But let us particularly notice the rich grace that shines in this third parable.—“How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel!” If one had gone down to examine those tents and tabernacles in “the vision” of man, they might have appeared “black as the tents of Kedar;” but looked at in “the vision of the Almighty,” they were “goodly,” and whoever did not see them thus needed to have “_his eyes opened_.” If I am looking at the people of God “from the top of the rocks,” I shall see them as God sees them, and that is, as clothed with all the comeliness of Christ—complete in Him—accepted in the Beloved. This is what will enable me to get on with them, to walk with them, to have fellowship with them, to rise above their points and angles, blots and blemishes, failures and infirmities.[20] If I do not contemplate them from this lofty—this divine ground, I shall be sure to fix my eye on some little flaw or other, which will completely mar my communion, and alienate my affections.
In Israel’s case, we shall see, in the very next chapter, what terrible evil they fell into. Did this alter Jehovah’s judgment? Surely not. “He is not the son of man, that He should repent.” He judged and chastened them for their evil, because He is holy, and can never sanction, in His people, aught that is contrary to His nature. But He could never reverse His judgment respecting them. He knew all about them,—He knew what they were and what they would do; but yet He said, “I have not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither have I seen perverseness in Israel.”—“How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel!” Was this making light of their evil? The thought were blasphemy. He could chasten them for their sins; but the moment an enemy comes forth to curse or accuse, He stands in front of His people and says, “I see no iniquity.”—“How goodly are thy tents!”
Reader, dost thou think that such views of divine grace will minister to a spirit of Antinomianism? Far be the thought! We may rest assured we are never farther away from the region of that terrible evil than when we are breathing the pure and holy atmosphere of “the top of the rocks”—that high ground from whence God’s people are viewed, not as they are in themselves, but as they are in Christ—not according to the thoughts of man, but according to the thoughts of God. And furthermore, we may say that the only true and effectual mode of raising the standard of moral conduct is to abide in the faith of this most precious and tranquilizing truth, that God sees us perfect in Christ.
But we must take one more glance at our third parable. Not only are Israel’s tents seen to be goodly in the eyes of Jehovah, but the people themselves are presented to us as abiding fast by those ancient sources of grace and living ministry which are found in God. “As the valleys are they spread forth, as gardens by the river’s side, as the trees of lign aloes which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar-trees beside the waters.” How exquisite! how perfectly beautiful! And only to think that we are indebted to the godless confederacy between Balak and Balaam for those sublime utterances!
But there is more than this. Not only is Israel seen drinking at those everlasting well-springs of grace and salvation, but, as must ever be the case, as a channel of blessing to others. “He shall pour the water out of his buckets.” It is the fixed purpose of God that Israel’s twelve tribes shall yet be a medium of rich blessing to all the ends of the earth. This we learn from such scriptures as Ezekiel xlvii. and Zechariah xiv, on which we do not now attempt to dwell; we merely refer to them as showing the marvelous fullness and beauty of these glorious parables. The reader may meditate with much spiritual profit upon these and kindred scriptures, but let him carefully guard against the fatal system falsely called spiritualizing, which, in fact, consists mainly in applying to the professing church all the special blessings of the house of Israel, while to the latter are left only the curses of a broken law. We may rest assured that God will not sanction any such system as this. Israel is beloved for the fathers’ sakes, and “the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.” (Rom. xi.)