May God, in His infinite mercy, keep us from falling. May we have grace to watch more jealously against every thing, no matter what, that might defile the head of our consecration. It is a serious thing to get out of communion, and a most perilous thing to attempt to go on in the Lord’s service with a defiled conscience. True it is that grace pardons and restores, but we never regain what we have lost. This latter is set forth with solemn emphasis in the passage of Scripture before us,—“He shall consecrate unto the Lord the days of his separation, and shall bring a lamb of the first year for a trespass-offering; _but the days that were before shall be lost_ [or, shall fall, as the margin reads it], because his separation was defiled.”
This is a point, in our subject, full of instruction and admonition for our souls. When the Nazarite became defiled by any means, even by the touch of a dead body, he had to begin over again. It was not merely the days of his defilement that were lost, or let fall, but actually all the days of his previous Nazariteship. All went for nothing, and this simply by reason of touching a dead body.
What does this teach us? It teaches this, at least, that when we diverge, the breadth of a hair, from the narrow path of communion, and get away from the Lord, we must return to the very point from which we set out, and begin _de novo_. We have many examples of this in Scripture, and it would be our wisdom to consider them, and also to weigh the great practical truth which they illustrate.
Take the case of Abraham, in his descent into Egypt, as recorded in Genesis xii. This was very evidently a divergence from his proper path. And what was the consequence? The days were lost, or let fall, and he had to get back to the point whence he had swerved, and begin over again. Thus, in Genesis xii. 8, we read, “And he removed from thence unto a mountain on the east of Bethel, and pitched his tent, having Bethel on the west, and Hai on the east; and there he builded an altar unto the Lord, and called on the name of the Lord.” Then, after his return out of the land of Egypt, we read, “He went on his journeys from the south even to Bethel, unto the place where his tent had been _at the beginning_, between Bethel and Hai, unto the place of the altar which he had made there _at the first_; and there Abram called on the name of the Lord.” (Gen. xiii. 3, 4.) All the time spent in Egypt went for nothing. There was no altar there, no worship, no communion; and Abraham had to get back to the self-same point from which he had diverged, and begin on the new.
Thus it is in every case; and this will account for the miserably slow progress which some of us make in our practical career. We fail, turn aside, get away from the Lord, are plunged in spiritual darkness; and then His voice of love reaches us, in restoring power, and brings us back to the point from which we had wandered; our souls are restored, but we have lost time and suffered incalculably. This is most serious, and it should lead us to walk with holy vigilance and circumspection, so that we may not have to double back upon our path, and lose what can never be regained. True it is that our wanderings and our stumblings and our failings give us an insight into our own hearts, teach us to distrust ourselves, and illustrate the boundless and unchangeable grace of our God. All this is quite true; but still there is a very much higher way of learning both ourselves and God, than by wandering, stumbling, or failing. _Self_, in all the terrible depths of that word, should be judged in the light of the divine presence; and there, too, our souls should grow in the knowledge of God as He unfolds Himself, by the Holy Ghost, in the face of Jesus Christ, and in the precious pages of holy Scripture. This surely is the more excellent way of learning both ourselves and God; and this, too, is the power of all true Nazarite separation. The soul that habitually lives in the sanctuary of God, or, in other words, that walks in unbroken communion with God, is the one who will have a just sense of what nature is, in all its phases, though it be not learnt by sad experience. And not only so, but he will have a deeper and juster sense of what God is in Himself and to all who put their trust in Him. It is poor work to be learning self by experience. We may depend upon it, the true way to learn it is in communion; and when we learn it thus, we shall not be characterized by perpetually dwelling upon our personal vileness, but rather we shall be occupied with that which is outside and above self altogether, even the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord.