Bible Commentaries

The Ministry of Symbolism

Ezekiel 5:5-6).

"Set in the midst of the nations": Egypt and Ethiopia on the south; the Hittites, the Syrians, and Assyrians, from time to time, on the north; on the coast, southern and northern, were the Philistines and the Phoenicians; whilst on the deserts of the east, and in the near south, were the Ishmaelites going to and fro, and keeping up intercourse with all the nations. It is thought that Solomon himself established commercial relations with the nations of India. So situated, what opportunities Israel had of presenting the aspect of a people well instructed in the divine law, and sweetly obedient to the divine will and purpose; how without so much as uttering one word of mere exhortation she might have preached with the eloquence of unimpeachable consistency and generous beneficence: Jerusalem was called upon to be the great expositor of monotheism in the ancient world. Yet how wondrously was Jerusalem separated by natural barriers from all other lands or nations—by deserts, by the sea on the west, by the northern mountains; how in this geographical solitude Israel might have cultivated to perfection the worship of the one true God! When the Israelites failed in this high purpose they seemed to dry up the sea, and create a high-road through the desert, and break down the mountains, that they might not only allow, but almost invite, the surrounding nations to come in and reduce them to subjection, making a prey of the very treasure of God's heart. While the judges judged Israel, Israel was continually falling under the power of some of the petty tribes on the confines of the Holy Land, When the empire of Solomon was broken up, in consequence of the sins of the people, the Israelites had no defence against the powerful nations that assailed them: Judaea and Chaldaea made sport of the Israelites. How is the fine gold become dim! how is the giant of God reduced to the feebleness of childhood! how are the mighty fallen! All this apostasy was moral; not because the surrounding nations had better arms, or better military training, did Israel fail in the war, but because Israel had wickedly resisted divine judgment. Immortality is always weakness. When conscience ceases to take part in the battle of life, the battle has already ended in ruin.

What is true of the Israelites is true of all other peoples; and what is true of peoples in their collective capacity is true of the individual man: he goes up or down according to his moral temperament, his moral discipline, his moral purpose in life. How tremendous is the judgment of God as revealed in such words as these:—

"Wherefore, as I live, saith the Lord God; Surely, because thou hast defiled my sanctuary with all thy detestable things, and with all thine abominations, therefore will I also diminish thee; neither shall mine eye spare, neither will I have any pity. A third part of thee shall die with the pestilence, and with famine shall they be consumed in the midst of thee: and a third part shall fall by the sword round about thee; and I will scatter a third part into all the winds, and I will draw out a sword after them" ( Ezekiel 5:11-12).

And so the judgment passes on from thunder to thunder, and the last grand note of that judgment-thunder is, "I the Lord have spoken it." It was impossible for Ezekiel to invent all these moral judgments. We feel that they must have come up from eternity, because they express what never entered into the heart of man to conceive concerning the proper desert and issue of sin. Hell itself is a revelation. Make of that part of the invisible state what we may, it surely never entered into the heart of man to invent it. We may have perverted the idea; by our foolish exaggerations we may have distorted the divine revelation; but the great central fact of judgment, of burning indignation, of unquenchable anger against sin, we must always recognise as one of the unchangeable realities of true religion. It is clear that all judgment was not future in the Old Testament. There was an immediate degradation, and an immediate infliction of tremendous penalty. "I will make thee waste, and a reproach among the nations that are round about thee, in the sight of all that pass by"; "I shall send upon them the evil arrows of famine"; "I will increase the famine upon you, and will break your staff of bread"; "So will I send upon you famine and evil beasts, and they shall bereave thee; and pestilence and blood shall pass through thee; and I will bring the sword upon thee." These were immediate visitations. In the New Testament we are supposed to come upon a prediction rather than a realised judgment. What we have to suffer for our sins is supposed to be in the future, whilst here we may enjoy ourselves in the very act of drinking goblets of iniquity, and sitting down to partake of the festivities of darkness. All this is an error on our part. Under the New Testament dispensation, as under the Old, judgment is immediate, penalty is now impending, our very next step may be into a burning pit They allegorise who postpone judgment, not they who immediately feel it and respond to it penitentially. Every serpent that bites the hedge-breaker is but a hint of the still greater punishment that awaits us when all life is looked at by a judicial eye and pronounced upon by a judicial voice. Blessed are they who take counsel of immediate dispensations and providences, and who have the spiritual eye that in all these can see symbols of something infinitely more appalling. The Lord does not fail to set forth the great truth that the bread and the water are his, and that in his hands are all the issues of the immediate time. It is not man that makes the sword; it is the Lord that fashions it: it is not a mere failure in the arrangement of accidents that ends in physical disaster; it is a plan of the Most High by which he brings us to religious considerateness, to penitence, to self-renunciation, and to that high state of being which is best expressed by the word Faith.

Prayer

Almighty God, we bless thee for thy house. The tabernacle of God is with men upon the earth. Where there is no tabernacle thou art thyself the more accessible; thou art as a sanctuary in the wilderness, thou art a pavilion from the heat and from the storm. We thank thee that neither in this mountain nor yet at Jerusalem alone shall men worship the Father; thou thyself art everywhere present to be adored and spoken to, and to receive our thanksgivings because of the multitudinousness of the blessings of thy right hand. May we find thee in the wilderness, and find thee in the city; at midnight do thou speak unto us in whispers, at midday do thou come to us with all the glory of light: wherever we are, whatever our estate or condition, let it please thy condescending love to visit us, and minister unto us, and comfort us with exceeding succour. Thou hast been with us all our lifetime; thou hast left no empty day upon all the record; specially hast thou been with us in the day of trouble; thou didst ask us; to come to thee on that dark day and tell thee all about the calamity and the sorrow of our life. Thou didst heal us and comfort us, and in renewed strength thou didst send us back to the vineyard and to the battlefield. We bless thee for thy Son Jesus, who told us all about thee and taught us to call thee Father. From the cradle to the Cross he was always the Christ, the Anointed One, the Bright One, the Centre of Light, the Fountain of Blessing, the Alpha and Omega, beyond whom there is no space, beyond whose duration there is no time. We thank thee for the cradle, for the Cross, for the crown of Christ. In Christ our souls begin their everlasting heaven. The Lord hear us when we cry for pardon, listen to us when we sue for help and added joy, and multiply his blessing upon us in the time of broken-heartedness. Amen.