1. Give ear, O my people, to my law. We naturally expect God’s chosen nation to be first in
hearkening to his voice. When God sends forth his messengers trained to declare
his word with power, it is the least we can do to give them our ears and the
earnest obedience of our hearts. His teaching has the force of law; let us
yield both ear and heart to it. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
Give earnest attention; lean forward to catch every syllable. We are, as
readers of the sacred records, bound to study them deeply, exploring their meaning,
and laboring to practice their teaching. As the officer of an army commences
his drill by calling for “Attention,” every trained soldier of Christ is
called upon to give ear to his words.
2. I will open my mouth in a parable. Analogies are intended by God to be traced between the
story of Israel and the lives of believers. Unspiritual people may sneer about
fancies and mysticisms, but Paul said, “which things are an allegory,” and
Asaph in the present case called his narrative “a parable.” I will utter
dark sayings of old. The mind of the poet-prophet was so full of ancient
lore that he poured it forth in a copious stream of song, with spiritual truth
capable of enriching those who could dive and bring them up. Verse 2 hints
that the outer sense conceals an inner and hidden meaning, which only the
thoughtful will be able to perceive.
3. Which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told
us. Tradition was of the utmost service
to the people of God in the olden time, before the more sure word of prophecy
had become complete and generally accessible. The receipt of truth from the
lips of others laid the instructed believer under solemn obligation to pass on
the truth to the next generation. Blessed be God, we have now the less mutable
testimony of written revelation, but this by no means lessens our obligation to
instruct our children in divine truth by word of mouth. Ministers and
Sabbath-school teachers were never meant to be substitutes for mothers’ tears
and fathers’ prayers.
4. We will not hide them from their children. Our negligent silence must not deprive our own and our
father’s offspring of the precious truth of God. Showing to the generation
to come the praises of the Lord.
We will look forward to future generations, and endeavor to provide for their
godly education. It is the duty of the church of God to maintain, in fullest
vigor, every agency intended for the religious education of the young; to them
we must look for the church of the future, and as we sow towards them, so shall
we reap. Children ought to be made to know his strength, and his wonderful
works that he hath done. The first lesson for a child should be concerning
his mother’s God. Teach him what you will, if he learn not the fear of the Lord
he will perish for lack of knowledge. Around the fire-side fathers should
repeat not only the Bible records, but the deeds of the martyrs and reformers,
and moreover the dealings of the Lord with themselves both in providence and
grace. Children should be taught cheerfully by word of mouth by their own
mothers and fathers, as well as by the printed pages of what they too often
regard as dull, dry task books.
5. For he established a testimony in Jacob. The favored nation existed for the very purpose of
maintaining God’s truth in the midst of surrounding idolatry. They were the
guardians of the truth. And appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded
our fathers, that they should make them known to their children. We have
the command for this oral transmission very frequently given in the Pentateuch
(for example, Deuteronomy 6:7).
6. That the generation to come might know them, even the
children which should be born.
As far as our brief life allows us to arrange, we must industriously provide
for the godly nurture of youth. The narratives, commands, and doctrines of the
Word of God are not worn out; they are calculated to exert an influence as long
as our race exists. Who should arise and declare them to their children.
The one object aimed at is transmission; the testimony is only given that it
may be passed on to succeeding generations.
7. That they might set their hope in God. Faith comes by hearing. Those who know the name of the Lord
will set their hope in him, and that they may be led to do so is the main end
of all spiritual teaching. And not forget the works of God. Grace cures
bad memories; those who soon forget the merciful works of the Lord have need of
teaching; they require to learn the divine art of holy memory. But keep his
commandments. Those who forget God’s works are sure to fail in their own.
He who does not keep God’s love in memory is not likely to remember his law.
The design of teaching is practical; holiness towards God is the end we aim at,
and not the filling of the head with speculative notions.
8. And might not be as their fathers, a stubborn and
rebellious generation. Fathers
stubborn in their own way, and rebellious against God’s way, are sorry examples
for their children; and it is earnestly desired that better instruction may
bring forth a better race. If our fathers were rebellious we must be better
than they were, or else we shall perish as they did. A generation that set
not their heart aright. They had no decision for righteousness and truth.
In them was no preparedness, or willingness of heart, to entertain the Saviour;
neither judgments, nor mercies could bind their affections to their God; they
were fickle as the winds, and changeful as the waves. And whose spirit was
not steadfast with God. The tribes in the wilderness were constant only in
their inconstancy; there was no depending upon them. It was, indeed, needful
that their descendants should be warned, so that they might not blindly imitate
them. How blessed would it be if each age improved upon its predecessor; but
alas, it is to be feared that decline is more general than progress, and too
often the hearts of true saints are far more rebellious than even their fathers
were in the unregeneracy.
9. Well
equiped with the best weapons, the leading tribe failed in faith and courage
and retreated before the foe. There were several particular instances of this,
but probably the psalmist refers to the general failure of Ephraim to lead the
tribes to the conquest of Canaan. How often have we also, though supplied with
every gracious weapon, failed to wage successful war against our sins: we have
marched onward gallantly enough till the testing hour has come, and then in
the day of battle we have proved false to good resolutions and holy
obligations. Array unregenerate people in the best that nature and grace can
supply, and they still remain helpless cowards in the holy war, so long as they
lack a loyal faith in their God.
10. They kept not the covenant of God. Vows and promises were broken, idols set up, and the living
God was forsaken. They were brought out of Egypt in order to be a people
separated unto the Lord, but they fell into the sins of other nations, and did
not maintain a pure testimony for the one only true God. And refused to walk
in his law. They gave way to fornication, idolatry, and other violations of
the Decalogue, and were often in a state of rebellion against the benign
theocracy under which they lived. They had pledged themselves at Sinai to keep
the law, and then they willfully disobeyed it.
11. Had they
remembered his works and wonders, they would have been filled with gratitude
and inspired with holy awe; but the memory of God’s mercies to them was as soon
effaced as if written upon water. Scarcely could one generation retain the
sense of the divine presence in miraculous power; the succeeding race needed a
renewal of the manifestations, and even then was not satisfied without many
displays. Before we condemn them, let us repent of our own wicked
forgetfulness.
12. Egypt,
here called the field of Zion, was the scene of marvelous things which
were done in open day in the sight of Israel. These were extraordinary,
upon a vast scale, indisputable, and such as ought to have rendered it
impossible for an Israelite to be disloyal to God.
13. He divided the sea, and caused them to pass through. When the waters were divided the bottom of the sea would
naturally have been in a very unfit state for the passage of so vast a host as
that of Israel; it would have been impassable had not the Lord made the road
for his people. And he made the waters to stand as an heap. He forbade a
drop to fall upon his chosen; they felt no spray from the crystal walls on
either hand. Fire will descend and water stand upright at the bidding of the
Lord of all. The nature of creatures is retained or altered at the will of him
who first created them. The Lord can cause those evils which threaten to
overwhelm us to suspend their ordinary action, and become innocuous to us.
14. In the daytime also he led them with a cloud. He did it all. He alone. He brought them into the
wilderness, and he led them through it; it is not the Lord’s manner to begin a
work, and then cease from it while it is incomplete. The cloud both led and
shadowed the tribes. It was by day a vast sunscreen, rendering the fierce heat
of the sun and the glare of the desert sand bearable. And all the night with
a light of fire. All and every night the token of his presence was with his
people. The grace which calms our joys soothes our sorrows. We have felt him to
be both shade and light, according as our changing circumstances have required.
15. He clave the rocks in the wilderness. Moses was the instrument, but the Lord did it all. And
gave them drink as out of the great depths. As though it gushed from
earth’s innermost reservoirs, the streams were so fresh, so copious, so
constant.
16. The
supply of water was as plenteous in quantity as it was miraculous in origin.
Streams followed the camp; the supply was not for an hour or a day. This was a
marvel of goodness. If we contemplate the aboundings of divine grace we shall
be lost in admiration. Mighty rivers of love have flowed for us in the
wilderness. Alas, our return has not been commensurate.
17. And they sinned yet more against him. Outdoing former sins, going into greater deeps of evil: the
more they had, the more loudly they clamored for more, and grumbled because
they had not every luxury that pampered appetites could desire. It was bad
enough to mistrust their God for necessaries, but to revolt against him in a
greedy rage for superfluities was far worse. Ever is it the nature of the
disease of sin to proceed from bad to worse. In the case before us the goodness
of God was abused into a reason for greater sin. If he had wrought fewer
miracles before, they would not have been so inexcusable in their unbelief, so
wanton in their idolatry. By provoking the Most High in the wilderness.
Although they were in a position of obvious dependence upon God for everything,
being in a desert, they were graceless enough to provoke their benefactor by
hankering after false gods, then challenging his power, slandering his love,
rebelling against his will. For them the heavens dropped manna, and they
returned grumbling; the rocks gave them rivers, and they replied with floods of
wickedness. Israel in the wilderness acted out, as in a drama, all the story of
human conduct towards God.
18. And they tempted God in their heart. He was not tempted, for he cannot be tempted by any, but
they acted in a manner calculated to tempt him. Christ cannot die again, and
yet many crucify him afresh. The sinner in the wilderness would have had the
Lord change his wise proceedings to humor their whims, hence they are said to
tempt him. By asking meat for their lust. Was there nothing for it but
that he must give them whatever their diseased appetites might crave? What they
at first silently wished for, they soon loudly demanded with menaces,
insinuations, and upbraidings.
19. Unbelief
of God is a slander against him. To question the ability of one who is
manifestly Almighty is to speak against him. These people were base enough to
say that although their God had given them bread and water, yet he could not
properly order or furnish a table. He could give them coarse food, but could
not prepare a feast properly arranged, so they were ungrateful enough to
declare. As if the manna were a mere makeshift, and the flowing rock-stream a
temporary expedient, they ask to have a regularly furnished table, such as they
had been accustomed to in Egypt. Alas, how have we also quarrelled with our
mercies, and querulously pined for some imaginary good, counting our actual
enjoyments to be nothing because they did not happen to be exactly conformed to
our foolish fancies. They who will not be content will speak against providence
even when it daily loads them with benefits.
20. Behold, he smote the rock, that the waters gushed out,
and the streams overflowed. They
admit what he had done, and yet, with superabundant folly and insolence, demand
further proofs of his omnipotence. Can he give bread also? Can he provide
flesh for his people? If they had argued, “Can he not give flesh?”
the argument would have been reasonable, but they ran into insanity when,
having seen many marvels of omnipotence, they dared to insinuate that other
things were beyond the divine power. Yet, in this also, we have imitated their
senseless conduct. Each new difficulty has excited fresh incredulity. We are
still fools and slow of heart to believe our God, and this is a fault to be
bemoaned with deepest penitence. For this cause the Lord often chastens us
sorely; for unbelief has in it a degree of provocation of the highest kind.
21. Therefore the Lord heard this, and was wroth. He was not indifferent to what they said. He dwelt among
them in the holy place, and, therefore, they insulted him to his face. So a
fire was kindled against Jacob. The fire of his anger which was also
attended with literal burnings. And anger also came up against Israel.
Whether he viewed them in the lower or higher light, as Jacob or as Israel, he
was angry with them: even as mere men they ought to have believed him; and as
chosen tribes, their wicked unbelief was without excuse. The Lord does well to
be angry at so ungrateful, gratuitous and dastardly an insult as the
questioning of his power.
22. This is
the master sin, itself evil and the parent of evils. It was this sin which shut
Israel out of Canaan, and it shuts myriads out of heaven. God is ready to save,
combining power with willingness, but rebellious man will not trust his
Saviour, and therefore is condemned already. In the text it appears as if all
Israel’s other sins were as nothing compared with this; this is the special
provocation which angered the Lord. Let every unbeliever learn to tremble more
at his unbelief than at anything else. If he be no fornicator, or thief, or
liar, let him reflect that it is quite enough to condemn him that he trusts not
in God’s salvation.
23. Though he had commanded the clouds from above. Such a marvel ought to have rendered unbelief impossible:
when clouds become granaries, seeing should be believing, and doubts should
dissolve. And opened the doors of heaven. The corn of heaven was poured
out in heaps. Those who would not believe in such a case were hardened indeed;
and yet our own position is very similar, for the Lord has wrought for us great
deliverances, quite as memorable and undeniable, and yet suspicions and
forebodings haunt us. He might have shut the gates of hell upon us, instead of
which he has opened the doors of heaven; shall we not both believe in him and
magnify him for this?
24. And had rained down manna upon them to eat. There was so much of it, the skies poured with food.
Mysterious though it was, it was eminently adapted for human nourishment, and
it was available: they had only to gather it up. O Lord Jesus, thou blessed
manna of heaven, how all this agrees with thee! We will now feed on thee as our
spiritual meat, and will pray thee to chase away all wicked unbelief from us.
Our fathers ate manna and doubted; we feed upon thee and are filled with
assurance. And had given them of the corn of heaven. It was all a gift
without money and without price. Food which dropped from above, and was of the
best quality, so as to be called heavenly corn, was freely granted them. The
point to be noted is that this wonder of wonders left the beholders, and
feasters, as prone as ever to mistrust their Lord.
25. Man did eat angels’ food. The delicacies of kings were outdone, for the dainties of
angels were supplied. It was not for the priests, or the princes, that the
manna fell; but for all the nation, for every man, woman, and child in the
camp; and there was sufficient for them all, for he sent them meat to the
full. God’s banquets are never stinted; he gives the best diet, and plenty
of it. Gospel provisions deserve every praise that we can heap upon them; they
are free, full, and preeminent. If we have ever fed upon Jesus we have tasted
better than angels’ food. It will be our wisdom to eat to the full of it, for
God has so sent it that we are not straitened in him, but in ourselves. Let us
eat abundantly and magnify the all-sufficient grace which supplies all their
needs, according to his riches in glory, by Christ Jesus.
26. He caused an east wind to blow in the heaven. Storms arise, and tempests blow at his command. And by
his power he brought in the south wind. Either these winds followed each
other, and so blew the birds in the desired direction, or else they combined to
form a south-east wind; in either case they illustrated the Lord’s supreme and
universal power. If one wind will not serve, another will; and if need be, they
will both blow at once. If we ourselves were half as obedient as the winds, we
should be far superior to what we now are.
27. He rained flesh also upon them. First, he rained bread and then flesh, when he might have
rained fire and brimstone. And feathered fowls, like as the sand of the sea.
There was no counting them. By a remarkable providence, if not by miracle,
enormous numbers of migratory birds were caused to alight around the tents of
the tribes. It was, however, a doubtful blessing, as easily acquired and
superabounding riches generally are. The Lord save us from meat which is
seasoned with divine wrath.
28. And he let it fall in the midst of their camp. They had no journey to make; they had clamored for flesh,
and it almost flew into their mouths, round about their habitations.
This made them glad for the moment, but they knew not that mercies can be sent
in anger, else had they trembled at sight of the good things which they had
lusted after.
29. So they did eat, and were well filled. They greedily devoured the birds, even to repletion. The
Lord showed them that when lust wins its desire it is disappointed, and by the
way of satiety arrives at distaste. For he gave them their own desire.
The meat was unhealthy for them, but as they cried for it they had it, and a
curse with it. O my God, deny me my most urgent prayers sooner than answer them
in displeasure. Better to hunger and thirst after righteousness than to be well
filled with sin’s dainties.
30. They were not estranged from their lust. Lust grows upon that which it feeds upon. If sick of too
much flesh, yet men grow not weary of lust, they change the object, and go on
lusting still. When one sin is proved to be a bitterness, men do not desist,
but pursue another iniquity.
31. But while their meat was yet in their mouths, before they could digest their coveted meat, it turned to
their destruction. The wrath of God came upon them before they could
swallow their first meal of flesh. Short was the pleasure, sudden was the doom.
The festival ended in a funeral. And slew the fattest of them, and smote
down the chosen men of Israel. Perhaps these were the ringleaders in the
lusting; they are first in the punishment. God’s justice has no respect of
persons; the strong and the valiant fall as well as the weak and the mean. What
they ate on earth they digested in hell, as many have done since. How soon they
died! See here the danger of gratified passions; they are the janitors of hell.
When the Lord’s people hunger, God loves them; Lazarus is his beloved, though
he pines upon crumbs; but when he fattens the wicked he abhors them. We must
never dare to judge men’s happiness by their tables; the heart is the place to
look at. The poorest starving believer is more to be envied than the most
full-fleshed of the favorites of the world.
32. For all this they sinned still. Judgments moved them no more than mercies. They defiled the
wrath of God. Though death was in the cup of their iniquity, yet they would not
put it away, but continued to drink it as if it were a healthful potion. How
truly might these words be applied to ungodly people who have been often
afflicted, laid upon a sickbed, broken in spirit, and impoverished in estate,
and yet have persevered in their evil ways, unmoved by terrors, unswayed by
threatenings. And believed not for his wondrous works. Their unbelief
was chronic and incurable. They might be made to wonder, but they could not be
taught to believe. Continuance in sin and in unbelief go together. Had they
believed they would not have sinned; had they not been blinded by sin they
would have believed. God’s ways with us in providence are in themselves both
convincing and converting, but unrenewed nature refuses to be either convinced
or converted by them.
33. Therefore their days did he consume in vanity. Apart from faith life is vanity. To wander up and down in
the wilderness was a vain thing indeed, when unbelief had shut them out of the
promised land. It was meet that those who would not live to answer the divine
purpose by believing and obeying their God should be made to live to no
purpose, and to die before their time, unsatisfied, unblessed. Those who wasted
their days in sin had little cause to wonder when the Lord cut short their
lives, and swore that they should never enter the rest which they had despised.
And their years in trouble. Weary marches were their trouble, and to
come to no resting-place was their vanity. Innumerable graves were left all
along the track of Israel: they could not enter in because of unbelief.
Doubtless much of the vexation and failure of many lives results from their
being sapped by unbelief, and honeycombed by evil passions. None live so
fruitlessly and so wretchedly as those who allow sense and sight to override
faith, and their reason and appetite to domineer over their fear of God. Our
days go fast enough according to the ordinary lapse of time, but the Lord can
make them rust away at a bitterer rate, till we feel as if sorrow actually ate
out the heart of our life, and like a canker devoured our existence.
34. When he slew them, then they sought him. They obeyed only so long as they felt the whip. Hard are
the hearts which only death can move. While thousands died around them, the
people of Israel became suddenly religious, and repaired to the tabernacle
door. And they returned and inquired early after God. They could not be
too zealous; they were in hot haste to prove their loyalty to their divine
King. Who would not be pious when the plague is abroad? Even reprobates send
for the minister when they lie dying. Thus sinners pay involuntary homage to
the power of right and the supremacy of God, but their hypocritical homage is
of small value in the sight of the great Judge.
35. And they remembered that God was their rock. Sharp strokes awoke their sleepy memories. They were led to
see that their dependence must be placed upon their God; for he alone had been
their shelter, their foundation, their fountain of supply, and their
unchangeable friend. What could have made them forget this? Was it that their
stomachs were so full of flesh that they had no space for ruminating upon
spiritual things? And the high God their redeemer. Alas, how readily do
people forget their God! What shame, to have no sense of favors a few days after
they have been received. Will nothing make us keep in memory the mercy of our
God except the utter withdrawal of it?
36. Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth. Bad were they at their best. False on their knees, liars in
their prayers. Mouth-worship must be very detestable to God when dissociated
from the heart: other kings love flattery, but the King of kings abhors it.
Since the sharpest afflictions extort from carnal people a feigned submission
to God, there is proof positive that the heart is desperately set on mischief,
and that sin is ingrained in our very nature. The devil cannot be whipped out
of human nature, though another devil, namely hypocrisy, may be whipped into
it. Piety produced by the damps of sorrow and the heats of terror is of
mushroom growth; it is rapid in its upspringing—“they inquired early after
God”—but it is a mere unsubstantial fungus of unabiding excitement. And
they lied unto him with their tongues. Their godly speech was cant, their
praise mere wind, their prayer a fraud. Their skin-deep repentance was a film
too thin to conceal the deadly wound of sin. This teaches us to place small
reliance upon professions of repentance made by dying people, or when the basis
is evidently slavish fear and nothing more. Any thief will whine out repentance
if he thinks the judge will thereby be moved to let him go scot-free.
37. For their heart was not right with him. There was no depth in their repentance. Every wind turned
them; their mind was not settled upon God. Neither were they steadfast in
his covenant. Their promises were no sooner made than broken. Good
resolutions called at their hearts as men do at inns; they tarried a while, and
then took their leave. They were hot today for holiness, but cold towards it
tomorrow. They changed from reverence to rebellion, from thankfulness to
grumbling. One day they gave their gold to build a tabernacle for Jehovah, and
the next they plucked off their earrings to make a golden calf.
38. But he, being full of compassion, forgave their
iniquity, and destroyed them not.
Though they were full of flattery, he was full of mercy, and had pity on them.
Not because of their hypocritical pretensions to penitence, but because of his
own real compassion for them he overlooked their provocations. Yea, many a
time turned he his anger away. When he had grown angry with them he
withdrew his displeasure. He was slow, very slow, to anger. Though not
mentioned in the text, we know from the history that a mediator interposed—the
man Moses stood in the gap; even so at this hour the Lord Jesus pleads for
sinners, and averts the divine wrath. And did not stir up all his wrath.
Had he done so they must have perished in a moment. When his wrath is kindled
but a little, people are burned up as chaff. Who knows the power of thine
anger, O Lord? We see the fullness of God’s compassion, but we never see all
his wrath.
39. For he remembered that they were but flesh. They were forgetful of God, but he was mindful of them. He
dealt leniently with them. Though in this he saw no excuse for their sin, yet
he constrained it into a reason for mercy; the Lord is ever ready to discover
some plea or other upon which he may have compassion. A wind that passeth
away, and cometh not again. Spirit and wind are in this alike, so far as
our humanity is concerned; they pass and cannot be recalled. What a nothing is
our life. How gracious on the Lord’s part to make our insignificance an
argument for staying his wrath.
40. How often did they provoke him in the wilderness. Times enough did they rebel: they were as constant in
provocation as he was in his patience. In our own case, who can count their own
errors? In what book could all our perverse rebellions be recorded? The
wilderness was a place of manifest dependence, where the tribes were helpless
without divine supplies; yet they wounded the hand which fed them while it was
in the act of feeding them. Is there no likeness between us and them? And
grieve him in the desert. Their provocations had an effect; God was not
insensible to them; he is said to have been grieved. His holiness could not
find pleasure in their sin, his justice in their unjust treatment, or his truth
in their falsehood. What must it be to grieve the Lord of love! Yet we also
have vexed the Holy Spirit, and he would long ago have withdrawn himself from
us, were it not that he is God and not man. We are in the desert where we need
our God; let us not make it a wilderness of sin by grieving him.
41. Yea, they turned back. Their hearts sighed for Egypt and its fleshpots. They
turned to their old ways again and again, after they had been scourged out of
them. Full of twists and turns, they never kept the straight path. And
tempted God. As far as in them lay they tempted him. His ways were good,
and they in desiring to have them altered tempted God. Before they would
believe in him they demanded signs, defying the Lord to do this and that, and
acting as if he could be cajoled into being the minion of their lusts. Let us
not tempt Christ lest we also be destroyed. And limited the Holy One of
Israel. Doubted his power and so limited him, dictated to his wisdom and so
did the same. To chalk out a path for God is arrogant impiety. It is profanity
itself to say to him, “Thou shalt do this or that, or I will not worship
thee.”
42. They remembered not his hand. Yet it must have been difficult to forget it. Such displays
of divine power as those which smote Egypt with astonishment, it must have
needed some more than usual effort to blot from the tablets of memory. It is
probably meant that they practically, rather than actually, forgot. Nor the
day when he delivered them from the enemy. The day itself was erased from
their calendar, so far as any due result from it or return for it. Strange is
the faculty of memory in its oblivions as well as its records. Sin perverts
people’s powers, makes them forceful only in wrong directions, and practically
dead for righteous ends.
43. How he had wrought his signs in Egypt. The plagues were ensigns of Jehovah’s presence and proofs
of his hatred of idols; these instructive acts of power were wrought in the
open view of all, as signals are set up to be observed by those far and near. And
his wonders in the field of Zion. In the whole land were miracles wrought,
not in cities alone. This the Israelites ought not to have forgotten, for they
were the favored people for whom these memorable deeds were wrought.
44. And had turned their rivers into blood. The waters had been made the means of the destruction of
Israel’s newborn infants, and now they do as it were betray the crime—they
blush for it, they avenge it on the murderers. The Nile was the vitality of
Egypt, its true life-blood, but at God’s command it became a flowing curse;
every drop of it was a horror, poison to drink, and terror to gaze on.
Sometimes the Almighty One has allowed people to make rivers crimson with gore,
and this is a severer judgment; but the event now before us was more
mysterious, more general, more complete, and must therefore have been a plague
of the first magnitude. And their floods, that they could not drink.
Lesser streams partook in the curse, reservoirs and canals felt the evil; God
does nothing by halves. All Egypt boasted of the sweet waters of their river,
but they were made to loathe it more than they had ever loved it. Our mercies
may soon become our miseries if the Lord deals with us in wrath.
45. He sent divers sorts of flies among them, which
devoured them. Small creatures become great
tormentors. When they swarm they can sting a man till they threaten to eat him
up. The tiniest plagues are the greatest. What sword or spear could fight with
these innumerable bands? Vain were the monarch’s armor and robes of majesty;
the little cannibals were no more lenient towards royal flesh than any other;
it had the same blood in it, and the same sin upon it. How great is that God
who thus by the minute can crush the magnificent. And frogs, which destroyed
them. These creatures swarmed everywhere, and when they died the heaps of
bodies made the land stink so foully that a pestilence was imminent. Those who
contend with the Almighty little know what arrows are in his quiver; surprising
sin will be visited with surprising punishment.
46. Different
sorts of devourers ate up every green herb and tree. What one would not eat another
did. What they expected from the natural fertility of the soil and what they
looked for from their own toil, they saw devoured before their eyes by an
insatiable multitude against whose depredations no defense could be found.
Observe in the text that the Lord did it all—“he sent,” “he gave,” “he
destroyed,” “he gave up”—whatever the second agent may be, the direct hand
of the Lord is in every national visitation.
47. He destroyed their vines with hail. No more shall the butler press the clusters into your hand,
Pharaoh! The vintage failed. And their sycamore trees with frost. Frost
was not usual, but Jehovah regards no laws of nature when people regard not his
moral laws. The sycamore fig was perhaps more the fruit of the many than was
the vine; therefore this judgment was meant to smite the poor, while the former
fell most heavily upon the rich. The heavens obey their Lord and yield their
stores of hail, and the fickle weather is equally subservient to the divine
will.
48. He gave up their cattle also to the hail. What hail it must have been to have force enough to batter
down bullocks and other great beasts. God usually protects animals from such
destruction, but here he withdrew his safeguards and gave them up; may the Lord
never give us up. Some read, “shut up,” and the idea of being
abandoned to destructive influences is then before us in another shape. And
their flocks to hot thunderbolts. Fire was mingled with the hail and smote
the smaller cattle. Hard were those hearts which afterwards forgot all that the
Lord had done, and broke off from their allegiance to him.
49. He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger, wrath,
and indignation, and trouble.
His last arrow was the sharpest. Blow followed blow, each one more staggering
than its predecessor, and then the crushing stroke was reserved for the end. By
sending evil angels among them. Messengers of evil entered their houses at
midnight, and smote the dearest objects of their love. The angels were evil to
them, though good enough in themselves; those who to the heirs of salvation are
ministers of grace, are to the heirs of wrath executioners of judgment. When
God sends angels, they are sure to come, and if he bids them slay they will not
spare. See how sin sets all the powers of heaven against people; they have no
friend left in the universe when God is their enemy.
50. He made a way to his anger, coming to the point with them by slow degrees, first
destroying their property, then coming in upon their persons. He broke down all
the comforts of their life, and then advanced against their life itself.
Nothing could stand in his way. He spared not their soul from death, but
gave their life over to the pestilence. In their soul was the origin of the
sin, and he followed it to its source and smote it there. A fierce disease
filled the land with countless funerals; Jehovah dealt out myriads of blows,
and multitudes of spirits failed before him.
51. And smote all the firstborn in Egypt. No exceptions were made; the monarch bewailed his heir as
did the menial at the mill. They smote the Lord’s firstborn, Israel, and he
smites theirs. The chief of their strength is in the tabernacles of Ham.
Swinging his scythe over the field, death topped off the highest flowers. The
tents of Ham knew each one its own especial sorrow, and were made to sympathize
with the sorrows which had been ruthlessly inflicted on the habitations of
Israel. Thus curses come home to roost. Oppressors are paid in their own coin.
52. But made his own people to go forth like sheep. The contrast is striking, and ought never to have been
forgotten by the people. The wolves were slain in heaps; the sheep were
carefully gathered and triumphantly delivered. The poor serfs became honored
people, while their oppressors were humbled before them. The people of Israel
were defenseless in themselves as sheep, but they were safe under their great
Shepherd; they left Egypt as easily as a flock leaves one pasture for another. And
guided them in the wilderness like a flock. Knowing nothing of the way by
their own understanding or experience, they were nevertheless rightly directed,
for the all-wise God knew every spot of the wilderness.
53. And he led them on safely, so that they feared not. After the first little alarm, natural enough when they
found themselves pursued by their old taskmasters, they plucked up courage and
ventured boldly into the sea, and afterwards into the desert where no one
dwelt. But the sea overwhelmed their enemies. They were gone forever,
never to disturb the fugitives again. That tremendous blow effectually defended
the tribes for forty years from any further attempt to drive them back.
We now, after a pause, follow again the chain of events, the
narration of which had been interrupted by a retrospect, and we find Israel
entering into the promised land, there to repeat her follies and enlarge her
crimes.
54. And he brought them to the border of his sanctuary. He conducted them to the frontier of the Holy Land, where he
intended the tabernacle to become the permanent symbol of his abode among his
people. He did not leave them halfway upon their journey. Even to this
mountain, which his right hand had purchased. Nor did he leave them then,
but still conducted them till they were in the region round about Zion, which
was to be the central seat of his worship. This the Lord had purchased in type
of old by the sacrifice of Isaac, fit symbol of the greater sacrifice which was
in due season to be presented there. That mountain was also redeemed by power
when the Lord’s right hand enabled his valiant men to smite the Jebusites and
take the sacred hill from the insulting Canaanites. Thus shall the elect of God
enjoy the sure protection of the Lord of hosts, to the border land of death and
through the river up to the hill of the Lord in glory.
55. He cast out the heathen also before them, or, “he drove out the nations.” Not only were armies
routed, but whole peoples displaced. The vices of the Canaanites made them rot
above ground; therefore the sword of the tribes completed the execution to
which the justice of heaven had appointed them. The Lord was the true conqueror
of Canaan. And divided them an inheritance by line. Among the condemned
nations were not only giants in stature, but also giants in crime; they had too
long defiled the earth, and were doomed to forfeit life and lands by the hands
of the tribes of Israel. The distribution of the forfeited country was made by
divine appointment; it was no scramble, but a judicial appointment of lands
which had fallen to the crown. And made the tribes of Israel to dwell in
their tents. The favored people entered upon a furnished house: they found
the larder supplied, for they fed upon the old corn of the land, and the
dwellings were already built in which they could dwell. Thus does another race
often enter into the lot of a former people, and it is sad indeed when the
change which judgment decrees does not turn out to be much for the better,
because the incomers inherit the evils as well as the goods of the ejected.
Such a case of judicial visitation ought to have had a salutary influence upon
the tribes; but alas, they were incorrigible, and would not learn even from
examples so near at home and so terribly suggestive.
56. Yet they tempted and provoked the most high God. Change of condition had not altered their manners. They
left their nomadic habits, but not their tendencies to wander from their God.
Though every divine promise had been fulfilled to the letter, and the land
flowing with milk and honey was actually their own, yet they tried the Lord
again with unbelief, and provoked him with other sins. He is not only high and
glorious, but Most High, the only being who deserves to be so highly had in
honor; yet, instead of honoring him, Israel grieved him with rebellion. And
kept not his testimonies. They were true to nothing but hereditary
treachery. They knew his truth and forgot it, his will and disobeyed it, his
grace and perverted it to an occasion for greater transgression. Do you need a
looking glass? Here is one which suits the present expositor well; does it not
also reflect your image?
57. But turned back.
Turned over the old leaf, repeated the same offenses, were false and faithless
to their best promises. And dealt unfaithfully like their fathers. They
were a new generation, but not a new nation. Evil propensities are transmitted.
Human nature does not improve. They were turned aside like a deceitful bow,
which not only fails to send the arrow towards the mark in a direct line, but
springs back to the archer’s hurt, and perhaps sends the shaft among his
friends to their serious jeopardy.
58. For they provoked him to anger with their high places. This was their first error—will worship, or the worship of
God, otherwise than according to his command. Many think lightly of this, but
indeed it is no mean sin; and its tendencies to further offense are very
powerful. The Lord would have his holy place remain as the only spot for
sacrifice; and Israel, in willfull rebellion (no doubt glossed over by the plea
of great devotion) determined to have many altars upon many hills. How much of
the worship of the present day is neither more nor less than sheer will
worship! Nobody dares plead a divine appointment for a tenth of the offices,
festivals, ceremonies, and observances of certain churches. And moved him to
jealousy with their graven images. This was but one more step; they
manufactured symbols of the invisible God, for they lusted after something
tangible and visible to which they could show reverence. This also is the
crying sin of modern times. Images, pictures, crucifixes, and a host of visible
things are had in religious honor, and worst of all people nowadays worship
what they eat. Surely the Lord is very patient, or he would visit the earth for
this worst and basest of idolatry.
59. When God heard this, he was wroth. The mere report of it filled him with indignation; he could
not bear it, he was incensed to the uttermost, and most justly so. And
greatly abhorred Israel. He cast his idolatrous people from his favor, and
left them to themselves, and their own devices. How could he have fellowship
with idols? Sin is in itself so offensive that it makes the sinner offensive
too. We must see to it that we keep ourselves from idols through divine grace,
for rest assured, idolatry is not consistent with true grace in the heart.
Where the Lord dwells, no image of jealousy will be tolerated.
Note that God did not utterly cast away his people Israel
even when he greatly abhorred them, for he returned in mercy to them, so the
subsequent verses tell us; so now the seed of Abraham, though for a while under
a heavy cloud, will be gathered yet again, for the covenant will not be broken.
As for the spiritual seed, the Lord has not despised nor abhorred them; they
are his especial treasure and lie forever near his heart.
60. He left
Shiloh to become a complete ruin. At the door of that tent shameless sin had
been perpetrated, and all around it idols had been adored, and therefore the
glory departed. Let us take heed, that as the ark never returned to Shiloh
after its capture by the Philistines, so the Gospel may be taken from us in
judgment, never to be restored to the same church again.
61. And delivered his strength into captivity. The ark was captured by the Philistines in battle, only
because the Lord for the punishment of Israel chose to deliver it into their
hands, otherwise they could have had no power at all against it. It was a black
day when the mercy-seat was removed. And his glory into the enemy’s hand.
The ark was the place for the revealed glory of God, and his enemies exulted
greatly when they bore it away into their own cities. Nothing could more
clearly have shown the divine displeasure. It seemed to say that Jehovah would
sooner dwell among his avowed adversaries than among so false a people as
Israel. This was a fearful downfall for the favored nation, and it was followed
by dire judgments of most appalling nature. When God is gone all is gone. No
calamity can equal the withdrawal of the divine presence from a people. Who
shall help thee now that thy God has left thee?
62. He gave his people over also unto the sword. They fell in battle because they were no longer aided by
the divine strength. And was wroth with his inheritance. They were his
still, and twice in this verse they are called so; yet his regard for them did
not prevent his chastising them, even with a rod of steel. Where the love is
most fervent, the jealousy is most cruel. Sin cannot be tolerated in those who
are a people near God.
63. The fire consumed their young men. As fire slew Nadab and Abihu literally, so the fire of
divine wrath fell on the sons of Eli, who defiled the sanctuary of the Lord. And
their maidens were not given to marriage. The bride lacked her bridegroom;
the sword had left unmarried those who otherwise would have been congratulated.
Therefore Israel’s state was not replenished; the nation had failed in its
solemn task of instructing the young in the fear of Jehovah, and it was a
fitting judgment that the very production of a posterity should be endangered.
64. Their priests fell by the sword. Hophni and Phineas were slain; they were among the chief in
sin, and therefore they perished with the rest. Priesthood is no shelter for
transgressors. And their widows made no lamentation. Their private
griefs were swallowed up in the greater national agony, because the ark of God
was taken. The dead were buried too often and too hurriedly to allow the usual
rites of lamentation. This was the lowest depth; from this point things will
take a gracious turn.
65. The Lord awaked as one out of sleep. Justly inactive he had suffered the enemy to triumph; but
now he arouses himself, his heart is full of pity for his chosen, and anger
against the insulting foe. Waking and putting forth his strength like a man who
had taken a refreshing draught, the Lord is said to be like a mighty man
that shouteth by reason of wine. Strong and full of energy, the Lord dashed
upon his foes and made them stagger beneath his blows. His ark from city to
city went as an avenger rather than as a trophy, and in every place the false
gods fell helplessly before it.
66. He smote his enemies in the hinder parts. The hemorrhoids rendered them ridiculous, and their
numerous defeats made them yet more so. They fled but were overtaken and
wounded in the back to their eternal disgrace. He put them to a perpetual
reproach. We can well imagine that the hemorrhoids were the subject of many
a taunt against the Philistines, as also were their frequent defeats by Israel
until at last they were crushed under, never to exist again as a distinct
nation.
67. Moreover he refused the tabernacle of Joseph. God had honored Ephraim, for to that tribe belonged Joshua
the great conqueror, and Gideon the great judge, and within its borders was
Shiloh the place of the ark and the sanctuary; but now the Lord would change
all this and set up other rulers. He would no longer leave matters to the
leadership of Ephraim, since that tribe had been tried and found wanting. And
chose not the tribe of Ephraim. Sin had been found in them, and therefore
they were set aside as unfit to lead.
68. But chose the tribe of Judah. To give the nation another trial this tribe was elected to
supremacy. This was according to Jacob’s dying prophesy. Our Lord spring out of
Judah, and he it is whom his brethren shall praise. The Mount Zion which he
loved. The tabernacle and ark were removed to Zion during the reign of
David; no honor was left to the wayward Ephraimites. Hard by this mountain the
father of the faithful had offered up his only son, and there in future days,
the great gatherings of his chosen seed would be, and therefore Zion is said to
be lovely unto God.
69. And he built his sanctuary like high palaces. The tabernacle was placed on high, literally and
spiritually as a mountain of beauty. True religion was exalted in the land. For
sanctity it was a temple, for majesty it was a palace. Like the earth which
he hath established forever. Stability as well as stateliness were seen in
the temple, and so also in the church of God.
70. He chose David also his servant. It was an election of a sovereignly gracious kind, and it
operated practically by making the chosen man a willing servant of the Lord. He
was not chosen because he was a servant, but in order that he might be so. And
took him from the sheepfolds. A shepherd of sheep he had been, and this was
a fit school for a shepherd of men. Lowliness of occupation will debar no one
from such honors as the Lord’s election confers.
71.
Exercising the care of those who watch young lambs, David’s tenderness and
patience would tend to the development of characteristics most becoming in a
king. It is wonderful how often divine wisdom so arranges the early and obscure
portion of a choice life so as to make it a preparatory school for a more
active and noble future.
72. So he fed them according to the integrity of his heart. David was upright before God, and never swerved in heart
from the obedient worship of Jehovah. Whatever faults he had, he was
unfeignedly sincere in his allegiance to Israel’s superior king. And guided
them by the skillfulness of his hands. Under David, the Jewish kingdom
first rose to an honorable position among the nations, and exercised an
influence over its neighbors. In closing the psalm which has described the
varying conditions of the chosen nation, we are glad to end so peacefully. We
too may be content to finish all our songs of love with the reign of the Lord’s
anointed. Only we may eagerly inquire, when will it come? When shall we end
these desert roamings, these rebellions, and chastisings, and enter into the
rest of settled kingdom, with the Lord Jesus reigning?
Thus have we ended this lengthy parable. May we in our
life-parable have less of sin, and as much of grace as is displayed in Israel’s
history, and may we close it under the safe guidance of “that great Shepherd
of the sheep.”
Excerpt from:
The Treasury of David
By Charles H Spurgeon
