Chapter XXXVII: Part 37

Such was Hezekiah's burst of thankfulness when God heard his prayer, and gave him fifteen years more of life. While the danger lasted, he was surprised into more of alarm than became his place and character; but now, marvellously spared, he calls upon the living everywhere to praise God for His goodness. _His_ case, he feels, was _theirs_ too. All men alike live upon God's bounty, and are debtors to His patience. He guards them from evil,--sends them good things, without which life must be presently extinguished,--renews their being, and makes it over to them by a fresh grant, not only when the closing year reminds us of the gift, but at each day's working time. Therefore Hezekiah is not satisfied with a solitary strain of thanksgiving. He looks round upon a world teeming with animated, intelligent beings, and in every brother who God hath made and kept alive he finds one who should bring in his tribute of praise. He wants a chorus of rejoicing worshippers.

1. This season naturally makes us thoughtful. We think of what life has been to us lately, and what it might have been. We have nearly passed another stage on our journey to the grave, and we miss some who began it with us. We stand, like unwounded soldiers on the battlefield with the dead and the dying all round them. This is all God's doing. He who gives life sustains it. If to have lived on be deemed a blessing, and praise for the boon be due anywhere, it can only be to Him whose providential government of the world is like an hourly repetition of the creative power which called it out of nothing.

2. But is life worth having? Is prolonged life a blessing, and may we fairly require men to be grateful for it? This is assumed by Hezekiah. Life and praise may go well together, because to so great a degree life and happiness go together. Not always. Some are so unhappy that they cry out under their burden, and almost wish, for a moment, for deliverance at any cost. But the settled feeling of men's minds is the other way. To almost all of them life is the hoarded treasure which they will guard at any price. They will put up with the worst they have to bear before they will accept release on the terms of being banished straightway to an unknown world. The reason is, that by the side of this harvest of woe, of which they reap a few ears now and then, there groweth a harvest of blessing, of which they are constant reapers (P. D. 2282, 2256).

3. Remember the "common mercies" of which through another year we have been partakers. Our very senses are so many curious inlets by which pleasures, more or less vivid, come thronging in from the wide world around us. Continued health. Senses and faculties marvellously kept from injury. The happiness of our houses; specially to be remembered at this season. When we call upon the living to praise God, we have much more to show for the demand than the bare fact that God lets them live. He lets most of them live happily. He causes their cup to run over with blessings. He does all this, in spite of forgetfulness and disobedience on their part that would wear out any other love but His (H. E. I. 2307-2309). Praise God for the "common mercies" of another year.

4. While we live we are on mercy-ground. _That_ is the special mercy beyond all our common mercies. Life, while it lasts, connects us with all that is blessed and glorious in the scheme of salvation. While we are here, "there is but a step between us and death;" but while we are here, too, the door stands wide open through which we may pass into the presence-chamber of our King. _While you are here,_ if you will make Christ your friend, sin may be cast out, and the blessed Spirit of truth become your daily Teacher, and your future years be all rich in blessing and bright with hope. Praise God for the prolongation to you of this great opportunity, and embrace it now! Let the new year find you serving Christ.

5. Living saints, as well as spared sinners, should praise God for His preserving mercy. They have had fresh opportunities for serving God and for growth in grace. They have no righteousness of their own wherein to stand before God, and never will have; but talents improved and laid out for God will bring a blessing. He is too bountiful a Master to let any of His servants work for nought. Heaven itself is not alike to all, though it shall be satisfying to the meanest child in God's family. The disciple whom Jesus specially loved leant on His bosom at the Last Supper; and at the marriage-supper, when all the guests shall be assembled from many lands, they who have attained to the godliest stature in their days of conflict shall sit nearest to the King, and wear the brightest crowns (H. E. I. 2751-2753, 3288; P. D. 412, 1752). Every year is a fresh sowing-time for a more abundant harvest.

6. Some among you have special reasons for saying with Hezekiah, "The living," &c. (1.) This strain belongs to the aged man or woman, who has already lived beyond the allotted term of human life. In your feebleness, God has carried you through another stage. Beyond your expectation, perhaps, you have seen another Christmas. Many are the mercies of one year, but when they come to be multiplied by near fourscore, what an array we have then! Praise the Lord! (2.) Some before me, while the year was running out, thought they should never see the end of it. Like Hezekiah, you prayed for life when death seemed to be close upon you. God restored your life to you. What have you done since to show yourself grateful for that mercy? Have a care that your mercies do not make your case worse. If they do not melt, they harden.

7. If the living should praise God, how largely is He defrauded of His due! We are surrounded with living men. Each one of these has a fresh grant of life with each day's sun-rising. What a tide of praise should be going up unceasingly to His throne! Do we find the world so full of praise? Alas! no; if praise be the sign of life, we seem to be walking among the tombs. God is forgotten in His own world. While common friends are thanked for trifling favours, the Giver of mercies, repeated with every breath, is to many of us an unheeded stranger.--_John Hampton Gurney, M.A.: Sermons, chiefly on Old Testament Histories,_ pp. 297-312.

HEZEKIAH'S STRENGTH AND WEAKNESS.

xxxix. 1, 2. _At that time Merodach-baladan, &c._

A study of the character of Hezekiah is profoundly instructive. The sacred writers impartially present him to us in his strength and in his weakness.

I. HEZEKIAH IN HIS STRENGTH.

He was in the full sense of the word a good king (2 Kings xviii. 3, 5). He was conspicuous--1. For his religious zeal. Though, politically, it was a hazardous thing to do, he utterly abolished idolatry in his kingdom. 2. For his religious wisdom (2 Kings. xviii. 4).[1] 3. For his strong faith. This was shown especially in his conduct in the matter of the siege of Jerusalem by Sennacherib. When we consider these things, we may well understand the high praise given to Hezekiah; certainly there were few kings like him; perhaps none who exhibited a ripeness of religious knowledge and a strength of character so remarkably superior to the times in which he lived.

II. HEZEKIAH IN HIS WEAKNESS.

The weakness of his character was displayed--1. When the king of Babylon sent messengers and a present to him to congratulate him on his recovery from his illness. Then he must needs take them over his house and his armoury, and parade before them all the strength of his dominions (2 Kings xx. 12-13). It was natural and right that he should be pleased with the conduct of the king of Babylon; it was gratifying to him personally; it augured well for the future, as concerning his kingdom, that he should be on good terms with the king of Babylon, now rising into power; but it was unworthy of him to lose his self-possession in the manner described. (1.) He was evidently overcome for the nonce by silly feelings of vanity. He seems to have thought that inasmuch as the king of Babylon had considered him worthy of the compliment of sending to him, he on his part must show that he was indeed a very magnificent king, as the king of Babylon had no doubt heard that he was. (2.) His vanity caused him to forget how little service his armoury and his treasures had been to him in the hour of peril (H. E. I. 3998, 4000, 4001, 4011). (3.) His vanity caused him to forego an opportunity of honouring God and of instructing his neighbours in Divine truth.[2] Doubtless it was his failure in duty in this respect that brought upon him so severe a rebuke (vers. 3-7). 2. The weakness of his character had already manifested itself in his conduct during his illness. In the prospect of death his strength of mind quite broke down (ch. xxxviii.) But there was a difference: in the other case he acted unworthily of his knowledge; in this case he was weak because he was, compared with ourselves, weak in religious privileges. He looked to his grave with such melancholy feelings because he could not clearly see a life beyond it. The answer of the great riddle of humanity had been guessed by many before Christ, but His resurrection made the truth clear (2 Tim. i. 10; H. E. I. 3415). If it were not for the light which our Lord has thrown into the grave, we should mourn like Hezekiah, and our eyes would fail as did his. Having more light than he had, it is our duty to live a nobler life than he did, and not to be cowards in prospect of death (H. E. I. 1570-1643).--_Harvey Goodwin, M.A.: Plain Truth Sermons,_ Third Series, pp. 78-92.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Amongst other idolatrous forms of worship which he
destroyed, he broke in pieces the brazen serpent which
Moses had made in the wilderness (2 Kings xviii. 4). Many
men would have been ready to destroy all the heathen forms
of idolatry; they would have made no peace with Baal, or
Dagon, or any other gods of the nations, but they would
have hesitated to destroy a relic of the life of Israel in
the wilderness; they would have thought it sacrilegious to
break up an image which Moses himself had made, and they
would have reasoned that the religious feelings of the
people were so entwined about this memorial of their early
days, that it would do more harm than good to violate their
feelings, and take away that which excited in their minds
religious thoughts. If a king of Judah had so argued, it
would not have seemed right to confound him with the mere
rabble of idolaters. If Hezekiah had destroyed all other
forms of idolatry and left this remaining, we could easily
have found an excuse for his conduct; but forasmuch as he
took a higher view of his duty, we are bound to give him
credit for that higher view, and to remark his spiritual
discernment. Hezekiah was not deceived by any flimsy
arguments about the sacred nature of the relic which the
people adored; it was a cause of idolatry, that was enough.
It had been sacred once. In the wilderness, when it was
held up as an object upon which the people might gaze, it
would have been a sacrilege to mutilate it; but now it was
but "a piece of brass," and if that piece of brass be the
centre of a system of idolatry, there is but one safe
course, and that is to destroy it.--_Goodwin._

[2] If his purpose was to impress upon the Babylonians the
greatness of his strength, the story of the destruction of
Sennacherib would have answered his purpose much better. If
Hezekiah had taken the ambassadors to the Temple, and told
them how he had spread Sennacherib's letter before the
invisible presence of his God in that holy house, and how
he had prayed that the designs of his enemy might be
brought to nought, and how that eventually the Assyrians
had all either perished or fled, the men of Babylon would
have been far more impressed with the power of Hezekiah,
believing as they would that he was under the protection of
an unseen Hand, than they possibly could be by the mere
vulgar display of treasures and armour, which their own
country would show in abundance, and which was the very
thing calculated to excite their desire of
plunder.--_Goodwin._

HOME LIFE AND INFLUENCE.

xxxix. 4. _What have they seen in Thy house?_

State briefly the circumstances that gave rise to this question. It evidently suggests to Hezekiah that he has not made the best use of the visit of the Babylonians. He might have turned it to greater account than the gratification of his vanity by displaying his treasures. Instead of magnifying the greatness and glory of God, and thus lifting the minds of his visitors to the highest themes, he had only held out a bait to their covetous desires, and tempted them to steal the treasures so vainly displayed. This was to be the result of his folly (ver. 6). This is how we miss the great opportunities of our life. There come to us golden seasons when we might bear valuable testimony for God; but we have some petty, personal desires of our own to carry out, and they pass away unimproved. Then comes the prophetic message, borne by our own conscience, that the plan we adopted to gratify our improper desires will only lead us to confusion and unhappiness.

The extent to which Hezekiah came under the censure of God in this matter we shall not now further consider. We shall extend the application of this question to the matter of _home life and home influence._ So it has a bearing on all of us. "What have they seen in _thy_ house?"

I. It should be seen that our home is the common centre of attraction for all the family (P. D. 1828-1830, 1836).

II. In the home each member of the family should be seen faithfully discharging the duties of his or her relationship to it; husbands, wives, fathers, &c.

III. It should be seen that every Christian gift and grace is carefully cultivated. "For Christ's sake," should be the motto of the whole family. In all they do, every member of it should seek to display love such as He manifested when He dwelt among us: His love was patient, magnanimous, sympathetic. This is the way to make the humblest home happy (P. D. 1823, 1834, 1838, 1839).

CLOSING REFLECTIONS.--1. If we do not thus exhibit Christianity at home, it may be questioned whether we possess it at all (H. E. I. 2994). 2. If others know that there is no practical Christianity displayed by us at home, they will rightly set but little value upon our religious performances abroad. 3. It is from the culture of home life that our hopes are to spring with regard to the spiritual life. In the home lurk the disorders that disturb society. The true way to bring these disorders to an end is to endeavour to make the homes of our land the nurseries of every Christian grace and virtue. 4. Let us aim at the accomplishment of the needful national reforms, by each of us doing what we can to make _our own home_ all that it ought to be.--_William Manning._

HEZEKIAH TRIED.

xxxix. 8. _Then said Hezekiah, &c._

In the narrative connected with the text we find much in Hezekiah to be avoided and much worthy of imitation.

+I. We find Hezekiah in great affliction.+ He had recently escaped from great public and national calamity; he is speedily involved in private and personal suffering (ch. xxxviii. 1). "He was sick," and Isaiah was sent to prepare him for death. He was greatly alarmed at the approach of death (ch. xxxviii. 9-14) How different from St. Paul (Phil. i. 23). He lived in a dark and imperfect dispensation; few then had clear views of the world to come (2 Tim. i. 10). Hezekiah's faith failed him greatly, and he clung to life with pertinacity.

+II. In his trouble he sought the Lord+ (ch. xxxviii. 2, 3). He made solemn vows of what he would do if spared (ch. xxxviii. 15). When partially restored, he renewed his vows (ch. xxxviii. 19). Thus believers in every kind of trouble should seek comfort of God in earnest prayer; nor is it improper then solemnly to give ourselves to God, and renew our vows. We are encouraged to do this by the speed with which a gracious answer was sent to Hezekiah (ch. xxxviii. 4, 5). Isaiah was hardly gone out from pronouncing the judgment when he was sent back with a message of mercy (2 Kings xx. 4-5). How wonderfully compassionate is God to His feeble people! Their poor, trembling prayers, uttered in fear and doubting, are heard and answered. He not only hears prayer, but answers directly (Dan. ix. 20-23).

+III. We find him speedily forgetful of the mercy he had received.+ Ambassadors arrive at his court. Whence and for what purpose? (vers. 1, 2). What an opportunity for him to redeem his vows, and to proclaim the power and goodness of God to these heathens! Alas! he shows them all his riches, &c., but of God and His temple he says nothing. Flattered and betrayed by the world (vers. 3, 4), what a heart his and ours must be! _How could this be?_ We are told (2 Chron. xxxii. 31) that such is man when left to himself! We are never in greater danger than after seasons of great mercy and special providences (H. E. I. 4902-4904).

+IV. He humbly received the rebuke that was sent to him+ (text). Here the habit of his mind appeared: he had fallen into the sin of vanity, but humility and resignation to the will of God, especially to His afflicted dispensations, were his usual characteristics. A clear evidence of true godliness, meekly and cheerfully to submit to fatherly correctives. Aaron (Lev. x. 1-3), Eli (1 Sam. iii. 18), the bereaved mother (2 Kings iv. 26), David (Ps. cxix. 75).

LESSONS.--1. _Let us cultivate humility, watchfulness, and jealously of ourselves_ (H. E. I. 4883, 4901). 2. _Let us not be disconsolate because we are conscious of weakness and unworthiness._ The errors and failings of the best of men are left on record, not to extenuate our sins, but to save us from despair. They were men of like passions with ourselves--the same infirmities and corruptions--yet God bore with them, and saved them out of all their distresses. Let us therefore "hope to the end," and "patiently continue in well-doing," believing that we shall be "more than conquerors through Him who hath loved us" (H. E. I. 1117, 2376).--_F. Close, A.M.: Fifty-two Sketches of Sermons,_ pp. 52-55.

SUBMISSION UNDER GOD'S REBUKE.

xxxix. 8. _Then said Hezekiah, &c._

I. THE REBUKE.

The character of Hezekiah is well known. One of the very best of the kings of Judah (2 Kings xviii. 3-7). Nevertheless even in this excellent man there were moral weaknesses which were displayed when his physical malady was removed. The arrival of the Babylonian ambassadors excited within him hopes of political advantages arising from alliance with the idolatrous king whom they represented, and in order to impress the envoys with a sense of his importance, he made an ostentatious display of his wealth (ver. 2). This displeased the Lord. Why? 1. Because Hezekiah let slip a favourable opportunity of making known to the heathen the glory and the goodness of the God of Israel.[1] 2. Because his ostentation made it plain that pride was usurping the throne of his heart (2 Chron. xxxii. 26).

But this was not the habitual frame of Hezekiah's mind; he was a good man, and therefore God lovingly chastened him. If it had been the wicked Ahab who had done this deed, the Lord might possibly have taken no notice of it; He might have left that idolatrous sinner to have followed his own devices. But seeing this evil spirit begin to show itself in a pious and humble man, the Lord mercifully and savingly interposes to check it in the beginning (vers. 3-7).

II. THE MANNER IN WHICH IT WAS RECEIVED.

Sharp as was the rebuke sent him by Isaiah, Hezekiah so received it as to give a rare example of pious and cheerful resignation (text). Both parts of his reply are remarkable. 1. _"Good is the word of the Lord which thou hast spoken."_ None but a child of God could have used this language in sincerity, under such trying circumstances. But he has such faith in God, that although it is impossible for him to foresee what wickedness his posterity would commit, he knows that the decree will be found to be righteous (1 Sam. iii. 18). But doubtless he meant something more than submission to God's sovereignty; he meant to acknowledge the goodness of the Lord to himself, of which this very rebuke was a new manifestation (H. E. I. 190-196, 162-165). 2. _"He said moreover, For there shall be peace and truth in my days."_ That is, God hath been pleased to inform me that my children are to be carried into captivity and to suffer much affliction; but in my grief for this, I must not forget to thank Him for His tender mercies to myself. He has declared that I shall have peace, and this is far more than I deserve.

APPLICATION.--1. We may learn what exceeding sinfulness and immense danger there often is in sins which we are apt to pass over as trifles, and hardly to notice in ourselves (H. E. I. 4897, 4898, 4516). 2. Remark an inestimable privilege of the children of God's love: they may fall into the very same troubles as their naughty neighbours, but in the one case calamity is the angry lash of the law, in the other it is the faithful rebuke of an anxious Father. 3. For the history of God's dealings with Hezekiah we may infer what must be the wisest wish for any man to make, viz., that God would take us into His holy keeping and choose our inheritance for us. If we were left to determine for ourselves, some would choose one thing, and some another. Yet "sorrow is better than laughter;" and the history of Hezekiah is proof of it (H. E. I. 211, 3986, 3998-4001). 4. If sin have brought rebuke unto you, search and try your ways, that you may see what your transgression and weakness is; and then accept the chastening of the Lord as a token of His love (H. E. I. 144-147). 5. Whatsoever may have befallen you, remember always that the mercies which remain are far greater than you deserve; and that in the day of prosperity, no less than in the evil, there is need for perseverance and watchfulness (H. E. I. 4888-4890).--_Archdeacon Bather: Sermons on Old Testament Histories,_ pp. 275-285.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] If, instead of showing them his treasures, he had related
to these idolatrous Chaldeans, who were worshippers of the
sun, the account of his marvellous cure, and especially the
miracle by which the shadow was made to go ten degrees
backward on the dial, he might have been the means of
bringing them to the knowledge of the true God who made the
heavens, and of convincing them that He was master even of
that glorious luminary, which they ignorantly adored
instead of its Creator.--_Bather._

ADDITIONAL OUTLINES.

* * * * * * * *

INSTINCT FOLLOWED--REASON DISREGARDED.

i. 3. _The ox knoweth his owner, &c._

"We are wise." So spake the Greek of old in the pride of his intellectual powers, and so speak many in our own day who have imbibed the spirit of the Greek. Reason is a wonderful faculty, and there have not been wanting, in any age of the world, those who have felt elated by their successful exercise of it. It can look before and after, deriving experience from the past and suggestions provision against the future. It can explore the hidden secrets of Nature and render the world of matter subservient to man; it can turn in upon itself and speculate upon its own processes; nay, it can teach us something of the existence and attributes of the Most High. Such being the triumphs of reason, it can hardly be matter of wonder that the wise men of this world plume themselves on the attainment of those triumphs.

The vainglorying of men, however, whatever form it may assume, is abomination in the sight of God. In the scheme of salvation which God has devised there is no room for boasting either of our moral or intellectual endowments: "It is excluded." That scheme is essentially humbling in its character; it is so constructed as to shut out pride at every cranny where it could possibly insinuate itself; it is such as to stop every mouth and bring in all the world guilty before God. And not only guilty, but blind also. He will have all the world convicted in the court of Conscience of folly, no less than of sin. In order to bring His people to this conviction, he expostulates with them in many passages of His Word on the vainglorious boasts they were in the habit of uttering, shows them their utter emptiness, and exhibits the inconsistency of man's moral conduct with his pretensions to wisdom and enlightenment (cf. Jer. viii. 7, 8).

Our text implies two things--1. That the religion subsisting between the brute creation and man is in some measure similar to that which subsists between man and God; and, 2. That the acknowledgement made by dumb animals of their relation to mankind strangely contrasts with the natural man's refusal of acknowledgement to God.

+I. We are to compare the relations subsisting between an inferior and a superior creature with those subsisting between a superior and the Creator.+ Note, though these relations may be susceptible of comparison, and may be used to lift up our minds to apprehension of the truth, there is an insufficiency in the lower relation to type out the higher. The distance between man and the inferior creatures, if great, is measurable; whereas the distance between finite man and the Infinite God is incalculable.

The dumb creature recognises the master whose property it is: "The ox knoweth his owner." What constitutes man's right of ownership in the ox? Simply the fact that he bought it. He did not create it. If he supports its life, it is only by providing it with a due supply of food, not by ministering to it momentarily the breath which it draws, nor by regulating the springs of its animal economy. That is the sum of his ownership. _But what constitutes God's right of ownership in us, His intelligent and rational creatures?_

1. We are the work of His hands. Creation constitutes a property in all our faculties and a claim to our services which no creature hath or can have in another.

2. Our property is most entire, our claim of right most indisputable, in those things which, having been once deprived of them by fraud or violence, we have subsequently paid a price to recover. The flocks and herds in the possession of civilised European settlers in uncivilised countries are often swept away by a barbarous horde of native freebooters. Imagine, then, a case in which, it being impossible to bring the offenders by justice (by reason of their numbers and strength), the owners of the cattle should effect a ransom of their property by laying down a sum equivalent to its value. Is it not thenceforth theirs by a double claim--the claim of original ownership and the claim of subsequent ransom? Such is the claim which God has over us. That claim, grounded originally upon the fact of creation, has been confirmed, enlarged, extended a thousand-fold by the fact of redemption (1 Cor. vi. 20; 1 Pet. i. 18, 19).

3. Our text suggests another detail of the claims which our Heavenly Owner has upon our allegiance: "The ass knoweth his master's crib." He knows the manger at which he is fed and the hand that feeds him. Here is a palpable claim upon regard, although by no means so high as those previously advanced. It is a claim appreciable by the senses, capable of being understood and responded to by the mere animal nature. In palliation of man's neglect of those claims of God which are established by creation and redemption, it might haply be pleaded that he is a creature of the senses, and that the facts of creation and redemption are not cognisable by them. These stupendous facts are transacted and past. But even this paltry justification is entirely cut off by the fact here implied, that man is indebted to God for his daily maintenance, for the comfort and the convenience even of his animal life.[1]

Observe, also, that it is not the brute creation _in a savage state_ whose relations towards men are here drawn into comparison with the relations of man towards God. To illustrate his argument the inspired writer has chosen instances from the domestic animals, who share man's daily toils, live as his dependants, and are familiarised by long habit with their master's abode and ways of life. In drawing out the contrast, he does not mention mankind generally, but "_Israel_ doth not know, _my people_ doth not consider." It were in some measure excusable that the heathens should refuse acknowledgement to the living God, whom they know not. But what shall we urge in extenuation of the indifference of "Israel," who from his very infancy has been of the household of God, domesticated by the hearth of the Universal Parent, and furnished with every means of access to His presence?

+II. A contrast is drawn between the acknowledgement made by dumb animals of their relation to their owners and Israel's refusal of acknowledgment to his God.+

The cattle "know" or recognise the voice of their owner; his call they heed, in his steps they follow; irrational creatures though they be, they are not insensible to their benefactor's fond cares. What a cutting reproof of the insensibility of God's people!

1. They recognise not God in His warnings, whether they be addressed to them as individuals or to the nation of which they are members. Afflictions arrest them not in their career of vanity and sin. Judgments stir them not out of their lethargy of indifference. They hear not, see not, God in them.

2. They do not acknowledge God in His mercies. God's blessings of Nature and Providence are accepted by them as a matter of course. If regarded at all, they are traced no higher than to secondary causes. The continual experience of them renders them not one whit more submissive to the yoke of God's service. As to the higher blessings of forgiveness and grace, they feel no need of them, and evince no gratitude for them.

Want of consideration is the root and reason of this strange insensibility. It is not that "Israel" lacks the faculty of apprehending God, but he will not be at pains to exercise that faculty. It is not that he lacks a speculative knowledge of the truths now set forth, but that he does not lay to heart this knowledge, nor allow it its due weight.--_E. M. Goulburn, D.C.L.: Sermons,_ pp. 153-181.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Of this fact a strongly figurative but very beautiful
statement is contained in a passage of Hosea--a passage
remarkably illustrative of that before us, inasmuch as
there also the imagery is drawn from man's dealings with
the cattle. "I drew them," says God, "with the cords of a
man, with bonds of love: and I was to them as they that
take off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto
them." _"I was to them as they that take off the yoke on
their jaws."_ The owner of the ox does not overtask his
strength, does not cause him to toil in the furrow without
intermission. At the approach of evening the faithful
animal is driven homewards, and freed from the shackles of
the galling and burdensome yoke. An image this of God's
dealing with His human children. Our every period of
refreshment and repose, of ease and relaxation from toil,
is from the unseen hand of our heavenly Owner. Those many
fractions of comfort and happiness which lighten the load
of life--those numerous (although momentary) glimpses of
sunshine which relieve the plodding routine of our daily
career--those flowers with which the path of the great
majority is more or less strewed: the innocent sally of
mirth, the smile of affection, the expression of sympathy,
the cheering word of encouragement from those whose
encouragement is justly valued--these, like all other
mercies, are from God, and (though these be but a small
part of what we have to be thankful for) are designed to
draw us towards Him in bonds of gratitude and love.

_"And I laid meat unto them."_ By those who avail
themselves of their services, the cattle are supplied with
provender. God not only called us into being, but maintains
us in being. He it is who gives us our daily bread, and
spreads our board with food convenient for us; for food,
for health, for continuance of life our dependence upon Him
is absolute. By means of these and similar mercies it is
that God establishes a claim to the gratitude and
devotedness even of those among His rational creatures who
have most deeply buried themselves in the things of time
and sense, and whose hearts seem to be stirred by no breath
of spiritual aspiration, and troubled by no prospect of
eternity.--_Goulburn._

THE CESSATION OF WAR.

ii. 4. _They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and
their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up
sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any
more._

A prediction of times yet to come. It is never yet been fulfilled. It is true that when the religion of Christ came to the world it came with the spirit and principles of an all-pacific dispensation (_"On earth peace, goodwill towards men"_); and true that, in the degree of its actual prevalence, this has been the effect. But how far is this from anything adequate to the terms of the prediction, which exhibit a bright and ample idea of this spirit and tendency of Christianity realised, reduced to fact, on the great scale!

+I. War has been a prominent character of all ages.+

1. Man, when he came fresh from his Creator's hands, must have had in his soul the principle of all kind affections (Gen. i. 27), a state of feeling that would have been struck with horror at the thought of inflicting suffering. Yet in the first family of man war and slaughter began. Men may argue and quibble against our notion of _"the fall,"_ but here was fall enough! and demonstration enough!

2. War prevailed among the antediluvians (Gen. vi. 5, 12). We are told of some that "became mighty men, men of renown." How? Partly perhaps in a war against savage beasts, but far more in the exploits of that "violence" which filled the earth, and doomed it to be overwhelmed.

3. War prevailed among the race descended from Noah. It was by the descendants of the only faithful friend and servant of the Almighty found on earth that the desolated world was to be repeopled, and we might have hoped for a better race, if human nature were intrinsically good, or corrigible by the most awful dispensations. But the Flood could not cleanse the nature of man, nor the awful memory of it repress the coming forth of selfishness, pride, ambition, anger, and revenge. (1.) The history of the Jews is to a large extent a history of wars. (2.) The history of the other races is a history of their conflicts with each other, of a terrible process by which the smaller states were absorbed in others, until they were all included in the Roman empire. How many millions of human beings were destroyed in the process! (3.) Since that period the history of the world has been to a large extent written in blood.[1]

_Reflections:_--1. What a state of the spirit of mankind is here disclosed to us! 2. What a state of Christianity, or to any real prevalence of it, among the nations denominated Christian! 3. How necessary that all religious persons, especially tutors and parents, should set themselves systematically, as opportunities offer, to counterwork that maddening enchantment of the "glory" of war; of war considered merely as the field of great exploits. Let them strive to break up, in the view of young and ardent minds, this splendid, pestilent delusion about heroes, conquests, fame, and glory.

+II. War is not necessarily sinful, nor are those engaged in it to be always condemned.+ Defensive war does not violate Christian principles. Nay, it is sometimes a duty.[2] An opposite opinion is held by some who rest on the literal and extreme construction of a few expressions, such as "Resist not evil," "Give place to wrath," "Love your enemies," "To him that smiteth thee on one cheek, turn also the other." These interdict revenge. But their unqualified literal interpretation requires that Christianity should subject mankind universally to the unrestrained will of whoever is the most unjust and wicked; should teach that so long as there are men who have more of Satan and Moloch in them than the rest, and are intent on practicing oppression and cruelty, it is the absolute duty of Christians, as such, individually and nationally, to let them do it,--at least rather than resist them in such a way as to endanger their persons. This would be a delightful doctrine to all the tyrants, bigots, slave-drivers, robbers, and murderers! But the magistrate is not _so_ to leave the matter to God's disposal, or to refrain from using the "sword" against the doers of evil. And the government of a nation is but a magistracy on a large scale.

But those principles upon which a Christian casuist would justify war, under certain possible circumstance, would not justify perhaps one in twenty of the wars that have been waged. Very rare has been the instance of a war, on either side, strictly and purely defensive, of either the nation itself or any other endangered or oppressed people depending on its protection. Hence--

+III. We rejoice over this prediction that war is to cease on the earth.+

1. This prediction spreads a visionary sense before us so new, strange, and delightful, that nothing but prophecy, and faith in the Divine power and goodness, could enable us to expect its realisation.[3]

2. It is difficult to conceive the practicability of its attainment. For it is something intrinsic in the soul and nature of man, throughout the whole race, that war has sprung from. _There_ is the hot and terrible element that has burst abroad in so many thunders. And yet is it _man_ that is to be universally at peace! How can it be? (2 Kings vii. 2). Vicious selfishness, ambition, envy, rivalry, rapacity, revenge, these are the things in men that cause wars between them, on the small scale and the great. How can these ever be so repressed, subdued, extirpated, that all war shall cease?

3. Certainly not by experience, philosophy, or civilisation.[4]

4. Nothing will operate efficaciously to this grand effect that does not go deep into the constitution of men's souls, and quell internally those fatal passions which have perpetuated external war. And that is what cannot be done by any civilisation, national refinement, science, or even an enlightened theoretical policy. All these may be but like fair structures and gardens extended over a ground where volcanic fires are in a temporary slumber below. All these may be shattered and exploded by some mighty impulse of ambition or some blast of revengeful anger. No; there must be a greater, nobler power brought into prevalence among mankind. Nothing springing merely from the action of the human mind can suffice. It must be something coming from heaven. CHRISTIANITY is the appointed and qualified agent.

+IV. It is credible that Christianity will cause wars to cease upon the earth.+

1. It has accomplished something in this direction already. To _it_ is mainly attributable the mitigation of ferocity and exterminatory rage, so evident in modern wars. We dare not assert even that it may not have prevented some wars.

2. It is essentially a peacemaker. Look at its genuine tendency, as displayed on the smaller scale, in a family, a neighbourhood, a district: a family in a constant state of hostility within itself, but at length the members of it are converted by the religion of Jesus Christ. The consequence how happy! (H. E. I. 1126.)

3. Precisely as it progresses among any people it will produce a distaste for war.[5]

4. Consequently its progress among the nations is a progressive abolition of war. Every extension of this blessed religion is so much gained against war; quenching still another and another spark of infernal fire; repressing in some more minds those evil passions which are the prompters and the essential power of war.

5. Christianity _is_ progressing among the nations.

6. Consequently it is reasonable to cherish the hope of a scene of universal peace (P. D. 2675).

CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS.--1. The universal cessation of war means much more than merely the cessation of much mischief. Think what will be effected when the wealth, time, labour, art, ingenuity, of truly Christian nations are directed to the noblest purposes of peace! 2. Extirpate the war-spirit from your own breast. The selfish, proud, arrogant, envious, revengeful, are essentially of the _war tribe,_ however, little they have to do with actual war, however much they may condemn and profess to deplore it. Such individuals are not fit for that future terrestrial "kingdom of heaven."--_John Foster: Lectures, Second Series,_ pp. 142-173.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] What a vision of destruction! Think of all that tormented
and desolated the earth during the long period of the fall
of the Roman Empire,--of that inundation of revenge and
death, the progress and utmost extension of the Mahomedan
power; of the mighty account of slaughter in the Spanish
conquest of America; of the almost incessant wars among the
states of civilised Europe down nearly to the present hour.
Think even of the bloody wars within our own island,
especially on the border between its northern and southern
divisions; the hundreds of remaining fortresses, monumental
of war. And to complete the account--as if the whole solid
earth were not wide enough--the sea has been coloured with
blood, and received into its dark gulf myriads of the
slain, as if it could not destroy enough by its tempests
and wrecks!--_Foster._

[2] Almost four or five years since, our Government had a war
with the Pindarees--a terrible assemblage of outlaws,
robbers, and murderers, to the number of fifty thousand,
occupying a strong and almost inaccessible tract on the
northern frontier. Thence with impetuous rapidity, they
rushed down, all horsemen, on the country, inhabited by a
population of cultivators; seized whatever could easily be
carried off, and with furious eagerness demolished, burnt,
destroyed the rest. But far more than this, they were
universally possessed with the spirit of murder; they
killed the people without regard to sex or age. Not only
so, but when sufficiently at leisure for such amusement,
they inflicted excruciating tortures previous to death.

Now, when the Governor-General had intelligence of
this--_what was he to do? what,_ acting as a Christian?
_Nothing?_ What, as a great magistrate, did he "bear the
sword" for? What was he Governor at all for? To lie in
splendid state, and number and tax the people? Or was he to
direct that prayer should be made in the churches for
something very like a miracle? And on failure of that,
prayers that the wretched people he governed might be all
meekly resigned to their fate? and that even should the
fell and fiendish legion, being unresisted, choose to
pursue their way all down to Calcutta, all the people in
their tract could not escape, and at last himself and the
people of the city, might be enabled calmly to submit to a
sovereign dispensation of Providence?

He did not do this. He chose rather to set out on the rule
of his appointment, to be "a terror to evil-doers," "a
minister of God, a revenger, to execute wrath upon them
that do evil" (Rom. xiii. 4). But if war is in all possible
cases wrong, he perpetuated an enormous crime against
Christianity in marching his armies with a celerity
unparalleled in that climate, and encountering,
intercepting, and exterminating the murderers, so that the
surviving people could feel themselves in peace.

* * * * * * *

Put the stronger case of an immense host of northern
barbarians being landed on our coasts (Tartars, Cossacks,
Calmucks), and joined there by the legions of the Popish
states, what would happen if we all, as Christians, judged
it wrong and wicked to fight? Unless, indeed, we should
suppose a divided opinion in the nation with respect to the
Christian principle of the case, and that so a very large
and powerful proportion was resolute to resist in all the
array and action of war. Now, while with the utmost
sacrifice and peril they were doing so, and suppose
successfully, what a remarkable phenomenon would be
presented! namely, the other division of the people
deploring these very proceedings and successes by which
their houses are saved from ravage and
desolation,--deploring them as an awful outrage against
Christian rectitude,--praying for the instant _conversion_
of these deluded men to a right apprehension of Christian
duty,--that they might immediately throw away their arms
and allow the barbarian inundation to burst forward! Or,
having failed in this prayer (and a mighty victory having
finally cleared the land of the infernal irruption), then
lamenting that a dreadful national violation of Christian
principles had been irretrievably consummated! And as
success purchased by crime can in the result be little else
than a calamity and a judgment, they might be alarmed and
dismayed to find themselves still in possession of their
former freedom of worship, of speech, of action, and of all
their rights as citizens.--_Foster._ (Written in 1823.)

[3] It is difficult to realise the fact to our imagination. No
fighting on the face of the whole earth! no armies, no
military profession, no garrisons, nor arms, nor banners,
nor proclamations! No leagues, offensive or defensive; no
guarding of frontiers; no fortresses; no military prisons!
No celebrating of victories in gaudy pomps and revelries
for the vulgar, or in prostituted poetry for the more
refined! A wondering what kind of times those could be in
which mankind accounted it the highest glory to kill one
another! Truly this is a state of things we are ill
prepared even to conceive!--_Foster._

[4] Such things will be _included,_ certainly, in whatever
process can and shall reduce the world at length to peace;
they will be taken as accessories and subsidiaries to the
Master Power in operation. But whoever would reckon on such
things alone should be strangely mortified, one thinks, in
adverting to many facts of old and recent history. What,
for example, is he to do with the history of Greece? or of
the Italian Republics? Or nearer home, Britain and France
account themselves the most enlightened and civilised
states in the world; they have not been, with all their
might, fighting and slaying each other and neighbouring
nations for centuries, almost without intermission, down to
this time! In the French revolutionary government, which,
after a time, became essentially warlike, there were more
philosophers, speculative, literary men, than ever in any
other. In our own country, through the last half-century,
the enlightened and civilised people (often so described
and lauded at least) have needed but a little excitement,
at any time, to rush out into war. Our institutions of
learning, and even theology, have constantly abetted the
spirit. An ever-flowing, impetuous stream there has been of
oratory, poetry, and even pulpit declamation, mingling with
and inspiriting the coarse torrent of the popular zeal for
battles and victories. We have had both poets and divines
actually sending the most immoral heroes to heaven, on the
mere strength of their falling in patriotic combat. All
this tells but ill for the efficacy of civilisation,
literature, refinement, and the instruction of experience
to promote the spirit of peace, without the predominance of
some mightier cause.--_Foster._

[5] What will the natural consequences be in respect to war?
Will it not be coldness towards that pernicious phantasm,
martial "glory";--a loathing of that sort of eloquence and
poetry that are making a god of it;--a hatred of the very
name of ambitious conquerors;--horror at the image of vast
masses of men waiting to destroy one another;--a sense of
the flagrant absurdity, as well as iniquity, of the
avenging some little wrong at the cost of so mighty a
portion and variety of misery;--and a faith that Providence
has not so abandoned the world that we are not to wait one
moment for any interposition from it in favour of justice,
but, the instant the scales of justice are poised, we must
throw in the sword? Such would be the spirit and temper of
a nation predominantly Christian.--_Foster._

GOD EXALTED IN THE GREAT DAY.

(_Advent Sermon._)

ii. 17. _The Lord alone shall be exalted in that day._

Two questions: What is "that day?" How shall the Lord then be exalted?

I. _"That day."_ "The first five verses of this chapter foretell the kingdom of the Messiah, the conversion of the Gentiles, and their admission into the Church. From the sixth verse to the end is foretold the punishment of the unbelieving Jews for their idolatrous practices, their confidence in their own strength, and distrust of God's protection; and, moreover, the destruction of idolatry in consequence of the establishment of Messiah's kingdom."--_Lowth._ But here, as in many other portions of Scripture, a larger and remoter meaning looms beyond and behind the first sense of the expressions, which would otherwise be too big and swelling for the actual interpretation of them. Compare the description in which the text twice occurs with the almost parallel passages in chap. v. 14-16. How magnificent! What startling terms! What emphatic iterations! Surely a want of fitness and congruity would almost be felt if expressions such as these referred _only_ to some temporal calamity of the Jewish nation; surely we cannot mistake in looking onward to some mightier catastrophe, to some final exaltation of God and abasement of all creatures. By "_that_ day," therefore, we mean what is elsewhere called "_the_ day," "the great day," "the day of judgment," "the great and terrible day of the Lord"--the consummation of all things.

When that day shall come I do not know, and I am content to remain in ignorance. It may come suddenly, without warning, unannounced. Then it is for men always to have their lamps burning and their hearts in readiness, lest they be taken by surprise. It may come with great signs preceding and accompanying it. Then it is for men, according to their capacity, to note and discern those signs. It is the very uncertainty connected with it that is to make us watchful (Matt. xxiv. 36, 42). We are to be vigilant and observant, without pretending to determine what God has left unrevealed. Such attempts have in all ages been made, and in all ages have been falsified. The failure of those attempts has not only covered those who made them or believed in them with ridicule, it has brought into discredit the sacred Book which the aim was to expound. It is our first duty and highest interest to be at every moment prepared; but a far other and better preparation may, and must be made for it, than in the futile endeavour to discover its precise date.[1]