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Expositor's Bible Commentary Deuteronomy 11:1 Therefore thou shalt love the LORD thy God, and keep his charge, and his statutes, and his judgments, and his commandments, alway. ISRAEL’S ELECTION, AND MOTIVES FOR FAITHFULNESS Deuteronomy 9:1-29 ; Deuteronomy 10:1-22 ; Deuteronomy 11:1-32 THE remaining chapters of this special introduction to the statement of the actual laws beginning with chapter 12 contain also an earnest insistence upon other motives why Israel should remain true to the covenant of Yahweh. They are urged to this, not only because life both spiritual and physical depended upon it, as was shown in the trials of the wilderness, but they are also to lay it to heart that in the conquests which assuredly await them, it will be Yahweh alone to whom they will owe them. The spies had declared, and the people had accepted their report, that these peoples were far mightier than they, and that no one could stand before the children of Anak. But the victory over them would show that Yahweh had been among them like a consuming fire, before which the Canaanite power would wither as brushwood in the flame. Under these circumstances the thought would obviously lie near that, as they had been defeated and driven back in their first attempt upon Canaan because of their unrighteousness and unbelief, so they would conquer now because of their righteousness and obedience. But this thought is sternly repressed. The fundamental doctrine which is here insisted on is that Israel’s consciousness of being the people of God must at the same time be a consciousness of complete dependence upon Him. If His gifts were ultimately to be the reward of human righteousness, then obviously that feeling of complete dependence could not be established. They are to move so completely in the shadow of God that they are to see in their successes only the carrying out of the Divine purposes. Instead of feeling fiercely contemptuous of the Canaanites they destroy, because they stand on a moral and spiritual height which gives them a right to triumph, the Israelites are to feel that, while it is for wickedness that the Canaanite people are to be punished, they themselves had not been free from wickedness of an aggravated kind. Their different treatment, therefore, rests upon the fact that they are to be Yahweh’s chosen instruments. In the patriarchs he chose them to become the means, the vehicle, by which salvation and blessing were to be brought to all nations. While, therefore, the evil that comes upon the peoples they are to conquer is deserved, the good they themselves are to receive is equally undeserved. That which alone accounts for the difference is the faithfulness of God to the promises He made for the sake of His purposes. He needs an instrument through which to bless mankind. He has chosen Israel for this purpose, partly doubtless because of some qualities, not necessarily spiritual or moral, which they have come to have, and partly because of their historical position in the world. These taken together make them at this precise moment in the history of the world’s development the fittest instruments to carry out the Divine purpose of love to mankind. And they are elected, made to enter into more constant and intimate communion with God than other nations, on that account. In the words of Rothe, "God chooses or elects at each historical moment from the totality of the sinful race of mankind that nation by whose enrollment among the positive forces which are to develop the kingdom of God the greatest possible advance towards the complete realization of it may be attained, under the historical circumstances of that moment." Whether that completely covers the individual election of St. Paul, as Rothe thinks, or not, it certainly precisely expresses the national election of the Old Testament, and exhausts the meaning of our passage. Israelite particularism had universality of the highest kind as its background, and here the latter comes most insistently to its rights. It was not only the election of Israel to be a peculiar people which depended upon the wise and loving purpose of God; the providences which befell them also had that as their source. To fit them for their mission, and to give them a place wherein they could develop the germs of higher faith and nobler morality which they had received, Yahweh gave them victory over those greater nations, and planted them in their place. This, and this only, was the reason of their success; and with scathing irony the author of Deuteronomy stamps under his feet {Deu 9:7 ff.} any claim to superior righteousness on their part. He points back to their continuous rebellions during the forty years in the wilderness. From the beginning to the end of their journey towards the Promised Land, they are told, they have been rebellious and stiff-necked and unprofitable. They have broken their covenant with their God. They have caused Moses to break the tables of stone containing the fundamental conditions of the covenant, because their conduct had made it plain that they had not seriously bound themselves to it. But the mercy of God had been with them. Notwithstanding their sin, Yahweh had been turned to mercy by the prayer of Moses ( Deuteronomy 9:25 ff.), and had repented of His design to destroy them. A new covenant was entered into, with them (chapter 10) by means of the second tables, which contained the same commands as were engraven on the first. The renewal, moreover, was ratified by the separation of the tribe of Levi {Deu 10:8 ff.} to be the specially priestly tribe, "to bear the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord, to stand before the Lord to minister unto Him and to bless in His name." From beginning to end it was always Yahweh, and again Yahweh, who had chosen and loved and cared for them. It was He who had forgiven and strengthened them; but always for reasons which reached far beyond, or even excluded, any merit on their part. The grounds of Moses’ successful, intercession for them {Deu 9:25 ff.} are notable in this connection. They have no reference at all to the needs, or hopes, or expectations of the people. These are all brushed aside, as being of no moment after such unfaithfulness as theirs had been. The great object before his mind is represented to be Yahweh’s glory. If this stiff-necked people perish, then the greatness of God will be obscured and His purposes will be misunderstood. Men will certainly think, either that Yahweh, Israel’s God, attempted to do what He was not able to do, or that He was wroth with His people, and drew them out into the wilderness to slay them there. It is God’s purpose with them, God’s purpose for the world through them, which alone gives them importance. Were it not for that, they would be as little worth saving as they have deserved to be saved. For his people, and, we may be sure, for himself, Moses recognizes no true worth save in so far as he or they were useful in carrying out Divine purposes of good to the world. Nor is the absence of any plea on Israel’s behalf, that it is miserable or unhappy, due merely to a desire to keep the rebellious people in the background for the moment, and to appeal only to the Divine self-love for a pardon which would, on the merits of the case, be refused. It is the God of the whole earth, before whom "the inhabitants of the earth are as grasshoppers," who is appealed to; a God removed far above the petty motives of self-interested men, and set upon the one great purpose of establishing a kingdom of God upon the earth into which all nations might come. If His glory is appealed to, that is only because it is the glory of the highest good both for the individual and for the world. If fear lest doubt should be cast upon His power is put forward as a reason for His having mercy, that is because to doubt His power is to doubt the supremacy of goodness. If the Divine promise to the patriarchs is set forth here, it is because that promise was the assurance of the Divine interest in and Divine love of the world. Under such circumstances it would need a very narrow-hearted literalism, such as only very "liberal" theologians and critics could favor, to reduce this appeal to a mere attempt to flatter Yahweh into good-humor. It really embodies all that can be said in justification of our looking for answers to prayer at all; and rightly understood it limits the field of the answer as strictly as the expressed or implied limitations of the New Testament, viz. that effectual prayer can only be for things according to the will of God. Moreover it expresses an entirely natural attitude towards God. Before Him, the sum of all perfections, the loving and omniscient and omnipresent God, what is man that he should assert himself in any wise? When the height and the depth, the sublimity and the comprehensiveness of the Divine purpose is considered, how can a man do aught save fall upon his face in utter self-forgetfulness, immeasurably better even than self-contempt? The best and holiest of mankind have always felt this most; and the habit of measuring their attainments by the faithfulness and knowledge, the virtue and power which is in God, has impressed some of the greatest minds and purest souls with such humility, that to men without insight it has seemed mere affectation. But the pity, the condescension, the love of Christ has so brought God down into our human life, that we are apt at times to lose our awe of God as seen in Him. Were we children of the spirit we should not fall into that sin. We cannot, consequently, be too frequently or too sharply recalled to the more austere and remote standpoint of the Old Testament. For many even of the most pious it would be well if they could receive and keep a more just impression of their own worthlessness and nullity before God. In the section from the twelfth verse of chapter 10 {Deu 10:12} to the end of chapter 11 the hortatory introduction is summed up in a final review of all the motives to and the results of obedience and love to God. The fundamental exhortation as to love to God is once more repeated; only here fear is joined with love and precedes it; but the necessity of love to God is expanded and dwelt upon, as at the beginning, with a zeal that never wearies. The Deuteronomist illustrates and enforces it with old reasons and new, always speaking with the same pleading and heartfelt earnestness. He does not fear the tedium of repetition, nor the accusation of moving in a narrow round of ideas. Evidently in the evil time when he wrote this love towards God had come to be his own support and his consolation; and it had been revealed to him as the source of a power, a sweetness, and a righteousness which could alone bring the nation into communion with God. In affecting words resembling very closely the noble exhortation in Micah 6:1-16 , "He hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth Yahweh require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" he teaches much the same doctrine as his contemporary: "And now, Israel, what doth Yahweh thy God require of thee, but to fear Yahweh thy God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve Yahweh thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, to keep the commandments of Yahweh and His statutes which I command thee this day for thy good?" {Deu 10:12} In spirit these passages seem identical; but it is held by many writers on the Old Testament that they are not so that they represent, in fact, opposite poles of the faith and life of Israel. Micah is supposed by Duhm, for instance, to mean by his threefold demand that justice between man and man, love and kindliness and mercy towards others, and humble intercourse with God are, in distinction from sacrifice, true religion, and undefiled. Robertson Smith also considers that these verses in Micah contain a repudiation of sacrifice. In Deuteronomy, on the contrary, fear and love of God and walking in His ways are placed first, but they are joined with a demand for the heartfelt service of God and the keeping of His statutes as about to be set forth. Now these certainly include ritual and sacrifice. The one passage, written by a prophet, excludes sacrifice as binding and acceptable service of God; the other, written perhaps by a priest, certainly by a man upon whom no prophetic lessons of the past had been lost, includes it. To use the words of Robertson Smith in discussing the requisites of forgiveness in the Old Testament, "According to the prophets Yahweh asks only a penitent heart and desires no sacrifice; according to the ritual law, He desires a penitent heart approaching Him in certain sacrificial sacraments." The author of Deuteronomy teaches the second view; the author of Micah, chapter 6, who is probably his contemporary, teaches the former. How is such divergence accounted for? The answer generally made is that Deuteronomy was the product of a close alliance between priests and prophets. A common hatred of Manasseh’s idolatry and a common oppression had brought them together as never perhaps before. With one heart and mind they wrought in secret for the better day which they saw approaching, and Deuteronomy was a reissue of the ancient Mosaic law adapted to the prophetic teaching. It represented a compromise between, or an amalgamation of, two entirely distinct positions. But even on this view it would follow that from the time of Josiah, when Deuteronomy was accepted as the completest expression of the will of God, the doctrine that ritual and sacrifice as well as penitence were essential things in true religion was known, and not only known but accepted as the orthodox opinion. Putting aside, then, the question whether sacrifice was acknowledged by the prophets before this or not, they must have accepted it from this point onward, unless they denied to Deuteronomy the authority which it claimed and which the nation conceded to it. Jeremiah clearly must have assented to it, for his style and his thought have been so closely molded on this book that some have thought he may have been its author. In any case he did not repudiate its authority; and all the prophets who followed him must have known of this view, and also that it had been sanctioned by that book which was made the first Jewish Bible. We have here, at all events, the keynote of the supremacy of moral duty over Divine commands concerning ritual which distinguishes the prophetic teaching in Micah and elsewhere, joined with the enforcement of ritual observances. But there are few purely prophetic passages which raise the higher demand so high as it is raised here. To love and fear God are anew declared to be man’s supreme duties, and the author presses these home by arguments of various kinds. Again he returns to the election of Israel by Yahweh, without merit of theirs; and to bring home to them how much this means, the Deuteronomist exhibits the greatness of their God, His might, His justice, and His mercy, which, great as it is to His chosen people, is not confined to them, but extends to the stranger also. This most gracious One they are to serve by deeds, to Him they are to cleave, and they are to swear by Him only, that is, they are solemnly to acknowledge Him to be their God in return for His undeserved favor. For their very existence as a nation is a wonder of His power, since they were only a handful when they went down to Egypt, and now were "as the stars of heaven for multitude." Then once more, in chapter 11, he repeats his one haunting thought that love is to be the source of all worthy fulfillment of the law; and he endeavors to shed abroad this love to God in their hearts by reminding them once more of all the marvels of their deliverance from Egypt, and of their wilderness journey. Their God had delivered them first, then chastised them for their sins, and had trained them for the new life that awaited them in the land promised to their fathers. Even in the security of the land they were to find themselves not less dependent upon God than before. Rather their dependence would be more striking and more impressive than in Egypt. As we have seen repeatedly, this inspired writer belonged in many respects to the childhood of the world, and the people he addressed were primitive in their ideas. Yet his thoughts of God in their highest flight were so essentially true and deep, that even today we can go back upon them for edification and inspiration. But here we have an appeal based upon a distinction which today should have almost entirely lost its meaning. The Deuteronomist yields quite simply and unreservedly to the feeling that the regular, unvarying processes of nature are less Divine, or at least are less immediately significant of the Divine presence, than those which cannot be foreseen, which vary, and which defy human analysis. For he here contrasts Egypt and Canaan, in both of which he represents Israel as having been engaged in agricultural pursuits, and speaks as if in the former all depended upon human industry and ingenuity, and might be counted upon irrespective of moral conduct, while in the latter all would depend upon Divine favor and a right attitude towards God. It is quite true that in preceding chapters he has been teaching that, even for worldly material success, the higher life is necessary, that man nowhere lives by bread alone; and that we may assuredly assume is his deepest, his ultimate thought. But he has a practical end in view at this moment. He wishes to persuade his people, and he appeals to what both he and they felt, though in the last resort it might hardly perhaps be justified. In Egypt, he says, your agricultural success was certain if only you were industrious. The great river, of which the land itself is the gift, came down in flood year after year, and you had only to store and to guide its waters to ensure you a certain return for your labor. You had not to look to uncertain rains, but could by diligence always secure a sufficiency of the life-giving element, In Canaan it will not be so. It "drinketh water only of the rain of heaven." God’s eye has to be upon it continually to keep it fertile, and the sense of dependence upon Him will force itself upon you more constantly and powerfully in consequence. They could hope to prosper only if they never forgot, never put away His exhortations out of their sight. Otherwise, he says, the life-giving showers will not fall in their due season. Your land will not yield its fruits, and "ye shall perish quickly off the good land which Yahweh giveth you." Now what are we to say of this appeal? There can be no doubt that the Divine omnipotence was really, in the Deuteronomist’s view as well as in ours, as irresistible in Egypt as in Canaan. Fundamentally, no doubt, life or death, prosperity or adversity, were as much in the hand of God in the one case as in the other; and the Deuteronomist, at least, had no doubt that rebellion against God could and would destroy Egypt’s prosperity as much as Canaan’s. But he felt that somehow there was a tenderer and more intimate communion of love between Yahweh and His people under the one set of circumstances than under the other. We are not entitled to impute to him a questionable distinction which modern minds are apt to make, viz. that where long experience has taught men to regard the course of providence as fixed, there the sphere of prayer for material benefit ends, and that only in the region where the Divine action in nature seems to us more spontaneous and less capable of being foreseen, can prayer be heartily, because hopefully, made. But the feeling that suggests that was certainly in his mind. He felt the difference between the fixed conditions of life in Egypt and the more variable conditions in Canaan, to be much the same as the difference between the circumstances of a son receiving a fixed yearly allowance from his father, in an independent and perhaps distant home, and those of a son in his father’s house, who receives his portion day by day as the result and evidence of an ever-present affection. Both are equally dependent upon the father’s love, and both should theoretically be equally filled with loving gratitude. But as a fact, the latter would be more likely to be so, and would be held more guilty if he were not so. Upon’ that actual fact the Deuteronomist takes his stand. As they were now to enter into Yahweh’s land, His chosen dwelling-place, he sees in the different material conditions of the new country that which should make the union between Yahweh and His people more intimate and more secure, and He presses home upon them the greater shame of ingratitude, if under such circumstances they should forget God and His laws. Finally {Deu 11:22-25} he promises them the victorious extension of their dominion if they will love Yahweh and keep His laws. From Lebanon to the southern wilderness, from the Euphrates to the western sea, they should rule, if they would cleave unto their God. At no time was this promise fulfilled save in the days of David and Solomon. For only then had Lebanon and the wilderness, the Euphrates and the sea, been the boundaries of Israel. This must, then, be regarded as the time of Israel’s greatest faithfulness. But it is striking that it is in Josiah’s day, after the adoption of Deuteronomy as the national law, that we meet with a conscious effort to realize this condition of things once more. There would seem to be little doubt that the good king took an equally literal view of what the book commanded and of what it promised. He inaugurated a period of complete external compliance with the law, and like the young and inexperienced man he was, he regarded that as the fulfillment of its requirements, and looked for a similar instantaneous fulfillment of the promises, Bit by bit he had absorbed the ancient territory of the Northern Kingdom; and in the decay of the Assyrian power he saw the opportunity for the enlargement of his dominion to the limit here defined. He consequently went out against Pharaoh Necho in the full confidence that he would be victorious. But if the Divine promise and its conditions were taken up too superficially by him, Divine providence soon and terribly corrected the error. The defeat and death of Josiah revealed that the reformation had not been real and deep enough, and that the nation was not faithful enough to make such triumph possible. Indeed, so far as we can see, the time for any true fulfillment of Israel’s calling in that fashion had then passed by. The harvest was past, and Israel was not saved, and could not now be saved, for it was in its deepest heart unfaithful. It may be questioned by some, of course, whether an Israel faithful even in the highest degree could at any time have kept possession of so wide a dominion in the face of the great empires of Assyria and Egypt. These were rich, and had a far larger command both of territory and men: how then could the Israelites ever have maintained themselves in face of them? But the question is how to measure the power of the higher ideas they held. It is not force but truth that rules the world; and absolutely no limit can be set to the possibilities which open out to a free, morally robust, and faithful people, who have become possessed of higher, spiritual ideas than the peoples that surround them. Even in this skeptical modern day the transformation as regards physical strength which takes place when certain classes of Hindus become either Mohammedans or Christians is so startling and so rapid that it appears almost a miracle. As regards courage, too, it is even more rapid and equally remarkable. The great majority of the struggles of nations are fought out on the level of mere physical force and for material ends, and the strongest and richest wins: but whenever a people possessed of higher ideas and absolutely faithful to them does appear, the opposing power, however great it may be in wealth and numbers, is whirled away in fragments as by a tornado, or it dissolves like ice before the sun. What Israel might have been, therefore, had it been penetrated by the principles of the higher religion, and been passionately true to it, can in no way be judged by that which it actually was. Among the untried possibilities which it was too unfaithful to realize, the possession of such an empire as Deuteronomy promises would seem to be one of the least. Our chapter sums up what precedes with the declaration on the part of Yahweh, "See, I am setting before you this day a blessing and a curse," according as they might obey or disobey the Divine command. It is stated, in short, that the whole future of the people is to be determined by their attitude to Yahweh and the commands He has given them. In these two words "blessing" and "curse," as Dillmann observes, He sets before them the greatness of the decision they are called upon to make. Just as at the end of chapter 3 the vision of Yahweh’s stretched-out hand, which has strewn the world with the wrecks and fragments of destroyed nations, is relied on to prepare the people for contemplating their own calling, so here the: gain or loss which would follow their decision is solemnly set before them. By Dillmann and others it is supposed that Deuteronomy 11:29 and Deuteronomy 11:31 , which instruct the people to "lay the blessing upon, Mount Gerizim and the curse upon Mount Ebal," have been transferred by the later editor from chapter 27, where they would come in very fittingly after Deuteronomy 27:3 . But whether that be so or not, they are evidently so far in place here that they add to the solemnity with which the fate of the nation in the future is insisted upon. Their "choice is brief and yet endless"; it can be made in a moment, but in its consequence it will endure. But here a difficulty arises. Dr. Driver in his "Introduction" says of this hortatory section of our book that its teaching is that "duties are not to be performed from secondary motives, such as fear or dread of consequences; they are to be the spontaneous outcome of a heart from which every taint of worldliness has been removed, and which is penetrated by an all-absorbing sense of personal devotion to God." Yet in these later chapters we have had little else but appeals to the gratitude and hopes and fears of Israel. Chapters 8 to 11 are wholly taken up with incitements to love and obey God, because He has been immeasurably good to them, never letting their ingratitude overcome His loving-kindness; because they are wholly dependent upon Him for prosperity and the fertility of their land; and because evil will come upon them if they do not. That would seem to be the opposite of what Driver has declared to be the informing spirit and the fundamental teaching of Deuteronomy. Yet his view is the true one. Even if the Deuteronomist had added these lower motives to attract and gain over those who were not so open to the higher, that would not deprive him of the glory of having set forth disinterested love as the really impelling power in true religion. We are not required to lower our esteem of that achievement, even if, like the reasonable and wise teacher he is, he boldly uses every motive that actually influences men, whether it should do so or not, to win them to the higher life. But it is not necessary to suppose that he does so. His demand is that men shall love Yahweh their God with all their heart and strength, and to win them to that he sets forth what their God has revealed Himself to be. Men cannot love one whom they do not know: they cannot love one who has not proved himself lovable to them. As his whole effort is to get men to love God, and show their love by obedience to His expressed will, the Deuteronomist brings to mind all His loving thoughts and acts towards them, and so continually keeps his appeal at the highest level. He does not ask men to serve God because it will be profitable to them, but because they love God: and he endeavors to make them love God by reciting all His love and friendliness and patience to His people, and by pointing out the evil which His love is seeking to ward off. The plea is not the ignoble one that they must serve Yahweh for what they can gain by it, but that they should love Yahweh for His love and graciousness, and that out of this love continual obedience should flow as a necessary result. That is his central position; and if he points out the necessary results of a refusal to turn to God in this way he does not thereby set forth slavish fear or calculating prudence as in themselves religious motives. They are only natural and reasonable means of turning men to view the other side. He uses them to bring the people to a pause, during which he may win them by the love of God. That is always the true appeal; and Christianity when it is at its finest can do nothing but follow in this path. Having before his mind the results of evil conduct, he does urge men to escape from the wrath that may rest upon them. But the only means so to escape is to yield to the love of God. No self-restraint dictated by fear of consequences, no turning from evil because of the lions that are seen in the path, satisfies the demand of either Old Testament or New Testament religion. Both raise the truly religious life above that into the region of self-devoting love; and they both deny spiritual validity to all acts, however good they may be in themselves, which do not follow love as its free and uncalculating expression. Yet they both deal with men as rational beings who can estimate the results of their acts, and warn them of the death which must be the end of every other way of supposed salvation. In this manner they keep the path between extremes, ignoring neither the inner heart of religion nor winding themselves too high for sinful men. How hard it is to keep to this reasonable but spiritual view is seen by popular aberrations both within and without the Church. At times in the history of the Church Christian teachers have allowed their minds to be so dominated by the terror of judgment that judgment has seemed to the world to be the sole burden of their message. As a reaction from that again, other teachers have arisen who put forward the love of God in such a one-sided way as to empty it of all its severe but glorious sublimity; as if, like Mohammed, they believed God was minded mainly "to make religion easy" unto men. Outside the Church the same discord prevails. Some secular writers praise those religions which declare that a man’s fate is decided at the judgment by the balance of merit over demerit in his acts; while others mock at any judgment, and commit themselves with a light heart to the half-amused tolerance of the Divine good nature. But the teaching which combines both elements can alone sustain and bear up a worthy spiritual life. To rely upon terror only, is to ignore the very essence of true religion and the better elements in the nature of man; for that will not be dominated by fear alone. To think of the Divine love as a lazy, self-indulgent laxity, is to degrade the Divine nature, and to forget that the possibility of wrath is bound up in all love that is worthy of the name. One other point is worthy of remark. In these chapters, which deal with the history of God’s chosen people in their relations with Him, there come out the very elements which distinguish the personal religion of St. Paul. The beginning and end of it all is the free grace of God. God elected His people that they might be His instrument for blessing the world, not because of any goodness in them, for they were perverse and rebellious, but because He had so determined and had promised to the fathers. He had delivered them from the bondage of Egypt by His mighty power, and dwelt among them thenceforth as among no other people. He gave them a land to dwell in, and there as in His own house He watched and tended them, and strove to lead them upwards to the height of their calling as the people of God by demanding of them faith and love. It is a very enlightening remark of Robertson Smith’s that the deliverance out of Egypt was to Israel in the Old Testament what conversion is to the individual Christian according to the New Testament. Taking that as our starting-point, we see that the thought of Deuteronomy is precisely the thought of Romans. It is said, and truly enough, that the Pauline theology was a direct transcript of Paul’s own experience; but we see from this that he did not need to form the moulds for his own fundamental thoughts. Long before him the author of Deuteronomy had formed these, and they must have been fa

Love the Lord thy God, and keep His charge. Deuteronomy 11:1 On the imperfection of righteousness without religion John Drysdale, D. D. In the expression, "the love of God," are comprehended admiration of Him, and delight in meditating upon Him, reverence towards Him, desire of His approbation, and a fear of offending Him, gratitude for His benefits, and trust in Him as our Father; for perfect goodness, which is the object of this love, at the same time calls for the exercise of all these affections of soul. And this inward religion is the sole fountain of an uniform righteousness "of keeping the commandments of God alway." I. THE INFLUENCE OF RELIGION UPON RIGHTEOUSNESS will appear, if we consider — 1. That God, who is the wise and righteous Creator and Governor of the universe, and the object of all religion, is also the perfect pattern of all excellence. 2. As loving God under the notion of the pattern of all goodness, naturally transforms a devout mind into the Divine image, by a secret but strong sympathy betwixt God and the pious soul, by its essential admiration and love of what is really beautiful, righteous, and excellent, and by its desire of possessing what it so much admires; so the same view of God will appear to work the same effect in another way. Perfect goodness, which is the true object of love, is an awful thing, commanding reverence from every mind, and a care not to contradict its ordinances. It is not a changing principle, but ever holds one fixed invariable course. Every attentive person therefore will perceive that the only way to be acceptable to this goodness is to resemble it, and consent, in all his actions, to its dictates. This must be a natural reflection upon the first just apprehension of the Divine goodness, and of some force even before love towards it has grown strong in the soul. Can, then, a man who really loves the perfect goodness of God, be without great awe of Him? Must he not be earnest for God's approbation, and be afraid to do anything disagreeable to Him? 3. The devout Christian looks upon himself as a son of God through Jesus Christ the Redeemer of mankind; and shall he not be animated with a spirit suited to the dignity of his high birth and origin? 4. Must not the soul of that man who loves God be animated by a strong gratitude towards Him? Can he behold the Almighty continually pouring forth His bounty on himself and on all other creatures, without feeling himself moved with the warmest sentiments of gratitude leading him to keep the charge and statutes of God cheerfully? II. We come now to make IMPROVEMENT of all that has been said. 1. Hence we may see how much we are indebted to our holy religion, which has given us so amiable a character of God as naturally invites our love. The Gospel has opened our eyes to discern the beauties of His holiness; it has banished all that darkness which overshadowed the nations, and all those dreadful opinions of the Almighty, which were fitted only to excite terror in the breasts of men. 2. Considering the necessity and great advantage of religion and true devotion, whence can it proceed that a matter of such moment is so generally neglected? It is very observable that many, who bestow little thought upon God and His righteousness, never fail to applaud every instance of worth and righteousness amongst men. An upright, a merciful, a generous man they extol with the most liberal praises; while the fountain of all this excellence is not acknowledged, is not heeded. What can occasion this egregious contradiction? There are many causes for it; but amongst others this must be acknowledged not a small one. That the hypocrisy and sinful lives of many who profess piety and devotion, bring a strong prejudice against religion itself, and occasion it to be evil thought of and evil spoken of. 3. From what has been said, let us all be persuaded to cultivate a spirit of devotion, and strive to grow in the love of God. ( John Drysdale, D. D. ) God requires our love You buy a camellia, and determine, in spite of florists, to make it blossom in your room. You watch and tend it, and at length the buds appear. Day by day you see them swell, and fondly hope they will come to perfect flower; but just as they should open, one after another they drop off, and you look at it, despairingly exclaiming, "All is over for this year." But someone says, "What! the plant is healthy; are not the roots, and branches, and leaves good? Yes," you answer, "but I do not care for them, I bought it for the blossom." Now, when we bring God the roots, and branches, and leaves of morality, He is not satisfied, He wants the blossoming of the heart, and that is love. God the only object of supreme love There is a noble economy of the deepest life. There is a watchful reserve which keeps guard over the powers of profound anxiety and devoted work, and refuses to give them away to any first applicant who comes, and asks. Wealth rolls up to the door, and says, "Give me your great anxiety"; and you look up and answer, "No, not for you; here is a little half-indifferent desire which is all that you deserve." Popularity comes and says, "Work with all your might for me"; and you reply, "No; you are not of consequence enough for that. Here is a small fragment of energy which you may have, if you want it; but that is all." Even knowledge comes, and says, "Give your whole soul to me"; and you must answer once more, "No; great, good, beautiful as you are, you are not worthy of a man's whole soul. There is something in a man so sacred and so precious that he must keep it in reserve till something even greater than the desire of knowledge demands it." But then, at last, comes One far more majestic than them all — God comes with His supreme demand for goodness and for character, and then you open the doors of your whole nature and bid your holiest and profoundest devotion to come trooping forth. Now you rejoice that you kept something which you would not give to any lesser lord. Now here is the deep in life which can call to the deep in you and find its answer. And what He did unto Dathan and Abiram. Deuteronomy 11:6 The spirit of revolution W. Grashoff. Moses recalls the revolt against his authority in the wilderness. It took place in conjunction with the revolt of Korah ( Numbers 17 ). The point which Moses emphasises is the revolt against Divinely constituted authority, and the result thereof. At the head of the civil rebellion were the sons of Reuben, Dathan and Abiram. As descendants of the first-born of Israel they grudged Moses his lofty position. They allied themselves with the Levitical revolt, and under the cloak of asserting the universal priesthood of the people ( Numbers 16:3 ) led many to follow them into the vortex of revolution. This insurrection against the Divinely ordered religious and political order threatened the very existence of Israel. God therefore visited the rebels with special Divine judgment, and the nation was saved. This episode in Israel's history gives us a glimpse of the motives which underlie most revolutionary movements. In these — I. VICE DECKS HERSELF IN THE APPEARANCE OF VIRTUE. 1. The revolutionaries profess ardent desires for the commonweal, for freedom — to save the "enslaved community," etc. Liberty, equality, etc., is their cry, war against tyranny and oppression. They seek to play the role of unselfish friends of the people. 2. But in their depths such movements are mostly dominated by selfishness. In the revolt here referred to Korah was simply an ambitious Levite, hypocritical and selfish. The Reubenites were moved by tribal ambition. Selfishness, ambition, special interests were the moving springs of this as of other revolutions. 3. The revolution of Dathan and Abiram took its rise first on an ecclesiastical ground; but the political movement was not far behind the ecclesiastical. Men with widely differing opinions joined in opposing constituted authority. The cry for "illumination" is speedily followed by that for so-called "freedom." 4. Revolution is not accompanied by penitence. It never seeks the ground of its complaints in the faults of the people themselves. 5. Most revolutions are dominated by some "phrase" or party cry. Here it was: "All the people are holy." The power of the partial truth in it lay in God's Word: "Ye shall be to Me...an holy nation." But God had appointed leaders in Church and State, therefore it was against His authority Dathan and Abiram rebelled. II. THE PROPHETIC SIGNIFICANCE OF THIS TYPICAL EVENT. 1. The deepest fulfilment lies in the future — in the days of antichrist. Then the political and ecclesiastical order will be overturned — when antichrist comes offering promise of deliverance from all ecclesiastical and political ills. 2. But the punishment meted out to Dathan and Abiram with their fellow rebels shall fall more fiercely on antichrist ( Revelation 19:20 ). 3. A veil, however, overhangs this future. Still there are experiences in history which prepare us to understand what shall be. The French Revolution is a striking example. It was not merely a revolt of ruled against rulers. It was first a spiritual revolution. Scepticism had loosened religious authority, and the political crisis speedily followed, as in the rebellion of Korah. So in France ambitious leaders shrieked of liberty, etc. The whole foundations of order were overturned. Then from the Revolution rose one who had no law but his own will. He trod men under his feet; for twenty-five years the storm raged. Here was a faint experience of what will be in the times of antichrist. A respite has been given; but he who has eyes may conceive somewhat of the trend of that great future revolt. III. WHAT SHALL WE DO IN VIEW OF WHAT IS COMING? 1. Let us ask, guided by God's Word, what revolts in Church and State will lead to. What is the meaning of much of so-called "progress" and "freedom"? "If the Son shall make you free," etc. ( John 8:36 ). What is "culture" if not found in Christ's Gospel? — this is the only "culture" of eternal worth. Modern "progress" does not always mean progress in righteousness. 2. Do not let the hollow "phrases" of the modern age influence us. In God's Word the madness of rebellion, its falseness and hypocrisy are seen, and its terrible end. The way of righteousness is conformity to the Divine order. The sin of participation in rebellion must be shunned. Those who stand on the side of revolution, of the antichristian age, or (in the future) of antichrist, lay themselves open to the punishment of the rebellious Reubenites. ( W. Grashoff. ) Not as the land of Egypt. Deuteronomy 11:10-12 Canaan on earth Egypt is typical of the condition of the children of God while they are in bondage to the law of sin. There they are made to work unceasingly, without wages or profit, but continually subject to pains. The coming up out of Egypt is the type of the deliverance which every one of God's people enjoys, when by faith he strikes the blood of Jesus on his doorpost, and spiritually eats the paschal lamb; and the passage through the wilderness is typical of that state of hoping, and fearing, and doubting, which we usually experience between the period when we come out of Egypt, and attain unto the full assurance of faith. Many of you are really come out of Egypt; but you are still wandering about in the wilderness. "We that have believed do enter into rest"; but you, though you have eaten of Jesus, have not so believed on Him as to have entered into the Canaan of rest. I. TRUE RELIGION MAKES A DIFFERENCE NOT ONLY IN A MAN, BUT IN A MAN'S CONDITION; IT AFFECTS NOT ONLY HIS HEART, BUT HIS STATE; NOT ONLY HIS NATURE, BUT HIS VERY STANDING IN SOCIETY. The Lord thy God cares not only for Israel, but for Canaan, where Israel dwells. God has not only a regard to the elect, but to their habitation, and not only so, but to all their affairs and circumstances. My habitation is now guarded by Jehovah; my position in this world is no longer that of a needy mendicant; my position, which was that of a bondslave in Egypt, is now become that of an inheritor in Canaan. In this difference of the condition of the Christian and the worldling we shall mark three things. 1. The Christian's temporal condition is different to that of the worldling, for the worldling looks to secondary causes; the Christian looks to heaven; he gets his mercies thence. 2. But now comes the second distinction, and that is, a difference in the toilsomeness of their lives. The worldly man, just like the Israelites in Egypt, has to water his land with his foot. Read the passage: "For the land, whither thou goest in to possess it, is not as the land of Egypt, from whence ye came out, where thou sowedst thy seed, and wateredst it with thy foot as a garden of herbs." This alludes, possibly, to the practice amongst all eastern nations where the land is irrigated, of letting out a certain quantity of water into a trench, and then having small gutters dug in the gardens, to compel the water to run along different parts of the ground. Sometimes one of these gutters might be broken, and then the gardener would press the mould against it with his foot, to keep the water in its proper channel. But I am inclined to think that the passage alludes to the method which those eastern countries have of pumping up the water by a tread wheel, and so watering the land with their foot. However that may be, it means that the land of Egypt was watered with extraordinary labour, in order to preserve it from sterility. "But," says Moses, "the land, to which ye are going, is not a land which you will have to water with your foot. The water will come spontaneously; the land will be watered by the rain of heaven. You can sit in your own houses, or under your own vine, or under your own fig tree, and God Himself shall be your irrigator. You shall sit still, and 'in quietness shall ye possess your souls.'" Now, here is a difference between the godly and ungodly — the ungodly man toils. Suppose his object is ambition; he will labour and spend his very life, until he obtains the desired pinnacle. Suppose it is wealth; how will he emaciate his frame, rob his body of its needed sleep, and take away the nourishment his frame requires, in order that he may accumulate riches! And if it is learning, how will he burn his eyes out with the flame of his hot desire, that he may understand all knowledge; how will he allow his frame to become weak and wan by midnight watchings! Men will in this way labour, and toil, and strive. But not so the Christian. No; his "strength is to sit still." He knows what it is to fulfil the command of Paul — "I would have you without carefulness" We can take things as God gives them, without all this toil and labour. I have often admired the advice of old Cineas to Pyrrhus. Old story saith, that when Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, was making preparation for his intended expedition into Italy, Cineas, the philosopher, took a favourable opportunity of addressing him thus: "The Romans, sir, are reported to be a warlike and victorious people; but if God permit us to overcome them, what use shall we make of the victory?" "Thou askest," said Pyrrhus, "a thing that is self-evident. The Romans once conquered, no city will resist us; we shall then be masters of all Italy." Cineas added, "And having subdued Italy, what shall we do next?" Pyrrhus not yet aware of his intentions, replied, "Sicily next stretches cut her arms to receive us." "That is very probable," said Cineas, "but will the possession of Sicily put an end to the war?" "God grant us success in that," answered Pyrrhus "and we shall make these only the forerunners of greater things, for then Libra and Carthage will soon be ours; and these things being completed, none of our enemies can offer any further resistance." "Very true," added Cineas, "for then we may easily regain Macedon, and make absolute conquest of Greece; and when all these are in our possession, what shall we do then. Pyrrhus, smiling, answered, "Why then, my dear friend, we will live at our case, take pleasure all day, and amuse ourselves with cheerful conversation." "Well, sir," said Cineas, and why may we not do this now, and without the labour and hazard of an enterprise so laborious and uncertain?" So says the Christian. 3. This brings us to the last difference that we will note, and that is, that the unbeliever, he who has not crossed the Jordan and come to full confidence, does not understand the universality of God's providence, while the assured Christian does. In Egypt the ground is almost entirely flat; and where it is not flat, it is impossible, of course, to grow anything, unless the ground is watered at considerable difficulty by some method of artificial irrigation, which shall force the water on to the high places. "But," says Moses, "the land, whither ye go to possess it, is a land of hills and valleys." The Egyptians could not get the water up on the hills, but you can; for the mountains drink in the rain, as well as the valleys. Now look at a worldling. Give him comforts, give him prosperity. Oh! he can be so happy. Give him everything just as he likes it; make his course all a plain, all a dead valley and a flat; he can fertilise that, and water it; but let him have a mountainous trouble, let him lose a friend, or let his property be taken from him — put a hill in his way, and he cannot water that, with all the pumping of his feet, and all the force he strives to use. But the Christian lives in "a land of hills and valleys"; a land of sorrow as well as joys; but the hills drink the water, as well as the valleys. We need not climb the mountains to water their heads, for our God is as high as the hills. II. We must consider THE SPECIAL MERCY. We must now turn away altogether from the allegoric, and come to this special mercy, which is the lot only of God's people. "The eyes of the Lord thy God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year." That is, upon the lot of all Christians individually. Do not pick out one day in the year, and say it was a bad day, but take all the year round. "Ah! bless the Lord! He hath done all things well; my soul, and all that is within me, bless His holy name!" And you know why all things have been well. It is because the eyes of the Lord have been upon you all the year. Then might I not say a word to you concerning the eyes of the Lord having been upon us as a church? Ought we to let this year pass without rehearsing the works of the Lord? Hath He not been with us exceeding abundantly, and prospered us? Some old writer has said, "Every hour that a Christian remains a Christian is an hour of miracle." It is true; and every year that the Church is kept an entire Church is a year of the beginning of the miracle. "The eye of the Lord" has been upon us, "from year even unto the end of the year." ( C. H. Spurgeon . ) The Gospel for the day -- a glad word for the New Year M. G. Pearse. I. NOTICE THAT THE PEOPLE ARE REMINDED OF THE PAST. Confidence in God for the future is to grow out of the memory of His former dealings with them. "Your eyes have seen all the great acts of the Lord which He did." "Think of your almighty Helper," cried Moses, "He goeth with you into this land: He careth for it." And so let us call to mind the greatness and the glory of our God. What tokens of His love to us we have! What pledges of His care for us, far outpassing all that Israel ever looked upon. II. LOOK AT THE LAND IN WHICH GOD WOULD HAVE US TO LIVE. Egypt is the type of the world, the world that knows not God. "Who is the Lord that I should serve Him? I know Him not." This is the language of Pharaoh, the language, too, of the prince of this world. Egypt is the land where they looked down for their supply — wateredst it with thy foot. They got their harvests by their own toil and depending upon themselves; they knew not God. Israel must come out of this into a land where they look up for their supply, up into the hills whence cometh their help — a land of hills and valleys that drinketh in the rain of heaven. The wilderness between the two was the school where the people were to learn the first lesson of their dependence upon God. We have long enough been fretting and murmuring in the wilderness. In the Lord's name arise and enter into the land where God's presence encircles all, the eyes of the Lord are always upon it. Rest in the Lord. Believe in His power, not as a reserve fund from which you are to draw when your strength is spent, but as actively engaged for you, interested in all your affairs, ever eager to help and guide. III. NOTICE THE LORD'S PROMISES CONCERNING THIS LAND IN WHICH WE ARE TO DWELL. "The land whither ye go to possess it is a land of hills and valleys, and drinketh water of the rain of heaven." All our supply is to come from the Lord. Here are springs that shall never dry; here are fountains and streams that shall never be cut off. Here, anxious one, is the gracious pledge of the Heavenly Father. If He be the Source of our mercies, they can never fail us. Do not go down to Egypt for your pleasure, or your strength, or your wisdom, or your comfort. Man of God, thy place is Canaan, the land that the Lord careth for. Fetch all thy supplies from Him. If strength is needed, who can help thee like the Lord? Who else can give thee patience or who so tenderly comfort as the God of all consolation, the God of all patience? If the way grow tangled, who can give thee wisdom as He can? There is the land to live in — the land that drinketh in the rain of heaven. IV. HERE IS A LESSON IN PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. The land is a land of "hills and valleys." That is all we are told of it. And that is all we know of the land in which we are just entering. This much I can tell of your fortune in the New Year. It will be a year of ups and downs, of hills and valleys. The hills, so hard to climb, that make you sigh and wonder why they are sent — they make the glad and fruitful valleys. If life were all one dead level every pleasure would grow wearisome, the dull sameness of life would oppress us. We want the hills and valleys. The steep climb shows us the landscape that we could never have seen otherwise. The little vexations make the pleasant things fresh in their pleasantness. Only he who has tasted the bitterness of sorrow for sin can taste and see how gracious the Lord is. The beauty, the blessedness, the pleasure of our life is more dependent than we can ever know on the hills of life. The land whither thou goest is a land of hills and valleys. "A land of hills and valleys." Look again. The hills drink in the rain of heaven and thereby make the valleys fruitful. The desert is a desert, because no hills rise up to heaven to touch the clouds and bring down blessings on the thirsty land below. The hills collect the rain for a hundred fruitful valleys. Ah, so it is with us. It is the hill difficulty that drives us to the throne of grace and fetches down a shower of blessing. It is the trial that sends us to the Lord for help. The hills, the bleak hills of life that we wonder at and perhaps grumble at, bring down the showers. They drink in the rain from heaven. And yet again — the hills give to the valleys their fruitfulness and beauty by protecting them. They rise up and shut back bleak winds and furious storms: then in the sunny shelter the valleys shall be covered over with corn, the pastures are clothed with flocks. So is the land whither we go to possess it — a land of hills and valleys. Ah, how the soul had been withered, dead, if no steep hill had risen for its shelter. How many have perished in the wilderness, buried under its golden sands, who would have lived and thriven in the hill country. We cannot tell what loss and sorrow and trial are doing. Do not judge, much less grumble. Trust only. ( M. G. Pearse. ) The land, whither ye go to possess it, is a land of hills and valleys The land of hills and valleys G. H. Morrison, M. A. 1. Note how often God tells Israel that the land they were making for was their possession. In Egypt they had possessed nothing; they were possessed. Their time, their children, their lives were not their own there. Now they were to be slaves of a tyranny no more. And every man who is living his life well is marching forward in the track of Israel. There is a sense in which we all begin by being possessed; but we shall end, God helping us, possessing. Sometimes it is a foolish ambition that possesses us; sometimes it is a hereditary curse: or a habit, or sloth, or cowardice, or passion; and we are not our own. But when God breaks that bondage of the soul, far off, it may be, but gleaming in the morning, we see the peaks of a land that shall be ours. Gradually, not without many a failure, through daily effort, and prayer, and watching, we come to a country where we are not slaves but kings. 2. These marching Israelites had been told what the land was to be like in outline. It was to be "a land of hills and valleys." How high the hills would be, they did not know. Much was shrouded in impenetrable dark. And do you say that the future is all hidden? There is a deep sense in which that is true. The separate secrets of the coming days are lodged and locked in the eternal mind. But there is an outline of the coming year that God makes plain to every child of man. For, what your past has been, and what your God has been, and what your heart is eager for tonight — all that will map out the New Year for you. 3. There was to be no monotony in their new home. It would be ever fresh with endless charm. Every valley would have its rushing stream, and every ridge its separate vista. And is there ever monotony where God conducts? It is a lie to say that being good takes all the charm and colour out of life. It is our sins that grow monotonous; our graces are dew-bespangled till the end. 4. I wonder how long it took the Israelites to learn that the hills were necessary to the valleys. How sweet and fertile the valleys were, they knew. Life was a joy down by these happy meadows; it was a sweet music, that of the rustling corn. But yonder, towering skyward, were the hills, and the brigands were there, and over them, who could tell what tribes there were? And there was an element of tempest too, among the hills. The children said life would be perfect here, if God had but spared us those barren and baneful hills. But halt! these rushing brooks, where did they come from? Out of the hills. And where were the sharp sea winds that would have blighted the vine and withered the springing corn? It was the barrier of mountains that kept them off. The children said, we hate these ragged hills, and we wish that God would level them to the ground; — and it was when they grew to men and women that they knew that never a vine would have clustered in the hollows, and never a harvest turned golden in the valleys, but for the mountains that they wished away. Is there nothing in your life you wish away? Is there no cross, no trial, no limitation? Do not be angry with the hills, because they shut you in. Fret not. Accept them. Is there no lily of the valley at your feet? It would never have been there but for the hills. 5. But the valley does not always speak of harvest. It is not always ringing with the vine dresser's lilt. There are valleys in which we catch the sound of weeping, and see the rolling mist and never the sunlight. And it is then that we need this text graven upon our heart. For in the valleys we sometimes forget the hills. In the hour of mist we forget that the sun was ever shining. You would think there had never been any blue sky at all, we are so utterly disheartened in the cloudy day. Are the stars not there, though the clouds are abroad tonight? Are the hills not rising heavenward and Godward, though I am in the valley of the shadow? Recall the hours of vision on the mount. 6. Remember the valley when on the hill. To stand on the hill-top is an exquisite joy. There is vision in it: there is the birth of song. And to be strong and vigorous, with a firm grasp of oneself and one's work, that is like heaven began. Only remember, the day of the valley is coming; the shadow, the mist, and parting are coming; and the wise man, though not with noise and fuss, will be quietly preparing upon the hills for that. ( G. H. Morrison, M. A. ) Drinketh water of the rain of heaven The God of the rain C. Kingsley, M. A. Beautiful, simple, noble, true words. Who would change them for all the scientific phrases in the world? The eyes of the Lord were upon the land. It needed His care; and therefore His care it had. Therefore the Jew was to understand from his first entry into the land, that his prosperity depended utterly on God. The laws of weather, by which the rain comes up off the sea, were unknown to him. They are all but unknown to us now. But they were known to God. Not a drop could fall without His providence and will; and therefore they were utterly in His power. God is the living Judge, the living overlooker, rewarder, punisher of every man, not only in the life to come, but in this life. His providence is a special providence. But not such a poor special providence as men are too apt to dream of nowadays, which interferes only now and then on some great occasion or on behalf of some very favoured persons, but a special providence looking after every special act of man, and of the whole universe, from the fall of a sparrow to the fall of an empire. And it is this intense faith in the living God, which can only come by the inspiration of the Spirit of God, which proves the Old Testament to be truly inspired. This it is which makes it different from all books in the world. This it is, I hold, which marks the canon of Scripture. As it was then, so may it be again. There may come a time in this land when people shall profess to worship the Word of God; and yet, like those old scribes; make it of none effect by their own commandments and traditions. When they shall command men, like the scribes, to honour every word and letter of the Bible, and yet forbid them to take the Bible simply and literally as it stands, but only their interpretation of the Bible; when they shall say, with the scribes, "Nothing new can be true. God taught the apostles, and therefore He is not teaching us. God worked miracles of old; but whosoever thinks that God is working miracles now is a Pantheist and a blasphemer. God taught men of old the thing which they knew not; but whosoever dares to say that He does so now is bringing heresy and false doctrine, and undermining the Christian faith by science falsely so called." From ever falling into that state of stupid lip-belief, and outward religion, and loss of faith in the living God: Good Lord, deliver us. ( C. Kingsley, M. A. ) The eyes of the Lord thy God are always upon it. Good cheer for the New Year Observe here a type of the condition of the natural and the spiritual man. In this world in temporals and in all other respects the merely carnal man has to be his own providence, and to look to himself for all his needs. Hence his cares are always many, and frequently they become so heavy that they drive him to desperation. He lives in Egypt, and he knows no joy. But the spiritual man dwells in another country; his faith makes him a citizen of another land. It is true he endures the same toils, and experiences the same afflictions as the ungodly, but they deal with him after another fashion, for they come as a gracious Father's appointments, and they go at the bidding of loving wisdom. I. First, we will consider THE TEXT AS WE FIND IT. "The eyes of the Lord." What is meant here? Surely not mere omniscience, No, there is love in the text to sweeten observation. "The Lord knoweth the righteous" with a knowledge which is over and above that of omniscience. The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, not merely to see them, hut to view them with complacency and delight. 1. The meaning of the text then is, first, that God's love is always upon His people. The big heart of Deity is set upon us poor insignificant, undeserving, worthless beings. 2. The expression of the text teaches us that the Lord takes a personal interest in us. It is not here said that God loves us, and therefore sends an angel to watch over us; but the Lord does it Himself. 3. Further, the text reminds us of the unwearied power of God towards His people. What, can His eyes be always upon us? This were not possible if He were not God. The next word that seems to sparkle in the text is that word "always." "The eyes of the Lord are always upon it." And it is

11:1-7 Observe the connexion of these two; Thou shalt love the Lord, and keep his charge. Love will work in obedience, and that only is acceptable obedience which flows from a principle of love, 1Jo 5:3. Moses recounts some of the great and terrible works of God which their eyes had seen. What our eyes have seen, especially in our early days, should affect us, and make us better long afterwards. 11:8-17 Moses sets before them, for the future, life and death, the blessing and the curse, according as they did or did not keep God's commandment. Sin tends to shorten the days of all men, and to shorten the days of a people's prosperity. God will bless them with an abundance of all good things, if they would love him and serve him. Godliness has the promise of the life that now is; but the favour of God shall put gladness into the heart, more than the increase of corn, and wine, and oil. Revolt from God to idols would certainly be their ruin. Take heed that your hearts be not deceived. All who forsake God to set their affection upon any creature, will find themselves wretchedly deceived, to their own destruction; and this will make it worse, that it was for want of taking heed. 11:18-25 Let all be directed by the three rules here given. 1. Let our hearts be filled with the word of God. There will not be good practices in the life, unless there be good thoughts, good affections, and good principles in the heart. 2. Let our eyes be fixed upon the word of God, having constant regard to it as the guide of our way, as the rule of our work, Ps 119:30. 3. Let our tongues be employed about the word of God. Nor will any thing do more to cause prosperity, and keeping up religion in a nation, than the good education of children. 11:26-32 Moses sums up all the arguments for obedience in two words, the blessing and the curse. He charged the people to choose which they would have. Moses then appointed a public and solemn proclamation of the blessing and curse, to be made upon the two mountains of Gerizim and Ebal. We have broken the law, and are under its curse, without remedy from ourselves. In mercy, the gospel again sets before us a blessing and a curse. A blessing, if we obey the call to repentance, to faith in Christ, and newness of heart and life through him; an awful curse, if we neglect so great salvation. Let us thankfully welcome these glad tidings of great joy; and let us not harden our hearts, but hear this voice of God while it is called to-day, and while he invites us to come to him upon a mercy-seat. Let us be diligent to make our calling and election sure.