Brought Out to Be Brought In
(No. 2511)
INTENDED FOR READING ON LORD'S-DAY, APRIL 4, 1897.
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON THURSDAY EVENING, AUGUST
6, 1886.
"He brought us out from there, that He might bring us in, to give us
the land which He swore unto our fathers." Deuteronomy 6:23.
OUR text occurs in the passage where the Israelites are told to
personally instruct their children concerning the testimonies and
statutes and judgments of the Lord. When they asked the meaning of the
various ordinances of God's House, their parents were to tell them–not
to refer them to the priest–they were, themselves, to instruct their
children in the things of God. In our own case, however much we may
love and appreciate the Sunday school system–and we cannot love it too
much–I hope we shall never forget that the first duty towards the
child belongs to the parent. Fathers and mothers are the most natural
agents for God to use in the salvation of their children. I am sure
that, in my early youth, no teaching ever had such an impression upon
my mind as the instruction of my mother–neither can I conceive that to
any child there can be one who will have such influence over the young
heart as the mother who has so tenderly cared for her offspring.
We should especially tell our children our own experience, for so it is
enjoined in this passage–"When your son asks you in time to come,
saying, What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments,
which the Lord our God has commanded you? Then you shall say unto your
son, We were Pharaoh's bondmen in Egypt; and the Lord brought us out of
Egypt with a mighty hand." Perhaps, my Friend, there is no testimony
that you can bear which will be so useful, so interesting and so
striking, as the testimony of what you have, yourself, seen and handled
of the Word of Life. Tell the Gospel as you find it in the Bible, but
set it in the frame of your own experience of its preciousness! Tell
your son how you sinned and how the Lord had mercy upon you. Tell him
how He met with you, how you were brought to seek His face, how you
were born again, how you received a new heart and a right spirit. He
will think the more of this great change because it happened to his
father, or to his mother, or to some kind friend. And, perhaps, if he
is not himself converted as a child, in his later life he may think of
what you told him or the remembrance of his mother's God may rise
before him when he is far away from the scenes of his youth and has
spent many years in foolish vanities–and he may even then turn to God,
beckoned back to the great Father's House above by the memory of his
godly father and mother here below.
It is my earnest desire, just now, to bear witness on the behalf of
many of God's people while I try to explain the meaning of our text,
"He brought us out. . .that He might bring us in." We shall have three
heads to our discourse. First, we were brought out. As surely as Israel
was brought out of Egypt, we who believe in Jesus have been brought out
of the house of our bondage! Therefore, secondly, we are out. And
thirdly, the Lord who brought us out will bring us into another and a
better country–into "Your land, O Immanuel"–into that place of rest
and everlasting jubilee which God by Covenant has given over to His
people as their perpetual possession.
I. First, dear Friends, let us speak upon the fact that we were BROUGHT
OUT. Our text says, "He brought us out from there." That is, Jehovah,
the God of Israel, brought His people out from the house of bondage
and, in like manner, we bear our testimony that the Lord has delivered
us from the bondage of sin and Satan.
Our witness, therefore, is, first of all, that God has had to do with
us. Some there are who think that God dwells far away, shut up in
eternal seclusion. But we have not found it so, for He has had dealings
in mercy with us. They suppose that the things here below are too
little and too commonplace for God to consider, but it has not been so
with us, for He has dealt well with His servants according to His Word.
They suppose that there is a thick veil that shuts us out from the
Invisible, a great gulf that parts us poor mortals from any
communication with God. They smile and turn upon their heels when we
begin to talk of God–they are "agnostics"–know-nothings. Perhaps they
will not say that there is no God, but they dosay that they do not know
whether there is a God or not! And, as to any communication between the
Holy One of Israel and such poor creatures as we are, they will not
believe it to be possible. Well, then, we have to bear our testimony
upon this point and it is this–that with some of us a very little
while ago, and with others of us so many years ago as to be among the
memories of our youth–God had solemn dealings. We were in the land of
darkness and in the valley of the shadow of death. We were fond of
sin–we were slaves to it and we had no wish nor will to escape from
it–but He who is the Father of our spirits, having loved us with an
everlasting love, and having made a Covenant with His only-begotten Son
on our behalf, tore the heavens and in majesty came down!
This was done spiritually, for God is a Spirit and, therefore, they who
were round about us knew it not. And we ourselves saw Him not and
beheld no similitude–neither heard we any voice with our outward ear.
But, though it was spiritual, God's coming to us was very real, for
spirit is as real as matter and God is as real as the things that we
touch, or see, or feel. We are not deceived in this matter, or, if we
are, it has become so much a matter of daily consciousness, as well as
of past memory, that we must be, indeed, besotted beyond all
conception! But it has not been a dream to us, for it has changed our
whole lives and it does, today, affect and move us most powerfully. We
can imagine that it is a dream that we eat and drink, but it is no
dream that God lives in us and we live in Him! It may be a dream that
we have grown up from childhood into manhood–though it would take a
great deal of argument to prove that to us–but it is no dream that,
whereas we were blind, now we see! It is no dream that, whereas we were
dead, now we live! It is no dream that things we did not believe in are
now to us the best and highest and most practical of facts! It is not a
dream that God has dealt with us and, though we cannot expect men to
believe us, we feel sure that, had they known what we know, they would
have been as little doubtful about it as we are. Had they passed
through the experience we have had, they would have been as dogmatic in
their assertion about it as we take leave to be.
Though we may be thought fools for this confidence, we think we are not
fools. In other matters we are at least the equals of the men who think
us fools as to our religion–and we can reason as well as they. If they
have understanding, we have understanding, also. And, at any rate, we
are quite willing to leave the matter to the test of the next world.
You see, Beloved, we have two strings to our bow–if we should turn out
to have been wrong and should die like dogs, we shall be none the
worse–whereas, if our beliefs turn out to be well-founded, the ungodly
will be in a sorry case, indeed! So we bear our witness without any
kind of fear or shame, or any alarm about being thought fools for it,
and we say that God has dealt with our spirits. Our spirit has spoken
to His Spirit, and His Spirit has spoken to our spirit, and there have
been Divine communications to us from the great God who made us, who,
we assert, has new-made us and brought us out of our former condition
into another and a better state. So, with the Israelites, we can say,
"He brought us out."
In describing this bringing out, I have to remind you that the
Christian's life runs parallel with the life of Israel in Egypt.
In order to get Israel out of Egypt, the first thing was to make Israel
loathe Egypt. When Israel was in Goshen and the land brought forth
plentifully, Israel was like sheep in clover and, like a bullock that
loves deep pasture, had no desire to come out from the fat Delta of the
Nile. Israel prospered, Israel was great. Was not Joseph at the head of
the State? And even after his death, did not the memory of Joseph still
make every Egyptian respect the Israelites? They would have lived
there, still–there would have been no coming out of Egypt, for Israel,
if all had gone well with them there. The Lord saw that the first thing
to be done, in preparation for the people's emancipation, was to make
them loathe Egypt. So there arises a new king that knows not Joseph, a
king who considers that the existence of a foreign people in the midst
of his nation is a source of danger. He must begin, if possible, to
reduce their numbers. They shall work for him and render the unpaid
labor of slaves. When they do this and still multiply, they shall find
their own straw with which to make the bricks. When they complain of
this, they shall have the tale of the bricks doubled until they begin
to sigh and cry and groan by reason of their taskmasters.
If you had met an Israelite ten years before the period of slavery and
had said to him, "Do you feel at home in Egypt?" he would have
answered," Certainly! Everything prospers with us–we cannot do better
than be here." But afterwards, if you had met him and put to him the
same question, he would have said, "Wish to stay in Egypt? Not I! Would
God I could escape from the taskmaster! It is cruelty from morning to
night and a toil that is terrible. And I have heard"–and the strong
man would stand and weep as he told the story–"I have heard that now
there is an edict issued that our male children shall be cast into the
river, so that, if we have a son born into our house, it will be,
indeed, an unbearable sorrow, for our children must be destroyed by the
tyrant." It was a great step towards the accomplishment of God's
eternal purpose when He made Israel to feel that Egypt was a house of
bondage.
It is in some such way as this that God makes His own elect to feel
that the state of nature–the worldly, natural, sinful state–is a
state of bondage. Look at the multitude of our fellow men–they have no
wish to enter into any other state, they are quite satisfied with the
condition in which they now are. Provided that they can earn good
wages, that they can make money, that they can enjoy themselves in the
pleasures of this life, they do not want anything more. You seem to be
as those that mock when you talk to them about another world–they have
enough difficulty to make both ends meet in this world, they say! You
speak about a judgment to come–they would be a deal more impressed
with some information about the police courts than about the Last Dread
Assize when the Judge of All shall sit upon the Great White Throne! No,
if they do not believe themselves to be mere beasts, to live and die,
and then that will be an end of them, yet they act as if that were
their belief. It is so with the most of our fellow men and it was so
with you and with me in our unregenerate state. If we could have had
our choice, we would have had a good time of it here, perhaps taking as
our motto, "A short life and a merry one." Or, if we were more prudent,
we would have wished to have a well-ordered, moral, upright life in
which we could be respectable and respected, and that would have
satisfied us. O Sirs, it is a miracle of Grace that God has made us to
loathe that old land of Egypt and to count it to be a house of bondage!
And now, to live unto ourselves is slavery! To live for this world
seems to us to be the meanest and most beggarly thing that can be!
That was the first thing, then, that God did towards bringing out His
people–He made them to loathe Egypt.
The next thing He did was, to make them see His wrath upon Egypt–the
plagues that He sent. They had, no doubt, looked upon the Egyptians as
being a very happy people, like themselves. They were, for a time,
birds of a feather. But now they see all Egypt made the target for
Jehovah's thunderbolts! At one time, all is darkness. At another time,
the very air is filled with lice and flies. One day the frogs come up
everywhere, even into the king's chambers. At another hour, boils and
sores are on man and beast and, at the appointed period, there comes a
shower of fire and the fire is mingled with hail! And the fire runs
along the ground and terrific claps of thunder come, peal upon peal,
one after the other, and Israel thinks, "This is a poor country to live
in. We must rise up and be gone! If God deals thus with the Egyptians,
God grant that we may not be Egyptians! Let us clear out of this land
as soon as we can."
So has God made some of us see His judgments upon guilty men. We have
walked through the world with our eyes open and we have seen men as
others do not see them–with the leprosy of sin white upon their brow!
We have seen them with the fever of lust which nothing could abate. We
have seen them droop and die and, with our eyes open, we have seen them
pass into that region which is divided forever from all hope by a great
gulf, so that they that would pass from us to them cannot, neither can
they come to us that would pass from there! Yes, and our spirits have
listened till we have heard in dread and fear the weeping, wailing and
gnashing of teeth of souls that passed away unforgiven, without God and
without hope! We have heard that this city is to be burned up, for it
is the City of Destruction and, burdened as we were, we began to run
from it that we might, perhaps, escape before God should pour out the
full vials of His vengeance upon men. I am talking no dreams now, or,
at any rate, they are such dreams as I have had when I am most
awake–such dreams as some here present have had, and such dreams as
have made us anxious to get away from this present evil world which
lies in the Wicked One, that we may not be destroyed with it in the day
of God's righteous wrath!
Furthermore, dear Friends, God brought His people out of Egypt by
breaking the power which held them in bondage. When they wished to get
away from Pharaoh, they could not, for he held them as his slaves. But
in due time God began to deal with Pharaoh and, at last, when He had
killed the first-born in all the land, and the chief of all the
strength of Egypt, they could not hold in captivity a single Israelite,
no, not even a cow or a sheep or a goat that belonged to Israel! The
power of Egypt was so completely broken that not a hoof was left
behind!
And there came a day with us when the power of sin was finally broken.
We sat at the foot of the Cross looking up weeping and wondering, and
all of a sudden, as we believed in Jesus, we learned the meaning of the
angel's message to Joseph, "You shall call His name, JESUS, for He
shall save His people from their sins." And then and there He saved us
from our sins! The guilt of sin was gone but, what was stranger, still,
the power of sin was gone, too. We had proven the truth of the
Apostle's words, "Sin shall not have dominion over you: for you are not
under the Law, but under Grace."
With the crimson blood that bought our pardon, there fell the white and
sparkling drops that cleansed our nature! The water with the blood
delivered us from the guilt and power of sin and we were free,
strangely free! We wondered how it was that we had not the desires and
passions and inclinations that we used to have, or, if they came, we
had a new life and power with which we fought with them hand to hand.
We welcomed them no more as friends, but we spurned them as our worst
foes, for God had delivered us from the great bondage we were under!
Sin is a thing abhorred and detested by us and our spirit has come
clean out from under its power as a reigning force!
Remember also, Beloved, that when the Lord broke the power of Egypt
over Israel, it was on the night of the Passover that He did it. That
was the final blow that fell when the Israelites had slain the paschal
lamb and sprinkled its blood upon the lintel and the two side posts of
their houses. When Jehovah saw the blood, then He passed over them in
such a wondrous way that they, also, passed over the Egyptians and
marched out of the land more than conquerors through Him that had bled
for them under the emblem of the paschal lamb!
Beloved, that redemption has been accomplished for us, also! It is not
everyone who can remember the very day and hour of his deliverance,
but, as I told you the other morning, of Richard Knill, who said, "At
such a time of the day, clang went every harp in Heaven, for Richard
Knill was born again," it was even so with me! I looked to Jesus and as
I looked, I lived, and then and there I came clean out from that old
slavery in which I had dwelt up to that hour! Blessed be the name of
God for that glorious emancipation!
Yet once more upon this part of our text, "He brought us out" when,
after being set free, we were violently pursued by our old sins. The
Israelites went up harnessed, marching in their ranks and, I doubt not,
singing as they went because they were delivered from the daily task
and from the cruel bondage. But suddenly they turned their heads while
they were marching, for they heard a dreadful noise behind them, a
noise of chariots and of men shouting for battle! And, at last, when
they could really see the Egyptians and the thick cloud of dust rising
behind them, then they feared that they would be destroyed, they should
now fall by the hand of the enemy. You remember, Beloved, after your
conversion (it may not have happened to you all, but it did to me),
there came a time when the enemy said, "I will pursue, I will overtake,
I will divide the spoil! My lust shall be satisfied upon them! I will
draw my sword, my hand shall destroy them." So Satan, loath to leave a
soul, pursues it quickly. He will have it back if he can. And often,
soon after conversion, there comes a time of dreadful conflict–when
the soul seems as if it could not live. "Was it because there were no
graves in Egypt that the Lord brought us into this condition of
temporary freedom, that we might be all the more distressed by our
adversaries?" So said Unbelief!
But you recollect how God brought His people right out by one final
stroke. Miriam knew it when she took her timbrel and went forth with
the women, and answered them in the jubilant song, "Sing you to the
Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider has He
thrown into the sea!" I love best of all that note in the song of Moses
where he says, "The depths have covered them." "There remained not so
much as one of them." What gladness must have been in the hearts of the
children of Israel when they knew that their enemies were all gone! I
am sure it was so with me, for after my conversion, being again
attacked by sin, I saw the mighty stream of redeeming love roll over
all my sins and this was my song, "The depths have covered them!" "Who
shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that
justifies. Who is he that condemns? It is Christ that died, yes,
rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also makes intercession for us!"
II. There has been so much in the first part of our subject–"He
brought us out"–that I must speak only very briefly upon our second
division which is, WE ARE OUT.
That is to say, dear Friends, we are out of the bondage of sin and
death, never to be captured again, and never to go back again of our
own free will. ' 'Oh," says one, "that is strong teaching." I do not
care whether it is strong or weak, it is Bible teaching! Our Lord Jesus
said, "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me: and
I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither
shall any man pluck them out of My hand." To the woman at the well our
Savior said, "Whoever drinks of this water shall thirst again: but
whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst;
but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water
springing up into everlasting life." The work of the Holy Spirit is no
temporary regeneration, but one that really makes the man new
forever–and the devil, himself, cannot undo the work! No, dear Friend,
if God brings you up out of Egypt, you shall never go back again into
the house of bondage!
I heard, the other day, of a woman who came, at the end of a certain
revival meeting, to make a confession of her faith. She said she had
been regenerated six times! Now, I have heard and read in the Bible of
people being born again, but to be born again, and again, and again,
and again, and again, and again is not what I have read anywhere in the
Scriptures, or, if such a thing is possible–if being born again does
not finally save men, remember that awful warning of the Apostle, "It
is impossible. . . if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto
repentance." The Word of God is very explicit about that matter. "For
the earth which drinks in the rain that comes often upon it, and brings
forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receives blessing from
God: but that which bears thorns and briers is rejected, and is near
unto cursing; whose end is to be burned."
Our Savior also said, "Salt is good: but if the salt has lost its
savor, with what shall it be seasoned? It is neither fit for the land
nor yet for the dunghill; but men cast it out." You cannot imagine that
a person can be regenerated twice! If the work of regeneration is
accomplished once, and it does not save the soul, then there is no
salvation for it! That is all God ever will do and, therefore, do I
bless and glorify His name that there never was and never shall be an
instance in which He has made a man a new creature in Christ Jesus–and
then the work of Grace has failed! There are plenty who come near to
this point and who seem, sometimes, to have really reached it–but rest
assured of this, Beloved, if the Lord has brought you forth out of this
captivity, none shall ever undo what God has done! We are out. We are
out.''He that believes and is baptized shall be saved." We hold to that
plain and blessed Truth of God! Of old, the Lord said, "I will put My
fear in their hearts, that they shall not depart from Me." Nothing can
be more definite and explicit than that. We are bound for the land of
Canaan, and into Canaan we shall go!
We are out. That is, we are now separated unto the Lord. If we are,
indeed, what I have described, we do not belong, in the fullest sense,
to any country or to any people, but we belong to God–we are separate
from all people upon the face of the earth! You cannot make anything
but a Jew of a Jew. You may do what you like with him, but he always
remains a Jew. And you cannot make anything of a Christian but a
Christian. Put him where you may, he is still a Christian. Whatever
sphere of social life he occupies, or in whatever country he dwells, he
is always a Christian. I was never ashamed of being an Englishman
except when I have seen an Englishman behaving wrongly towards other
people. Then I have felt as if I would be a Frenchman, or anything
else! But I would be a Christian, first of all, and above all! When I
am a Christian, I know no nationality. We are cosmopolites–inhabitants
of every place, wherever we may be–if we are inhabitants of the holy
city which is above. Our citizenship is in Heaven. Therefore we are
separated from all the rest of mankind. The world knows us not because
it knew not our Lord. May God separate us more and more unto Himself!
But we are separated that we may be preserved by the Lord and blessed
by the Lord, for Israel, when brought out of Egypt, had to live by
manna that dropped daily from Heaven, and by water that gushed out of
the Rock. That is how all Christians ought to live. You are not to
depend, now, upon the world–you are to depend upon God for
everything– for your bread and for your water, and for all your needs.
The whole of your life is to be in Him–not only that which is
spiritual, but even that which is outward and visible is still to be a
life in Christ, and a life for Christ–for you are dead to the world
and your life is hid with Christ in God. The Lord said, even by the
mouth of Balaam, "The people shall dwell alone, and shall not be
reckoned among the nations." Oh, what a mercy it is to be out of Egypt
in that respect!
Dear Brothers and Sisters, whatever our condition may be, here, we are
out of Egypt en route for the Glory land. He who brought us out of
Egypt will bring us into Canaan. Our home is not here. Our feet are not
fixed upon this narrow plot of earth–they are moving towards another
country, that is, a heavenly one.
III. I can only just touch upon the last part of our text–HE WILL
BRING US– for our time has gone. But I want to say this much about it.
The Lord brought us out on purpose that He might bring us in. He did
not bring us out merely for what we are now, but also for what we are
yet to be. If Israel had only been what she ought to have been, she
would have been into Canaan almost as soon as she was out of Egypt! And
if you and I were all we ought to be, we would, even here, enjoy full
happiness, for there is a Heaven below, and there is a rest for the
people of God which we find in Christ even now.
So, next, the delay is caused by our unfitness. The Israelites were
unbelieving, so they had to wander for 40 years in the wilderness
before the nation entered upon its heritage in the land of Canaan. And
it is because you and I are so carnal and there is so much of unbelief
about us, that we go up and down, backwards and forwards, and do not
fully enter into the possession of the glorious privileges which are
ours by Covenant right. Yet, even here, we who have believed enter into
rest! We have a foretaste of Heaven, we have the first-fruits of the
Spirit. We have tasted the grapes of Eshcol and we are longing to cross
the Jordan and to be–
"Where our dear Lord His vineyard keeps, And all the clusters grow."
The Lord brought us out with this design, that He might bring us in. It
is clear that He who brought us out can bring us in. That which remains
to be done is not as much as that which has already been done. There is
not half as much difficulty between here and Heaven as there lies
behindus–between here and our fallen condition. Atonement has been
made and that is the greatest work of all! Sin has been put away,
eternal life has come into these dead souls and merely to keep that
flame alive, albeit it needs Divine Power, yet is a small thing
compared with the putting of the Light of God within us and the
redeeming us from sin, death and Hell!
He brought us out and He will bring us in, otherwise He would lose all
that He has done. If the Lord does not bring us into Glory, then the
precious blood of Christ has been shed in vain and the Holy Spirit has
operated upon our hearts in vain. If God does not finish His work upon
us and in us, then men and devils will say that He began to build, but
He could not finish. A soul in whom the Lord does not finish His work
would be a monument for the eternal derision of Satan and all his
hosts–and that shall never be! God's eternal purpose would fail if He
did not bring us in. Let us, therefore, trust in Him, and say, "He will
bring us in." Despite the Girgashites, the Hittites and all the other
"ites," He will bring us in! Across the Jordan we shall go with our
Joshua, Jehovah-Jesus, at our head and we shall take our possession,
everyone of us, in that glorious land and stand in our lot in that day,
as surely as He has brought us out.
The important point for us to settle is–Has the Lord, indeed, brought
us out? If any of you are still in bondage, the Lord make you to feel
your bondage! The Lord make you to cry out in the bitterness of your
soul! That is half-way towards getting out–that feeling of loathing
for your present state is half the battle of your coming out of Egypt!
The Lord make you to cry and groan, and look right out of yourselves
wholly to the Lord Jesus and if, by the grip of faith, you get hold of
my Master's garments, there is none that shall make you lose your hold,
for, if you have a hold on Him, He has a firmer hold on you! If you
have but touched Him with the finger of faith, He has laid His eternal
power under bond to save you and He must and will accomplish the work,
great as it is! God has laid help upon One who is mighty, and that
mighty One shall never fail. Oh, the bliss of being in Christ! It is to
be out of Egypt and it is to have the certain prospect of being,
by-and-by, in Heaven!
God bless you all, dear Friends, for Christ's sake! Amen.
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: DEUTERONOMYY 6.
Verse 1. Now these are the commandments, the statutes, and the
judgments, which the LORD your God commanded to teach you, that you
might do them in the land where you go to possess it God's commandments
are to be taught, but they are also to be practiced–"which the Lord
your God commanded to teach you, that you might do them." And it is
this doing of them that is the hard part of the work. It is not always
easy to teach them–a man needs the Spirit of God if he is to teach
them aright–but practice is harder than preaching. May God grant us
Grace, whenever we hear His Word, to do it!
2. Thatyou might fear the LORDyour God, to keep allHis statutes andHis
commandments, which Icommandyou, you, and your son, and your son's son,
all the days of your life; and that your days may be prolonged. The
fear of God must always be a practical power in our lives–"that you
might fear the Lord your God, to keep all His statutes and His
commandments." And that practical fear should lead us into obedience in
detail. We ought so to study God's Word that we endeavor "to keep
allHis statutes and His commandments." A slipshod obedience is
disobedience. We must be careful and watchful to know the Divine will
and in all respects to carry it out. You who are His children, dwelling
in such a household, and with such a Father, it well becomes you to be
obedient children. No, it is not only for us to obey the command of the
Lord our God, but we should pray till the rest of the verse also comes
true–"you, and your son, and your son's son," our children and our
children's children. I am sure that if we love God, we shall long that
our children and our children's children may love Him, too. If your
trade has supported you and brought you in a competence, you will
naturally wish to bring your son up to it. But, on a far higher
platform, if God has been a good God to you, your deepest desire will
be that your son and your son's son should serve the same Divine Master
through all the days of their life! "That your days may be prolonged."
God does not give long life to all His people, yet in obedience to God
is the most probable way of securing long life. There are also many of
God's saints who are spared in times of pestilence, or who are
delivered by an act of faith out of great dangers. That ancient
declaration of God often comes true in these later times, "As the days
of a tree are the days of My people, and My elect shall long enjoy the
work of their hands." At any rate, you who love the Lord shall live out
your days, whereas the wicked shall not live out half their days. You
shall complete the circle of life, whether it is a great circle or a
little one–with long life will God satisfy you, and show you His
salvation. The passage which now follows is held in very great esteem
by the Jewish people even to this day. They repeat it frequently, for
it forms part of their morning and evening services.
3, 4. Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it; that it may be
well with you, and that you may increase mightily, as the LORD God of
your fathers has promised you, in the land that flows with milk and
honey. Hear, O Israel: The LORD our Godis one LORD. There is but one
God. This is the very basis of our faith–we know nothing of "gods many
and lords many." Yet it is the Triune Godwhom we worship. We are not
less Unitarians, in the highest meaning of that word, because we are
Trinitarians! We are not less Believers in the one living and true God
because we worship Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
5. And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with
all your soul, and with all your might Does not this show what is the
very Nature of God? God is Love, for He commands us to love Him!! There
was never an earthly prince or king whom I have heard of in whose
statute book it was written, "You shall love the king." No. It is only
in the Statute Book of Him who is the Lord of Life and Love that we
read such a command as this! To my mind it seems a very blessed
privilege for us to be permitted to love One so great as God is. Here
it is we find our Heaven! It is a command, but we regard it rather as a
loving, tender invitation to the highest bliss–"You shall love the
Lord your God with all your heart"–that is, intensely. "And with all
your soul"–that is, most sincerely, most lovingly. "And with all your
might." With all your energy, with every faculty, with every
possibility of your nature.
6. And these words, which I command you this day, shall be in your
heart Oh, how blessed to have them written on the heart by the Holy
Spirit! We can never get them there except He who made the heart anew
shall engrave upon these fleshy tablets the Divine Precepts.
7. And you shall teach them diligently unto your children. Christian
parent, have you done this? "You shall" not only teach them, but,
"teach them diligently unto your children."
7. And shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk
by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up. Our common
talk should be much more spiritual than it often is. There is no fear
of degrading sacred subjects by the frequent use of them–the fear lies
much the other way–lest by a disuse of them we come to forget them.
This blessed Book, the Holy Word of God, is a fit companion for your
leisure as well as for your labor, for the time of your sleeping and
the time of your waking. It will bless you in your private meditations
and equally cheer the social hearth and comfort you when, in mutual
friendship, you speak, the one with the other. Those who truly love God
greatly love His holy Word.
8. And you shall bind them for a sign upon your hand. They shall be
your practical guide, at your fingertips, as it were.
8. And they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall see by
them, you shall see with them, you shall see through them.
9. And you shall write them upon the posts of your house and on your
gates. I could almost wish that this were literally fulfilled much more
often than it is. I was charmed, in many a Swiss village, to see a text
of Scripture carved on the doorpost. A text hung up in your houses may
often speak when you are silent. We cannot do anything that shall be
superfluous in the way of making known the Word of God.
10-12. Andit shall be, when the LORD your Godshallhave brought you into
the land which He swore unto your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to
Jacob, to give you great and goodly cities, which you built not, and
houses full of all good things, which you filled not, and wells dug,
which you dug not, vineyards and olive trees, which you planted not;
when you shall have eaten and are full; then beware lest you forget the
LORD, which brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house
of bondage. Bread eaten is soon forgotten. How often we act like dogs
that will take the bones from our hand and then forget the hand that
gave them! It should not be so with us. All our spiritual mercies and
many of our temporal ones are very much like the inheritance of Israel
in the land of Canaan–wells that they did not dig, and vineyards which
they did not plant. Our blessings come from sources that are beyond our
own industry and skill. They are the fruits of the holy inventiveness
of God and the splendor and fullness of His thoughtfulness towards His
poor children. Let us not forget Him, since evidently He never forgets
us!
13-15. You shall fear the LORD your God, and serve Him, and shall swear
by His name. You shall not go after other gods, ofthe gods ofthepeople
which are round about you, (for the LORDyour Godis ajealous God among
you), lest the anger ofthe Lord your God be kindled against you, and
destroy you from off the face ofthe earth. Our God is a jealous God.
One said to a Puritan, "Why be so precise?" and he replied, "Because I
serve a precise God." God has done so much for us, in order to win our
hearts, that He ought to have them altogether for Himself. When He has
them all, it is all too little–but to divide our heart is to grieve
His Spirit and sorely to vex Him.
16-24. You shall not tempt the LORD your God, as you tempted Him in
Massah. You shall diligently keep the commandments ofthe LORD your God,
andHis testimonies, andHis statutes, which He has commanded you. Andyou
shall do that which is right and good in the sight ofthe LORD: that it
may be well with you, and that you may go in and possess the good land
which the LORD swore unto your fathers, to cast out all your enemies
from before you, as the LORD has spoken. And when your son asks you in
time to come, saying, What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and
the judgments, which the Lord our God has commanded you? Then you shall
say unto your son, We were Pharaoh's bondmen in Egypt; and the LORD
brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand: and the LORD showed signs
and wonders, great and sore, upon Egypt, upon Pharaoh, and upon all his
household, before our eyes: and He brought us out from there, that He
might bring us in, to give us the land which He swore unto our fathers.
And the LORD commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the LORD
our God, for our good always, that He might preserve us alive, as itis
at this day. Oh, Friends, it will be well when our boys and girls ask
us questions like this and when we can give such answers! The great
lack of the age in which we live is obedience to God. "Modern thought"
has flung off obedience to Divine Revelation–and even in matters
relating to social morality, many men reject all idea of anything being
commanded of God–they only judge by what appears to them to be either
pleasurable or profitable. What is most needed just now is that we,
ourselves, and those about us become really conscious of the greatness
and Sovereignty of God–and yield ourselves to Him to do as He bids us,
when He bids us, where He bids us–and in all things to seek to follow
His commandments that He may "preserve us alive, as it is at this day."
25. Andit shall be our righteousness, if we observe to do all these
commandments before the LORD our God, as He has commanded us. That
would have been Israel's righteousness if the people had observed to do
all these commandments before the Lord. But it was marred and spoiled
by disobedience. We rejoice to know that we who believe in Jesus have a
righteousness unto which Israel did not attain, for the Lord Jesus
Christ, Himself, is our righteousness!