Ver. 20.-Secret things, "Secret things belong unto the Lord our God." So says tho great lawgiver. On II not dissimilar topic, Bishop Butler says, "We do not know tho whole of anything." Js it not so? Who can tell oJ,l about a stone or about a blnde of grass? Who can aver that the furthest star has been yet discovered, or tell us whnt lios beyond it? There are secrets among the minute; there are secrets among the vast. I. LET US MAKE A DISTINCTION AS TO THE MANNER, KIND, OR DEGREE OF SECRECY. 1. Some things are secret, awaiting fuller discovery to reveal them. 2. Some things are secret, but await the unfolding of events in God's providence. 3. Some things are secret in one sense, but not in another. We often know manifestations, but not essences; phenomena, but not noumena ; facts, but not modes or reasons. 4. There are some secret things which are altogether unknowable, and must long remain so; e.g. Who can give an account of the reason why sin was permitted to enter? Who can tell whether it will always exist? Who can explain the doctrine of the Trinity? Who can descry the reason why this man had such and such suffering? etc., etc. How soon, when we come to ask questions like these, are we in "a boundless deep, where all our thoughts are drowned" 1 II. LET us INQUIRE, JN WHAT RESPECT DO SECRET THINGS BELONG UNTO GoD? They belong unto him: 1. To conceive them. 2. To will them. 3. To originate them. 4. To comprehend them. 5. To overrule them. 6. To conduct them to their final issue. III. LET US ASK, WHAT EFFECT SHOULD THE FA<Yr THAT SECRET THINGS BELONG UNTO GoD HA VE UPON us? 1. It should humble us to find out how incompetent we are to scan the Divine works and ways. 2, It is obvious that we must leave secret things with him to whom alone they belong. 3. It is manifestly right to leave them with him. 4. It should give us no uneasiness to leave them there. 5. ,ve should be fully content to leave them there. For we have (1) a. revealed will of love; (2) plain and straightforward duty to discharge; (3) a. full gospel of redeeming mercy; and (-lc) a good hope through grace. What more can we want? 6. We should be adoringly thankful that God keeps in his own hands what we could not understand, and entrusts us only with what we can. 7. Thankfully leaving in God's hands what belongs to him, let us lovingly attend to that which belongs to us.
Ver. 20.-Revealed things. This verse is so full of meaning that it is not easy to do even approximate justice to it in one discourse. Hence we have reserved the latter part thereof for a suggested outline of a distinct homily: "Those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this Law." The statement here made concerning the Law of God in particular, is true of the entire Word of God as the regulator of faith and life. Three lines of thought here naturally follow on each other. I. WITHIN THE WORD OF GoD WE HAVE THE REVEALED MIND AND WILL OF GoD. He made known his ways unto Moses, etc. And now he bath spoken to us in his Son. The sum and substance of the Divine message is, "Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." II. THE MANIFEST OBJECT OF THIS REVELATION OF AND FROM GoD IS THAT WE MA1 THEREBY HAVE AN ADEQUATE GUIDE FOR FAITH AND LIFE. "That we may do all th& words of this Law" is the Old Testament form of setting this. The New Testament form is," Preaching . . . repentance towards God, and _faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ." III. lN THIS RESPECT THE WORD OF GoD 18, EMPHATICALLY," OURS." "Those things which are revealed belong unto us," etc. 1. They belong to us-our treasury of wealth. 2, They belong to us-our measure of responsibility, 3, They belong to us-our rule by which we shall be finally tried (Rom. ii, 1-16), THE BOOK OF DEUTERONOMY. [Oll, llU, 1-29,