IF I believe you will seldom get much good unless you are willing also to confer good ; those who are the nearest to the heart of the preacher, in all Christian service, will in all probability be most spiritually enriched under his ministry.^
2. This argument also is used by the Church. It is a powerful
' 0. H. Spurgoon.
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argument to a high heart ; and the Church's very existence — encamped in the wilderness, fighting the great battle against principalities and powers of evil, seeking, striving, suffering for that Promised Land, for man's higher life on earth, waiting for the consolation of Israel, giving itself to the great task of estab- lishing the Kingdom of Heaven on earth — the Church's very existence is an appeal to us. God had spoken good concerning Israel whether Hobab came or stayed ; but it was much to have Hobab's help in the great enterprise, much to have one who could be to them instead of eyes. And the Kingdom of Heaven will come with ua or without us ; but just because it is a task high and hard, we should be in the thick of it, taking our part of the glorious burden. Though we might not think of coming for our own sake, can we resist this other appeal to come for the sake of the Church ?
3. What good could Hobab have done ?
(1) He could have been a companion on the journey. — We are meant to depend on one another. No man can safely isolate himself, either intellectually or in practical matters. The self- trained scholar is usually incomplete. Crotchets take possession of the solitary thinker, and peculiarities of character that would have been kept in check, and might have become aids in the symmetrical development of the whole man, if they had been reduced and modified in society, get swollen into deformities in solitude. The highest and the lowest blessings for life both of heart and mind — blessedness and love, and wisdom and goodness — are ministered to men through men, and to live without de- pendence on human help and guidance is to be either a savage or an angel. God's guidance does not make man's needless, for a very large part of God's guidance is ministered to us through men. And wherever a man's thoughts and words teach us to understand God's thoughts and words more clearly, to love them more earnestly, or to obey them more gladly, there human guid- ance is discharging its noblest function. And wherever the human guide turns us away from himself to God, and says, " I am but a voice, I am not the light that guides," there it is blessed and safe to cherish and to prize it.
^ Some of us have sad memories of times when we journeyed ID company with those who will never share our tent or counsel
3^4 COME WITH US
our steps any more, and, as we sit lonely by our watchfire in the wilderness, have aching hearts and silent nights. Some of us may be, as yet, rich in companions and helpers, whose words are wisdom, whose wishes are love to us, and may tremble as we think that one day cither they or we shall have to tramp on by ourselves. But for us all, cast down and lonely, or still blessed with dear ones and afraid to live without them, there is a Presence which departs never, which will move before us as we journey, and hover over us as a shield when we rest ; which will be a cloud to veil the sun that it smite us not by day, and will redden into fire as the night falls, being ever brightest when we need it most, and burning clearest of all in the valley at the end, where its guidance will cease only because then " the Lamb that is in the midst of the throne will lead them." " This God is our God for ever and ever ; He will be our guide even unto death." ^
They talk about the solid earth.
But all has changed before mine eyes;
There's nothing left I used to know, Except God's everchanging skies.
I've kept old ways and loved old friends, Yet one by one they've slipped away;
Stand where we will, cling as we like. There's none but God can be our stay.
It is only by our hold on Him,
We keep our hold on those who pass
Out of our sight across the seas.
Or underneath the churchyard grass.*
(2) He could have teen of service to the good cause. — Come, said Moses ; if not for your own sake, come for our sake : if you do not need us, we need you : we are to encamp in the wilderness, girt round with danger and weighted with heavy tasks, and you can be to us instead of eyes. If you will not come because the Lord hath spoken good concerning Israel, come to help us to achieve that good. " Leave us not, and thou mayest be to us as eyes."
^ The Christian salvation is not just salvage, rescuing the flotsam and jetsam, the human wreckage that strews the sea of life ; though it is the glory of the faith and its divinest attribute that it does save even the broken and battered lives of men. But salvation includes and implies service also. It is a summons to participate in a great work, to share in a glorious venture.