PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
Expositions of Holy Scripture: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers
Alexander Maclaren, 1826-1910 · 230,719 words · 327 reading sections
Thought, Deed, Word
This command supplies us with an easily applied and effective test. Is there any place where you cannot take it, any act which you feel it would be impossible to do for His sake? Avoid such. Where the safety-lamp burns blue and goes out, is no place for you. It is a beautiful thought that Jesus does for us what we are…
400 wordsSECTION 182A Path In The Sea
'And the angel of God, which went before the camp of Israel, removed and went behind them; and the pillar of the cloud went from before their face, and stood behind them: 20. And it came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel; and it was a cloud and darkness to them, but it gave light by night to…
830 wordsSECTION 183A Path In The Sea
We can see here, too, a frequent characteristic of the miraculous element in Scripture, namely, its reaching its end not by a leap, but by a process. Once admit miracle, and it appears as if adaptation of means to ends was unnecessary. It would have been as easy to have transported the Israelites bodily and instantaneo…
702 wordsSECTION 184A Path In The Sea
III. Then comes the safe passage. It is hard to imagine the scene. The vivid impression made by our story is all the more remarkable when we notice how wanting in detail it is. We do not know the time nor the place. We have no information about how the fugitives got across, the breadth of the path, or its length. Chara…
775 wordsSECTION 185A Path In The Sea
V. Then comes, at last, the awful act of destruction, of which a man is the agent and an army the victim. We must suppose the Israelites all safe on the Arabian coast, when the level sunlight streams from the east on the wild hurry of the fleeing crowd making for the Egyptian shore. What a solemn sight that young morni…
675 wordsSECTION 186The Shepherd And The Fold
'The Lord is my strength and song, and He is become my salvation....' EXODUS xv. 2. These words occur three times in the Bible: here, in Isaiah xii. 2, and in Psalm cxviii. 14. I. The lessons from the various instances of their occurrence. The first and second teach that the Mosaic deliverance is a picture-prophecy…
653 wordsSECTION 187The Ultimate Hope
'Thou shalt bring them in and plant them in the mountain of Thine inheritance....'--EXODUS xv. 17. I. The lesson taught by each present deliverance and kindness is that we shall be brought to His rest at last. _(a)_ Daily mercies are a pledge and a pattern of His continuous acts. The confidence that we shall be kept…
332 wordsSECTION 188Marah
'And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the waters of Marah, for they were bitter: therefore the name of it was called Marah. 24. And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink? 25. And he cried unto the Lord; and the Lord showed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters,…
421 wordsSECTION 189The Bread Of God
'Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in My law, or no. 5. And it shall come to pass, that on the sixth day they shall prepare that which they bring in; and it sha…
896 wordsSECTION 190The Bread Of God
Christianity does not absolutely forbid laying up money or other resources for future wants. But the love of accumulating, which is so strong in many professing Christians, and the habit of amassing beyond all reasonable future wants, is surely scarcely permitted to those who profess to believe that incarnate wisdom fo…
791 wordsSECTION 191The Bread Of God
Commentators make much of what is supposed to be a natural substratum for the manna, in a certain vegetable product, found in small quantities in parts of the Arabian peninsula. No doubt, we are to recognise in the plagues of Egypt, and in the dividing of the Red Sea, the extraordinary action of ordinary causes; and th…
772 wordsSECTION 192Jehovah Nissi
'And Moses built an altar, and called the name of it Jehovah Nissi [that is, the Lord is my Banner].' --EXODUS xvii. 15. We are all familiar with that picturesque incident of the conflict between Israel and Amalek, which ended in victory and the erection of this memorial trophy. Moses, as you remember, went up on th…
735 wordsSECTION 193Jehovah Nissi
Let us remember, on the other hand, that whilst it is our simple bounden duty, as Christian men and women, to reckon ourselves as anointed and called for the purpose of warring against sin and sorrow, wherever we can assail them, there is nothing more dangerous, and few things more common, than the hasty identification…
660 wordsSECTION 194Jehovah Nissi
Sometimes, and often, there will be perplexities in our daily lives, and conflicts very hard to unravel. We shall often be brought to a point where we cannot see which way the Banner is leading us. What then? 'It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait' for the salvation and for the guidance of his God. An…
820 wordsSECTION 195Gershom And Eliezer
In like manner we are too apt to put far too much confidence in human teachers and human helpers of various kinds. And when God takes them away we say to ourselves that there is a gap that can never be filled. Ay! but the great sea can come in and fill any gap, and make the deepest and the driest of the excavations in …
715 wordsSECTION 196Gershom And Eliezer
I. 'A stranger here.' Now, that is true, in the deepest sense, about all men; for the one thing that makes the difference between the man and the beast is that the beast is perfectly at home in his surroundings, and gets all that he needs out of them, and finds in them a field for all that he can do, and is fully deve…
679 wordsSECTION 197Gershom And Eliezer
Do you think about it, do you feel that where Jesus Christ is, is your home? I have no doubt that most of you have, or have had, dear ones here on earth about whom you could say that, 'Where my husband, my wife is; where my beloved is, or my children are, that is my home, wherever my abode may be.' Are you, Christian p…
680 wordsSECTION 198Gershom And Eliezer
This second conviction was the illuminating light upon a perplexed and problematic past. Moses, when he fled from Egypt, thought that his life's work was rent in twain. He had believed that his brethren would have seen that it was God's purpose to use him as the deliverer. For the sake of being such, he had surrendered…
653 wordsSECTION 199Gershom And Eliezer
THE IDEAL STATESMAN [Footnote: Preached on occasion of Mr. Gladstone's death.] 'Thou shalt provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them.'--EXODUS xviii. 21. You will have anticipated my purpose in selecting this text. I should be doing violenc…
680 wordsSECTION 200Gershom And Eliezer
'Such as fear God'--there is the secret of strength, not merely in reference to the intellectual powers which are not dependent for their origin, though they may be for the health and vigour of their work, upon any religious sentiment, but in regard to all true power. He that would govern others must first be lord of h…
715 wordsSECTION 201Gershom And Eliezer
Let me try to vindicate that expression of opinion in a word or two. I cannot hope to vie in literary grace, or in completeness, with the eulogies that have been abundantly poured out; and I should not have thought it right to divert this hour of worship from its ordinary themes, if I had had no more to say than has be…
736 wordsSECTION 202Gershom And Eliezer
I need not dwell in detail on the thoughts of how, by reason of this deep underlying fear of God, the other qualifications which are sketched in our ideal found their realisation in him; how those who, all through his career, smiled most at the successive enthusiasms which monopolised his mind, and sometimes at the con…
740 wordsSECTION 203The Decalogue: I--Man And God
'And God spake all these words, saying, 2. I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 3. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. 4. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in the heaven above, or that is in the…
677 wordsSECTION 204The Decalogue: I--Man And God
This prelude certainly confines the Decalogue to the people of Israel. Their deliverance is the ground on which the law is rested, therefore, plainly, the obligation can be no wider than the benefit. But though we are not bound to obey any of the Ten Commandments, because they were given to Israel, they are all, with o…
704 wordsSECTION 205The Decalogue: I--Man And God
The first commandment enjoins, or rather blesses us by showing us that we may cherish, supreme affection, worship, trust, self-surrender, aspiration, towards one God. After all, our God is that which we think most precious, for which we are ready to make the greatest sacrifices, which draws our warmest love; which, los…
890 wordsSECTION 206The Decalogue: I--Man And God
IV. The third commandment must be so understood as to bring it into line with the two preceding, as of equal breadth and equally fundamental. It cannot, therefore, be confined to the use of the name of God in oaths, whether false or trivial. No doubt, perjury and profane swearing are included in the sweep of the prohib…
715 wordsSECTION 207The Decalogue: Ii.--Man And Man
We have not the Jewish Sabbath, nor is it binding on us. But as men we ought to rest, and resting, to worship, on one day in the week. The unwritten law of Christianity, moulding all outward forms by its own free spirit, gradually, and without premeditation, slid from the seventh to the first day, as it had clear right…
832 wordsSECTION 208The Decalogue: Ii.--Man And Man
III. The order of these human duties is significant. We have, next after the law of parental reverence, three commandments, which, in a descending series of importance, forbid crimes against life, marriage, and property. Then the law passes from deeds to the more subtle, and, as men think, less grave, offences of the t…
651 wordsSECTION 209The Decalogue: Ii.--Man And Man
The promise attached to it has another side of threatening. It is a plain fact that when the paternal relation is corrupted, a powerful solvent has been introduced which rapidly tends to disintegrate society. The most ancient empire in the world today, China, has, amid many vices and follies, been preserved mainly by t…
738 wordsSECTION 210The Decalogue: Ii.--Man And Man
False witness is not only given in court. The sins of the tongue against the law of love are more subtle and common than those of act. 'Come, let us enjoy ourselves, and abuse our neighbours,' is the real meaning of many an invitation to social intercourse. If some fairy could treat our newspapers as the Russian censor…
472 wordsSECTION 211The Feast Of Ingathering In The End Of The Year
'And the feast of harvest, the first-fruits of thy labours, which them hast sown In thy field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field.' --EXODUS xxiii. 16. The Israelites seem to have had a double beginning of the year--one in spring, …
658 wordsSECTION 212'The Love Of Thine Espousals'
So the undying past lives in its results in ourselves, and in our being answerable for it to God. This metaphor is insufficient in one respect. There is not one epoch for sowing and another for reaping, but the two processes are simultaneous, and every moment is at once a harvest and a seed-time. This fact masks the …
670 wordsSECTION 213'The Love Of Thine Espousals'
I. Note the preliminaries of the covenant. The chapter begins with the command to Moses to come up to the mount, with Aaron and other representatives of the people. But he was already there when the command was given, and a difficulty has been found (or, shall we say, made) out of this. The explanation seems reasonable…
849 wordsSECTION 214'The Love Of Thine Espousals'
They must have yielded much blood. It is divided into two parts, corresponding to the two parties to the covenant, like the cloven animals in Abraham's covenant. One half is 'sprinkled' on the altar, or, as the word means, 'swung,'--which suggests a larger quantity and a more vehement action than 'sprinkling' does. Tha…
804 wordsSECTION 215'The Love Of Thine Espousals'
III. Note the vision and feast on the basis of the covenant. The little company that climbed the mountain, venturing within the fence, represented the whole people. Aaron and his sons were the destined priests. The elders were probably seventy, because that number is the product of the two perfect numbers, and perhaps …
538 wordsSECTION 216The Bread Of The Presence
'Thou shalt set upon the table shew-bread before Me alway.'--EXODUS xxv. 30. I suspect that to many readers the term 'shew-bread' conveys little more meaning than if the Hebrew words had been lifted over into our version. The original expression, literally rendered, is 'bread of the face'; or, as the Revised Version …
997 wordsSECTION 217The Bread Of The Presence
Again, there is another consideration, bearing on another region in which the assertive self is only too apt to spoil all work. And that is, that if our activities are offerings to God, this means that His supreme Will is to be our law, and that we obey His commands and accept His appointments in quiet submission. The …
730 wordsSECTION 218The Bread Of The Presence
Still further, this table with its burden has suggestions that as Christians we are bound to bring all our work to Him for His judgment upon it. The loaves were laid right in front of the veil, behind which blazed the light of His presence. And that meant that they were laid before 'those pure eyes and perfect judgment…
669 wordsSECTION 219The Bread Of The Presence
The lamp and the table go together. They are both offshoots from the altar in the middle. That is to say, your lives will not shine before men unless your activities are offered to God. The smallest taint of making self your end, your law, or your strength, mingling with your lives, and manifest in their actions, will …
466 wordsSECTION 220The Golden Lampstand
'Thou shalt make a candlestick of pure gold....' --EXODUS xxv. 31. If we could have followed the Jewish priest as he passed in his daily ministrations into the Inner Court, we should have seen that he first piled the incense on the altar which stood in its centre, and then turned to trim the lamps of the golden candl…
809 wordsSECTION 221The Golden Lampstand
But now let me turn for a little while to the more specific meaning of this symbol. The life which, by the central position of the Altar of Incense, was symbolised as being centrally, essentially in its depths and primarily, a life of habitual devotion and communion with God, in its manward aspect is a life that shines…
769 wordsSECTION 222The Golden Lampstand
But, brethren, we have to remember that there are dangers attending the life that reveals its hidden principles as being faith in Christ and obedience to Him. Did you ever notice how, in the Sermon on the Mount, there are two sets of precepts which seem diametrically opposite to one another? There is a whole series of …
669 wordsSECTION 223The Golden Lampstand
To begin with, we note that our light is a derived light, and therefore can only be kept bright when we keep close to the source from whence it is derived. 'That was the true Light, which coming into the world lighteth every man'--there is the source of all illumination, in Jesus Christ Himself. He alone is _the_ Ligh…
747 wordsSECTION 224The Names On Aaron'S Breastplate
'Take heed lest He also spare not thee.' O brethren! is it not a bitter irony to call _us_ 'lights of the world'? Let us penitently recognise the inconsistencies of our lives, and the reticence of our speech. Let us not lose sight of the high ideal, that we may the more penitently recognise the miserable falling short …
721 wordsSECTION 225The Names On Aaron'S Breastplate
So Christ gathers us all, if we will let Him, into Himself; and our lives may be hid with Him--in a fashion that is more than mere external and formal representation, or as people have a member of Parliament to represent them in the councils of the nation--even in a true union with Him in whom is the life of all of us,…
886 wordsSECTION 226The Names On Aaron'S Breastplate
III. Still further, this symbol suggests to us the depth and reality of Christ's sympathy. The heart is, in our language, the seat of love. It is not so in the Old Testament. Affection is generally allocated to another part of the frame; but here the heart stands for the organ of care, of thought, of interest. For, ac…
664 wordsSECTION 227Three Inscriptions With One Meaning
'Thou shalt make a plate of pure gold, and grave upon it ... HOLINESS TO THE LORD.'--EXODUS xxviii. 36. 'In that day there shall be upon the bells of the horses, HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD.'--ZECH. xiv. 20. 'His name shall be in their foreheads.'--REV. xxii. 4. You will have perceived my purpose in putting these three…
946 wordsSECTION 228Three Inscriptions With One Meaning
What is a saint? Some man or woman that has practised unheard-of austerities? Somebody that has lived an isolated and self-regarding life in convent or monastery or desert? No! a man or woman in the world who, moved by the mercies of God, yields self to God as 'a living sacrifice.' So the New Testament writers never h…
704 wordsSECTION 229Three Inscriptions With One Meaning
But let us remember that that universally diffused sanctity will need to have a centre of diffusion, else there will be no diffusion, and that all life will become sacred when the man that lives it has 'Holiness to the Lord' written on his forehead, and not else. If that be the inscription on the driver's heart, the ho…
654 wordsSECTION 230The Altar Of Incense
'Thou shalt make an altar to burn incense upon.' --EXODUS xxx. 1. Ceremonies are embodied thoughts. Religious ceremonies are moulded by, and seek to express, the worshipper's conception of his God, and his own relation to Him; his aspirations and his need. Of late years scholars have been busy studying the religions …
828 wordsSECTION 231The Altar Of Incense
In all true prayer there must be the lowest prostration in reverence before the Infinite Majesty. But the noblest prayer is that which lifts 'them that are bowed down' rather than that which prostrates men before an inaccessible Deity. And so, whilst we lie low at His feet, that may be the prayer of a mere theist, but …
663 wordsSECTION 232The Altar Of Incense
Once more, this altar of incense teaches us that kindled prayer delights God. That emblem of the sweet odour is laid hold of with great boldness by more than one Old and New Testament writer, in order to express the marvellous thought that there is a mutual joy in the prayer of faith and love, and that it rises as 'an …
676 wordsSECTION 233The Altar Of Incense
But between the two, central to both, stood the altar of incense. What does that say as to the place of prayer, defined as I have defined it, in the Christian life? It says this, that the light will burn dim and go out, and the loaves, the expression and the consequences of our activities, will become mouldy and dry, u…
705 wordsSECTION 234Ransom For Souls--I.
But the other side is as true. It is bad to clot your religion into lumps, and to leave the rest of the life without it. There must be the smouldering all day long. 'Rejoice evermore; pray without ceasing.' You can pray thus. Not set prayer, of course; but a reference to Him, a thought of Him, like some sweet melody, '…
538 wordsSECTION 235The Golden Calf
'The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less than half a shekel....'--EXODUS xxx. 15. This tax was exacted on numbering the people. It was a very small amount, about fifteen pence, so it was clearly symbolical in its significance. Notice-- I. The broad principle of equality of all souls in the sig…
667 wordsSECTION 236The Golden Calf
It was not yet six weeks since the people had sworn, 'All that the Lord hath spoken will we do, and be obedient.' The blood of the covenant, sprinkled on them, was scarcely dry when they flung off allegiance to Jehovah. Such short-lived loyalty to Him can never have been genuine. That mob of slaves was galvanised by Mo…
705 wordsSECTION 237The Golden Calf
We need not discuss the metallurgy of verse 4. But clearly Aaron asked for the earrings, not, as some would have it, hoping that vanity and covetousness would hinder their being given, but simply in order to get gold for the bad work which he was ready to do. The reason for making the thing in the shape of a calf is pr…
765 wordsSECTION 238The Swift Decay Of Love
Moses was so absorbed in his vocation that his life was less to him than the well-being of Israel. How far he saw into the darkness beyond the grave we cannot say; but, at least, he was content, and desirous to die on earth, if thereby Israel might continue to be God's people. And probably he had some gleam of light be…
757 wordsSECTION 239The Swift Decay Of Love
I. Note, then, what they saw. The vivid story puts it all in two words,--'the calf and the dancing.' There in the midst, perhaps on some pedestal, was the shameful copy of the Egyptian Apis; and whirling round it in mad circles, working themselves into frenzy by rapid motion and frantic shouts, were the people,--men an…
662 wordsSECTION 240The Swift Decay Of Love
The roots of idolatry are in all men. The gross form of it is impossible to us; but the need for aid from sense, the dependence on art for wings to our devotion, which is a growing danger to-day, is only the modern form of the same dislike of a purely spiritual religion which sent these people dancing round their calf.…
654 wordsSource & rights
Public domain in the USA; original historical text digitized by Project Gutenberg.
Project Gutenberg source record →
Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.