“ And we see;” that is, ‘It is evident from what hath been laid down and proved ;’ or, ‘ This we have evinced, given an ocular demonstration of it.’
“ Now we see;”and this evident conclusion consists of two parts :— 1, An assertion, “That they could not enter in.” 2. The reason of it, “ Because of unbelief.” 1. In the first the apostle doth not only declare the “ factum” and event,—they did not enter, they died in the wilderness, there their carcasses fell; but the “jus” also, in a negation, odx 7duv4dnouv,— they could not enter;” that is, they lost all right unto an entrance by virtue of any promise of God. Whatever desire they had so to do, as they manifested their desires by their mourning at the heavy tidings brought them by Moses concerning their exclusion, Num. xiv. 39; whatever attempts they made for that end, as they got themselves up and fell upon the Canaanites and Amalekites that were next them, so to begin their conquest, by whom they were defeated,
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Ox Advyh- Sncay.
VER. 15-19.] EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 195
verses 40, 44, 45; having lost all right unto the promise, “they could not enter.” “TIllud possumus, quod jure possumus ;’—“ In things moral our ability is commensurate unto our right.” ‘This being lost, “they could not enter.” The expression is elliptical, and “God’s rest” is to be supplied from the foregoing verse. “He sware they should not enter into his rest.” And his determination is the rule of our right.
2. The reason and cause hereof is expressed in the last words, “ Because of unbelief.” They that shall look over the whole story of the sins of the people, and of God’s deal- ing with them, would perhaps of themselves fix upon other causes of their exclusion from the rest of God, as the Jews their posterity do to this day. Might not they say, ‘It was because of their idolatry in making the golden calf, which became a reproach unto them in all ages?’ So great a sin this was, that when God passed it by, as to their present destruction, he reserved, as it were, liberty to himself to remember it in after-visitations. Exod. xxxii. 34: “Go,” saith he, “ead the people unto the place of which I have spoken unto thee.
..... Nevertheless, in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them.” Hence the Jews have a saying, that “no trouble be- falleth Israel but there is in it an ounce of the golden calf.” Or, they might think the cause of it was their abominable mixture of all sorts of sins, in their conjunction with the Midianites and Moabites, worshipping Baal-peor, eating the sacrifices of the dead, and giving themselves up unto uncleanness. Their frequent murmurings also would occur unto their minds. But our apostle lays it here abso- lutely and wholly on their unbelief, and evidently proves it so to have been. A sin this is that men are very unapt to charge themselves withal; but that which above all others will be charged on them by God. And this is here charged on this people most righteously,—
(1.) Because the name which God was then designing to glorify among them, and himself thereby, was that of JEHOvAH: Exod. vi. 3, ‘I will now be known by my name JEHOVAH. And his purpose, by the renewed revelation and engagement of that name, was to teach them that he would now manifest the stability of his promises in their accomplishment. By their unbelief, therefore, did they rebel against God, and oppose his design in the especial revela- tion of himself whereby he would be glorified.
(2.) Because their unbelief was the spring and cause of all their other sins. Hence were their idolatries, and adulteries, and mur- murings, and all their other provocations.
(3.) Because they had herein often broken with God from under great convictions; for oftentimes, upon his mighty works, their minds had been conquered to the profession of faith and confidence: “The people feared the Lorn, and believed the Lor, and his servant Moses,”
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; A? amioriay.
196 AN EXPOSITION OF THE [cHAP. III.
Exod. xiv. 31. But immediately on the next trial they met withal they renounced their own experiences, and despised the faithfulness and power of God, which before they acknowledged, chap. xv. 24.
(4.) Because their last provocation was with direct respect unto the promise, which we have at large insisted on from Num. xiv., “So we see that they could not enter in, because of unbelief.”
There are sundry things that these words present unto us for our instruction; but as this verse is but a recapitulation of, and conclu- sion from what was before disputed and confirmed, so the practical truths contained in it have formerly occurred unto us as to the sub- stance or main design of them; and some of them we shall be again minded of in the beginning of the next chapter. Here, therefore, I shall only briefly propose them; and they are these that follow:—
Obs. I. Whatever we consider in sin, God principally considers the root and spring of it in unbelief, as that which maketh the most direct and immediate opposition unto himself.
The people in the wilderness were guilty of many provoking sins before God entered the caution mentioned against their entrance into his rest; yet the Holy Ghost sums up all here in their un- belief. This was that which God regarded, and which he would not pass by without a severe animadversion upon it; for indeed,—