supersede His work. Spiritual life is not natural life
carried up to its highest point of attainment.
2. God promises to give the Spirit as abundantly to them as to us.
Same terms used. And having received the Spirit, they are to grow in grace vigorously
(Isaiah 44:4). The manifestation of this
in public (Isaiah 44:5). (A. Tucker.)
Revival:
Foremost among the judgments which followed Israel¡¦s idolatries
was the visitation of drought. Dwelling, as we do, under milder skies, and in a
sea-girt isle, we enjoy copious supplies of fertilising rain. Yet, even in our
own land, a sensible reduction of the rainfall in spring is followed by empty
shocks in August. But in the sunny climes of Syria, if the half-yearly gift of
rain failed, the effect was disastrous in the extreme. In the footsteps of
famine marched dark-robed pestilence, and grim Death with his scythe of keenest
edge. Nor was this all. Towns and hamlets, stripped of strong men, became an
easy prey to the marauder. Successful raids paved the way for desolating war;
and defeat, oppression, national ruin, came in swift procession. Hence,
impiety, must have grown bold indeed, if the Hebrews did not earnestly ask for
the ¡¥early and the latter rain.¡¨ Now if drought is so injurious in the fields
of nature, is it not equally injurious in the Church?
I. A STATE OF
BARRENNESS DESCRIBED. The ground is said to be ¡§dry¡¨--that is, in a parched and
impenetrable condition. This is not its normal state: this is deadly to
vegetable growth. For some reason the land has been deprived of dew and rain.
No seed, however big with latent life, can break its rigid shell; much less
spring up or prosper. With such homely imagery as this the prophet leads our
thoughts from the outer world to the inner. There is a sense of need expressed.
Here is a marked improvement. The soul is athirst; the insensibility is guns.
The rigid hardness of winter is at an end.
II. A GENEROUS GIFT
PROVIDED. A promise from God is as good as its performance.
1. The Source of the supply. It must come from above. The great folly
to which all men are prone, is to seek the supply of their wants apart from
God.
2. The suitableness of the means. What can be more suitable than
showers of rain for a thirsty soil? Yet equally suitable is every gift of God
to satisfy the wants of dependent man!
3. The copiousness of the gift. If showers will not suffice, there
shall be floods.
4. The range of the promise. It shall not terminate with ourselves:
it shall extend to our children--ay, to our children¡¦s children!
III. ABUNDANT
FERTILITY FORESEEN. There shall be a revival of life in the Church, as in the
parched fields after a copious shower--as in nature, at the advent of spring.
1. Multiplicity of conversions is here predicted ¡§They shall spring
up as amongst the grass.¡¨
2. Rapidity of growth shall be another feature of this era.
3. Constancy of verdure will be enjoyed. They shall be ¡§as willows by
the water-courses.¡¨ In the arid deserts of the East you will find here and
there--conspicuous for their rarity--bright spots of luxuriant herbage,
fruitfulpalms, flagrant flowers, in the midst of scorching sand. The secret is
here,--that far down beneath the surface, a fount bubbles from the riven rock,
which, watering the roots of trees and grass, produces beauty, shade, and
fruit. So have we seen a man, placed in a very desert of privation--exposed to
a scorching sun of trial--yet retaining all the freshness of his piety, and
yielding fruits of wisdom, patience, hope. For the roots of his faith were
nourished from a secret spring. (Dickerson Davies, M. A.)
A revival promise:
I. THE GREAT
COVENANT BLESSING OF THE CHURCH The gift of the Holy Ghost. Whatever metaphor
is used this is the meaning of it.
1. This blessing has been already given. We must never underrate the
importance of the ascension of our Lord, and the gift of the Spirit which
followed thereupon. He is permanently resident in the midst of the Church.
2. This blessing is the subject of a promise. A promise of God is the
essence of truth, the soul of certainty, the voice of faithfulness, and the
substance of blessing. What a right royal promise it is! We hear the double ¡§I
will, I will.¡¨
3. This gift is a most needful blessing.
4. While we need the Spirit of God, His working is most effectual to
supply all our needs when He does come upon us. In the East, you can generally
tell where there is a stream or a river by the line of emerald which marks it.
If you stood on a hill, you coma see certain lines of green, made up of grass,
reeds, rushes, and occasional trees, which have sprung up along the
water-courses. Nothing is required to make the land fertile but to water it.
Even thus let the Spirit of God come upon any Church, and it is all that it
needs to make it living and fruitful.
5. The promise is liberal and unstinted. ¡§Pour floods.¡¨ I have seen
in Italy the fields watered by the processes of irrigation: there are trenches
made to run along the garden, and smaller gutters to carry the lesser streams
to each bed, so that each plant gets its share of water; but the husbandman has
to be very careful, for he has but little water in his tank, and only an
allotted share of the public reservoir. No plant must have too much; no plot of
ground must be drenched. How different is this from the methods of the Lord! He
pours the water; He deluges the land.
6. This covenant blessing is peculiarly promised to a certain class
of persons who are especially dear to us. ¡§I will pour My Spirit upon thy
seed,¡¨ &c.
II. THE
GLORIOUS-RESULT OF THIS COVENANT BLESSING.
1. The upspringing of spiritual life. Wherever the Spirit of God
comes, there will be life in the Church and in the ministry; life in prayer, in
effort, in holiness, in brotherly love.
2. The next effect will be seen in the calling out of numerous
converts by the Holy Spirit. ¡§They shall spring up as among the grass, and as
willows by the water-courses.¡¨ Who can count the blades of grass? The converts
called out by the Spirit of God are vigorous and lively. The grass in the East
springs up without any sowing, cultivating, or any other attention: it comes up
of itself from the fruitful soil. There is the water, and there is the grass.
So where the Spirit of God is with a Church there are sure to be conversions,
it cannot be otherwise.
3. These conversions will come from all quarters. One shall say,
another shall call, another shall subscribe. One comes from the wealthy, another
from the poor, a third from nobody knows where. They shall come from all trades
and occupations, from all churches and denominations.
4. These converted people shall be led to avow their faith. They
shall not, like Nicodemus, come to Jesus by night.
III. THE CONDUCT
SUITABLE IF WE OBTAIN THIS BLESSING.
1. We must confess how dry, how wilderness-like we are.
2. Let us cultivate prayer.
3. We must put forth our own personal effort. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Overflowing in usefulness to other:
Egypt has the river Nile all the year round, but as a fertilizing
power the Nile is practically useless till it is in flood and overflowing its
banks. Then it bestows the needed blessing upon every foot of land it touches.
It is when we are filled with the Spirit to the point of overflowing that we
become a power for good to others. (T. Waugh.)
Revived Churches:
If you go down to some of our Thames bridges, you will find the
barges stuck fast in the mud, and you cannot stir them. It would be a very
difficult thing to provide machinery with which to move them; all the king¡¦s
horses and all the king¡¦s men could not do it. But wait till the tide comes in;
now every black, heavy old barge ¡§walks the waters like a thing of life.¡¨
Everything that can feat is movable as soon as the silver flood has returned.
So, many of our Churches lie in the mud. Everything seems motionless,
powerless; but when the Spirit of God comes in like a flood, all is altered. (C.
H. Spurgeon.)
I will pour My Spirit upon
thy seed
God¡¦s covenant with Christian parents
(with Acts 2:39):--Has God given to us any sure
grounds to expect the conversion of the children of His people. Note--
I. THE
RELATIONSHIP OF THE CHILDREN TO THE PARENTS, as it is laid down in Scripture.
It is plain that when God becomes our God, He becomes the God of our children.
II. CHRISTIAN
NURTURE furnishes us with another reason for expecting the salvation of our
children. ¡§Train up a child,¡¨ &c.
III. WE MAY FOUND
OUR HOPES UPON GOD¡¦S FAITHFULNESS AS A PRAYER-HEARING GOD. Let us not despair
if the answer to prayer be long delayed. The Rev. Mr. Grimshaw, rector of
Haworth, had but one son, and he did not follow his father¡¦s footsteps. After
his father¡¦s death, he was heard to say, in his maudlin drunkenness, when
riding, ¡§This horse once carried a saint; now it carries a devil.¡¨ Yet,
hopeless as this case seemed, he became a true penitent, and one of his
deathbed sayings was, ¡§How astonished my father will be to see me in heaven!¡¨ (Evangelical
Advocate.)
Christian home environment:
There have been few of the great teachers of Christendom who have
not derived their deepest convictions from the impressions made by their
earliest domestic environment. (J. Stalker, D. D.)
The value of young life:
The nation of the future rests upon the cradles of to-day. The
young life in any institution is that which repairs its defects, enlarges its
usefulness, and stimulates its charities. The young life, in any family, is the
influence which suns the path of age, invigorates exertion, and quickens the
growth of the virtues. Where would the valour and vigour of the country be if
deprived of the support of young life? Disraeli says that almost everything
that is great has been done by youth; and the history of heroes is the history
of youth. In the vegetable world the mission and influence of the young life is
not less plain than powerful. According to Louis Figuier, the bud must be
considered as a fundamental element in the plant, which, without it, would soon
perish. It is the bud which year by year repairs the losses, supplies the
flowers, the leaves, the branches which nave disappeared. Through its means the
plant increases in growth. Through it its existence is prolonged. The bud is the
true renovator of the vegetable world. Therefore these buds are everywhere--on
the roots, the leaves, and sometimes even on the flowers, for Nature never
loses sight of the phenomena essential to organic life--namely, the production
of new beings. (Scientific Illustrations and Symbols.)
Child-piety:
A Christian gentleman¡¦s little son, just before he died, said to
his father: ¡§When I get to heaven, I shall go up to Jesus and say, ¡¥Jesus, I
know You; my papa told me about You.¡¦¡¨ (T. Champness.)
A Christian childhood:
Rev. F. B. Meyer was asked: ¡§How did you find Christ?¡¨ This
is his written reply: ¡§I do not remember when first I became a Christian. The
love of God came over me as the dawn over a summer sky; and it was only in
after years that I realised what God had done for me in those early days. My
mother and father were godly people. They expected me to be a Christian, and at
my mother¡¦s knee I said my morning and evening prayers. It is to their prayer
and faith and unremitting care that I owe everything.¡¨
God¡¦s blessing on the offspring of His people
Speaking of the way in which his mother received him when he
informed her that he had decided to leave the railway office and become a
minister, the Rev. John M¡¦Neill said: ¡§Taking my face between her hands, she
drew it close to her own and said, ¡¥John, I meant you for that before I ever
saw your face.¡¦ I knew then, what I had never guessed before, that I owe my
conversion and my ministry to my mother¡¦s prayer.¡¨ (Presbyterian.)
Verse 4
And they shall spring up as among the grass
Springing up as grass
R.., more accurately, omits ¡§as¡¨; but the text is unquestionably
corrupt. There is no doubt that the LXX. preserves the true reading: ¡§spring up
as grass among the waters.¡¨ (Prof. J. Skinner, D. D.)
As willows by the
water-courses
The willow
Hebrews ¡¥arab, a tree growing on the banks of streams in
Palestine, Egypt, and Babylon (Leviticus 23:40; Job 40:22; Psalms 137:2). It grows to a considerable
size, and was found generally in groves. It has, indeed, been pointed out that
the tree now called ¡¦arab by the Arabs is not a willow but a species of poplar
(Populus Euphratica)
As, however, this tree is confined to hot countries like those on
the lower Euphrates, it seems more likely that the name was originally that of
the willow, and that it was subsequently transferred to the poplar. The Arabic
translation of the Bible renders the Hebrews ¡¥arab by saphsaph, which
means ¡§willow,¡¨ or, according to the Talmud, a species of the willow growing by
brooks. (J. Macpherson, M. A.)
Willows
(Hebrews ¡¥arabim) are mentioned five times in the Bible,
always associated with rivers or watercourses. The willow (Salix) is
represented in Palestine by several species, though it is by no means a
conspicuous tree in any part of the country. The weight of authority is
decidedly in favour of the willow, which though not a conspicuous tree would be
doubtless associated in the minds of the inhabitants with pleasurable feelings,
as testifying to the presence of the much-prized water. (W. Houghton, M. A.)
The ¡§willow¡¨:
Branches of the garab, which R. Kiepert brought with him,
according to Wetzstein¡¦s indication of the place, and which O. Kersten, the
secretary of the Imperial German Consulate, sent to the Royal Herbarium at
Berlin, show that the garab is the Oriental poplar, Populus
Euphratica (Olivier), whose undergrowth may easily on superficial
observation be confounded with willow bushes; but it is distinguished from the
willow by its leaves, which, although small, are almost quite smooth-edged, and
not saw-like. (F. Delitzsch, D. D.)
The growth of the willow:
In the Duke of Bedford¡¦s willow garden was a willow which grew in
twenty years to the height of between 60 and 70 feet. Four feet from the ground
it was 7 feet in circumference. A small cutting grew to the height of 25 feet
in four years Fuller says. ¡§In the isle of Ely where willows flourish, there is
a proverb to this effect, The profit by willows will buy the owner a horse,
before that by other trees will pay for the saddle.¡¨
Willows by the water-courses
Every year we welcome the opening buds of the willow with their
silky down, as among the first indications of approaching spring. The children
delight to pluck off the shooting twigs, in their rambles in the meadows in
search of early flowers. They call them palm branches, though they have little
in common with the palm save that willow branches as well as palm branches were
carried in the hand of the Jews on their great festival. There are many
varieties of the willow, distributed over all parts of the globe, but they are
most common in the temperate and sub-tropical regions, where they form a
pleasing feature in the landscape, especially in the vicinity of ponds and
rivers. The Jewish exiles in the watered plains of Babylon were painfully
familiar with the willows, for on their branches they hung their silent harps
and wept as they thought of far-away Zion (Psalms 137:1-9.). Yet the prophet who
came to his countrymen with the cheering promise of Divine pardon and speedy
restoration to their native land, found in these same willows a beautiful
illustration of the happy change that would be produced and the blessings that
would speedily follow their restoration to Divine favour and Fatherland.
1. The rapid and luxuriant growth of the willow is suggestive. A mere
stake driven into the ground in the vicinity of water where there is plenty of
moisture will take root and bud into leaf and branch in a remarkably short
space of time. We are familiar with the immense crop of long and slender twigs
that shoot up in the summer months and are yearly cut for basket-making in the
osier beds by the banks of our rivers. A well-watered soil seems to be the one
thing necessary to ensure the life and growth of the willow. In the winter the
pollards stand out in the landscape, gaunt and desolate, like old and rotten
sign-posts, and the osier beds look like a muddled mass of chopped root stumps.
But in summer there is a perfect transformation from apparent death into new
life, with graceful and luxuriant growth and greenness. Now, it is winter with
men when they live apart from God and strangers to the blessings and comforts
of the Gospel. But as soon as men are brought under the gracious influence of
the Gospel of Christ, and come into touch with the ¡§river of the water of
life,¡¨ all things are changed in them and for them. And the beauty and the joy
for us is that so much of this change comes quickly. Certainly, for some of the
choicest experiences of the Divine life the Christian has to wait. But very
many of the comforts and beauties of the Gospel come to the Christian speedily.
2. The willow is capable of service. The wood of the willow is not to
be compared to that of the oak and the other slow-growing forest trees. And yet
there is a special power and service in the willow which make its cultivation
important and of commercial value. Indeed, no growth in nature is without this
capacity for service when it falls into the hands of those who know how to use
it. You know what power may be found in the delicate pore of such grasses as
the flax and hemp when it is properly prepared and spun into cordage. And the
slender twigs of the willow, though so rapid in their growth, are yet so tough
and flexible that they are extensively used in basket-making, which is,
perhaps, the oldest industry in the world. The wood of the larger kinds of
willow also is so tough and durable as well as flexible that the ancients
employed it in the making of shields for the soldier and warships for the
sailor. While the steamer has largely superseded the sailing boat, the
paddle-blades of steamers are still made of willow-wood, and if shields have
been superseded, the cricket fields of the world still make a large demand upon
the willow for the best bats. Even more surprising is it to find that the most
suitable charcoal for making gunpowder is procured from the willow-wood, so
that even the slender willow, the whip and plaything of the child, can become a
powerful force in war. And as soon as men come under the influence of the
Gospel of Christ they become serviceable as they never were before. Even the
youngest Christians are powers for good in many ways in all our Churches. While
there are some things for which we need the firmness, wisdom, and experience of
years, we have almost endless capacity and readiness for service in the young
Christians. (J. Menzies.)
Verse 5
One shall say, I am the Lord¡¦s--
A public profession of religion
Those who become the subjects of special grace will choose to join
the Church, and enter into covenant to walk in all the commandments and
ordinances of the Lord.
I. DESCRIBE THE
SUBJECTS OF SPECIAL GRACE.
II. WHAT IS IMPLIED
IN THEIR PROFESSING RELIGION.
III. WHY THE
SUBJECTS OF SPECIAL GRACE CHOOSE TO JOIN THE CHURCH AND ENTER INTO COVENANT
WITH GOD.
1. They love the commands of God.
2. They love the ordinances of God.
3. Their hearts are united to Christians.
4. They desire to promote the cause and interest of God in the world.
5. They desire to grow in grace.
6. They are so sensible of the deceitfulness of their own hearts, and
their proneness to forget and forsake God, that they desire to bind themselves,
by covenant vows and obligations, to be steadfast and unmovable in His service.
Those who have sincerely made a public profession of religion must
rejoice to see any who appear to be the subjects of special grace, make a
public profession of religion. Improvement--
1. If those who have become the subjects of special grace desire to
make a public profession of religion, and to enter into covenant with God, then
none who have really become subjects of special grace have any just excuse for
neglecting to join the Church, and neglecting to bind themselves to love and
obey God for ever.
2. If the subjects of special grace always desire to profess religion
and partake of Divine ordinances, then so long as they neglect their duty they
must necessarily feel unhappy.
3. While the subjects of special grace neglect to join the Church,
they live in a very sinful manner. They greatly injure both themselves and
religion.
4. It appears from what has been said that some who have long
entertained a hope of being the subjects of special grace, must soon give up
their hope if they continue to neglect joining the Church.
5. It highly concerns those who have entered into covenant with God,
to be steadfast in His covenant, and persevere in universal obedience. (N.
Emmons, D. D.)
Converts, and their confession of faith:
This is to take place after the Lord has poured out His Spirit
upon His people, and upon their offspring.
The mainspring of everything good and gracious is the Holy Spirit.
When the Spirit of God comes, converts come too. If they do not come by the
Spirit of God, they are not worth having. Converts will come forward to confess
their faith.
I. THIS CONFESSION
OF FAITH IS PERSONAL. ¡§One shall say, I am the Lord¡¦s,¡¨ &c. It is not a
joint confession, but an individual one. It is ¡§one¡¨ and ¡§another¡¨ and
¡§another.¡¨
1. All confession of Christ must be personal; anything else is unreal
and worthless. All religion that is true is personal.
2. This personal confession needs to be carefully attended to when
there are many coming forward.
3. This individual confession of your faith in Christ is incumbent
upon you very specially when there are few coming forward. I should say to
myself, ¡§If there is nobody in this village confessing Christ, then it is all
the more urgent upon me that I should confess Him. If there are few added to
the Church, then I will go that the Church may not be discouraged in its
Christian efforts. I like to have around me those who feel, ¡§It is no
consideration with me whether there are many or few; I have to act as before
God on my own account. If there be few who do right, that is all the more
reason why I should do it.¡¨
II. THIS CONFESSION
IS VARIED.
1. One person speaks out for himself: ¡§One shall say, I am the
Lord¡¦s.¡¨ That is a fine speech. If you, from your very soul, can say this in
any company, and not be ashamed to say it before men, angels, or devils, God
has taught you a noble piece of eloquence.
2. The next person mentioned in our text confessed his faith in a
different way, for he called himself by the name of Jacob; that is to say, he
took up his position with the people of God under their lowliest title.
¡§There,¡¨ said he, ¡§I am prepared to suffer affliction with the people of God,
to be reproached when they are reproached, to be shunned when they are shunned,
to be ridiculed when they are ridiculed. I belong to Jacob. He is an extra
ordinary person, cut off from the rest of the world to be the Lord¡¦s, and I go
with him.¡¨
3. But here is a third person, who makes his confession in a still
different way: ¡§Another shall subscribe with his hand unto the Lord, and
surname himself by the name of Israel.¡¨ I do not know this person; sometimes, I
think that he is a friend of mine, who is afraid to speak, but who likes to
write. ¡§I could not,¡¨ says one, ¡§speak my confession of faith, but I could
joyfully sit down and write it.¡¨ Yes, you are timid, and trembling, and slow of
speech. Do not condemn yourself for that. Still, I am not sure that this is the
person mentioned in the text. I seem to fancy that it is a stronger body, a man
who is not content with saying it, but who writes it down in black and white,
¡§I am the Lord¡¦s.¡¨ That which is written remains; so he puts it down. This
person who thus subscribed, or wrote with his hand, unto the Lord, also went
the whole way towards God and His people at their best, for it is added that he
surnamed himself by the name of Israel. There are some who give themselves up
to the Church of God in a very complete and unreserved manner, resolving that
all the privileges they can enjoy they will have, all the holiness they can
ever attain to they will gain, and all the consecration that lies within the
region of possibility they will strive after and secure.
III. THESE
CONFESSIONS OF FAITH ARE ALL GRACIOUS. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
¡§I am the Lord¡¦s¡¨:
1. ¡§I am His¡¨ follows ¡§My Beloved is mine.¡¨ You must have Christ
before you say that you belong to Christ.
2. This is a very practical confession. If I am the Lord¡¦s, then I
must not give myself up to be the slave of another.
3. It will also be a high incentive to duty to say truly, ¡§I am the
Lord¡¦s.¡¨ I must live for Him.
4. This confession has a sweet, comforting aspect.
5. This is my hope of safety and perfection. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Another shall subscribe
with his hand unto the Lord
Subscribing with the hand
In the day when the prophet Isaiah wrote his book, it was a custom
for people to draw on their hand the name, likeness, or symbol of the person
they loved or the master they served. It was often painted on the hand of a
woman with an ink which could be rubbed off only with much trouble; but men
punctured their skin with s needle, dropping in the ink at the same time, as is
now frequently done by sailors; and occasionally the name or symbol was branded
on their skin with a hot iron. In this way, a man would write on his hand, or
on some other portion of his body, the name or likeness of the god he
worshipped; the soldier would bear the name of his commander; the slave would
have the name of his master; and we are informed that, in a subsequent age, the
early Christians printed upon their hand or arm, and sometimes upon their
breast, the name of Jesus and a likeness of the cross. Having this custom in
mind, the prophet, writing as though God were speaking through him to His
wearer people,--as, no doubt, was the case,--says, ¡§Can a woman forget her
sucking child, that she should not have compassion on her own son? yea, she may
forget, yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms
of My hands¡¨ (Isaiah 49:16). Had our text in English
been written more in harmony with the original language, it would have read
thus--¡§Another shall subscribe, or write, upon his hand, I belong to Jehovah!¡¨
(W. Birch.)
Tattooing
There are constant allusions to this in the classics. We know that
devout worshippers dedicated themselves to the god they worshipped, and were
stamped with a secret mark. Paul alludes to this when he says, ¡§Henceforth let
no man trouble me, for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus¡¨; as much
as to say, ¡§I am Christ¡¦s: I have had His name branded upon me.¡¨ When he
suffered from being scourged and beaten with rods, he called it bearing the
marks of the Lord Jesus, and did as good as say, ¡§Flog away, you will only
engrave His name into my flesh, for I am Christ¡¦s.¡¨ Now it would be a very
superstitious and foolish thing for any man to be tattooed with the name of the
Lord, or with a cross; but all that such an act meant in those who did it of
old we ought to mean, namely, that we are for ever, and beyond recall, the
property of Jesus. (C. H.Spurgeon.)
Subscribers:
My object is to persuade you to subscribe your life to the Lord.
You may answer, Who is the Lord? I reply--
1. He is the Creator.
2. He is the Father of your spirit.
3. If so, He is impressionable. He is grieved because of sin. Is not
the Saviour¡¦s broken heart a manifestation of the heart of our Heavenly Father?
4. He is your true Friend.
5. I call on you to subscribe your life unto the Lord, because of
your everlasting welfare. (W. Birch.)
Verse 6
Thus saith the Lord, the King of Israel
¡§I am the First, and I am the Last¡¨
This affirmation of God¡¦s existence appears more comprehensive
than the similar one, made by Him to Moses, ¡§I am that I am.
¡¨ It is true, when we say that He is by His own absolute will and power, we assert
by implication all that belongs necessarily to the essence and character of the
Almighty. We assert His eternity; for He who so exists could have had no
beginning, and can have no end: we assert His creation of all other beings, and
His sovereignty over them; for He who alone is from eternity, must have given
existence to all things that are besides Himself; and, as the Author of all, in
and for whom all exist, must be the sovereign Ruler and Disposer of all.
Nevertheless the ampler form of expression, ¡§I am the First and I am the Last,¡¨
implying comparison with and precedency to all other existences, would seem to
convey-to- the mined more distinct notions of the eternity, the omnipotence,
the creative will and beneficence, of that infinite Being ¡§who is above all,
and before all, and in all.¡¨ (R. Cattermole, B. D.)
The First and the Last
Bitter was the sorrow of the prophet who spoke these words when he
saw his people turn away from Jehovah. Israel had been enlightened by the
purest lights. Alone of all the nations of the ancient world, it possessed the
knowledge of the One living and holy God. Yet these truths are forgotten; these
privileges are rejected; this God is denied. Obedient to the idolatrous
inspirations of the Semitic races whose vitiated blood runs through their
veins, the Israelites turn towards Moloch, Baal, Astarte. Then the prophet
argues, struggles, waxes indignant, implores; he shows the inanity of that
idolatrous worship and the infamy of those hideous rites; he reminds Israel of
the greatness of their origin and of their destiny; he calls up before their
eyes the sacred figure of Jehovah; he tells his people, in the words which the
Almighty Himself has put into his mouth, ¡§Thus saith the Lord, the King of
Israel, and His redeemer the Lord of Hosts; I am the First, and I am the Last;
and beside Me there is no God.¡¨ This history is our own. A light more
resplendent far than that which illumined Israel hath shone upon the Christian
nations. What has all this availed us, and whither are marching the rising
generations? Doubtless, the stone and wooden idols of the past cannot be set up
again. But this gloomy fatality before which men would compel us to abdicate
our reason, is it not an idol too?
I. ¡§I AM THE
FIRST.¡¨
1. We find in this the affirmation of the fundamental doctrine of the
supreme God, the Creator of all things. To-day men would teach us another
Genesis of the world: the old doctrines of Epicurus are once more becoming
current; we hear of eternal matter, of millions and millions of atoms which, by
whirling about continually in space, have unconsciously and spontaneously
invested themselves with a motion in accordance with the mathematical laws
which they had themselves called into existence. We are told that out of a
mechanical combination suddenly issued a living cell, and that, millions of
centuries aiding, this life has become vegetative, then animal, then conscious,
intellectual, and finally moral; we axe asked to acknowledge this ascending
progression of matter which, from the inert molecule it was in the first
instance, has become sensitive protoplasm, then has been transformed into the
plant, which in its turn has become endowed with motion, then advancing one
step further has turned into the hideous animal, creeping in the mire of the
primitive marshes, to rise up at length in its conquered majesty and call
itself Plato, Aristotle, Jesus Christ. And having thus accounted for the
formation of things, men look with scornful pity upon those who still have
recourse to the intervention of an all-creating God; their idea of the Divine
Being may be expressed in the words of the learned Laplace to Napoleon the
First. ¡§I have had no need of this hypothesis.¡¨ In presence of this self-styled
scientific Genesis, it is not only my faith which revolts, but my reason
repeats, with the enthusiasm of a conviction firmer than ever, ¡§I believe in
God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth¡¨; for if there is m my
reason an immovable principle, it is indeed this: that no effect can exist without
a cause, that all which is in the effect must also be in the cause; that,
consequently, matter can never have brought forth intelligence, chaos can never
have given birth to harmony, for in nowise can the lesser ever have produced
the greater. 2 This reminds us, further, that as God is the supreme Cause, He
must also be the supreme End of all that exists, the centre of the thoughts and
affections of all the beings He has created. All things, says St. Paul, are by
Him and for Him. Every being has a destination, and the noblest destination of
all beings is that which the Scriptures call the glory of God. You know what
this ideal has become, and what sin has made of it.
3. This means, further, that God is at the basis of all that is done
to raise and save humanity, to bring it back to the true life which it has lost
by separating itself from Him. God is at work in the midst of mankind. It is in
a region higher than that of science that we must seek the hidden sources of
the river of life which brings regeneration, consolation, and eternal hope to
the world. Whence come they then? They gush from the depths of the religious
revelation which the God whom we serve has given to mankind. God the Creator is
also God the Redeemer, and, in order of grace as in that of nature, He may
truly say: ¡§I am the First.¡¨ What has been accomplished in the world must also
be accomplished in each individual being, and the redemption of humanity is
nothing if it is not worked out in the innermost soul of those who are to reap its
fruits.
II. ¡§I AM THE
LAST.¡¨ By this we must understand--
1. That God never abdicates, and that He shall ever remain the
Supreme Master, when all the lords of a day shall have passed away after having
made a little noise in the world.
2. That God remains the Supreme Judge, and that, consequently, the
hour of justice shall certainly strike.
3. That God is the Supreme Refuge of every soul that calls upon Him,
the only one which remains standing when all others have disappeared. (E.
Bersier, D. D.)
Bibical monotheism:
As to this, the sublimest utterance of Scripture, we offer three
preliminary remarks--
1. It is supported by the structure and order of nature. So far as
the universe has come within the sweep of scientific observation and research,
it appears as one complete whole. All its parts are beautifully harmonised; all
its forces are nicely balanced.
2. It is in direct antagonism to certain prevalent opinions. It is
opposed to atheism, which declares there is no God; to fetichism, the worship
of any material object that a capricious superstition may select; to
polytheism, which holds the plurality of gods; and to pantheism, which regards
nature as identical with Deity, and thus destroys a Divine personality.
3. It is accepted as a fundamental truth in all evangelical churches.
But our object is to consider the practical uses of Biblical monotheism.
I. IT REVEALS THE
GREATNESS OF THE CREATOR. Survey this wondrous universe. Gaze upon the vast,
and examine the minute in the clearest and broadest light of modem science, and
what do you see--wisdom? Yes, manifold wisdom. Goodness? Yes, like an
overflowing tide, overflowing all. Power? In rearing the stupendous fabrics,
building up the mountains, pouring out the oceans, stretching out the heavens.
Do you see wealth in all this? If you attach value to one acre of earth, what
is the value of the globe? If there be but one God, how great must He be!
II. IT REVEALS THE
DEFINITENESS OF MORAL OBLIGATION. Deep in the souls of all men is the sense of
duty. My definition of virtue is this--¡§following a right rule from a right
motive.¡¨ What is the rule? Clearly, if there be but one God, the will of that
one God must be the rule. What is the motive? Clearly, if there be but one God,
supreme love to that one God. Were there a plurality of gods there would be a
difficulty to find out what virtue is; we should have to determine whose will
to obey--the will of each, or some, or all. And we should also have to find out
who of all the gods we should love the most.
III. IT REVEALS THE
FITNESS OF RELIGION TO THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOUL.
1. The human heart has a centralising tendency. Deep in our emotional
nature is a craving for some one object on which to place entire confidence,
and centre the deepest love.
2. The moral character of the soul depends upon its central object.
By a law of our nature we become like that we most love. He who loves God
becomes a partaker of the Divine nature.
3. The soul¡¦s happiness is determined by the character of the object
most loved. All experience shows that most of our happiness and misery comes
out of our supreme love. All, in every age, who have loved the one God
supremely have felt with the psalmist who said, ¡§Whom have I in heaven but
Thee?¡¨
IV. IT REVEALS THE
HUMAN BROTHERHOOD OF SOULS. ¡§To us,¡¨ says Paul, ¡§there is but one God, the
Father of all things, and we in Him.¡¨
V. IT REVEALS THE
WONDERFUL IN MEDIATION. ¡§God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten
Son,¡¨ &c. Here is love passing knowledge.
1. What a disparity between Him who loves and them who are loved!
What a disparity in natures! God, the Almighty, the All-wise, the Eternal. Man,
the feeble, the ignorant, and the dying. What a disparity in character! God,
the Essence and Fountain of all holiness. Man, vile and polluted with sin.
2. What a manifestation of the greatness of His love. Is this one God
our one God? Have we no idols? (D. Thomas, D. D.)
Verse 8
Fear ye not
Christian courage
Boldness for God, and boldness in dealing with God, should form
part of the Christian character; and the Word of God encourages this Christian
boldness.
We are repeatedly exhorted to ¡§fear not,¡¨ to ¡§be of good courage.¡¨
I. WHY ARE WE TO
EXPECT THAT THE PEOPLE OF GOD WOULD BE LIKELY TO FEAR?
1. They have always been a persecuted people.
2. Many a man, before he is decided for God, finds out that, if he
makes up his mind to enter into the service of the Lord, his worldly interest
is nearly sure to suffer.
3. Others, again, know their personal interest for their worldly
circumstances. They know, for instance, their birth, their wealth, their
talent. Then perhaps they are called of God to think seriously about their
eternal state; and the result is, that they feel in their own minds, ¡§If I
forsake all this outward display of means, and show that I do not value it as I
have hitherto done, my influence amongst others will very greatly suffer.¡¨
4. There is many a man, if he would serve the Lord, must make a
sacrifice of many of his personal and worldly comforts.
5. Then, take the case of doctrines. There are many who imbibe from
their earliest days the idea that religion is gloomy, that God is an object of
terror, that death must be misery; they live in no thought of the Lord¡¦s coming
again in joy and happiness, and heaven itself, with its delights and its
pleasures, is never really considered. Now, all these things frequently produce
fear in our minds.
II. THE REASON WHY
WE SHOULD NOT FEAR. The reason is, that the Lord thus argues with us: ¡§Have not
I told thee from that time, and have declared it?¡¨ That is, God challenges man
to deny this fact, that He knows the end from the beginning, and has proved
that He knows it by foretelling the end from the beginning. This is the manner
in which God argues in other passages. (Isaiah 42:9). God knows the end; God
foresees the means, and foreseeing the means He exercises control over those
means--everything that happens therefore, great or small, is under the control
of God, who ¡§orders all things after the counsel of His own will,¡¨ and
consequently we have nothing to fear, because we are in His hands who ¡§doeth
all things well.¡¨ This is the manner in which we find the argument used in Isaiah 51:12.
III. Having thus
stated the Christian¡¦s duty as well as his privilege--not to fear; and having
seen what the reason is, that God has foretold all things, and therefore
decreed and settled all things from the beginning, HE THEN CHALLENGES HIS
PEOPLE in these words--¡§Ye are even My witnesses,¡¨ and therefore urges upon
them, by the strongest possible personal appeal, to bear testimony to the fact
that the Lord He is God, and our God too, for ever and for ever. (M.
Villiers, M. A.)
Verses 9-20
They that make a graven image
The vanity of graven images
Substituting homely prose for glowing poetry we may, after a
fashion, reduce the prophet¡¦s thought to propositions like the following--
1.
Neither
the idol nor its god knows anything, while Jehovah knows all.
2. Neither the idol nor its god can do aught, while Jehovah is
almighty.
3. Neither the idol nor its god is aught, while Jehovah is the living
God, God of the entire universe, and a God of love,--in a word, the perfect
Personality.
4. The worship of idols or their gods is degrading, while that of
Jehovah exalts and saves the soul. (W. S. Ayres.)
The idolater¡¦s jolly:
With a dash of pungent satire, Isaiah shows what a silly man he
is. We have here the whole process of god-manufacture. The poor devotee selects
a cedar, or a cypress, or an oak, which probably his own hands planted many
years ago; and, having hewn it down, sets to work with line, and plane, and
chisel, to fashion it into the resemblance of a human being. This being done,
he places it in a shrine or temple, and falls down before it, and worships it.
What becomes of the rest of the tree? Oh, with it he makes a blazing fire to
warm himself, or to bake his bread! So that it is quite a chance which portion
of the wood becomes a god, and which portion turns to ashes on the hearth; the same
tree suffices to cook food for his hungry body, and to provide an object of
adoration for his hungry soul. The man is an utter fool, only to be ridiculed
and laughed at; and the prophet holds him up to the derision of all sensible
men, as one whose head is surely turned, or who has fairly lost his wits. (J.
T.Davidson, D. D.)
Verse 14
He planteth an ash
The planter and the rain
The civilised and cultivated tree is the joint product of human
care and the earth¡¦s fertility.
Let us study the picture and see how true it is to what the world contains.
1. We may ask ourselves how it is that any institution or established
form of human living comes to be prevalent and dominant. A strong idea, of
freedom, of justice, of mercy, enters into some strong man¡¦s soul. It makes
itself completely his. Then it will not be satisfied with him; it grows
restless within him, and demands the world. Then he takes it out some day and
plants it. With some vigorous, incisive word or deed he thrusts his live and
fiery idea down deep into the fruitful soil of human life. Then human life
takes up his idea and nourishes it. Wonderfully all the forces gather around it
and give it their vitality. History bears witness that it has all been living
by the power of that idea unknown, unguessed; philosophy says that in it lies
the key of her hard problems; economy discovers that by it life may be made
more thrifty and complete; poetry shows its nobleness; affection wreaths it
with love; all the essential hopes and fears and needs of human nature come
flocking to it; until at last you can no more conceive of human life without
that idea than you can think with complacency of the landscape without the
great tree which is as thoroughly a part of it as is the very ground itself. A
free Church, a just court, a popular government--this is the way in which every
institution comes to be. Here is the relation of the world¡¦s few great creative
men to the great mass and body of its life. Helpless Europe without Martin
Luther. Helpless also Martin Luther without Europe. Here is the mutual need of
great souls and the great world.
2. We have another illustration, even more striking, close at our
hand, in the way in which character grows up in our personal nature. Where do
our characters come from? It is easy sometimes to represent them as the result
of strong influence which other men have had over us. It is easy at other times
to think of them as if they made themselves, shaping themselves by mere
internal fermentation into the result we see. But neither account tells the
story by itself. When we question ourselves, not about character in general,
but about special points and qualities of character, then we are sure that it
was by some outer influence made our own, some seed of motive or example set
into our lives and then taken possession of by those lives and filled with
their vitality, developed into their owe type and kind of vice or virtue--it
was thus that this, which is now so intimate that we call it not merely ours
but ourselves, came into being. This is the reason of the perpetual identity
along with the perpetual variety of goodness and badness. We are all good and
bad alike; and yet every man is good and bad in a way all his own--in a way in
which no other man has ever been bad or good since the world began,--just as
all ash-trees are alike because they have all been planted from the same
nurseries; and yet every ash-tree is different from every other because it has
grown in its own soil and fed on its own rain: the society and the
individuality of moral life.
3. The truth has its clearest illustration, it may be, in the way in
which God has sent into the world the Gospel of His Son. Most sharp and clear
and definite stands out in history the life and death of Jesus Christ. It was
the entrance of a new, Divine force into the world. But what has been the story
of that force once introduced? It has been subjected to the influences which
have created the ordinary currents of human life. The characters and thoughts
of men have told upon it. The Gospel has shared in the fortunes of the
Christian world. It has followed in the track of conquering armies; it has been
beaten back and hindered by the tempests of revolution and misrule; it has been
tossed upon the waves of philosophical speculation; it has been made the
plaything or the tool of politics; it has taken possession of countries and
centuries only by taking possession of men through the natural affections of
their human hearts; it has worked through institutions which it only helped to
create. While it has helped to make the world, it has also at every moment been
made by the world into something different from its own pure self. If you try
to take either half of the truth by itself you get into the midst of puzzle and
mistake. Think of the Gospel simply as an intrusion of Divine force kept apart
from any mixture with the influences of the world, and it is impossible to
understand the forms in which it has been allowed to present itself. Its
weaknesses and its strength are alike unintelligible. Think of it as a mere
development of human life, and you cannot conceive how it came to exist at all.
But consider it in its completeness. Remember that it is a Divine force working
through human conditions; let it be all one long incarnation, God manifest in
the flesh--and then you see at once why it is so weak and why it is so strong;
why it has not occupied the world with one lightning flash of power, and why it
must at last, however slowly, accomplish its complete salvation.
4. Every Christian is a little Christendom; and the method of the
entrance of the Gospel into the great world is repeated in the way in which the
Gospel enters into every soul, which then it occupies and changes. Again, there
is the special act of the implanting of the new life, and then there is the
intrusting of the new-implanted life to the nature and its circumstances. The
man was born again! Since then, long years have come and gone. What have they seen?
The rain has nourished it--that long-sown seed! Nothing has happened since
which has not touched that seed and helped or hindered its maturity. Still
remember, it is His rain. The influences into whose influence the seed was
given still were God¡¦s. He took the child, and gave the friend, and sent you on
the journey, and shaped the nature which bestowed on the Christian life its
distinctive character.
5. May we not say that the principle itself includes the whole truth
of the supernatural, and its relation to the natural? (Phillips Brooks, D. D)
Verse 16
He burneth part thereof in the fire.
Which is to far better purpose than the other part made into an
idol, (J. Trapp.)
Aha, I am warm
Cold
This is an expression of that natural joy which will escape from
one in some way or other, when from a comfortless apartment, or from a frosty
street, or from some wintry office of obligation, he sees the shining of his
own hearth. If it could be introduced thus with an exclamation in the land of
Judea, that mild land, it should certainly be repeated in this stern climate
with a deep feeling of relief and thankfulness. The household gods of ancient
Italy were set up about the fireplace of each dwelling, as about a sacred spot,
deserving to be surrounded with the images of a divine protection; and even
now, all over the world, altar and hearth are but another phrase for home.
¡§Who,¡¨ asks the psalmist, ¡§can stand before His cold?¡¨ God sends it; and He has
filled the earth with materials, and the mind of man with resources, to repel
and overcome it. He is the same Sovereign Wisdom and Goodness in this as in
every other part of His works. And yet we must confess that it is one of His unwelcome
ministers; but, like all the rest of what we account so in the natural world,
subservient to high purposes in the holy providence of the Lord. Let us turn to
the various instrumentality by which its vigour is mitigated and its power for
mischief broken. ¡§I am warm,¡¨ says the speaker in the text. So would the ground
say if it had a tongue, while it lies sheltered under the fleecy garments of
dazzling whiteness, which the very cold has woven for it out of the dark mists.
¡§I am warm,¡¨ say the beast and the bird of the frozen zone, as the one lies
close in his furry coat or the locks of his long hair, and the other is not
afraid to cleave the inexorable sky with his breast of down. ¡§I am warm,¡¨
repeat the animals who are natives of our own temperate circle, as they take
shelter in the hollow retreats which their industry has contrived, or make
their way towards the more genial countries whither their instincts direct them. ¡§I am warm,¡¨ say the
lake and the stream, while they are armed with the polished breast-plate which
has been forged for them, not among furnaces of glowing heat, but in the
¡§magazines of the haft.¡¨ ¡§I am warm,¡¨ says man; he who commands the inferior
creatures, he who makes a path for himself even over the deep, he who compels
into his bond-service the substances and the elements of the world. He cuts
clown the trees, and makes them do him a kinder office by their blaze than they
had done before by their shadow. And better than this; he opens the dark
treasures with which a gracious providence has stored the lower parts of the
earth, and he finds them more precious than the ¡§vein for the silver,¡¨ than
¡§the place of sapphires and dust of gold.¡¨ What are the feelings which the
consideration of the cold and all its alleviating circumstances should impress
upon the mind?
1. Thankfulness towards God. There is no small danger of losing sight
of the Almighty Benefactor in partaking of His benefits. There is no small
danger of even turning those very benefits into a sort of idols that we
substitute in His place. This was precisely and literally the case with the
person whom the prophet describes as speaking in the text. You are like him,
who transform your interest into your religion; making a show of worship, when
you are thinking only how to be warmed and fed. You, too, are like him who
shape your faith and your convenience out of the same material; making the
concerns of the soul but part and parcel with common necessities. We are all
like him, so far as we turn our comforts into our divinities.
2. Sympathy with His suffering creatures. (N. L. Frothingham.)
The wisdom of God in the freezing of water:
I cannot omit calling your attention to a remarkable fact in the
freezing of water, which has nothing to surpass it in the surprising wisdom of
its ordination, even if it has any perfect parallel in the whole economy of
nature. We know it to be a general law of material substances, that they expand
with the heat and contract with the cold. The particles of water are subjected
to this rule, like all other particles of matter. But if this were allowed to
hold on throughout, giving way to no exception, do but reflect what would be
the consequences. The drops at the surface, as they were successively
congealed, would sink. The process of freezing would begin at the bottom. Layer
after layer would thus be deposited, which no returning suns could penetrate to
dissolve; and the most that the summer could do would be to wet the face of the
flinty mass. The water-courses would be for ever stopped in their glad and wholesome
flow; and many a broad river would scarcely float a boat upon its plashy
shallows. And now what has been done to avert such a calamity? A new law has
been instituted, in direct contravention of the old, to meet the exigency of
the case. The water, precisely at the moment of congelation, breaks away into
the line of an opposite decree. It expands and grows lighter. It refuses to
descend. It rests fixed upon the top, an ornament and a defence. I know not how
others may be affected by a view like this; but it seems to me to call for an
adoring acknowledgment of that all-pervading design which thus supplies the
wants of its creation by a special departure from its own method, as invariable
in its action as the method itself. (N. L. Frothingham.)
Verse 17
And the residue thereof he maketh a god
Residual religion
The scene is one which we may describe as very childish indeed.
It belongs to the very earliest stage one might imagine of the thought of
worship, The man who evidently lives under conditions by no means of the
highest civilisation feels himself exposed to the natural inclemency of the
weather, and to the pangs of hunger. He selects a tree, and because he needs
food he breaks up the tree and kindles a fire and prepares his food. He then
rejoices in the warmth of the fire that he has kindled, and he has satisfied
two of the simple wants of nature. He has been hungry, and he has provided
himself food. He is cold, and he has provided himself with warmth. But there is
yet another instinct in his nature which demands satisfaction. He is conscious
that he is a weak creature in the midst of a strange and wonderful world.
Mysterious powers that he cannot fathom seem to float about his life, and to
interpose their forces often to the derangement of his plans. And therefore,
when he has satisfied those two simple physical wants, he takes the residue of
the tree that he has cut down, and he makes it into a god. Thus it is that he
satisfies three imperious desires and needs of his nature. Is it wholly untrue
to say that there are many men who live after this fashion, that when they have
supplied their own wants, when their body has been amply fed, when the
conditions of their life have been cared for so that they are well provided
with the warming comforts of life, then, out of the residue of their time, out
of the residue of their money, out of the residue of their thought, they will,
perchance, consecrate something to God? (Bp. W. B. Carpenter, D. D.)
Materials and principles of life:
There is one very common delusion which, if we will watch
ourselves, we shall find that we are all of us more or less liable to. We
confuse the materials of life with the principles which ought to govern life.
The materials of life in this poor man¡¦s case were very simple indeed. He is a
man who can cut down a tree of the forest to make himself a habitation, and
from the wood all round about him gathers what may be called the material of
life, whether for the house or for the cooking of food, and these materials of
life are such that you and I, looking back upon them from our refined and
elevated position, say that they are very simple and very crude indeed; but he
manipulates these materials after a certain principle. Given that we have
different materials to deal with, and that ours is not the life of the forest
and the dependence upon the forest, but that ours is the life of modern
civilisation, with our railways and our telegraphs and our newspapers daily,
with our opportunities of enjoyment in abundance, and with means of information
in the multiplied books which are issued daily from the press. With all these
things which constitute the material of our life, and with our occupations
governed and guided by the principles of modern civilisation, it is possible
that we may say--and we shall say truly--that the materials of life which we
possess are far superior to the rude materials which belonged to that poor
man¡¦s life. But is the difference between one man and another to be judged by
the materials which a man uses, or by the principles which he applies in the
use of those materials? (Bp. W. B. Carpenter, D. D.)
Religion the all-comprising principle of life:
Is religion to be looked upon as a thing that you can separate? Or
are you going to regard religion as a principle which is applicable to life,
and applicable at every hour and in every place, and all through life? Was that
old rhyme right that told us that the twenty-four hours of the day should be
divided into eight hours for work, and eight for rest, and eight which are
given to God; or was not that correction right of the man who said, ¡§eight for
toil, and eight for rest, and all for God¡¨? Gounod had painted on his piano the
head of the Christ, as if he would say, ¡§Wherever I look before I compose, I
look upon the head of the crucified Lord, and I know that the spirit of that
Lord passes into me; and when I begin to compose my melodies, the music of His
life penetrates my soul, and gives me the respiration. We should look into the
face of God, understand the character of God, understand that He claims every
human being as His son, and understand, therefore, that there is no bondage
here, but that there is the freedom of the son, and the love of the son¡¦s
heart, and the desire of the son¡¦s heart to advance the kingdom and the family
of God. (Bp. B. W. Carpenter, D. D.)
Verse 20
He feedeth on ashes
Earth used as food
One of the most extraordinary examples of depraved or perverted
appetite is the use of earth for food.
This propensity is not an occasional freak, but a common custom, and is found
among so large a number and variety of tribes that it may be regarded as
co-extensive with the human race. From time immemorial the Chinese have been in
the habit of using various kinds of edible earth as substitutes for bread in
times of scarcity; and their imperial annals have always religiously noticed
the discovery of such bread-stones, or stone-meal, as they are called. On the
western coast of Africa a yellowish kind of earth, called ¡§caouac,¡¨ is so
highly relished, and so constantly consumed by the negroes, that it has become
to them a necessary of life. In the island of Java, and in various parts of the
hill-country of India, a reddish earth is baked into cakes and sold in the
village markets for food; while on the banks of the Orinoco, in South America,
Humboldt mentions that the native Indians find a species of unctuous clay,
which they knead into balls, and store up in heaps in their huts as a provision
for the winter or rainy season. They are not compelled by famine to have
recourse to this clay; for even when fish, game, and fruit are plentiful they
still eat it after their food as a luxury. This practice of eating earth is not
confined solely to the inhabitants of the Tropics. In the north of Norway and
in Swedish Lapland a kind of white powdery earth, called mountain-meal, found
under beds of decayed moss, is consumed in immense quantities every year. It is
mixed by the people with their bread in times of scarcity; and even in Germany
it has been frequently used as a means of allaying hunger. All these examples
of the use of earth as food are so contrary to our experience that they might
seem incredible were it not that they are thoroughly authenticated. Such an
unnatural custom must, in the long run, prove injurious to the constitution of
those who indulge in it, although it is wonderful how long it can be carried on
by some individuals apparently with impunity. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
Feeding on ashes:
In the spiritual world there are many who feed upon ashes. The
prophet is speaking of the idolater.
I. WHO IS THE
IDOLATER--who is the ¡§he¡¨ that is said to feed on ashes? The prophet had a
definite audience before him. He was prophesying to the children of Israel.
Notwithstanding the purity and sublimity of their own monotheistic creed, and
the awful threatenings and sanctions with which it was guarded, we can trace
throughout their entire history, as a marked feature of their character, a
propensity to blend a theoretical belief in the true God with an accommodating
reverence to the idols of the heathen Pantheon. Except when under the immediate
spell of some special revelation of Jehovah, they craved for some visible shape
or outward sign of the divinity--a craving which was satisfied for a time by
the erection of the tabernacle and temple, and the establishment of the worship
connected with them, but which soon overleaped barriers thus imposed upon it,
and sought for novel sensations in the tabernacle of Moloch and in the star of
the god Remphan--figures which they made to worship them. The very priests and
Levites, who were most concerned in keeping the worship of Jehovah pure, were
the leaders of the various national apostasies. Isaiah deeply deplored this
national fickleness and spiritual inconstancy. In the passage under
consideration he seeks to overwhelm it with contempt. Were Isaiah addressing us
in these days his ideas would be the same, though the form in which he would
present them would be different. Material idolatry, in its literal import, has
passed away among civilised nations. But the essence of the temptation remains
the same. Human society is changed, but human nature is unchanged. The impulse
which led to idolatry is therefore as strong at the present day as it was in
the time of Isaiah; and images are set up and worshipped now as fantastic as
any pagan fetich or joss. The New Testament form of the Second Commandment, ¡§Be
not conformed to this world,¡¨ requires to be frequently and urgently enforced.
If I were to sum up all spiritual idolatry in these days in one form, I should
call it worldliness, for everything else is but a phase of this. And this worldly
conformity leads speedily, in most instances, to a low moral standard, and to a
weak and corrupt form of religion, and produces the same humiliating results
which flowed from the idolatry of ancient times.
II. WHAT IS
IDOLATRY? It is a perverted spiritual appetite. In certain diseased states of
the brain there is an unnatural craving for the most extraordinary and
unwholesome substances. Men and women under such morbid influences have been
known to eat cinders and sand with apparent relish, and even to prefer them to
the richest dainties. In such cases it is not the appetite that is at fault.
The controlling power of the brain, which chooses the proper food, is impaired,
and this healthy appetite is set to work upon substances which are altogether unsuitable.
In like manner idolatry arises from a natural craving of the soul, which was
made for God, for His worship and enjoyment. It finds that it must go out of
itself for the blessedness it needs. This spiritual appetite is a God-given
instinct of our nature. It is the soul seeking its highest good. It is healthy
and natural. But when, under the guidance and power of a deceived heart, it
seeks its gratification in earthly things to the exclusion altogether of God,
it affords a most melancholy example of a perverted spiritual appetite.
III. WHAT ARE THE
EFFECTS OF IDOLATRY? How does idolatry affect the man guilty of it? There is a
very striking and beautiful relation between the food of man and his digestive
organs. He is omnivorous. He is the ruler of the world, and therefore the
varied life of the world must throb in his veins. But all the varied food which
she presents to him must be organic food. ¡§Phosphorus literally flames in the
brain, that thoughts may breathe and words may burn; lime gives solidity to the
bones; the alkaline salts promote the oxidation and removal of the effete
materials of the body. Common minerals--iron, sulphur, soda, potash, and
others--circulate in the blood, or are garnered in the various tissues. But all
these inorganic materials are furnished, not from the earth directly, but in
the food; the various vegetable and animal products containing them in varying
quantities.¡¨ Such being the law of man¡¦s nutrition, it will be seen at once
that if he feeds directly upon ashes, he is feeding upon substances that are
altogether incongruous, and unfitted to nourish him. His organs cannot digest
or assimilate ashes. And is not the analogy between spiritual and natural
things here very clear? If man¡¦s spiritual appetite can feed only on God, then
if man seeks his portion only in the things of the world, what can you expect
but spiritual indigestion and misery? It is true, indeed, that just as the body
requires inorganic elements--salt, lime, and iron--as well as organic, for its
proper nourishment, so man requires the things of the world as well as the
things of faith for his spiritual welfare. But then we are to seek these
temporal things, not directly from the world, but through the channel of
communion with God. There are natures that, by a long course of feeding upon
ashes, have become accustomed to this unnatural diet. Like the clay-eaters of
South America, their digestive organs become assimilated to their food, and
they are put to little inconvenience by it. We meet with persons who are
satisfied with their portion in this world, who mind earthly things, and are
contented with the nourishment for their souls which they find in them. But are
such persons the truly great and noble ones of our race? How can an infinite
hunger be appeased by a finite good? The soul wants organised food; food that
has spiritual life in it; food that is redolent of the sunshine and permeated
with the light of heaven; food that has drunk in all the impalpable virtues and
forces of the things unseen and eternal; food that can gather up in itself
these vitalising influences, and transfer them to us to glow within our veins
and animate our nerves; and, instead of that, we get ashes out of which all the
glow and the virtue have departed. Our sin will become our punishment; our
idols our scourges. I have remarked that there are some who are satisfied with
their worldly portion--who, though feeding upon clay, are not put to
inconvenience by it. Such individuals, in the midst of their contentment, are
in reality, if they only knew it, more to be pitied than those whose truer
instincts are tortured by the unsuitable food by which they endeavour to
appease their spiritual cravings. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
Feeding on ashes
I. THE VAIN
OBJECTS TO WHICH MAN DIRECTS HIS ENERGIES. ¡§He feedeth on ashes.¡¨
II. THE REASON OF
THIS PERVERTED CHOICE. ¡§A deceived heart hath turned him aside.¡¨ Sin, in its
very nature, has a tendency to harden the heart. When it first begins to make
advances, there is resistance offered to it. Conscience speaks, expostulates,
reproaches; but sin gets the mastery. Conscience becomes by degrees blunted;
the heart at length gets callous, that it cannot feel; the eye is altogether
darkened, that it cannot see; the ear heavy, that it cannot hear the instruction
of wisdom. Thus the heart is in due time thoroughly deceived. It rejoices in
evil, instead of in good; it has an exclusive appetite for the bitter instead
of the sweet. But there is a diseased state of the heart where the fatal
results do not appear so manifest to the eye of man. When the world is keenly
loved and followed, when self is worshipped, when God is not supreme in the
affection, the root must be looked for in the heart. The heart is deceived. How
dangerous is this state of heart! How much does it need of watchfulness in the
case of every one of us, so that we may not be ensnared by it.
III. THE DANGER OF
THIS STATE, AND THE DIFFICULTY OF ITS REMEDY. ¡§He cannot deliver himself.¡¨ When
the heart has been once beguiled by the deceitfulness of sin, and its
affections have been riveted and firmly fixed upon earthly things, it is not in
man to deliver himself. God, indeed, has provided means whereby those who have
banished themselves from Him may be brought home to His fold. In Him there
resides power to cut asunder the chain, however firmly it may bind us down to
the earth.
IV. SOME PRACTICAL
QUESTIONS FOR OUR EXAMINATION. ¡§Is there not a lie in my right hand?¡¨ (H. J.
Hastings, M. A.)
I. WHAT THE SOUL
PROPERLY REQUIRES. We cannot find food for the body in ourselves; we have to
look for it in the animal or vegetable world. Our spiritual part--our
intellect, conscience, affections--is every whit as dependent on extraneous
supplies as our bodies are.
The deceived heart:
I propose to show--
II. HOW PERILOUSLY
FAR SOME ARE FROM GIVING TO THEIR SOULS WHAT THEY REQUIRE. You see this
magnificent provision; it is spread before your eyes. But the question is, are
you feeding on it? Feeding implies taking it to yourself, appropriating it,
masticating it with pleasure, receiving it into your digestion. It then becomes
a part of you, and goes into your bones, your blood, your flesh, your marrow.
We admit that you come to the feast, that you admire it, and that you intend to
eat; but we cannot admit that you are feeding on it thus far. We cannot say you
have the Word of God dwelling in you richly in all wisdom. (J. Bolton, B. A.)
A perverted appetite:
Two lessons were learnt by Israel in captivity--the
all-sufficiency of God, and the absurdity of idols. It is on the latter of
these that we are now to dwell. Why do men act with such inconceivable folly?
The prophet knows nothing of the modern theory that men do not worship the
stone or wood, but accept the effigy as a help to fixedness of thought and
prayer; he would affirm that with the mass of men this is a fiction, and that
the worship of the devotee stops short with what he can see and touch. The
cause of idolatry lies deeper. ¡§He feedeth on ashes; a deceived heart hath
turned him aside,¡¨ &c.
I. THERE IS A
HUNGER FOR THE DIVINE IN MAN.
1. It is universal.
2. It is significant. We can tell something of the composition of the
human body by the materials which it needs for its sustenance. Similarly the
true dignity of man betrays itself in the hunger which perpetually preys upon
him. If man is only matter, if thought is only the movement of the grey matter
of the brain, if there is no spirit and no beyond, how is it that the material
world cannot supply the supreme good?
3. It is inevitable. The functions which food performs in our system
are threefold. It is needed to replace the perpetual waste which is always
wearing down the natural tissues; to maintain the temperature at some 98¢X; and
to provide materials for growth. And each of these has a spiritual analogy. We need
God, for the same three reasons as the body needs food.
II. THIS APPETITE
MAY BE PERVERTED. ¡§He feedeth on ashes.¡¨ Men tamper with their natural
appetite. But there is a close similarity in their treatment with that
wonderful yearning after the unseen and eternal which is part of the very
constitution of our being--a hunger after the ideal Food, the ideal Beauty, the
ideal Truth, which may be resisted and ignored, but still claims satisfaction;
and if it does not get it in God, it will seek it in the ashes of idolatry. Men
worship idols yet. The man of the world worships money, rank, high office. The
child of fashion worships in the temple of human opinion, and feeds on the
ashes of human applause an appetite which was meant to satisfy itself on the ¡§Well
done!¡¨ of the Almighty. The student who questions or denies the Being of God,
worships in the temple of learning; and feeds with the ashes of human opinion
an appetite which was intended to be nourished by eternal truth. And in every
case these substitutes for God, with which men try to satisfy themselves, are
as incapable of satisfying the heart, as ashes of supporting the physical life.
III. THE TRUE BREAD.
1. It is the gift of God. ¡§My Father giveth the true Bread from
heaven.¡¨ God who made thee hunger for bread, made bread to grow for its
appeasement. Other vegetables have their peculiar habitat. But the cornplant
will make its home in every land, and grow on every soil. He has also provided
beauty for our taste, truth for our thought, love for our heart; and has
gathered all these and much more into His one Gift, Jesus Christ.
2. Nature yields her provision to man through death. So it is through
death that Jesus has become the Food of men. We must assimilate our food. We
must receive Jesus into our hearts by an act of spiritual apprehension. (F.
B.Meyer, B. A.)
Feeding on ashes:
I shall speak of three classes of young men who are ¡§feeding on
ashes.¡¨
I. Those who are
giving themselves up to SENSUAL PLEASURE. There is no one on earth who has so
much right to the pleasures of the world as the believer. I do not believe in
asceticism. I do not believe in pious melancholy. But this innocent hilarity,
which leaves no ill results behind, is good and healthful, and a very different
thing from the emmaddening gaieties of the world.
II. I have a word
to say to you who are setting up another idol for your worship. It is neither
Venus nor Bacchus, but it is Plutus; it is WORLDLY SUBSTANCE it is money. There
is no sin in desiring to be rich, if your money comes to you honourably, and
goes from you usefully. But what is all that, if that is all? Can you feed the
immortal soul within you with bank cheques and good investments? Will all the
gold in the Bank of England appease the hunger of your deathless spirit? No!
But many seem to think it will. Such men are the most hopeless cases to deal
with. I should be more sanguine of bringing to the feet of Jesus a poor bloated
debauchee, than of doing any good to one of these hardened, wizened,
shrivelled-up money-scrapers, who for twenty, thirty, or forty years have no
other thought but this--to lay up gain.
III. There is a
third class of men who are daily ¡§feeding on ashes,¡¨ because ¡§a deceived heart
has turned them aside.¡¨ They have got hold of a lot of INFIDEL LITERATURE, and
they are stuffing their souls with as weak and poisonous rubbish as it is
possible to meet with. With the prophet, I invite you to something more
palatable and nourishing; I bid you to a feast of ¡§milk and honey¡¨; ¡§hearken
diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight
itself in fatness.¡¨ (J. T. Davidson, D. D.)
Feeding on ashes:
Many to-day feed on the kind of ashes Isaiah has in mind.
1. False conceptions of God.
2. False conceptions of Christ.
3. False conceptions of religion.
4. False conceptions of the Church.
5. False conceptions of morality, life, and happiness.
Application:--
1. Upon the true or false conception of God and His relations to men
conduct depends. The Christian¡¦s conception of God is revealed in the
incarnation, life, and atonement of His Son. He only is a true Christian who
obeys Christ¡¦s words, imitates His life, and becomes conformed to His image. He
must be our ideal.
2. Again, we ask how comes it that men thus feed on ashes? ¡§A
deceived heart hath turned him aside.¡¨ (J. B. Nies, Ph. D.)
Feeding on ashes:
To-day we are told by a hundred voices that all religion begins at
the bottom, and slowly struggles up to the top. Isaiah says the very opposite.
The pure form is the primitive; the secondary form is the gross, which is a
corruption. They tell us, too, that all religion pursues a process of
evolution, and gradually clears itself of its more imperfect and carnal
elements. Isaiah says ¡§He cannot deliver his soul,¡¨ and no religion ever worked
itself up, unless under the impulse of a revelation from without. That is
Isaiah¡¦s philosophy of idolatry, and I expect it will be accepted as the true
one some day.
I. A LIFE THAT
SUBSTANTIALLY IGNORES GOD IS EMPTY OF ALL TRUE SATISFACTION. ¡§He feedeth on
ashes.¡¨ Very little imagination will realise the force of that picture. The
gritty cinders will irritate the lips and tongue, will dry up the moisture of
the mouth, will interfere with the breathing; and there will be no nourishment
in a sackful of them. The underlying truth is this--God only is the food of a
man¡¦s soul. You pick up the skeleton of a bird upon a moor; and if you know
anything about osteology, you will see in the very make of its breast-bone and
its wing-bones the declaration that its destiny is to soar into the blue. And
written on you, as distinctly as flight on the bird, or swimming on the fish,
is this, that you are meant, by your very make, to soar up into the heights of
the glory of God, and to plunge deep into the abysses of His infinite love and
wisdom. What does your heart want? A perfect, changeless, all-powerful love.
And what does your mind want? Reliable, guiding, inexhaustible yet accessible
truth. And what does your will want? Commandments which have an authoritative
ring in their very utterance, and which will serve for infallible guides for
your lives. And what do our weak, sinful natures want? Something that shall
free our consciences, and deliver us from the burden of our transgressions, and
calm our fears, and quicken and warrant our lofty hopes. And what do men whoso
nature is to live for ever want but something that shall go with them through
all changes of condition? We want a person to be everything to us. No
accumulation of things will satisfy a man. God has not so blundered in making
the world that He has surrounded us with things that are all lies, but He has
so made it that whosoever flies in the face of the gracious commandment which
is also an invitation, ¡§Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His
righteousness,¡¨ has not only no security that the ¡§other things¡¨ shall be
¡§added unto¡¨ him, but has the certainty that though they were added to him, in
degree beyond his dreams and highest hopes, they would avail nothing to satisfy
the hunger of his heart.
II. A LIFE WHICH
THUS IGNORES GOD IS TRAGICALLY UNAWARE OF ITS OWN EMPTINESS. ¡§A deceived heart
hath turned him aside.¡¨ That explains how the man comes to fancy that ashes are
food. His whole nature is perverted, his vision distorted, his power of
judgment marred. That explains, too, why men persist in this feeding on ashes
after all experience. You will see a dog chasing a sparrow. It has chased
hundreds before and never caught one. Yet, when the creature rises from the
ground, away it goes after it once more, with eager yelp and rush, to meet the
old experience. That is like what a great many of you are doing, and you have
not the same excuse that the dog has. And that deceived heart, stronger than
experience, is also stronger than conscience. How is it that this hallucination
that you have fed full and been satisfied, when all the while your hunger has
not been appeased, can continue to act on us? For the very plain reason that
every one of us has in himself a higher and a lower self, a set of desires of
the grosser, more earthly, and, using the word in its proper sense, worldly
sort--that is to say, directed towards material things, and a higher set which
look right up to God if they are allowed fair play. And of these two
sets--which really are one at bottom, if a man would only see it--the lower
gets the upper hand, and suppresses the higher and the nobler.And so in many a
man and woman the longing for God is crushed out by the gross delights of
sense.
III. A LIFE THUS
IGNORING GOD NEEDS A POWER FROM WITHOUT TO SET IT FREE. ¡§He cannot deliver his
soul.¡¨ There is nothing more awful in life than the influence of habit. There
is something more wanted than yourselves to break this chain. It is the Christ
who is ¡§the Bread of God that came down from heaven¡¨; who can deliver any soul
from the most obstinate and long continued grovelling amongst the transitory
things of this limited world, and the superficial delights of sense and
gratified bodily life; who can bring the forgiveness which is essential, the
deliverance from the power of evil which is not less essential, and who can
fill our hearts with Himself, the food of the world. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
The deceived heart:
I. THERE ARE MANY
PEOPLE WHO ARE ENTIRELY DECEIVED IN THEIR RELIGION.
1. The idolater.
2. The Romanist.
3. Freethinkers.
4. False professors.
II. ALTHOUGH THERE
ARE MANY PERSONS THUS DECEIVED IN RELIGION, WE ARE NOT TO SUPPOSE THAT ANY OF
THEM ARE REALLY CONTENTED IN HEART WITH THEIR RELIGION.
III. IT IS A STRANGE
THING THAT ALL THESE PEOPLE SEEM VERY WELL CONTENTED WITH THEIR FALSE
RELIGIONS.
IV. I WANT TO SPEAK
TO THOSE WHO ARE PROFESSORS OF RELIGION BUT WHO DO NOT POSSESS IT. (C.
H. Spurgeon.)
The deceitfulness of the heart in embracing false confidences
The heart discovers its deceitfulness--
I. BY ITS STRONG
PROPENSITY TO RECEIVE ANY ERROR MORE READILY THAN TRUTH.
II. BY ITS EXTREME
RELUCTANCE TO THE ONLY WAY OF SALVATION, AND BY ITS VIOLENT PROPENSITY TO EVERY
LYING REFUGE. More particularly we observe--
1. That multitudes betake themselves to the general mercy of God.
2. The heart often disposes one to look into itself for something
good.
3. Others found their hope on resolutions of reformation.
4. Partial and outward reformation is the confidence of many.
5. Many confide in a bare profession of religion and observation of
the form of duties.
6. Others deceive themselves into a reliance on their Church
privileges.
7. Some confide in their gifts, or in their usefulness by means of
them.
8. Some may trust to a work of the law, as if it were in itself
saving.
9. This principle of deceit is discovered by the sinner¡¦s endeavours
to obtain justification by moral duties.
10. Many trust to their sincerity in religion. But what is this
sincerity in which you make your boast before God? Do you not confide in it as
the ground of your justification? If so, it must be the sincerity of a person
who is not yet justified; that is, of one still under the curse of the law.
11. Another false confidence, which many fly to, is the observance of
superstitious rites.
12. Some may rest on their sufferings in the cause of Christ.
13. Others may depend on a notional faith. Some are persuaded of the
truth of the Gospel. But they prove that their faith is not Divine, because it
is unfruitful.
14. The deceitfulness of the heart operates in others, by making them
rest upon supposed attainments in holiness. There is a question the solution of
which materially affects every one of us before God. If false professors may
have so eminent attainments, and so remarkable a resemblance to true holiness,
how may we distinguish between such attainments as are the fruit of the
Spirit¡¦s saving work and those which only flow from natural affections or from
a common operation?
Perverted spiritual appetites:
Drunkenness is a perverted spiritual appetite, a seeking in the
creature what God alone can give, the longing of the soul for higher and purer
happiness than the hard round of daily life and the weary sorrowful circle of
the world can give. So, too, covetousness, if analysed in the same way, will be
found to be a perverted spiritual appetite, a misdirected worship. Covetousness
is identified in Scripture with idolatry: ¡§Covetousness which is idolatry,¡¨
says St. Paul. ¡§No covetous man, who is an idolater, hath an inheritance in the
kingdom of God.¡¨ The love of money, as it has been well said, is the love of
God run wild, the diseased action of a spiritual appetite, the aberration of a
nature that was made for God. Wealth is the mystic shadow of God, which the
soul is unconsciously groping after and craving for. It presents some faint
features of resemblance to Him. It seems omnipotent, able to do all things;
omnipresent, showing signs of itself everywhere; beneficent, supplying our
present wants, providing for our future, procuring for us an endless variety of
blessings, and giving us almost all that our hearts can desire. And because it
presents these superficial resemblances to God, it becomes a religion to many,
a worship loud in praise and aspiration as any that ever filled a church. And
so is it with every form of idolatry of which man in these enlightened days can
be guilty. It is the soul, in its restless pursuit of happiness, mistaking the
true object of which it is in quest. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
Arsenical poisoning:
The peasant women of Styria are in the habit of constantly eating
a certain quantity of arsenic, in order to enhance their personal charms. It
imparts a beautiful bloom to the complexion, and gives a full and rounded
appearance to the face and body. For years they persevere in this dangerous
practice; but if they intermit it for a single day, they experience all the
symptoms of arsenical poisoning. The complexion fades, the features become worn
and haggard, and the body loses its plumpness and becomes angular and emaciated.
Having once begun, therefore, to use this cosmetic, they must in self-defence
go on, constantly increasing the dose in order to keep up the effect. At last
the constitution is undermined; the limit of safety is overpassed; and the
victim of foolish vanity perishes miserably in the very prime of life. And is
it not so with those who feed upon the poison of the world¡¦s idolatries? They
may seem to thrive upon this insidious and dangerous diet, but all the time it
is permanently impairing their spiritual health, and rendering them unfit for
spiritual communion. The more they indulge in it, the more they must surrender
themselves to it; and the jaded appetite is stimulated on to greater excesses,
until at last every lingering vestige of spiritual vitality is destroyed, and
the soul becomes a loathsome moral wreck, poisoned by its own food. (H.
Macmillan, LL. D.)
Unsuitable food:
There is such a thing as a wasting of the body from insufficient
nutrition, even when the appetite is satisfied and the stomach content. A
strange plant, called the nardoo, with clover-like leaves, closely allied to
the fern tribe, grows in the deserts of Central Australia. A melancholy
interest is connected with it, owing to the fact that its seeds formed for
several months almost the sole food of the party of explorers who a few years
ago crossed the continent. This nardoo satisfied their hunger; it produced a
pleasant feeling of comfort and repletion. The natives were accustomed to eat
it in the absence of their usual roots and fruits, not only without injury, but
apparently with positive benefit to their health. And yet, day after day, Burke
and Wills became weaker and more emaciated upon this diet. Their flesh wasted
from their bones, their strength was reduced to an infant¡¦s feebleness, and
they could only crawl painfully a mile or two in a day. At last, when nearing
the bourne of their hopes, the explorers perished one by one of starvation; a
solitary survivor being found in the last extremity under a tree, where he had
laid him down to die, by a party sent out in search of the missing expedition.
When analysed, the nardoo bread was ascertained to be destitute of certain
nutritious elements indispensable to the support of a European, though an
Australian savage might for a while find it beneficial as an alternative. And
thus it happened that these poor unfortunate Englishmen perished of starvation,
even while feeding fully day by day upon food that seemed to satisfy their
hunger. Now, is it not precisely so in the experience of those who are seeking
and finding their portion in earthly things? They are contented with it, and
yet their hunger is in reality unappeased. Their desires are crowned, and yet
they are actually perishing of want. God gives them their request, but sends
leanness to their souls. Is it not far more dreadful to perish by slow degrees
of this spiritual atrophy, under the delusive belief that all is well, and
therefore seeking no change of food, than to be tortured by the indigestion of
feeding on ashes, if by this misery the poor victim can be urged to seek for
food convenient for him? (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
¡§He feedeth on ashes¡¨:
Is not the very term most significant? What are ashes? They are
the last solid products of matter that has been used up--the relics that remain
after all that is useful and nutritious has been consumed. You burn a piece of
wood or a handful of corn, and its grosser particles fall to the ground, while
all its ethereal parts--its carbon and hydrogen--mount to the skies and
disappear. It is a sad thing to gaze upon the ashes of the commonest fire; for
in them there is an image of utter death and ruin--of something that has been
bright and beautiful, and is now but dull, cold, barren dust. And what are
earthly, created things, upon which so many are feeding the hunger of their
immortal souls, but ashes?
They were once bright and beautiful. God¡¦s blessing was upon them,
and they were very good. But sin has consumed all their goodness and beauty,
has burned up all in them that was capable of ministering to the spiritual
wants of men, and left nothing behind but dust and ashes. We can apply this
truth to all the world, so far as it is made the portion of the soul. In a
moral sense, the whole world, which was once capable of ministering to man¡¦s spiritual
wants, is now a mere heap of cinders. Its beauty has gone with its goodness,
and its sufficing power with its holiness. It has become spiritually oxidised
by combination with the all-devouring element of sin. The man that loves the
world now feeds on ashes; not upon earth, for there is a degree of nourishment
in soil, owing to the remains of former life, and the worm and the plant feed
upon it; not upon clay, for the clay which the American-Indians eat is found to
consist of microscopic plants with silicious envelopes, called diatoms,
containing a small portion of organic matter sufficient to sustain
existence;--no, but on dry, white, dusty ashes, utterly destitute of any
nutritious element whatever, upon which no creature can live, and upon which almost
no plant can grow--the refuse of everything that is good. (H. Macmillan, LL.
D.)
Unsuitable food:
Some time ago, I read in the papers of a little boy who for months
had been gathering up prune-stones, being fond of the kernel; so, wishing to
prepare for himself a great treat, he laid up quite a large store: at last came
the day of anticipated enjoyment; he ate them all, and, after hours of agony,
died! So I have seen men who have given up their whole life to one aim, to
amass wealth; preparing a banquet of enjoyment for the evening of their days;
and, when they sat down to the feast, lo! on the table only ashes, ashes! (J.
T. Davidson, D. D.)
A deceived heart hath
turned him aside
The self-deception of most who affect to be infidels
1. Consider seriously, what was the real origin of your unbelief. A
father¡¦s house forsaken, and a father¡¦s instructions soon to be forgotten, you
entered on the world. Passions rose within you. Companions encouraged them;
religion checked them. Your belief became irksome to your indulgence; and your
faith descended to doubts. It was natural and necessary that it should do so,
if you meant to continue in your sins.
2. You have had times, no doubt, when you thought your course
somewhat wrong; and, partly sated with such enjoyments, had some idea of
turning from them. What, then, was the obstacle? Was it the difficulty which
you had in accounting for the truth of revelation? Was it not the voice of
pleasure whispering, Will you then renounce the joys which were once so dear to
you? Here was the fatal obstacle. Not in the difficulties of revelation, but in
the timidity and weakness of the heart.
3. If this be not true, go one step farther. Many have met with
calamity; a death unexpected among your friends, some great and sudden change
of fortune, which showed you the uncertainty of human happiness. In these
cases, what was your resource? Did you go to the tables, whither before you had
gone for pleasure? Was it in the society of those who ¡§make a mock at sin ¡§that
you expected the gleam of comfort in the hour of sorrow? Your heart will own
that, when you were in heaviness, you could think upon God. But religion¡¦s
truth all the time remained the same. If, therefore, you doubted on it under
the former situation, why not under the latter? Your heart deceived you. You
did not disbelieve. You wished to do so; and passion blinded you. Affliction
removed the veil from your heart.
4. But, living as we do in an age of boasted light, this reasoning
will probably be considered as carried too far; and it will be urged by many a
young man, that, although the passions may have had some influence in biassing
his opinions, yet his doubts of the Gospel have arisen, in some measure, from
his judgment. Let us, then, meet him on this ground. We expect, therefore, from
you some striking argument that is to set aside at once the authority of ages
and destroy the best hopes and resources of the human heart. And what do we
find? A few common-place phrases and objections--doubts, not created by
yourselves, but only received from others, and kept up by you, to preserve a
kind of watchword of a party against believers.
5. But if you have not searched very deeply into these things
yourself, they with whom you are in the habit of associating are adequate to
give you sufficient religious instruction, and you have taken, you say, your
creed chiefly from them. Let us, then, repair a moment to them. You profess
yourselves general believers in a God, and possessed of some amiable virtues.
How often in the assemblies of your friends and instructors is the name of God
mentioned without irreverence? How seldom have you heard rigid virtue made the
subject of discussion except to be ridiculed? Have you often heard beauty and
innocence mentioned without some sentiment of an abandoned passion? (G.
Mathew, M. A.)
Verse 21-22
Remember these, O Jacob and Israel
God¡¦s Israel not forgotten
This verse, standing in connection with the following, is a call
to Jacob and Israel to return to the Lord.
Many are the arguments used to induce them to do so.
1. ¡§Remember these¡¨ idolaters, their follies, their wickednesses,
their wretched and miserable condition, and forget not that you were guilty once
as they are. It is well to retrace our past history, often to do it, to be
reminded of what we once were in the days of our unregeneracy.
2. Miserable and sad as your present condition is, yet ¡§I know thee
by-name; thou art Mine, return unto Me.¡¨ Thou art still ¡§Jacob,¡¨ still
¡§Israel,¡¨ still ¡§My servant.¡¨ Is there one who has been departing from the
living God? Can anything be more touching than this call to thee? Surely it is
like the look which Jesus gave Peter when he went out and wept bitterly.
3. ¡§I have formed thee,¡¨ formed thee with new and spiritual
workmanship, formed thee a vessel to honour, formed thee for My glory.
4. ¡§Thou shalt not be forgotten of Me.¡¨ Thou hast forgotten Me, the
mighty cost at which I redeemed thee. Thou hast forgotten the way by which I
led thee in the wilderness, the miracles I wrought for thee, the manna with
which I fed thee, the rock of which I made thee drink, the deliverances out of
the hands of thine enemies; thou hast forgotten thy high calling, thy holy
profession, thy truest happiness; but ¡§thou shalt not be forgotten of Me.¡¨
I. THE TRUE ISRAEL
SOMETIMES THINK THEMSELVES FORGOTTEN OF GOD. Their utter insignificance and the
deep consciousness of it lead to this. Sometimes dark and mysterious
providences lead to this. Sometimes apparent delays in answers to prayer. What
is the consequence? We loathe ourselves; instead of advancing we seem
retrograding; instead of mounting we seem to be sinking. Here, too, sense takes
too often the seat of judgment, and not only decides on what God is doing, but
sometimes on God Himself; and is ready to cry out, ¡§My God hath forgotten me.¡¨
There are seasons too, under a sense of unutterable vileness, when the soul
responds to the solemn appeal (Isaiah 43:22-24), ¡§Thou hast not
calledupon Me, O Jacob; but thou hast been weary of Me, O Israel,¡¨ &c.
There are times when a man seems as if he stood alone among his fellow-men, as
if he were the very chief of sinners. I will mention one more case--when we
have by some wilfulness in disobedience grieved the Holy Spirit.
II. THE PEOPLE OF
GOD NEVER ARE FORGOTTEN BY HIM. Tender are the ties that bind us to one
another; the tenderest, the closest, the most indestructible of all ties,
friends, brothers, relations, parents, even a mother. It is the instance
selected (Isaiah 49:15). There is no tie like this
bywhich Jehovah binds Himself to His people. The ties that bind man to man, in
their purest actings, are but the ties of human nature in its feebleness, its
fickleness.
III. THE MANIFOLD
PROOFS THAT GOD HAS CONDESCENDED TO GIVE, THAT HIS ISRAELS SHALL NOT BE
FORGOTTEN. We too easily forget that the true basis of faith is the veracity of
God. The believer too often acts, thinks, speaks, as if he did not believe God,
though he mean not so. Were Jehovah to forget, He would violate every
perfection of His nature. He sees all His in His Son; and when He forgets His
Son, then and not till then will He forget His Israel. When Jesus forgets to
intercede, when Jesus intercedes in vain, when God Himself changes, then will
He forget. Look up then, ye Jacobs, ye Israels of God; let the past encourage
you. What do thy reasonings say? What do thy humblings say? What thy upholdings
in deep and heavy trouble? Thy special interpositions? Thy perseverance in the
ways of God? (J. H. Evans, M. A.)
Gracious mercy:
In the midst of idolaters this chapter speaks of a people who
worship, love, serve God. Here is--
I. AN INVITATION.
¡§Return unto Me.¡¨ This implies previous distance, wandering, unworthiness.
¡§Return.¡¨
1. How? The sinner says, I am bound, sin holds me chained, justly.
God answers, I have redeemed thee, paid thy ransom, broken thy chains.
2. To whom? ¡§Unto Me.¡¨ The sinner says, I am polluted, defiled. God
answers, I have blotted out thy sins. Thou hast cleansing in the precious
blood.
3. In what way? Not towards Me. Many are satisfied with appearance.
But unto-into My very presence--to walk, dwell, commune with Me. All trace of
former guilt gone.
II. A PRIVILEGE.
¡§Thou art My servant.¡¨
1. They serve Him. He fits them for this. ¡§I have formed thee,¡¨
fitted by indwelling of the Spirit, giving new tastes, desires, &c. We are
not made servants by serving; we are made servants that we may serve.
2. They serve acceptably, cheerfully, continually, purely. None are
Christians who do not serve. Notice the repetition in text, also Isaiah 44:1,
2. God dwells lovingly on it.
3. They serve in hope. God¡¦s servants have a gracious promise--¡§Thou
shalt not be forgotten of Me.¡¨ Others may forget, be removed, but God never. We
may be in trouble, persecution, danger, weariness, death, never forgotten.
III. A CAUTION.
¡§Remember these.¡¨ God¡¦s people rejoice, but with trembling: walk surely, but
not securely (1 Corinthians 10:12). ¡§Remember
these¡¨--the world, careless, backsliders, self-seekers, heathens. ¡§Remember
these¡¨--
1. That you may be humbled (Titus 3:3).
2. That you may honour God before them (Matthew 5:16).
3. That you may do them good (Galatians 6:1). Are your sins blotted
out? If so, serve God; ¡§remember these.¡¨ If not, return. (Homilist.)
O Israel, thou shalt not
be forgotten of Me.--
God¡¦s remembrance of Israel
I. If we turn to
some of the evidences of this statement, we may first look to the history of
Israel, and to that of ourselves in a PROVIDENTIAL ASPECT.
1. As regards the Israelites in their national and personal
relations.
2. But the special evidence of the text lies in the heart of
Christian experience.
3. The evidence of this Divine declaration may be further shown by a
reference to the works of creation.
II. Consider some
of the REASONS which may be assigned for this Divine utterance.
1. One reason is to be found in the fact of man¡¦s redemption.
2. Another in the graciousness, in the love and mercy of the Divine
purposes with regard to ourselves. (W. D. Horwood.)
¡§Forget thee, I will not¡¨:
I. THE TITLE WHICH
THE LORD GIVES TO HIS PEOPLE. ¡§My servant.¡¨
1. Notice what a practical title it is. It has to do with action and
service; it has to do with the heart, but also with the hand, with the inner
and with the outer life. There is no true Christian but the practical
Christian. A servant is not always at work; but a servant is always a servant,
and ever ready for work.
2. It is a personal title--¡§Thou.¡¨
3. It is an exclusive title--¡§My servant. These other people are
servants of Baal or Ashtaroth; but thou art My servant.¡¨ When a man has a
servant, he expects him to serve him, and not to be in the employ of other
people. God¡¦s servants must serve God; not idols, not the world, not self, not
sin, not Satan.
4. It is an honourable title. It must be so, for God uses the title
in this verse twice over. ¡§Thou art My servant: I have formed thee; thou art My
servant.¡¨ To serve God, is truly to reign,
5. This is a title of acceptance. As God says, twice over, ¡§Thou art
My servant,¡¨ He means, ¡§I accept thee as My servant; I own thee as such.¡¨ One
reason why we are God¡¦s servants is that He has forgiven us our trespasses (Isaiah 44:22).
II. THE PROMISE
WHICH HE MAKES TO US. ¡§Thou shalt not be forgotten of Me.¡¨ Men forget us. And
they turn against us. Those for whom you do the most are often those who will
be most unkind, and most bitter against you. But God says, ¡§Thou shalt not be
forgotten of Me.¡¨ What does this promise mean?
1. That God will never cease to love His servants.
2. That the Lord will never cease to think of His servants. The
thoughts of God are wonderful. He can think of every individual saint as much
as if there were no other saint in the universe.
III. SOME REASONS
WHICH ASSURE US THAT GOD WILL NOT FORGET THOSE WHO ARE TRULY HIS SERVANTS.
1. The very best reason is that He says he will not forget us.
2. God cannot forget us, since He has made us. The former part of the
verse says, ¡§Thou art My servant: I have formed thee.¡¨ With His own fingers He
has made us into vessels of mercy, so He cannot forget us.
3. He has blessed us; He has blessed us so much already that He
cannot forget us now.
4. He has loved us so long already. Was there ever a time when the
redeemed of the Lord were not written on the heart of Christ? He loved you
before the first star began to dart its golden arrows through the darkness of
space. Rest you then secure; love so ancient will never die out.
5. We have cost Him so much.
6. He is too good a Lord to cast us off. He is a wretch of a man who
casts off an old servant simply because he is old. The Lord does not turn His
old servants adrift; but says, ¡§Even to your old age, I am He; and even to hoar
hairs will I carry you.¡¨ (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Verse 22
I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions
Sin blotted out
The meaning of the verse may be--He who offered his sacrifice
aright, was as sure that the sin for which he offered it was blotted out, as
that the smoke of the sacrifice was dispersed by the wind, and was no longer
discernible.
(E. Thompson, D. D.)
Blotting out sin: a classical side-light:
¡§This decree made the danger then hanging over the city, pass away
like a cloud.¡¨ (Demosthenes.)
Clouds and sins:
Clouds do good; but transgressions and sins never do good. They do
no good to the body, no good to the soul, no good to the spirit, no good to our
present condition, or to our future circumstances; and, in this respect, clouds
are unlike sins. Yet there are points of resemblance between clouds and sins.
Clouds veil the sun; and sins hide the loving face of God. Clouds hide the
lofty firmament; and sins conceal heaven. Clouds contract the prospect; and
sins prevent the sight of all coming good. Clouds drop down in rain; and sins
fall in punishment. Clouds are beyond our control; and sins committed are
entirely out of our power. Clouds are dispersible only by God; and sins God
alone can drive away. This is the point of the analogy instituted in our text.
(S. Martin.)
Not a cloud to be seen:
I. THE DIVINENESS
OF FORGIVENESS. ¡§I have blotted out,¡¨ &c. ¡§I, even I.¡¨ All sin is against
God. When you sin against each other you sin against God. And all punishment is
in God¡¦s hands; and the dispensation of pardon is His prerogative. Blessed be
God for keeping it within His own power! Pardon is dispensed faithfully and
wisely, for God is light. Pardon is dispensed graciously, for God is love. And
pardon is given according to the Divine promise and covenant, for ¡§God is
faithful and just to forgive us our sins.¡¨
II. THE
COMPLETENESS OF PARDON. In the country which Isaiah knew, the clouds were
entirely blotted out during four months of the year; so that it was an
extraordinary thing from May to September, to see a cloud: and the clearness of
the atmosphere enabled the prophet to appreciate this illustration to an extent
impossible to us, who are so often under a leaden sky. Still, even here, we do
know what it is to stand under a blue sky. In the morning, or in the evening,
or late at night, we know what it is to stand under the cloudless heavens, and
to say, ¡§There is not a cloud to be seen.¡¨ And when God pardons a man there is
not a sin to be seen. The sins of childhood, and youth, and maturity-the sins
of every year, and day, and hour--are blotted out. The sins of the body, and
the sins of the soul--the sins of the tongue, and of the hand, and of every
member of the body--the sins of the thought, and of the imagination, and of
desire, and ofaffection, and of volition, are all blotted out. The sins of the
heart, and the sins of the home, the sins of the place of business, and the
sins of the Church, and the sins committed against brothers and sisters, and
kindred of every degree--against husband, and wife, and children, and
neighbours, and friends, and the country, sins against the Saviour, and against
the Holy Spirit, and against our Father in Heaven are blotted out. Sins wilful,
sins careless, sins repeated, sins aggravated, are all blotted out. Not some
sins, but all sins. The least are not overlooked; the worst are not reserved.
Pardon is not the mitigation of punishment--it is not the passing by of some
transgressions and the bringing forward of others--but an entire remission of
future punishment. Sin is not behind following us; sin is not before preventing
us; sin is not above falling upon us; sin is not on either hand hemming us in.
Pardoned by God, our sins are gone; actually gone for ever.
III. THE ASSURANCE
WHICH GOD GIVES THE PARDONED THAT THEY ARE FORGIVEN. God might forgive without
telling us now that He has pardoned us. He might reserve the communication of
this fact until the last great day. But He would have the forgiven know that
they are pardoned. Now what profit is there in this? Knowledge of pardon is a
particular knowledge of God. A man who is pardoned sees God in the dispensation
of Divine forgiveness, as God is not to be seen elsewhere, or in any other
dispensation. It is one thing to see God in the general provision He has made
for the supply of our wants, and quite another thing for us to see God applying
that provision to ourselves. A knowledge of pardon is a source of joy and
peace. It is, moreover, a power awakening love. You remember the case of the
woman who came to Christ, upon the occasion of the great banquet given to Him
by one of the chief of the Pharisees. Then, the knowledge of pardon is a motive
to the pursuit of holiness.
IV. THE KNOWLEDGE
OF PARDON ENCOURAGES US TO BRING OTHERS TO GOD.
V. WHO ARE THE
ASSURED?
1. Those who confess to Him their sins.
2. The confession is to be accompanied by the forsaking of sin.
3. There is no forsaking sin, without turning to God. (S. Martin.)
What man can and cannot do:
Man may divert the course of a river, and fill up the former bed;
thus blotting out in certain places the river. Man may pare down portions of
the hills; thus blotting out the hills. Man may raise the valley; thus blotting
out the valley. Man may drain the lake, and sow it with seed, and raise crops
upon the soil of the lake¡¦s bed; thus blotting out the lake. Man may, to a
small extent, alter the boundaries of the ocean; thus blotting out in some
places even the sea. Man may tunnel the earth and make a highway where foot
never trod. But man can neither bring clouds into the firmament, nor send them
away. Moreover a man may blot out ignorance by teaching, and folly by
instruction, and some bad habits by good training, and animal wants by the
supply of temporal necessities, and captivity by release, and disease by
healing; but no man can forgive sins. The dispensation of pardon is too
precious, and too important, to be entrusted to men or to angels. (S.
Martin.)
Pardon not entrusted to men or angels:
A man, if he were entrusted with the dispensation of forgiveness,
might be sleeping, or journeying, or sick, or in various ways out of reach. A
man might be angry, or morose, or occupied, or unloving, when the penitent was
calling for forgiveness. And an angel might take a hypocrite for a true
penitent, or a contrite one for a hypocrite; or he might hesitate to forgive
some chief of sinners. God keeps the dispensation of forgiveness in His own
kind hand. (S. Martin.)
Sin and forgiveness:
There is, at first sight, a little obscurity in this expression.
Is the cloud intended to represent the sin, or is it the obscurity with which
the sin is to be obliterated? Does the text liken transgressions to a cloud
which is to be driven away, or the transgression to be covered and blotted out
as if by a cloud? There is a difference in opinion with regard to the matter.
But there is no reason for not taking the words literally as they stand, and
looking upon sin as likened to a cloud.
I. THE FIGURE
UNDER WHICH SIN IS REPRESENTED. ¡§A cloud¡¨; ¡§a thick cloud.¡¨ It affords an apt
illustration of human evil.
1. Clouds obscure the beauty of the earth. Sin obscures the prospects
of the soul and shuts out the glories of the heavenly horizon! It blurs the
outline of truth, it disturbs our views of life, of our fellow-creatures, of
our own actions and the actions and motives of others, of the providence and
dealings of God, of the true import of existence, of the future and the past.
What is evil seems good; what is good seems evil; what is real seems false; and
what is false appears true.
2. Clouds intercept the light of heaven. And what hides the full
brightness of the face of God, who is the source of all spiritual light and
warmth and joy, but sin? ¡§Your iniquities have separated between Me and you.¡¨
Our sins have kept the revelation of full light and the manifestation of
fullest love from vivifying and rejoicing our hearts. Not that even sin
entirely obscures God¡¦s mercy and love. The darkest cloud cannot altogether
hide the light of day. The sun¡¦s rays are so powerful that they penetrate even
through the thickest mists. But what a contrast is the feeble light of a
November day to that of the genial sunbeam in June! So not even sin can
entirely hide the Divine influence of the love of God or prevent it from
warming the earth. But how different is its manifestation to what it was amid
the glories of Paradise!
3. Clouds cause inconvenience and discomfort. The traveller amid the
mountain mists, with his garments soddened and weighted with the moisture, his
breathing laboured and his movements hampered, is a fitting representative of
the Christian journeying heavenwards amid the many hindrances which check his
progress through the uncongenial atmosphere of this sinful world, saturated
with the essence, as it were, of iniquity.
4. Clouds are about us everywhere.
II. THE PROMISE
WHICH IS HERE BESTOWED. Although the statement is put in the past--¡§I have
blotted out¡¨--yet it is really a future and a conditional declaration. The
early part of this chapter is a description of awful impenitence and apostasy.
In purpose, in intention, this is forgiven, but it is not a forgiveness
independent of reformation. We have seen the sky when the summer sun has driven
away the clouds. It is deep, unfathomable, ethereal, blue. The sun¡¦s glory is
undimmed. The whole of nature rejoices with unspeakable joy. The heart rebounds
with lightness. Not a speck on the surface of the heaven casts a shadow on the
earth. Such is the idea of a world without sin. All brightness and no clouds,
all joy without a sorrow to dim its glory. And this is the spiritual gist of
the promise which the great God has made to His believing people. It is an
assurance so certain that it is spoken of as having actually taken place. And
how will God blot out the sins of His people? By the same means as physically
disperse the clouds of earth.
1. By the tempests of wrath. The tempest of God¡¦s wrath, as it fell
upon the head of Christ, sent a current of electric justice through the load of
sin and rendered it possible for its power to be removed.
2. By the glorious shining of rays of warmth and light. It is the
warmth of God¡¦s infinite, eternal love that shall disperse the last trace of
sin. That love shining from His throne shall drive all the consequences of evil
from the heart, from the life. And with the clouds of sin shall go all other
clouds--the clouds of suffering, of sorrow, of death. And when sin is driven
away, that love shall shine in unceasing glory. It will not be limited to time,
or place, or season, or circumstance. It will not come in diminished or
lessened degrees, but it will be perfect, pure, and complete. Still, this is
but a figure--an incomplete one, too--one which has its deficiencies. But God
Himself gave it out. (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.)
Forgiveness: its blessings and its duties:
I. AN IMPORTANT
DECLARATION. ¡§I have blotted out,¡¨ &c.
II. A CORRESPONDING
DUTY. ¡§Return unto Me.¡¨
III. AN
ALL-CONSTRAINING MOTIVE. ¡§I have redeemed thee.¡¨ (S. Bridge, M. A.)
Sin and grace:
I. THERE IS
RECOGNISED THE EXISTENCE OF SIN.
II. THERE IS
AFFIRMED THE EXISTENCE OF MERCY. (W. M.Punshon, LL. D.)
Invitation:
The features of the Divine character, and the blessings of
salvation, which are to be manifested in God¡¦s dealings with Israel in the
latter days, are the very same as are now manifested in God¡¦s dealings with all
believers. We may consider the text, then, as an exhibition of God¡¦s mercy, in
which we are ourselves interested.
I. With reference
to HIS MERCY.
1. The first words of the text denote an act of God¡¦s gracious
forgiveness. ¡§I have blotted out thy transgressions and thy sins.¡¨ In the New
Testament scriptures, this expression ¡§blotting out¡¨ is connected with the
atonement Colossians 2:14).
2. The language of pardoning mercy goes still farther. ¡§As a thick
cloud.¡¨ How is a thick cloud blotted out? When a debt is blotted out from a
debt book, the blot remains. It is true there is no evidence against the
sinner; the charge against him is at an end; but the remains of what was a debt
are to be seen, and the very act of cancelling it shows that there was a debt.
But when a cloud is blotted out, it is different. How is that cloud blotted
out? Either by the wind dispersing it, or by the sun breaking through it and
dispersing it; and when this is done, we say either that the storm is ¡§blown
over,¡¨ or that there is now a clear sky, and all that we can see, if we see
anything, with regard to the threatening cloud, is now composed of those
beautiful hues which are lighted up by the shining of a bright sun in a clear
sky. Well, then, when God says that He will ¡§blot out as a thick cloud our
transgressions, and as a cloud our sin,¡¨ we are to understand that He
undertakes to remove all traces of our transgressions and all remains of guilt
from the conscience, so that the sinner thus pardoned may look up to God as a
Father full of grace and love, and may approach Him with holy boldness, and
without any particle of fear. Observe, then, what full forgiveness God assures
us of in this language. ¡§Thick clouds,¡¨ as well as ordinary clouds,--two
expressions which must be taken in a figurative meaning, as including all kinds
of sin--what we call ¡§greater and lesser sins¡¨ alike--are what the Lord
declares His purpose to do away with, and completely to remove from being a
ground of fear to those who approach Him in the name of His dear Son.
3. Now, inasmuch as no one can disperse a thick cloud but the God who
can send His bright sun to shine through it, so none hut that God who proclaims
Himself a pardoning God and Saviour can say, so that the conscience of the
sinner shall respond, ¡§I have blotted out as a thick cloud thy transgressions,
and as a cloud thy sins.¡¨ And this is the forgiveness in which God
delights--full, complete, and such as only He Himself can bestow.
II. But in order
that this mercy may be ours, and that we may rejoice in it, IT IS NEEDFUL THAT
WE SHOULD RIGHTLY RESPOND to that intimation of God¡¦s grace. ¡§I have blotted
out thy transgressions. Return unto Me.¡¨
1. It is the Redeemer who calls, because it says, ¡§Return, for I have
redeemed thee.¡¨
2. How different to our natural expectation is this! The Redeemer
crying after the sinner, instead of the sinner crying after the Redeemer.
3. Then observe how the language before us manifests the deep concern
of God our Saviour. ¡§Return to Me.¡¨ He would not speak in language like this,
if it were not a matter of immense moment to the sinner to return.
4. There is another suggestion: for what purpose is this call of
entreaty made? Not that the sinner may receive punishment. God calls thee, O
careless one, not to be frowned upon, but smiled upon.
5. Then, after all this intimation of grace on the part of God, there
can be no hope of lasting peace or a future glory, except as we return.
III. NOTICE THE LOVE
IN THE ASSURANCE THAT HE GIVES ABOUT REDEMPTION. ¡§Return, for I have redeemed
thee.¡¨ What return do you make to the call of Him who assures of mercy and redemption,
and who graciously says, Return? (W. Cadman, M. A.)
The cloud of sin and its dispersion:
I. A wonderful
teaching as to the INMOST NATURE OF SIN. I refer especially to the two words
for sin which are employed here. That translated transgression literally means
¡§treachery¡¨ or ¡§rebellion,¡¨ and that translated sin ¡§missing a mark.¡¨ All
iniquity is stamped with this damning characteristic, it is rebellion against a
loving will, an infinite King, a tender Father. And all iniquity has this, by
the merciful irony of Providence, associated with it, that it is a blunder as
well as a crime.
II. THE PERMANENT
RECORD OF SIN. ¡§I have blotted out.¡¨ That points, of course, to something that
has been written, and which it promises shall be erased. It may be, perhaps,
the idea rather of a stain which is covered and removed, but that I think less
probable than the other one, that the evil is written down somewhere. A book
written; a permanent record of my evil doing. Where is it written? Where,
rather, is it not written? Written on character, written to a very large extent
even on circumstances, written above all in the calm, perfect memory of the
all-judging God. The book is written by ourselves, moment by moment, and day by
day. We write it with invisible ink, and it only needs to be held to the fire
to flash up into legibility.
III. THE DARKENING
POWER OF SIN. ¡§I have blotted out as a thick cloud.¡¨ When the cloud draws its
veil over the heavens, the sunshine and the blue are shut out from a man¡¦s eye,
and all the flowerets close; and when the heaven is veiled the birds cease to
sing. So, like a misty veil drawn across the face of the heavens are man¡¦s
sins. Our only way of knowing God is by sympathy, by conformity.
IV. THE REMOVAL OF
THE SIN. I have blotted out as a thick cloud thy transgressions, and as a cloud
thy sins.¡¨ The erasure implies the making a clean sheet of the blurred page;
the cancelling of the whole long formidable column of figures that expresses
the debt. The blotting out as a cloud implies the disappearing of the misty
vapour, as some thin fleecy film will do in the dry Eastern heavens, melting
away as a man looks. So God, in His marvellous patience, shining on the upper
side, as it were, of all the mists that wrap and darken our souls, thins these away
by the process of self-communication, until they gather themselves up, routed
and broken, and disappear, floating in thin fragments beneath the visual
horizon. It is to no purpose to ask whether that means pardon or cleansing. It
means both. Isaiah could proclaim: ¡§I have blotted out thy transgressions,¡¨
because Isaiah could also proclaim: ¡§The chastisement of our peace was upon
Him, and with His stripes we are healed.¡¨ Now, mark this, that this removal of
sin, in all its aspects and powers, is regarded in my text as a past
accomplished fact. It is not set forth as contingent upon the man¡¦s return, but
as the reason for his return. ¡§I have redeemed thee, therefore come back to
Me,¡¨ not ¡§Come back to Me that I may redeem thee.¡¨ You have to take your portion
of the great blessing by the simple act and exercise of faith in Jesus Christ.
Then it becomes yours. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Sin as clouds
It is by no means an uncommon circumstance to find in the Bible
the very same natural object employed as a symbol of very different and even
opposite things. Thus, the lion is used as the emblem both of Christ and of the
Prince of Darkness; fire is used as the emblem both of Divine purity and of
human suffering; water is used as the emblem both of peace and of trouble; and
the cloud is employed as an emblem both of good and evil. Here the Almighty
Himself speaks of sin as a ¡§cloud.¡¨ In order to guard against an abuse of the
comparison, notice two striking points of dissimilarity.
I. He blotteth out
sin as a cloud which OBSTRUCTS THE GENIAL INFLUENCES OF HEAVEN. It rolls like a
thick cloud between God and the soul. It obstructs the rays of His love; it
makes life gloomy and sad.
II. He blotteth out
sins as a cloud which RISES FROM BENEATH. Whence come these clouds? Not from
the celestial regions. They are exhalations from the earth. From noxious marshy
lands and stagnant pools, as well as from restless seas they rise. So it is
with sin. It is an exhalation from the depraved heart. The clouds that roll
between the soul and its God are an aggregation of the noxious vapours that
have risen from the heart.
III. He blotteth out
sins as a cloud which EXISTS IN EVERY VARIETY OF FORM. Clouds are endless in
their variety. It is so with sin. You have it in the fleeting thought, the
transient feeling, the passing word; as well as in the deep plot, the cherished
passions, the confirmed habits, the dark, dark life.
IV. He blotteth out
sins as a cloud which is CHARGED WITH EVIL. Whilst clouds are sources of
blessings to the world, they are often filled with elements of destruction.
There are forged the thunderbolts that terrify; there are kindled the
lightnings that consume; there are the floods that deluge. It is so with sin.
The miseries of retribution are all nursed in it as storms in the cloud.
V. He blotteth out
sins as a cloud WHICH NO FINITE INTELLIGENCE CAN DISPERSE. Who can dispel the
smallest cloud from the face of the sky? No skill, no strength, can dispel one
cloud. It is so with sin. No finite being can dispel it. No Church, priesthood,
&c.
VI. He blotteth out
sins as a cloud, which ONCE DISPERSED, IS GONE FOR EVER. Sins pardoned, like
clouds dispersed, are lost for ever. ¡§In those days, saith the Lord, the
iniquity of Israel shall be sought for and there shall be none, and the sins of
Judah, and they shall not be found, for I will pardon them.¡¨
VII. He blotteth out
sins as a cloud, which WHEN DISSIPATED BENEFITS THE UNIVERSE. (Homilist.)
God¡¦s forgiveness:
I. A DESCRIPTION
OF SIN. Man¡¦s transgressions are as a thick cloud.
1. In their number.
2. Because they intervene between God and man.
3. Because they engloom the earth.
4. Because they contain the consequences which we dread. Out of the
cloud the angry lightnings flash, and in the cloud the fury of the tempest
sleeps.
II. A DESCRIPTION
OF FORGIVENESS. ¡§I have blotted out,¡¨ &c. You have witnessed the dispersion
of a storm. This is a symbol of God¡¦s forgiveness.
1. It is so because it is the work of God only. It is a transaction
in which man has no share.
2. God¡¦s forgiveness is a complete forgiveness.
3. May we not learn that all sin is overruled to our good? After the
storm has gone over us, have we not found the atmosphere purified? Can we not
see that the world is disciplined by the deluge of evils which pours forth from
the clouds of sin?
4. This is a symbol of God¡¦s forgiveness in respect to the gladness
which succeeds the storm. The prophet represents the whole earth as awakening,
after the dispersion of the storm, to exultant joy. ¡§Sing, O ye heavens,¡¨
&c. Such is the joy of the world on account of God¡¦s forgiveness.
III. A DESCRIPTION
OF THE CONDUCT OF THE FORGIVEN. ¡§Return unto Me,¡¨ &c. (H. M. Jackson.)
Departing clouds:
The bestowment of spiritual blessings is a warrant for the
expectation of all needful temporal blessings. This passage is the foundation
on which God causes His ancient people to rest. God¡¦s forgiving love is the
promise of all needful help and grace.
I. WE MAKE OUR OWN
CLOUDS. As the natural clouds are formed by the vapours drawn up from the sea,
so, in a degree, those clouds which darken our skies are the effects of our
transgressions.
II. GOD MAKES OUR
CLOUDS THE MINISTERS OF HIS MERCY. The natural clouds are the ministers of His
mercy, the testimonies of His faithful care, of His loving thoughtfulness for
the children of men. But how wonderful that the clouds of our sins should be
the ministers of His mercy! The clouds lead us to appreciate the glorious
sunlight.
III. GOD DISPERSES
OUR CLOUDS BY THE INTERVENTION OF HIS REDEEMING LOVE AND POWER. Clouds move in
obedience to nature¡¦s laws; and the clouds of our sins cannot be blotted out in
an arbitrary method. Not as a bad debt, not as chalked figures may be
obliterated. God is a Father, but He is a moral Governor. Even He has only a right
to blot out transgressions, because He has redeemed.
IV. GOD DISPERSES
OUR CLOUDS IN ORDER THAT WE MAY STAND IN THE CLEAR SUNSHINE. When sin is
blotted out, then the soul is started on a career of never-ending fruitfulness.
V. GOD MAKES THE
DEPARTING CLOUDS HIS PATHETIC PREACHERS. ¡§Return unto Me.¡¨ Every time we see
the clouds sweeping across the heavens, let us listen to their still small
voice. (W. Burrows, B. A.)
God¡¦s abundant pardon:
In pardoning His people God freely forgives them all their sins of
every description, flowing from corrupt propensities and evil habits, committed
through ignorance, infirmity, temptation, or presumption. (R. Macculloch.)
Barriers obliterated:
I. HERE IS AN
INTERPOSING AND DIVIDING MEDIUM: a cloud of sins. A vapour, says the Hebrew;
and, then, a thick cloud. God¡¦s people ought always to dwell in fellowship with
their God. There ought to be nothing between the renewed heart and God to
prevent joyful and hallowed fellowship; but it is not so. Sometimes a cloud
comes between,--a cloud of sin; and, whenever that cloud of sin comes between
us and God, it speedily chills us. Our delight in God is no longer manifest; we
have little or no zeal in His service, or joy in His worship. Beneath that
cloud, we feel like men who are frozen; and, at the same time, darkness comes
over us. We get into such a sad state that we hardly know whether we are God¡¦s
people or not. Besides that, it threatens us. Remember, clouds are earthborn
things. Yet, recollect that the sun is not affected by the clouds.
II. THE COMPLETE
REMOVAL OF THIS BARRIER. ¡§I have blotted out,¡¨ &c.
1. No known human power can remove the clouds. So it is with your
darkness and doubts if you have fallen into sin.
2. But what a mercy it is that God can remove these clouds of sin.
3. When God drives away these clouds from us, though we may see other
clouds, we shall never see those black ones any more. When the Lord takes away
His people¡¦s sins, they are gone, and gone for ever.
4. The glory of it is that the Lord has already done this great work
of grace. ¡§I have,¡¨ &c.
III. THE TENDER
COMMAND. ¡§¡¥Return unto Me.¡¦ The great barrier that separated us, is removed; so
let us not be divided from one another any longer.¡¨
1. When He says, ¡§Return,¡¨ He wants you to give up that which has
grieved Him.
2. The Lord¡¦s gracious invitation also means, ¡§Come back, and love
Me. See how I have loved you. I have already forgiven you your sin, you who
are, indeed, My child, but whose faith has almost disappeared. Though you have
provoked Me, I still love you. Will you not love Me? After such pleading, can
you keep on in this cold-hearted state towards your God?
3. The Lord also means, ¡§Return again to your old joys.¡¨
IV. THE SACRED
CLAIM WHICH BACKS UP THE GRACIOUS INVITATION. ¡§I have redeemed thee.¡¨
1. The meaning is this: ¡§I have loved you so much that I redeemed you
with the blood of My dear Son; and, having loved you so much in the ages past,
I love you still. Come back to Me. I did not make a mistake when I first loved
you, through which I shall have to change the object of My choice. I knew all
about you from eternity,;, all that you ever would be or could be, I knew it;
yet I loved you and bought you, &c.
2. You belong to Me. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Return unto Me
The freeness of the gospel scheme, and the universality of God¡¦s
love
I. THE FREENESS OF
THE METHOD OF MAN¡¦S ACCEPTANCE. ¡§Return unto Me; for I have redeemed thee.¡¨
There can be no difficulty in proving that we are bought with a price; there
can be no difficulty in showing that it was God Himself to whom the price was
paid. But there is something of a difficulty in understanding how purchase can
consist with gift; and how that which is dearly bought can be said to be freely
bestowed. The difficulty is just what follows. Much is said in the Bible as to
our deliverance being perfectly gratuitous; but if God bestows nothing that has
not been paid for, what becomes of that gratuitous character of redemption?
Certainly it would seem that purchase is so inconsistent with donation, that He
of whom forgiveness is bought can lay but slight claim to a surprising
liberality. Careful examination, however, will set this in a proper light.
¡§Return unto Me; for I have redeemed thee,¡¨ is an assertion whose proof lies in
the assurance that God is ready to receive the prodigal. A deliverance that has
been bought for the world is more illustrative of God¡¦s free grace than any
other which would have required no satisfaction. For a plan of deliverance in
every sense gratuitous is one of those absurd creations of the fancy which it
would have been impossible to turn into reality. If it could not have been said
to man, Thou art a redeemed thing, and a purchased thing, it must have been
said, in opposition to our text, Thou shalt not return; thou shalt continue a
ruined thing. It fell not within the power of Deity to grant what men call
unconditional forgiveness. It is requiring God to undeify Himself--to cease to
be the Just One, the Faithful One. The fact that we may return to the Father
only because we are purchased by the blood of His Son, wondrously demonstrates
the freeness of the grace. The death of the Son does not, after all, place the
Father under the necessity of extending forgiveness to sinners; He need not
have said, ¡§Return,¡¨ even though we were redeemed. We are not merely debtors
who have nothing to pay--we are criminals who have punishment to endure. If I
were only a debtor, and Christ had discharged the debt, I cease to be a debtor,
and God cannot, in justice, refuse to release me; but, if I were a criminal, I
do not cease to be a criminal because another might have died in my room. Hence
it is free grace, and nothing else, that grants me forgiveness.
II. THE EARNEST
LONGING THAT GOD HAS THAT SINNERS SHOULD BE SAVED, DISCOVERED IN THE PATHOS OF THE
ENTREATY. Men are bid to return because they are redeemed. There are,
therefore, two conditions: they must have faith in the Redeemer, and they must
have that repentance which includeth forsaking of sin: so precious are you in
God¡¦s sight that to return is to please God. (H. Melvill, B. D.)
I have redeemed thee
¡§I have redeemed thee¡¨
To redeem is ¡§to buy back¡¨; and our redemption is a buying us out
of bondage. We are ¡§sold under sin,¡¨ and God has bought us back with the
precious blood of His well-beloved Son. If you will look at Leviticus 25:23, &c., you will find
the law by which the land could be redeemed; or those persons who had waxen
poor and sold themselves as bondmen--the law of redemption.
1. Christ is born in our midst that He may become a Kinsman, a
Brother to us all, He comes bringing our ransom price. But he does not bid the
angels bring the gold and pearls for our deliverance. He gives Himself a ransom
for all. And now Jesus comes to us, our loving Brother, and He saith, ¡§I have
redeemed thee.¡¨
2. Now do not let us serve sin any more. Jesus has bought us back
from this hard master. He has bought for us the Father¡¦s house too. He has put
us in possession of heaven and all its joys. And thus from the bondage of sin
and evil of our hearts, we can cry to the King for His help. Prayer is the
white-winged bird that can bear our message right up to the Father¡¦s house. And
an answer shall come. (M. G. Pearse.)
Verse 23
Sing, O ye heavens
A song about redemption
The text is a magnificent call to heaven and earth to join in
singing the glories of redemption.
I. IN WHAT
PARTICULARS REDEMPTION CALLS FOR A SONG. Redemption calls for a song when we
remember--
1. Its Author. ¡§The Lord hath done it.¡¨ ¡§The Lord hath redeemed
Jacob.¡¨ Herein is indeed a marvel of grace, demanding the highest anthems
ransomed lips can raise. What could man have been to Him? What shadow of an
obligation was there on His part to put forth the slightest effort to save a
single one? The Lord hath done it alone. With whom took He counsel in this
matter? Who paid part-price with Him? Redemption is no work of the many; it is
God¡¦s own in plan and execution.
2. Its cost (1 Peter 1:18-19).
3. Its completeness. Christ hath so gloriously completed the work of
redemption that nothing can possibly be added to it. Unlike the atonement made
by the Aaronic priesthood, it lasts for ever.
4. Its comprehensiveness. It will take eternity to reveal all. If we
are Christ¡¦s, then have we been redeemed from the hand of Satan. From the guilt
of sin. With the guilt, away goes the power of sin. We are also redeemed from
the consequences of sin. From the power of death Hosea 13:14). Christ hath redeemed the
bodies of His saints for the glories of the resurrection morn.
5. The chiefest cause for song is redemption ¡§being¡¨ that in which
God has been pleased to glorify Himself the most. ¡§The Lord hath glorified
Himself in Israel.¡¨ All the attributes of God are most gloriously to be seen in
redemption work.
II. WHO THOSE ARE
WHO SHOULD SING THE SONG.
1. Heaven! ¡§Sing, O ye heavens,¡¨ and well you may, for redemption has
shed a fresh lustre on your glories. The highest joy the angels can have, is
that which arises from seeing their King glorified. Behold also the redeemed in
heaven! Listen to their song, sweeter even than an angel¡¦s, ¡§Unto Him that
loved us.¡¨ All heaven unites in this redemption song.
2. Let the ransomed on earth take their part. ¡§Shout, ye lower parts
of the earth.¡¨ Behold your serfdom gone--your bonds broken--your chains
snapped--your sins forgiven--your heaven secured, and then sing.
3. Surely who that have loved ones that have been redeemed should
join us in the song.
4. The trembling sinner has good cause to join his voice with ours.
¡§The Lord hath done it.¡¨ If done, then there can be no necessity for any
addition of thine. (A. G. Brown.)
Praise to God for redemption:
I. WHAT IS
IMPORTED IN GOD¡¦S REDEEMING JACOB.
1. That He pays a ransom for our souls.
2. That He rescues us from captivity.
3. That He takes vengeance on our enemies.
4. That He puts us in possession of our inheritance.
II. HOW GOD IS
GLORIFIED, WHEN MAN IS REDEEMED.
1. His infinite wisdom was displayed.
2. His power was illustrated.
3. His grace was shown.
4. His truth was vindicated.
III. THE PRAISE
WHICH OUGHT TO BE ASCRIBED UNTO GOD ON ACCOUNT OF REDEMPTION. The language of
the text has a certain grandeur and beauty. Two things seem to be expressed in
it.
1. Let every creature rejoice in the event.
2. Let all express their joy in every form.
¡§Sing,¡¨ ¡§shout,¡¨ ¡§break forth into singing.¡¨ Praise Him with the
heart. Let ¡§all that is within you bless His holy name.¡¨ Praise Him with the
lips. ¡§Speak of the glory of His kingdom, and talk of His power, to make known
to the sons of men His mighty acts.¡¨ Praise Him with your life. ¡§Ye are bought
with a price, therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are
God¡¦s¡¨ Praise Him in private. ¡§Is anyone merry? Let him sing psalms.¡¨ Praise
Him in public. ¡§O sing unto the Lord a new song, and His praise in the
congregation of the saints.¡¨ (E. Brown.)
The joy of redemption
There are three redemptions which may well make all hearts
rejoice.
I. REDEMPTION BY
BLOOD.
II. REDEMPTION BY
POWER. Conversion and regeneration. What sort of people are those whom Christ
saves? Some were the very worst of the worst. Think of what these souls are
saved from, and of what they are saved to. Some are saved in the teeth of ten
thousand obstacles.
III. REDEMPTION IN
PERFECTION. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The song of songs:
I. LET US SURVEY
THE SCENE. ¡§I have blotted out as a thick cloud thy transgressions, and as a
cloud thy sins.¡¨ So, going forth and returning to their God beneath that clear
sky, from which the Sun of Righteousness shone down with beams of love, the
forgiven people were filled with rejoicing, and by the mouth of the prophet
they cried aloud, ¡§Sing, O heaven, clouds veil thee no longer; shout, ye lower
parts of the earth, which have been refreshed with fertilising showers; shout,
O ye forest trees, whose every bough has been hung with diamond drops; for the
Lord hath redeemed Jacob, and glorified Himself in Israel.¡¨ Thus the scenery of
the text is helpful to the full understanding of it. Read the two verses
together, and their beauty is seen. When did the joyous event take place which
we are bidden to celebrate with song?
1. We may consider it as virtually accomplished in the eternal
counsels of God, for our Lord is ¡§the Lamb slain from before the foundation of
the world.¡¨
2. The clouds were actually removed when the atonement was presented.
3. The text also receives an actual fulfilment to each one of God¡¦s
people in the moment when the eye of faith is first turned to the crucified
Saviour.
4. This also comes true not only at first, but frequently during the
Christian life; for there are times when our unbelief makes new clouds, and
threatens new storms.
5. The text will obtain its best fulfilment at the day of the Lord¡¦s
appearing,--that day around which our chief hopes must ever centre.
II. LET US
CONTEMPLATE THE GLORIOUS SUBJECT FOR JOY. The great subject of joy is
redemption--the redemption of God¡¦s Israel.
1. This is a stupendous work.
2. Of redemption by price and by power we are bidden to sing, a
redemption so pre-eminently desirable that we can never sufficiently value it.
3. The very centre and emphasis of the song seems to me to lie in
this: ¡§The Lord hath done it.¡¨ Whatever God does is the subject of joy to all
pure beings.
4. It is sweet to reflect that redemption is an accomplished fact. It
is not ¡§The Lord will do it,¡¨ but ¡§The Lord hath done it.¡¨
5. We may lay peculiar force upon the word, the Lord hath ¡§done¡¨ it,
for He has finished the work.
6. A very important part of the song, however, lies in the fact that
what God has done glorifies Himself.
III. LET US LISTEN
TO THE SONG. The angels sing, for they have deep sympathy with the redemption
of man; the redeemed in glory sing, for they have been the recipients of this
mighty mercy; the material heavens themselves also ring with the sweet music,
and every star takes up the refrain, and with sun and moon praise the Most
High. Descending from heave, the song charms the lower earth, and the prophet
calls upon materialism to share in the joy; mountains and valleys, forests and
trees, are charged to join the song. Why should they not? This round earth of
ours has been o¡¦ershadowed by the curse through sin; she has yet to be
unswathed of all the mists which iniquity has cast upon her (Romans 8:20-21).
IV. LET US JOIN IN
THIS SONG. Consider how we sing this song. We sing it when by faith we see the
grand truth that Jesus Christ took His people¡¦s sin upon Him, and so redeemed
them. You will be still better able to sing this if you every day realise the
blessings of redemption and pardon, by drawing near to God, using the privilege
of prayer, trusting the Lord for everything, enjoying sonship, and communing
with your heavenly Father. (C. H.Spurgeon.)
Verse 24
I am the Lord that maketh all things
The Maker of heaven and earth
Our object is, not so much to discover from the creation the truth
of the being and character of the Creator, as to see how the Christian belief
in Him as Maker must influence us about the world He has made.
Trust Him as the Fatherly God, who is indeed Maker of heaven and earth, and
what will follow?
I. SUCH A TRUST
WILL ENSURE YOUR RIGHT ATTITUDE WITH REGARD TO SCIENCE.
1. It will free you from all alarm as to the contradictions between
science and the Scripture.
2. But our Christian belief should not only take away all dread of
science, it should inspire its earnest pursuit. For it is the study of the work
of God; a solution of His problems. The stars gleam with the glory of God, the
flowers are fragrant with His sweetness; so that astronomy and botany, as well
as all the sciences, have been well called ¡§sections of theology.¡¨
II. SUCH A TRUST IN
GOD AS THE MAKER OF HEAVEN AND EARTH QUALIFIES YOU FOR RIGHT USE AND ENJOYMENT
OF NATURE. He who believes in the Creator with all his heart will be altogether
a different man in trade or travel, in manufacture of the earth¡¦s productions,
search into her secrets, or enjoyment of her scenery, from the man who darkly
doubts--not to say from the man who impiously denies. For such a belief
excludes the Manichaean heresy, that matter is the creation of evil. It gives
to man that vision and voice about nature that were vouchsafed to Peter when he
was taught to call nothing ¡§common or unclean.¡¨ He who has the spirit of Jesus
Christ, who is reconciled by Him and taught by Him about God, will cherish
Christ¡¦s spirit about nature.
III. SUCH A TRUST IN
GOD INSPIRES WITH HOPE ABOUT THE DESTINY OF CREATION. There is much that is
saddening and bewildering in some of the aspects of creation. ¡§The whole
creation groaneth and travaileth in pain¡¨. In the midst of such reflections, a
great hope glows in the heart that believes in God as ¡§the maker of heaven and
earth.¡¨ For then He is not only seen as a Redeemer mercifully interposing to
alleviate misfortune and to restore some from ruin; but He is known to be the
utterly good God, whose goodness is ¡§over all His works,¡¨ over creation as much
as over redemption. He is a ¡§faithful Creator.¡¨ He will care for His own; will
bring it to the destiny for which He made it.
IV. SUCH A TRUST IN
GOD IS COMPLETELY POSSIBLE THROUGH OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. Jesus has to do with
nature, with us, and with God. He is ¡§the Door¡¨ into nature. Connect all with
Jesus, and we shall connect all with God. (U. R. Thomas, B. A.)
Verse 28
That saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd
Cyrus, the Lord¡¦s shepherd
Cyrus was the ideal king of the Persians and Greeks.
His is the only name that is mentioned with any detail, I believe, both in the
Persian and in the Greek, and also in the Hebrew literature. We speak of the great
heroes of the world as Alexander and Caesar and Napoleon. That list begins too
late. We ought to begin instead with Cyrus, who was at first a prince of a
small principality at the head of the Gulf of Oman. Later he conquered the
Medes and Persians. Later Asia Minor, including Lydia, and at last he captured
Babylon. In capturing Babylon he released from captivity the chosen people, and
it is because of that fact that he is called in the Scriptures, and that he is
known in history by the very unique title of the Lord¡¦s shepherd. There is only
one other person to whom that phrase has ever been applied, and it is a very
singular fact that a heathen king, one entirely out of all line with the chosen
people, one so far away from traditions, which we have been in the habit of
calling sacred, holy, as if his name had been Confucius or Buddha, in the
Scriptures should have been given exactly the same title that was given to our
Lord Jesus Christ Himself. (A. H. Bradforad, D. D.)
The unity of history:
We will observe a few facts in support of my contention that
history is the record of a beneficent development.
1. The governments of the world. In the early time government was
simply for a few; there was no monarchy but force; there was no place for love.
In the present time, in the immortal words of our President,. ¡§Government is of
the people, by the people, for the people. The word which I best remember of
any which I heard spoken in London was by Dr. Bevan, ¡§Of old, government was
for the few; to-day, government is for the many.¡¨ And that is what things have
been moving towards as the years have been passing.
2. Take another illustration, and that from the realm of religion. We
think of one God; but to those early Hebrews there were many gods. They were
not those who believed simply in one God for all the world. They believed in
Jehovah as the God able to subdue all the gods of the heathen. They had not
reached, except in the person of a few of their leaders, the sublime altitude
of modern times of one pervading and all-enduring Unity, one holy, spiritual,
true, and loving God. What¡¨ was their worship?
3. We come to another illustration quite as familiar. We hear very
much in our time concerning the social condition of the labouring people. The
great dumb multitudes have found a voice; and every now and then, some man,
ignorant of history, writes to say the rich were never so rich, and the poor
never so poor; the condition of one class was never so luxurious, the condition
of the other class was never so mean. He does not know what the condition of
the masses was in the time when the pyramids were built, in the time when the
Caesars ruled in Rome and doled out corn to the multitude. He has not read the
history of Great Britain, or of France, or of any other nation of Europe, or on
the face of the earth. The condition of the world is improving. In the old time
the condition of the woman was that of a thing or an animal; she belonged to
her husband. She is a woman now, the equal of her husband. In the old time the
child was absolutely under the power of the father. If the child was an orphan
he was put on the street. Now, to use the phrase of a contemporary writer, ¡§If
he hath no father and if he hath no mother, he becomes the child of the
public.¡¨ What mean our charities? Conclusion--
Notables fulfilling God¡¦s purpose
Rich princes shall do what poor prophets have foretold. (M.
Henry.)
.
Verse 28
That saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd
Cyrus, the Lord¡¦s shepherd
Cyrus was the ideal king of the Persians and Greeks.
His is the only name that is mentioned with any detail, I believe, both in the
Persian and in the Greek, and also in the Hebrew literature. We speak of the
great heroes of the world as Alexander and Caesar and Napoleon. That list
begins too late. We ought to begin instead with Cyrus, who was at first a
prince of a small principality at the head of the Gulf of Oman. Later he
conquered the Medes and Persians. Later Asia Minor, including Lydia, and at
last he captured Babylon. In capturing Babylon he released from captivity the
chosen people, and it is because of that fact that he is called in the
Scriptures, and that he is known in history by the very unique title of the
Lord¡¦s shepherd. There is only one other person to whom that phrase has ever
been applied, and it is a very singular fact that a heathen king, one entirely
out of all line with the chosen people, one so far away from traditions, which
we have been in the habit of calling sacred, holy, as if his name had been
Confucius or Buddha, in the Scriptures should have been given exactly the same
title that was given to our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. (A. H. Bradforad, D.
D.)
The unity of history:
We will observe a few facts in support of my contention that
history is the record of a beneficent development.
1. The governments of the world. In the early time government was
simply for a few; there was no monarchy but force; there was no place for love.
In the present time, in the immortal words of our President,. ¡§Government is of
the people, by the people, for the people. The word which I best remember of
any which I heard spoken in London was by Dr. Bevan, ¡§Of old, government was
for the few; to-day, government is for the many.¡¨ And that is what things have
been moving towards as the years have been passing.
2. Take another illustration, and that from the realm of religion. We
think of one God; but to those early Hebrews there were many gods. They were
not those who believed simply in one God for all the world. They believed in
Jehovah as the God able to subdue all the gods of the heathen. They had not
reached, except in the person of a few of their leaders, the sublime altitude
of modern times of one pervading and all-enduring Unity, one holy, spiritual,
true, and loving God. What¡¨ was their worship?
3. We come to another illustration quite as familiar. We hear very
much in our time concerning the social condition of the labouring people. The
great dumb multitudes have found a voice; and every now and then, some man,
ignorant of history, writes to say the rich were never so rich, and the poor
never so poor; the condition of one class was never so luxurious, the condition
of the other class was never so mean. He does not know what the condition of
the masses was in the time when the pyramids were built, in the time when the
Caesars ruled in Rome and doled out corn to the multitude. He has not read the
history of Great Britain, or of France, or of any other nation of Europe, or on
the face of the earth. The condition of the world is improving. In the old time
the condition of the woman was that of a thing or an animal; she belonged to
her husband. She is a woman now, the equal of her husband. In the old time the
child was absolutely under the power of the father. If the child was an orphan
he was put on the street. Now, to use the phrase of a contemporary writer, ¡§If
he hath no father and if he hath no mother, he becomes the child of the
public.¡¨ What mean our charities? Conclusion--
Notables fulfilling God¡¦s purpose
Rich princes shall do what poor prophets have foretold. (M.
Henry.)
¢w¢w¡mThe Biblical Illustrator¡n