were also sustained by food miraculously afforded them, food, not carnal only, but " spiritual," if spiritually improved^
But, instead of following the Lord fully, " they forgat God their Saviour," and addicted themselves to idolatry, to fornica- tion, to distrust and murmuring''.
For these, and other impieties, the heavy wrath of God came upon them ; and two only, of all the adults who had come out of Egypt, were suffered to enter into the promised land.]
In this view they were intended as types and en- samples*' to us —
[St. Peter mentions the judgments inflicted on fallen angels, the antediluvian world, and the cities of the plain, as exemplifying those which should come upon all, who at any period, should live and die in an ungodly state*^. St. Jude, in addition to those instances, mentions also the Israelites, who perished in the wilderness^. The former might properly re- present the people, who are wholly ignorant of God ; the latter may more particularly characterize those who profess religion : and the disappointment which they experienced in consequence of their sins, was typical of that, which all must experience, who profess to have been called with a holy calling, and yet walk unworthy of their profession. In them we see that the greater our privileges, the heavier, if we abuse them, will be our condemnation,]
Being so deeply interested in the events recorded concerning them, we should consider attentively, II. The admonitions they give us —
The Jewish dispensation closed, and the Christian dispensation commenced, in the apostolic age : and, this being the last that ever shall be given to the world, we who live under it may be said to Hve in the concluding period of the world.
Now the foregoing events admonish us,
1 . Not to rest in a mere profession of rehgion — [It was to no purpose that the Israelites called themselves the people of God, while they were unmindful of the obliga- tions which such a profession entailed upon them. While they called God and Abraham their father, they were, like their descendants also, children of the wicked one^. Thus it will be in vain for us to call ourselves Christians, if we have not the
•"^ ver. 1 — 4. b ver. 7 — 10. " Tiwoi.
" 2 Pet. ii. 4— r>. e ju^g, ver. 5. f John viii. 39, 41, 44.