The Pulpit Commentary — Numbers — Section 148

II. Goo's TEST OF SELF-CONTROL. He gives the quails, not for one day's luxury, hut to be the food of a month. As nothing is said to the contrary, we mast presume the manna was still continued. Indeed we can easily see the reason for its continu• ance. God in giving the quaile, adds an express and solemn warning. They are to he taken with all their consequences. Sweet at first, they shall turn to objects of bitter loathing. They were given, not in complacency, but in anger, hence they had in them the efficacy of a test. Surely the whole of Israel was not rebellious and murmuring. There must have been men of the N azarite spirit even then, and the question for them is : "Shall we go out after our wont and gather the manna (Exod. ui.), or shall we, like the rest, gratify our appetites with these delicious quails?" Who can doubt that God was watching hie own faithful ones, the lsrae-lites indeed in whom there was no guile? There are doubtless many things in the world, the chief use of which is to test the disposition of man to obey God (Gen. ii. 16, 17). These quails were given, but there was no obligation to eat them. Every Israelite was free to refuse. A timely repentance, and another wind woulrl have blown away the quails as rapidly as they came. There was a lesson if the people would learn it, from the submissive birds to the rebellious hum11n beings. III. Goo's PENALTY FOB SELF-INDULGENCE. There is a seeming contradiction between vers. 19{ 20, and ver. 33, but it is only seeming. God hastened his judgment and thereby real y showed his mercy. As David chose the brief pestilence, and to fall into the hand of the Lord (2 Sam. xxiv.), so here God comes with an immediate and sweeping visitation. Besides, it is possible the people neglected the command to sanctify themselves, and thus further provoked the anger already stirred up; when people get lust into their hearts all sense of law is apt to vanish. It was well the people should see clearly the close connection between disobedience and retribution. 'l'hus did God show, even in these quails, 1he spirit of a good and perfect gift. Nothing in creation is a blessing in itself; God must make it so, and he can easily in his anger turn it to a curse. God, in making the effect of eating the quails so con- spicuous and sudden, still further illustrated by contrast the glory of the manna, for this manna was a beautiful type of the true bread that cometh from heaven. The people had nover gathered the manna with such greed and application as they had gathered the quails. When a man breaks the law he is at once guilty, and the punishment, if it be deferred, is so as a matter of expediency, not of right. The lapse of time only makes the connection between sin and punishment less obvious, not at all less certain (Pa. cvi. 15; Gal. vi. 7-9).-Y. Vers. 21-23.-Deeper in unbelief I. MosEs IN HIS REPLY SHOWS AN IMPEBl"ECT APPRECIATION OF WHAT Goo HAD SAID. 1. As to God's purpose. He had spoken in holy auger, promising flesh, but threatening retribution along with it. The threat is quite as emphatic as the promise, but somehow Moses does not heed. At Sinai, when the people made the golden calf, he was so oppressed with the sense of their great sin, and so solicitous for their pardon, as to beg if the pardon were not granted that he might himself be blotted out of God's book. Where was this anxiety now? His great concern is, not how God may be propitiated and the people spared, but how the people may be propitiated and he himself spared. Contrast Moses here with Christ at all times. Think of the Son's never-failing remembrance of the Father's glory. The Son saw and appreciated all things the Father showed him; hen.:e the confidence with which we look to Christ for a revelation of all God's purposes con- cerning us, so far as it is right for us to know them. Jesus could ever go out and declare in fitting words and with proper emphasis all the will of God, for ho had 11 perfect appreciation of that will himself. But how was Moses to go out and speak properly to the people when he himself had only half-heard, as it were what God had said to him? Doubtless he repeated the message of God in the' very same words; but one fears that while he made it quite clear to the people they should havo flesh, he made it not quite so clear that God was sending it in anger. Let us ever get to the spirit of God's messages to us; never content till their fulness ot meaning has passed into our heart, so that something like tho fulness of Hervice may pass out of it again. 2. As to God's pou·er. History repeats itself. Unbclid, nat1uul ignornnco of God, slowness of heart to take in what he has s1loken,· --thel!8  128 THE BOOK OP N1Jlt:BEBS. [on. x1. -1--811.