Numb. xiv. 24. But my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit with him, and hath followed me full >/, him will I bring into the land whereinto he went ; and his seed shall possess it.
THE fewness of those who shall finally be saved is strongly declared in the Holy Scriptures ; yet they who venture to suggest such an idea, are deemed uncharitable in the extreme. But it is not owing to a want of mercy in God that any perish : it is utterly their own fault : God delights to bless his faithful and obedient people ; but the unbelieving and disobedient he will eternally condemn. The numbers that are found in either of these classes make no dif- ference with respect to him: if there were only one or two ungodly, they alone should perish, and all others should be saved : but if a whole nation be ungodly, and only one or two of them be observant of the divine commands, those individuals alone shall find acceptance with him, and all the rest shall meet with their deserved doom. None but Noah and his family escaped the deluge : none but Lot and his daughters were delivered from the judgments which came upon Sodom and Gomorrha: thus, in the pas- sage before us, we are told that Caleb alone, together with Joshua, was permitted to enter into the promised land, because they alone had followed the Lord fully.
To elucidate this record, and to bring it home to our own hearts, we shall shew,
I. When we may be said to follow the Lord fully —
The whole nation of Israel might be considered as followers of the Lord, because they had given up them- selves to him as his redeemed people, and depended on him for guidance and protection. In the same manner the whole body of Christians may be called followers of Christ, because they profess to have been redeemed by him from the far sorer bondage of sin and death, and because they look to him, in profession at least, to guide them by his Spirit, to keep them by