The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Samuel — Section 436

be counted RB a t.reasure, and mRde him conspicuous in IsrRel, now combined with the silent forces that ran through the forest trees to bring him into the judament for which bis courge of rebellion had been preparing him. When God's time he.a" come ho has many instruments for effecting his pnrpose. The best gifts of sinful men so~e- times get so entangled with the stable order of nature as to prematurely bring their life to an end. There are always "branches" stretching out in the natural order of things, forming objects against which the powers and possessions of men run, to their detriment and speedy death. The young man's natural vigour, of which he is proud, may run against a resisting force which shatters it in proportion to its strength. Brilliant intellects, in their defiance of God, have, in modern times, become so absorbed in literary work bearing on their infidelity, as to be caught early in the arms of death, Of bow many may it be said that their beauty has been their destruction I VII. THEIR MEMORY IS DESTINED TO BE UNHONOURED. Absalom, proud of his name and ambitious of posthumous fame, erected a memorial pillar for himself-a mournful premonition, as it were, of his miserable end. Nothing could have been more mortify- ing to him, had he known it, than to be cut down from a tree like a common felon and be buried as a dog. The wicked are cut off; their memorial perishes. It may be that men who die io sin have reared to their memory tablets or monuments of marble or brass; but the truth remains that they shall have no everlasting memorial in the assembly of the upright in the new Jerusalem. Earthly monuments are perishable. It is said of those who a.re so unfortunate and guilty as to die in a state of alienation from God, that their name shall" rot" (Prov. x. 7). The only enduring order of things is that of the kingdom of God: it "cannot be shaken," and a. place in that kingdom alone can ensure a. perpetual memorin.1. Those who are true sons, who have recovered the lost feeling of love, shall shine in the kingdom of the Father, and shall be heirs with Christ of his glory and joy. The wicked shall go into "outer darkness." GEKERAL LESSONS. 1. The attention of a.II, especially of the young, should be ea.lied to the fa.et that the right feeling of sonship is that of loving submission, and that the loss of this towards earthly parents is really the fruit of a loss of the filial feeling towards the heavenly Father. 2. If we would form right notions of the guilt of sin, the need and nature of atonement, and the punishment a.warded to sin in Scripture, we must pay due regard to what sin is in its essence-the assertion of self against God. 3. We see here the real nature of the change that is necessary in order to adoption into the redeemed family of God-a radical change of the governing feeling of the heart in relation to God. Regeneration is the inner antecedent of the conversion of the entire man. 4." Young men may take wanring against the terrible power of evil when once they break the bonds of love to parents, and in this first and chief sin they have the germ of Wllipeaka.ble crimes and woes. 5. Let those who in the height_ ~f sinful prosperity imagine that all is going well, remember that, though they thus reJ01ce, yet for all these things God will bring them into judgment (Eccles. xi. 9). 6. Both the righteous and the wicked may accept it as a certainty that, in some way or other, the very inanimate creation will sooner or later be sub,ervient to the ends of justice. 7. The best monu- ment we can rear to ourselves, or that others can raise to our memory, is that blessed memory of the just which rests on a life of love to earthly parents and righteous ful- filment of all the obligations we owe to God and man. TJ,e place of principles in conduct. The controversy between the "certain man" and Joab near the oak where A.bsalom was hanging was natural, and sprang from diversity of views, which took their shape in ea.eh case from the character of the individuals. 'fhe man was an ordinary loyal subject of David's, simple in life and thought, governed, as such men generally a.re, by a few great first principles of conduct. Joa.b was an astute man of the world true to David for reasons of a compound nature, entertaining such views of duty and life as generally sway _the minds of .men of the world, who regard present fe.cts in the light of an unsentimental_ expediency. . Each one was true to hlmself and the discussion raised was well sustained on ea.eh side by reasons cogent to the me~ themselves who expressed them, but of n.o force beyond the individual to con- vert the other to his view. We see, then- I. 'THAT LIFE MAY IN DIFFERENT MEN BE CONDUCTED ON DIFFERENT AND TOTALLY mnr.coxcrLABLE PRINCIPLES. Here was a simple countryman unwilling to touch tho c11. xvm. 1-88.J THE SECOND BOOK OF SAMUEL 44/i