The Patriarchs Part 20

How is it, then, that it does not betray itself in the Patriarchs? Was it because they were such constant witnesses to themselves of the grace and election of G.o.d, and had never heard the voice of the law? This helped to form their minds, we may be sure. But besides this, this absence of the spirit of bondage was beautifully consistent with their dispensational standing; for they were as children who had never as yet been from home. They were in infancy, and they could no more move in the presence of G.o.d in a spirit of fear and uncertainty, than a child, ere he left home, could be tempted to question his t.i.tle to the nurture and shelter of his father's house. And it is of the moral beauty and perfection of this infant Book of Genesis that we see this child-like, unquestioning faith in the saints of G.o.d there. They are faulty, and that, too, at times, through want of faith, when certain circ.u.mstances press them; but their souls are never defiled by a spirit of mistrust and bondage. We see this throughout--at least till we reach the moment when we are taking leave of the Book, and have gone beyond what is properly the patriarchal character of it. I mean, in Joseph's brethren, as soon as Jacob's funeral is over.

It then appeared that they had not been trusting their brother with a guileless, happy confidence. There had been an object of common interest between them, and that had been too much the secret of their confidence, instead of Joseph himself. They had not boldness by reason of what Joseph was, and of what he had done, but they had trusted in a circ.u.mstance. Jacob's presence was the stay of their hearts. They had repented; they had been convicted and quickened; but still, their confidence did not honour Joseph, as Joseph had richly deserved at their hands.

And this may have a word for us. We may ask ourselves, if countenance and fellowship of others were withdrawn, would it be found that our whole confidence has all along been in Jesus? that we have so learnt grace, that we can abide the presence of unveiled glory? that the removal of a Jacob clouds not the atmosphere in which our souls have been dwelling?

But we are now reaching the very end of the times of Joseph. However, ere we witness his death, we have (seasonable for us to notice this in this eventful day of ours) a fine instance of _faith's acquaintance with the course of the world's history_.

I do not speak of a _prophet's_ knowledge of what is about to be among the nations, such as Daniel had, when he told of the rise of one beast after another, and of the Great Image from its head of gold down to its toes of iron and clay. Such knowledge was by the _Spirit_, the Lord filling the heart of Daniel, and of others like him, with His own light.

I speak only of _faith's_ knowledge of that course of things which the history of the nations is to take.

Joseph says to his brethren, "I die: and G.o.d will surely visit you, and bring you out of this land unto the land which He sware to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob."

The children of Israel were at that time very happy in the land of Egypt. They were in the full favour of the king; they were in possession of the richest district in the country, and they saw one of themselves the second person in the kingdom. Not a single symptom of danger or of change appeared in all their condition. And Joseph himself was as happy as circ.u.mstances could make him. "He saw Ephraim's children of the third generation; the children also of Machir the son of Mana.s.seh were brought up upon Joseph's knees."

But in the midst of all this, Joseph speaks of _G.o.d visiting them_; words which bespeak days of sorrow to be at hand, such days as that G.o.d would then be their only friend and helper.

Strange this was, very strange! Who could believe it? Was Joseph dreaming? statesmen and politicians might have said. But no; Joseph was not dreaming. G.o.d's word was his wisdom. The divine oracle in chapter xv. had forewarned, that Egypt would afflict Israel, but that G.o.d would befriend them, and bring them back to Canaan--and this word from G.o.d was everything to Joseph, was everything to faith--appearances were nothing.

The oracle had spoken it. Joseph believed it and remembered it. And thus by faith Joseph saw Israel's _affliction_ in the day of Israel's brightest promise and prosperity--he saw Egypt's _enmity_ in this day of Egypt's friendship--he saw _brick-kilns and task-masters_ in the fair fields and sunny harvest of Goshen. As Noah, by like faith, had once seen a deluged world during 120 years of successive sowing times and reaping times, vintages and summer gatherings, times of buying and selling, planting and building.

This was faith's acquaintance with the coming course of things. And faith, in this our day, is to be a like politician, and to know something of the course of things by the light of G.o.d's word, in the face of all appearances. And this is the only act in Joseph's life which is recorded as of faith in Heb. xi. It is thus strikingly distinguished in the midst of so many acts of faith and G.o.dliness, and of such a course of walking with G.o.d, as we have seen in him. But it was worthy to be thus signalized. It was a great witness of Joseph's living upon the word of G.o.d, in the midst of the world's attractions and occupations, and with a mind superior to all present appearances. Abraham had been instructed, through divine visions and audiences, about this coming history of Israel in Egypt; Joseph only used what Abraham had received.

We have no visits of the Lord to Joseph, as we have to Abraham. Joseph, if you please, was not in Abraham's elevation. But we have in him what is morally the chiefest, the light and certainty of a believing mind, the apprehensions and decisions of faith. He remembered what Abraham had heard, and he acted on what he remembered. What he wanted in personal elevation, as an oracle of G.o.d, he had, in moral power, as a believer in G.o.d. And if I must needs choose between them, I would rather _believe_ than be _inspired_. And Joseph believed, when, as we read, "he made mention of the departing of the children of Israel, and gave commandment concerning his bones." Heb. xi. 22. This was _faith's political knowledge_, as I may speak--faith's acquaintance with the things which were coming on the earth. And this is that which made a Noah or a Joseph wiser than all the senators of the kingdoms. We know well how Joseph's words were vindicated, and how very unlooked for brick-kilns defiled the goodly lands of Goshen, and task-masters drove Israel to their work.

Just as before, in Noah's day, waters covered the very tops of the mountains, and a ship, apparently in all folly built for dry land, was soon the only ark of safety in a watery world.

And I do ask, Is it not to be thus with faith still? Have we not warrant, by faith in the word of G.o.d, to know the course which this world, with all its growing refinement and varied progress, is taking every hour? Have we not reason to know that it is on its way to judgment? Indeed we have. The Lord Jesus has been rejected in this world. That is the fact which gives the world its character with G.o.d. No advance in civil order and cultivation, no spread of even His own truth among the nations, can avail to relieve the world of the judgment that awaits it because of this deed. Let the day be as bright as was the day of the Egyptian Joseph to Israel, faith knows that "the polished surface" is soon to be broken up. Circ.u.mstances never give faith its object. It is the word of G.o.d that does that; and circ.u.mstances and appearances are not to be allowed to take the eye of faith off its object. The house, swept and garnished as it is at present, promises much. So did the land of Rameses and the friendship of Pharaoh, in the days of Gen. 50. But such promises are idle words in the ear of faith; it regards them not. As Jeremiah said to the king of Judah, when the allied army had arrived, and the hostile army had broken up and gone away, "Deceive not yourselves;" so faith says, in this hour, to the generation that is boasting in progress, "Deceive not yourselves." Faith says this with boldness; for well it knows, that the last state of the swept and garnished house is worse than the first.

Joseph then gave proof that he believed what he testified. Like Jacob, his heart was in Canaan, the land of the covenant, the land of his father's sepulchres. And, like Jacob, he took an oath of his brethren, saying, "G.o.d will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence." The unseen world was the real thing with him, as it had been with his fathers. The call of G.o.d had linked them all with that which lay beyond death, and their thoughts and their hearts were there before themselves. It was as natural for them to die as to live.

"Joseph died, being an hundred and ten years old."

His brethren, the children of Israel, were true to him, as he had been to his father Jacob. They embalmed his body at once. Afterwards, Moses carried it with him out of Egypt; and, at the last, Joshua buried it in Shechem in the land of Canaan. See Gen. 50. 26; Ex. xiii. 19; Josh.

xxiv. 32.

We thus close the story of Joseph, and with it the Book of Genesis, the book of the creation and of the first ways of G.o.d, the book also of the patriarchs, the earliest families of the children of men, and the infant age of the elect of G.o.d.

We are sensible, I think, when we leave this book, that in some sense we are getting on lower ground. I think this will be generally felt.

In Genesis, the Lord is rather _manifesting Himself_; afterwards He is _exposing man_. Man was not under law, as we have said, during the times of this book. He was set to learn G.o.d under many and different expressions and revelations of Himself. But as soon as law enters, and that is very quickly after we leave this book, man is necessarily brought forward, and we have to see him, not simply as under the call of G.o.d, but in his own place and character. And surely this is enough to make us sensible of being, in some sense, on lower ground. Of course, in the unfolding of counsels, in the bringing forth of G.o.d's resources upon man's failures, and in the further manifestations of G.o.d Himself upon the exposure of man, we are advancing all through the volume from beginning to end.

But, all-various and wondrous as these counsels are, which get their disclosure as we proceed through Scripture, let the wisdom of G.o.d be never so manifold, as we know it is, yet we may say, every part of it gets some notice or foreshadowing in this Book of Genesis. These are faint and obscure; but the rudiments of the whole language are found in this introductory and infant lesson. Atonement, faith, judgment, glory, government, calling, the kingdom, the Church, Israel, the nations, covenants, promises, prophecies, with the blessed G.o.d Himself in His holiness, love, and truth, the doings of His hand, and the workmanship and fruits of His Spirit, all these and the like appear in this book.

Creation was displayed at the beginning. Soiled and ruined under the hand of man, redemption was published. The heavens and the earth are then shown to be the scenes of redemption (as they had been at the first of creation) in the histories of _Enoch_ and _Noah_. And then in _Abraham_, _Isaac_, _Jacob_, and _Joseph_ we get man (the leading subject of redemption, as of course he is) in his election, adoption, discipline, and inheritance. These mysteries have been looked at in this series, and they lie under the eye, and for the observation of our souls, as we pa.s.s on from one of these histories to another.

And let us learn to say, beloved, to His praise who has spread out such living creations before us, that if the heavens declare the glory of G.o.d and the firmament showeth His handiwork, so with no less clearness and certainty do the pages of Scripture bespeak the breathings of His Spirit.

THE BOOK OF JOB.

JAMES v. 11.

"Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face"

May surely be said, upon the reading of this deeply affecting story.

Said, too, with peculiar fitness and fulness of truth, as though the thought of the Christian poet had been suggested by the tale of the inspired historian. The frown was specially dark and lowering, the smile behind it brilliantly beaming and happy. The veil was very thick, but the glory within very bright. The boastings of the Lord in His servant were above the noise of all the water-floods.

"The bud may have a bitter taste, But sweet will be the flower"

may as surely be the motto for the story also. For let us wait only for a little, and the fruit of the travail will be precious beyond all expectation. Very bitter indeed was the bud, but very sweet indeed was the flower. It had to ripen under the pruning of the sprigs and the taking away of the branches (Isaiah xviii. 5), but it tells, in the end, the skill and patience of its divine husbandman. I would, however, rather trace some of the principles of this beautiful Book, than thus at the beginning more largely antic.i.p.ate the moral of it.

Resurrection, called by the Lord "the power of G.o.d," or, at least, one of the ways of that power (Matthew xxii. 29), has been made known, through different witnesses, and in divers manners, from the very beginning. And connected as it is with redemption, the great principle of G.o.d's way and the secret of His purposes, it must have been so.

It was intimated in the creation of the beautiful scene around us, for the world itself was called forth from the grave of the deep. The material was without form, and darkness was upon the face of it, but light was commanded to shine out of darkness, and beauty and order were caused to arise. See Hebrews xi. 3.

It declared itself in the formation of Eve. Then again in the earliest promise about the bruised Seed of the woman. It was kept in memory in Seth given in the place of Abel whom Cain slew; and then again in the line of the fathers before the flood. But still more ill.u.s.triously was it published in Noah. "Every thing in the earth shall die," says the Lord to him, "but with thee will I establish my covenant;" thus disclosing the secret, that the earth was to be established according to the purpose of G.o.d, as in resurrection, stability, and beauty.

So, after these earlier fathers, Abraham was to have both a family and an inheritance on the same principle. He and his generations after him were taught resurrection in the mystery of the barren woman keeping house. The covenant blessing was linked with the risen family. Ishmael may get possessions, and promises too, but the covenant was with Isaac.

And more marvellously still, not to pause longer over other witnesses of it, we see resurrection in the blessed history of "the Word made flesh."

We might indeed have forejudged that it would have been otherwise. For in Christ, flesh was without taint. Here was "a holy thing." But even of such we have now to say, "Yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we Him no more." Christ known by us now is Christ in resurrection. And this is enough to let us know a.s.suredly, that resurrection is the principle of all the divine action, and the secret of the covenant.6

6 All orders of His creatures in all places of His dominions witness Him as the _living_ G.o.d; but in the history of redeemed sinners He is witnessed as the living G.o.d in _victory_. This is His glory; and resurrection should be prized by us as the display of it. The sepulchre with the grave-clothes lying in order, and the napkin which had been about the head, are the trophies of such victory.

John xx. 6, 7. The history of redeemed sinners celebrates Him thus. To hesitate about resurrection is to betray ignorance of G.o.d, and of the power that is His. See Matthew xxii. 29; 1 Cor.

xv. 34.

But resurrection has also been, from the beginning, an article of the faith of G.o.d's people; and, being such, it was also the lesson they had to learn and to practise, the principle of their life; because the principle of a divine dispensation is ever the rule and character of the saints' conduct. The purchase and occupation of the burying field at Machpelah, tell us that the Genesis-fathers had learnt the lesson. Moses learnt and practised it, when he chose affliction with the people of G.o.d, having respect to the recompense of the reward. David was in the power of it, when he made the covenant, or resurrection-promise, all his salvation and all his desire, though his house, his present house, was not to grow. 2 Sam. xxiii. The whole nation of Israel were taught it, again and again, by their prophets, and by-and-by they will learn it, and then witness it to the whole world, the dry bones living again, the winter-beaten teil tree flourishing again; for "what shall the receiving of them be, but life from the dead?" The Lord Jesus, "the Author and Finisher of faith," in His day, I need not say, practised this lesson to all perfection. And each of us, His saints and people, is set down to it every day, that we "may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings."

By the life of faith the elders obtained a good report. And so the saints in every age. For "without faith it is impossible to please Him;"

that faith which trusts Him as a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him, which respects the unseen and the future. They, of whom the world was not worthy, practised the life of faith, the life of dead and risen people. Hebrews xi. Stephen before the council tells us the same.

Abraham, Joseph, and Moses, in his account, were great witnesses of this same life; and he himself, at that moment, after the pattern of his master, Jesus, was exhibiting the strength and virtues of it, through the power of the Holy Ghost, and apprehending, through the same Spirit, the brightest joys and glories of it. Acts vii.

Now, I believe that the leading purpose of the Book of Job is to exhibit this. It is the story of an elect one, in early patriarchal days, a child of resurrection, set down to learn the lesson of resurrection. His celebrated confession tells us that resurrection was understood by him as a doctrine, while the whole story tells us, that he had still to know the power of it in his soul. It was an article of his faith, but not the principle of his life.

And a sore lesson it was to him, hard indeed to learn and digest. He did not like (and which of us does like?) to take the sentence of death into himself, that he might not trust in himself, or in his circ.u.mstances in life, or his condition by nature, but in G.o.d who raises the dead. "I shall die in my nest," was his thought and his hope. But he was to see his nest rifled of all with which nature had filled it, and with which circ.u.mstances had adorned it.

Such is, I believe, the leading purpose of the Spirit of G.o.d in this Book. This honoured and cherished saint had to learn the power of the calling of all the elect, practically and personally, the life of faith, or the lesson of resurrection. And it may be a consolation for us, beloved, who know ourselves to be little among them, to read, in the records which we have of them, that all have not been equally apt and bright scholars in that school, and that all, in different measures, have failed in it, as well as made attainments in it.

How unworthily of it, for instance, did Abraham behave, how little like a dead and risen man, a man of faith, when he denied his wife to the Egyptian, and yet how beautifully did he carry himself, as such, when he surrendered the choice of the land to his younger kinsman. And even our own Apostle, the aptest scholar in the school, the constant witness of this calling to others, and the energetic disciple of the power of it in his own soul, in a moment when the fear of man brought with it a snare, makes this very doctrine the covert of a guileful thought. Acts xxiii.

6.

Encouragements and consolations visit the soul from all this. Happy is it to know, that our present lesson, as those who are dead, and whose life is hid with Christ in G.o.d, has been the lesson of the elect from the beginning--that on many a bright and hallowed occasion they practised that lesson to the glory of their Lord, that at times they found it hard, and at times failed in it. This tale of the soul is well understood by us. Only we, living in New Testament times, are set down to learn the same lesson in the still ampler page, and after the clearer method, in which it is now taught us in the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.

There is some difference, let me observe, nay, I would say, distance, between a _righteous_ and a _devoted_ man. No saint is a devoted one, who has not been practising this lesson of which I have been speaking.

The measure of his devotedness may be said to be according to his attainment in it, according to the energy he is exercising as a man dead and risen with Christ. At the beginning of this history, Job was a righteous man. He was spoken well of again and again, in the very face of his accuser. But he was not a devoted man. The whisper of his heart, as I noticed before, was this, "I shall die in my nest." Accepted he was, as a sinner who knew his living and triumphant Redeemer, G.o.dly and upright beyond his fellows, but withal, as to the power that wrought in his soul, he was not a dead and risen man.

Such also, I might add, was Agur in the Book of Proverbs. He was G.o.dly, and of a lowly, self-judging spirit. He makes a good confession of human blindness and pravity, of the unsearchable glories of G.o.d, the purity and preciousness of His word, and of the security of all who trust in Him. Prov. x.x.x. 1-9. He was a man of G.o.d, and walked in a good spirit.