The Pulpit Commentary — Jeremiah — Volume 1 — Section 282

spoken of tell rather of the few mean possessions, the small triBing properties, of a poor mo.n, which in his haste he would gather together in a. bundle and so endeavour to save (cf. Exposition). In former judgments it was mainly the high and lofty, those of wealth and station, who had suffered; but now all, from the highest to the lowest, should be included in the overwhelming desolations abont to be poured forth. And so the prophet represents the poor and wretched hastily gathering up their little effects, and making off with them as best they may. And ver. 18 adds yet other terrible features to this delineation of the judgment that is coming: "Behold, I will sling out," etc. This, there- fore, shows how ready they must have been for such treatment. David selected smooth stones from the brook, such as were fit and apt for his slin~, and with them he went forth to meet Goliath. Not any missile, not any stone, would serve. And so if it were possible, as it was, for a people to be "slung out" of a. land, they must have made themselves fit for such judgment, or else they would not have been subjected to it. And this they had been doing for many a long year. "When the husbandman seeth that the harvest ,is come, he putteth in the sickle." This is true of the visitation of judgment as well as of grace. Tlie violence of the people's expulsion from their land is also indicated : as a stone is hurled forth from the sling. And the completeness of the judgment: "at this once," i.e. completely, thoroughly, at one blow. Former judgments had been partial, temporary, long drawn out. '!'his was to be complete, perpetual, and "at once," as a stone is in a moment driven forth from the sling. And their far-distant destination is suggested. God intended that they should be carried far off into the land of their exile (cf. Isa. x.xii. 18). But note- II. THE FACT THAT THESE JUDGMENTS ARE DECLARED TO HAVE A PURPOSE BEYOND THEMSELVES. All was to be done "tliat they may find." It is plain, therefore, how- ever we supply what must come after the word " find," that there wns a definite Divine purpose iu all these calamities. They were not to be an end in themselves, but to lead on to one beyond. And surely this must be the purpose of all God's jndgments; he can have no satisfaction in them simply as punishment. His heart is set on what is to come forth out of them, and the result has regard to them. "That tliey may find; " they who have sinned so terribly, they shall learn by these judgments that ho sends. III. WnAT THAT PUBPOSE IS, What is it that they may find? Our translators have simply added the words "it so," thus leaving undetermined what the finding is to be. But surely that which God would have them find is all that which hitherto they could not be persuaded to believe in, e.g. the bitterness of disobedience, the vanity of idols, the sure truth of God's word, the uselessness of all religion that is not from the heart, etc. But all this to the intent that they may find, as at last many of them did, the way of repentance and return to God. God had made them for himself, as he has made us all for himself. It is blasphemy to think of him as creating human souls, eudued as they all are with such vast capacities, with any other design. And hence it is that the heart of man is unquiet, bas no rest, until it fiud rest in God. GoJ. will not suffer it to be otherwise, blessed be his Name. And since for Judah and Jerusalem nothing else would do, they should go into bitter exile, and suffer as in the very fire, "th11t they might find" God; that they might come to themselves, and say," I will arise and go to my father,'' etc. " God wilt have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth;" and for the persistently impenitent a most awful will it is. As the late Duke of Wellington was wont to say," '!'here is only one thing worse than a great victory, and that is a great defeat;" so we may say there is only one thing worse for the ungodly than this set will of God for their salvation, and that is that his will should not be as it is. IV. WHAT, THEREFORE, WE A.BE TO LEARN FROM THIS. 1. Give thanks and pmise to the Lord God for hie most gracious purpose concerning men, that they should find him (cf. Pe. c., "Oh be joyful in the Lord, all ye lands, . . . for it is ha that halh made us, nnd not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture"). 2. Compel him not, as Judah did, to resort to sore judgmentil ere we will ~eek and "fiuJ." h!m, 3, At once take Christ's yoke and learn of him, and so find rest 1n our souls by findmg him.-O. Ver. 19.-Submission. I. TnE GRIEF CONTEMPLATED, It is told of in ver. 17, etc. And it was indeed great; the "wound was grievous ; " for: 1: It was so universal. h 2S2 THE BOOK OF 'l'HE PROPHET JEREMIAH. [oH. x. 1-25.