The Pulpit Commentary — Joshua — Section 138

thoughtless tattle about mercies suggests need of thought and carefulness, other precepts-as, "Go home and tell thy friends,'' "Show thyself to the priests," require- ments of confession, the example of multitudes who have said, " Come, and I will tell you what the Lord hath done for my soul," the instincts of honour and of grace -all combine to lay on him who receives Divine mercy the duty of telling it. We have all need to beware of a guilty secrecy which thinks it 11 mark of refinement and modesty to be silent about its Saviour. Your neighbours are perishing, all needing, SO'llle asking for, a Saviour. Will you be guiltless if you do not say, "Here is a Sanour, Christ Jesus-He saved me"? If He has led you across the Jordan into the rest He promised you, set up your memorial, and join the rest of Israel in testifying that Jesus Christ is a great Saviour. Membership in the Church of Christ is the simplest form of testimony and is the duty of every saved man. For the sake of others. set up your memorial of God's mercies in Gilgal. III. MAKE YOUR MEMORIAL AS ENDURING AS POSSIBLE. They were to set up twelve stones : something that would endure, that could give testimony to many generations. As a matter of fact they did remain till, probably, some centuries after the destmction of Jerusalem.':' And through alJ,.these generations that circle, or cairn, or altar, whatever it was, remained, elevating and inspiring men by its blessed memories. Let your testimony of Christ's salvation be an enduring one. Set up Dot a memorial of clay, which re.in may soften or heat might crumble, but of stone. Keep yow; own memories of mercy keen and clear. Do not let them crumble away; and try to serve the generations that are to come. Inheritors should be transmitters of help. The testimony of those that have gone before us has blessed us ; let our testimony bless those that follow after us. Let us not play at testifying of the grace of God, but make it seriously our work. There are men who, ginng themselves to th"' work, have blessed many generations. Let our Sanour ha,e from us some enduring witness which shall carry to the genera- tions after us the record of His love. ADd, lastly, this lesson should be noted- IV. THAT THE LESSONS OF THE MEMORIAL SHOULD SPECIALLY REACH OUR CHILDREN. In vers. 21 to the end it is assumed that the children will be the inquirers about the memorial, and the parents the interpreters of it, and that thus, from father to son, the story of God's grace shall be handed down, hallowing each generation. No man can complain that there is no open door set before him, when a child full of inquisitive simplicity faces him. And no one should despair of the future of a land in which parents can engage the ear of children with the story of their sacred experience. Is there not too much reticence between parents and children on the greatest of all themes ? If our hearts were more devout would it be impossible for us, without undue detail, to charge our children with a sense of what we owe to our Redeemer ? Might they Dot early learn how poor and worthless our life would have been without Him. Might they not learn something of answers to our prayers, of the blessedness of heavenly ?opes, of the safety ofr,rotect\ng grace, oft~e consolations of God's love, of that "delivery from all our fears of which the Psahmst speaks? "Ye shall let your children know, saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry land." When we obey this precept in letter and spirit more heartily, p~ob- ably we shall find our obedience will be rich in the results expected by the writer (ver. 24). "The people of the earth will know the hand of the Lord, and Israel will fear the Lord their God for ever."-G. Ver. 14.-Grace for beginners. In one sense Joshua is not a beginner. For forty years he has been at work for God. As spy, as general, as servant of Moses, during all these years he has wrought in the work, and with the help of God. Yet though eighty-five years of age, this crossing Jordan is bis first a.et of leadership. In the sovereignty of Israel he is a beginner, with a beginner's fe~rs, diffi~olties, bmdens. And here we see a beautiful illustration of the fact-that with e. beginner's cares comes a beginner's grace as well. A marvellous miracle stamps him as the leader sent by God. The "divinity that doth hedge a king" in e.n unusual degree • See Art. in Smith'11 Dictionary, 'Gilgal.' UJI. IV, 1---24.] THE BOOK OF ,JOSHUA. 73