HOMILIES BY V ABIOUS AUTHORS. Vers. 7-9.-.An outburst_of thanksgiving. A deep heart-effusion, in which all that the religious imagination, inspired by love, ca.n suggest, is projected upon the picture of Jehovah, the redeeming God of Israel. I. Hrs LOVIKG-KINL>NESB. (Cf. eh, Iv. 3; and the Hebrew word in eh. h:iii. 7; Ps. lxxxix. 28-49; cvii. 43; Lam. iii. 22.) The word (i~,:i) su~gests a. world of love. When used of men it implies pity, benignity, especially in circumstances of misfor- tune, as Gen. xxi. 23; 1 Sam. x. 2; Job vi. 14. How fine is the saying in 2 Sam. ix. 3, "I will act kindly toward him like unto God"! So that all human expressions of kindness may be and should be conceived as flowing from the one eternal Fountain. Sometimes, by a figure, God himself is called Favour, Mercy (Ps. cxliv. 2; Jonah ii. 9). II. Hrs GREAT DEEDS. "Renown," or" deeds of renown." The divorce of feeling from deed, of sentiment from action, that we so often see in feeble humanity, we do nut fin,l in God. With him, heart a.nd head are one. His deeds are daily, world-extended, historical, eternal. Every commotion of the nations, every war, every revolution, must be traced to the influence of his Spirit in the last resort. III. Hrs GENEROUS BESTOWALS. '!'here is an exuberant outflow of thought, feeling, and language here. Jehovah is to be celebrated "according to that which is due for 448 THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH. [<'H. txm. 1-19
all that be h11th bestowed, acoording to his compassion and bis abundant loving-kind- nesses." ·were it not that the impression of pain is keener and deeper with us than that of pleasure, it would be seen that at every moment life teems with mercies, gifts from the Giver of all good. IV. Hrs PROV1DENCE IN HISTORY. They were his people in virtue of the primeval covena.nt. They were his sons by adoption. The great salvation out of Israel was prot-0typical of a.II acts in which Jehovah "became unto them a Saviour. Distinct and strong is the representation of the sympathy of God with their suffering; distressed in all their <listres~es." His love and his clemency are again mentioned. He was ever, in that long and strange history of rebellion, "overcoming evil with good "-a pardoning God. Hi., care was that of a mother's heart--carrying the people, as it were, from their birth, promising to carry them even to hoar hairs, "I have made, and I will bear; I will carry, and I will deliver you" (eh. xlvi. iii. 4). Yet it is part of such providential dealing to chastise. There were especially times when the people did evil in the sight of Jehovah (Judg. ii. 11; iii. 7). Secretly a Holy Spirit, or Spirit of holiness, was striYing with them, and they v,,ere constantly resisting it. The great covenant with God was founded on this principle of holiness; this was the distinctive characteristic of the people as of their God. By their untruth to the covenant, they changed him as it were from a friend to an enemy. Thwarted love turns to jealousy (Ex:od. xxxiv, 14), and the gracious face of the Father becomes that of the wrathful J udge.--J. Vers. 10-14.-The remembrance of the pru;t. I. THE MEMORY OF Goo. If God is thought of, as be must be thought of, after the analogy of human experiences, he must be thought of as remembering, calling the past to mind, and as undergoing changes of mind in consequence. These a.re ways of representing first to thought, then in language, an infinit.e love, which must he capable of all the scale and gamut of feeling-anger, wrath, jeak,usy, and the revulsioo almost to the tenderness of tears. So in the wilder- ness, he, being full of compassion, forgave the iniquity of the rebels in the wilderness, turning his aoger away, because he remembered tho.t they were flesh, or but as the passing wind; he called to miod his covenaot; he repented according to the multitude of his mercies (Lev. xxvi. 45; Ps. lx:xviii. 39 ; cvi. 45). In the history of Israel there was nothing more memorable than the coming np out of Egypt, and the leadership of Moses and Aaron. IL THE HISTORY OF lsBAEL EXPLAINED FBOM THE GOVERNMENT OF Goo. The outward wonders, the deeds of might, were but the maoifestation of an inward waking of his Spirit in the breast of the people. A Spirit of instruction, of" providential guidance aod sa.g:.cious government"-" Thy good Spirit to instruct them" (N eh. ix:. 20). A holy light seemed in the retrospect to rest upon that period. It was said that the people "served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that over- lived Joshua," for" they had known all the works of the Lord, that he bad done for Israel." The next generation knew not the works of the Lord, nor the works he had done for Israel (Josh. mv. 31; Jud:i;. ii. 6-10). The Spirit of Jehovah appears to mean much the same as the face of Jehovah above (cf. Ex:od. xx:x:iii. 14; Hag. ii. 4, 5; cf. Numb. xL 10-30). The term" holiness" remiuds of the covenant, and the covenant of the obligaLions of fidelity on the part of the people, in response to the oath-keeping of God. Anotber image, almost carrying the same meaning, is that of the "arm of Jebovah's splendour" (eh. xl. 10; xiv. 1), ready to support Moses, to hold him up from falling (eh. x.li. 10-13). Then the sublime picture of the crossing of the Red Sea rises up in imagination (Exod. xiv. 21; cf. Ps. cvi. 9; lx:xvii. 16), and the wide and dreary stt-ppe. Finally, as a herd goes down from the mountain-side iuto the pasture- land of the plain, so, under the same guidance, the people came to their rest-a beloved word (Exod. x:xx:iii. 14; Deut. iii. 20; xii. 9; Josh. i.13; x:x:ii. 4; Pa. xcv, 11; Jer. xxx:i, 2; Heb. iv. 1, 9). 'fbe spiritual sum and substance of all is," Thus thou ciidst guide thy people to make unto thyself a monument of glory." By his work he became for ever known among the heathen. It was a work not to be executed by any false god, nor by any human e.rm. "Egypt was at this time the centre of all science, art, and culture; and what occurred there would be known in other lands. God delligned to make a signal demonstration of his existence and power, that should be known in all Ian& ap.d should ~evllr be forgotte!l," God's glory is the ~rand e11d of e.U be does, an'1 on. LXIII, 1-19.] THE BOOK OF THE PilOPllET ISAIAH. 419
consequently ought to be likewise of all that we either do or suffer. And whatever, therefore, befalls any man makes for God's glory and for his own good, if he be a child of God. We should learn, then, to estimate things by their use and tendency. Poison may o □ ter into the composition of an antidote; and things essentially good may, under certr1in circumstances, become pernicious. Prosperity may harden a.ad adversity may humble us; the one may prepare us for judgment, the other for mercy.-J.