Heard are the voices, Heard are the sage's, The world's, and the age's. Choose well: your choice is Brief and yet endless.^
* A. L. Waring. ' Goethe, translated by Carlyle,
As FOR Me and My House.
fSt
Literature.
Alford (H.), Quebec Chapel Sermons, iii. 423.
Hare (J. C), Sermons Preacht in Herstmonceux Church, i. 369.
Maclaren (A.) Expositions of Holy Scripture : Deuteronomy, etc., 183.
Morgan (G. H.), Modern Knights-Errant, 225.
Moule (H. C. G.), Thoughts for the Sundays of the Year, 224.
Norton (J. N.), Short Sermons, 414.
Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, xxi. (1875), No. 1229.
Christian World Pulpit, vii. 289 (Kennedy); xxvii. 11 (Watt); xxxvii.
55 (Stevenson). Preacher's Magazine, vi. (1895) 418 (Ingram).
*S»
y
As FOR Me and My House.
As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. — Josh. xxiv. 15.
1. It is an impressive experience to stand round the bed of a dying veteran whom we have followed and loved. Viewed from that vantage-ground, the mighty things of the world seem weak, and the gilded and glorious to be but hollow tinsel. The life of that man, spent as it has been in the service of God, casts a halo around this scene which cannot be described. The life may have been unpretentious, utterly lacking in the show and outward glory which brings earthly renown ; but we feel his life has been good in a way which will bear the searching light of the Great White Throne, and we are satisfied. With what interest and anxiety do we listen to every word that falls from his failing lips. There are reminiscences of the past, and the eyes sparkle at the remem- brance of God's goodness in times of storm and stress. Then come wise counsels for the future. And as the sons and daughters who have come from distant parts stand round, linked by the strongest of all ties — the tie of mutual grief — some such prayer as Bickersteth's ascends for them —
Let not one of these
Be wanting in the day Thou countest up
The jewels in Thy diadem of saints.
I ask not for the glories of the world,
I ask not freedom from its weariness
Of daily toil; but, oh Lord Jesu Christ,
Let Thy omnipotent prayer prevail for them
And keep them from the evil. In the hour
Of trial, when the subtle tempter's voice
Sounds like a seraph's, and no human friend
Is nigh, let my words live before Thee then,
And hide my lambs beneath Thy shadowing wings.
And keep them as the apple of Thine eye.
My prayers are ended if Thy will be done
»S3
154 AS FOR ME AND MY HOUSE
In them and by them. Till at last we meet Within the mansions of our Father's home, A circle never to be sundered more, No broken link, a family in Heaven.
2. Our text expresses the resolution of the great captain Joshua, when God had given His people rest from their enemies round about, and all the good things had come upon them which the Lord their God had promised them. Such were the words which he was not ashamed to utter in the assembly of Israel, when he had summoned them together at Shechem. He had «/called on them to make a deliberate choice between idolatry and the service of Jehovah. On this point, his own mind was made up. " Choose you this day whom ye will serve ; but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." It must have been a noble sight to see the well-tried champion of Israel, ripe in years and in honours, adding to all his proofs of courage this greatest one, of standing out before the armies of his people and owning himself a godly man ; crowning the exploits of a heroic life by a boldness no less heroic, on His behalf on whom life depends. And it must have been a remarkable sight, too, to witness that day the gathering of the tribes to Shechem. Veterans who had fought in the wars of the Lord once more embraced their aged captain. Long-severed friends in arms and danger once more greeted one another. Eound these were the assembled multitudes of Israel. They stood and listened to him who reminded them of the age which was gone by, and took pledges of them for the age which was to come.
Give thanks, 0 heart, for the high souls That point us to the deathless goals — For all the courage of their cry That echoes down from sky to sky; Thanksgiving for the armed seers And heroes called to mortal years — Souls that have built our faith in man And lit the ages as they ran.
Give thanks for heroes that have stirred Earth with the wonder of a word. But all thanksgiving for the breed Who have bent destiny with deed —
JOSHUA XXIV. 15 155
Souls of the high, heroic birth, Souls sent to poise the shaken earth, And then called back to God again To make heaven possible for men.
I.
As FOE Me.
1. This short phrase occurs again and again in Scripture. " As for me, I " (unlike the enemies of God) " will come into thy house in the multitude of thy mercy " (Ps. v. 7). " As for me, I " (unlike those whose portion is in this life) " will behold thy face in righteousness " (Ps. xvii. 15). We might add to such quotations many others where the same or similar Hebrew occurs, but is otherwise rendered in our Version. Such a passage is Psalm Ixxiii. 28, where we may read, " As for me, nearness to God for ^ me is good." Others may, if they will, go wandering from Him, devoting themselves to the world, to self, to sin, as their life and choice. My preference and resolve are otherwise. " Nearness to God for me is good."