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Exodus this mysterious messenger appears to keep close company with His chosen flock as they march onward to their rest under His guidance. It was the " messenger of God " who went before Israel in the Eed Sea, and spoke to Moses face to face. This was the visible Presence which commanded Moses to bring up the people, and to whom Moses said, " If thy presence go not with me, carry us not up hence. For wherein shall it be known here that I and thy people have found grace in thy sight ? Is it not in that thou goest with us ? " And of whom we read, " Behold, I send an angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not ; for he will not pardon your transgressions : for my name is in him." In these wonderful words, which might have been obscure at the time, but the meaning of which it is not now difficult to see, it is not hard to discover Jesus Christ, who was faithful, like Moses, though not like a servant of Moses, but as the Son of God. In His life and body He redeemed His people, and He guided them and helped them in the days of old. Well might St. Paul see in the Church in the wilderness a parallel of the Church of the New Testament. Well might he see in the manna and the water of refreshment a symbol of the Messiah. That rock from whence the water sprung was Christ, the same great patient Saviour.
IT Our theories about God are our theology. It is well to value them, to be careful of them, to try our best to keep them pure and high. But the deeper question is, "What is our religion ? What are our real thoughts of God ? In that deep and secret place of our inmost consciousness, where all our desires and feelings and hopes and aspirations are born, what is God to us ? " This is the great question, the searching question. And on the answer to it our peace, our happiness, our usefulness depend.
We say that God is perfect in wisdom. But do we feel that He is wise for us ? Do we trust His wisdom to guide and direct us ? Do we think of Him as the One who always knows what is best for us ?
We say that God is perfect in righteousness. But do we know Him as " the Lord, our righteousness " ? Do we trust assuredly in Him to cleanse us from guilt and deliver us from the power of sin ? Do we yield ourselves to His will and purpose to purify and perfect us by the discipline of life ?
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498 THE GREAT TEXTS OF THE BIBLE
We say that God is omnipresent: —
His dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living aii-, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man; A motion and a spirit that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things.
It is a grand doctrine, an inspiring doctrine, this of the Divine omnipresence. But do we think of God as present with us personally in all the experiences of life ? Such a thought of Him is infinitely more needful, infinitely more precious than any theory of His omnipresence.^
But the angel of His Presence cannot mean anything to us unless we realise what kind of a presence it is of which the prophet speaks. And surely this ought not to be hard to dis- cover and understand. He looks backward over the tribulations and distresses of Israel, this man of God, himself a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and as he surveys the long story of troubles and suffering he sees God's presence shining through it all, like the face of a friend.
(1) A friendly presence. — It means, first of all, a gracious, friendly, loving, sympathising presence. God is with us in our troubles, not merely because He has to be there, since He is everywhere. He is there because He wants to be. Just as truly as you desire to be near your friends, your children, when they suffer, just so truly does God desire and choose to be near us in our afflictions. He would not be away from us even LE He could. He is not present as a mere spectator, looking at us curiously while we suffer. That cold and distant conception of Him as the great onlooker, —
Who sees with equal eyes as God of all
A hero perish or a sparrow fall,
is not the thought of the Bible. He is with us as one who has the deepest interest in it all, feels all that happens to us, cares infinitely for us through it all. Nor is He present merely as the author of our pains and sorrows, who could have spared us from them if He would, but who insists upon inflicting them on us,
1 H. van Dyke, The Open Door, p. 127.
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whatever it may cost us to bear them. It costs Him as much as it costs us. " He doth not afflict wilKngly nor grieve the children of men." There is a wondrous power in the precise words in which the prophet voices this profound truth. They may be translated, " In all their adversity He was no adversary."