faith gets above all fears, and disputes, and says, Deliverance will cer- tainly come, redemption is at hand.
Num. xiii. 30, ' And Caleb stilled the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once, and possess it, for we are well able to overcome it ;' chap. xiv. 9, ' Only rebel not ye. against the Lord, neither fear ye the people of the land, for they are bread before us ; their defence is de- parted from them, and the Lord is with us : fear them not.' The spies by their lies did what they could to daunt and discourage the people, by crying up the strength of the Anakims, and the impossibility of the conquest, Num. xiii. 32, 33. These hollow-hearted hypocritical spies blow hot and cold almost in a breath, Num. xiii. 23-28. First, they make a narrative of the fruitfulness of the land, and presently they conclude that it was a land that was not sufficient to nourish the inhabitants, yea, a land that did devour the inhabitants, ver. 32. Liars have no iron memories. But now behold to what a mighty pitch Caleb's faith is raised. * Let us go up at once, and possess it, for we are able to overcome it.' Or, nearer the Hebrew, ' Marching up, march up, subduing, subdue.' Let us, saith believing Caleb, march up to the land of Canaan courageously, resolutely, undauntedly, for the day is our own, the land is our own, all is our own. ' They are bread for us,' we shall make but a breakfast of them, we shall as easily and as surely root them out, and cut them down with our swords, as we cut the bread we eat. ' Their defence is departed from them.' In the Hebrew it is, ' Their shadow is departed from them.' The shadow you know guards a man from the scorching heat of the sun, Ps. xci. 1, and cxxi, 5, 6. Caleb, by faith, saw God withdrawn from them ; by the eye of his faith he looked upon them as a people without a fence, a shadow, a guard, a covert, a protection ; and therefore, as a people that might easily be subdued and destroyed. His faith told him that it was not their strong cities, nor their high walls, nor their sons of Anak, that could preserve, shelter, secure, or defend them, seeing the Lord had forsaken them, and would be no longer as a shadow or a shelter to them. * And the Lord is with us,' to make us victorious, to tread down our enemies, and to give us a quiet posses- sion of the good land.
So Dan. iii. 16, ' Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, answered and said to the king, 0 Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter.' Ver. 17, ' Tf it be so, our God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thy hand, 0 king.' In the fiery furnace they are protected by a divine providence, they escape death beyond all men's expecta- tions, for the fire touched them not, neither could it burn during their abode in the furnace, for God so fortified their bodies that they could not be consumed by fire,l which accident 2 made them in great estima- tion with the king, for that he saw that they were virtuous, and be- loved of God, and for that cause they were highly honoured by him. Here is a fiery furnace before them, and a proud, boasting, tyrannical, enraged prince domineering over them, for not obeying his idolatrous will. Now to what a mighty pitch is their faith raised ! ' Our God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us, and he will deliver us.' Their
1 Josephus, Antiq., pp. 259, 260. ' ' Occurrence.'— G.
466 THE SIGNAL PRESENCE OF GOD
faith was bottomed upon their propriety in God : * Our God ; ' and upon the power, providence, and all-sufficiency of God : * Is able to deliver us ; ' and upon the gracious readiness and willingness of God : ' And he will deliver us out of thy hand, 0 king.' When dangers are greatest, then God commonly raises the faith of his people highest ; faith doth most and best for us, when we are at a dead lift. It quenches the violence of fire, Heb. xi. 34 ; as the apostle speaks, point- ing at the faith of these three children, or rather champions. Though now the fiery furnace was heat[ed] seven times hotter than it used to be at other times, yet such was the strength, and might, and power of their faith, that it so quenched the flames, that they had not one hair of their heads singed, nor their coats changed, nor the smell of fire found upon them, Dan. iii. 27 ; and thus the blessed martyrs may be said by their faith, patience, and constancy to quench the violence of the fire, though their bodies were consumed to ashes in the fire. So Dan. vi. 16. Daniel is cast into the den of hungry, enraged lions; innocent Daniel is exposed to the cruel paws and hungry jaws of lions. This kind of capital punishment was not unusual among the Baby- lonians, the Medes and Persians, and among the Komans also, with whom it was a common saying in Tertullian's time, Let the Christians be cast to the lions. The faces of the lions are stern, and their voices are terrible, Amos iii. 8 ; they are roaring and ravening, they are greedy of their prey. They are vigilant and subtle. Lying in wait to get their prey, they sleep little, and when they sleep, it is apertis oculis, with open eyes. They mind their prey much, and are cunning to catch it, Ps. xvii. 12, The lion hides himself, and when the prey comes near he suddenly surprises it. They are proud and stately, they go alone, they eat not with the lioness, much less with other creatures, they will not stoop to any, or turn away from any, they do what they list ; they are most cruel, bloody, devouring creatures ; they have terrible claws, sharp teeth, and are strong and mighty to crush and break the bones ; and it is very dangerous to meddle with lions. i Num. xxiv. 9, ' He lieth down as a lion, as a great Hon : who shall stir him up ?' Lions if offended and provoked are very revengeful. In the hunting or taking of lions, the lion ob- serves who wounds him, and on him if possible he will be revenged. jElian tells of a bear that came into a lion's den, and bit the whelps she found there. The lion returning, the bear to shift for herself got up into a high tree. The lioness watched at the foot of the tree. The lion ranged abroad in the woods, and meets with a man that had an axe, and used to fell trees ; this man the lion brings to the den, shewed him the wounded whelps, directs him to the tree where the bear was, which he cut down ; the bear being torn in pieces, the man was safely dismissed. By these hints we may guess at the deadly danger that Daniel was in. Some writers tell us, that if a cloth be cast upon the eyes of a lion to cover them, he will not hurt a man ;2 or if he be full. — Josephus, to illustrate the history, saith, that these princes pleaded before the king, saying that the lions were full and gorged, and there- fore they would not touch Daniel ;^ which he hearing, being displeased
1 Prov. XXX. 3; Neh. ii. 12; 2 Kings xvii. 6 ; Prov. xiviii. 15; 1 Pet. v. 8. ' Aristot., Pliny, Pereriup. ^ Josephus, Antiq., pp. 262, 263.