11ymbolizes a very dreadful fate (ver. 7). Tho danger is not the less because we close our eyes to it. Meanwhile a false confidence hinders the impenitent from fl~eing from the impending calamity and seeking a place of refuge. Light views of sin and judgment to come lull the careless into a fatal sleep. Ver. 5.-Goa}a lcnowZedge of man's thought. I. THE FACT. We know a few men; God knows all. None are so obscure, or remote, or secretive as to hide from him. We know the exterior life; God knows the life within-every thought, and wish, and dream, and fancy. We know in part and with many obscurities, having to piece together scattered hints, and possibly falling into great blunders in our estimation of our neighbours. God knows completely and without possibility of error, searching into the deep secrets of the heart, not setting down aught in malice, but also not blinded to sad truths by the partiality of an imperfect love. 1. God knows our ideas. He sees when we are in error, observes the crooked course of our ill-trained thinking, and notes the narrowness of our notions. He also knows the true thought which is not understood by our fellow-men. 2. He knows our desires. If he does not grant them, it is not because he is ignorant of them. Before a prayer is out of our lips the wish of it has reached the mind of God. When we cannot find words to express the longing of our souls, those vague, dumb desires are exactly measured and fully comprehended by God. God knows our evil desires, the wicked wishes that have not yet found vent in wicked deeds. 3. He knows our sorrows. Though the heart only knoweth its own bitterness among men, the sympathetic knowledge of God has gauged it to the bottom. No one can say, "My grief is quite beyond comprehension." No one can be utterly misunder- stood. Misjudged by man, the martyr is known to God. 4. God knows our sin. There is no secret place where a deed of wrong can be done without the eye of God seeing it. Abel is murdered in the field, but still his blood cries to God for vengeance. II. !Ts CONSEQUENCES. 1. Hypocrisy is a mistake. It only hides our shame from the less important spectators, while the all-seeing eye of God regards it as an addition to the guilt which lurks beneath. 2. Postponement of punishment is no guarantee for escape. The criminal who is not caught red-handed hopes that he will now elude the vigilance of the ministers of justice, and the longer he remains undetected the more confident does he grow in the assurance that he will never be caught, until long years of immunity almost beget a feeling of innocence. But if God knows all, there is no escape from his anger behind the obscuring growth of years. 3. God's long-suffering is manifest. The heathen might say, "My God does not strike me, because be has not discovered my offence." But when the omniscience of God is admitted, his forbearance is seen to he a wonder of patience and love. He knows all, and yet he is still ready to pardon, still waiting to be gracious, nay, even still heaping upon his sinful children many favours I 4. There is hope of salvation. If our escape lay only in our concealment of guilt, there would always be a danger of ruin through discovery. The criminal who has no better hope than this is standing on thin ice. But now we see that God knows the worst of us, and yet offers pardon and reconciliation through the gift of his Son, we have the greatest encouragement to accept his grace. Moreover, since he knows our troubles, hopes, fears, aspirations, and difficulties, he can send the exact help we need.
Ver. 16.-The sanctuary of the exile. The Jews of Jerusalem boasted themselves in their temple, but with a false confidence, for that splendid edifice was to be razed. On the other hand, the poor exiles of Baby Ion looked upon their state of separation from Jerusalem as involving a loss of the privileges of the sanctuary. Daniel prayed with his window open towards Jerusalem, as though God were still to be sought in the sacred city (Dan. vi. 10). But Ezekiel gives the captives the assurance that God will be their Sanctuary during the short time of exile in the distant land of their captivity. I. Goo IS THE DEST SANCTUARY. No Solomon can arise by the banks of the Chebar to build a new temple. The splendour of Lebanon and the skill of Hiram, together with the wealth and devotion of the Jewish nation at the height of its glory, produced a wonder of the world, which a feeble band of heart-broken captives could never dream of equalling. Yet the sorrow-stricken remnant of pious Israel were to have somethin~ better than gilded walls and cedar pillars. They were to have God as their Sanctuary. 1. God vouchsafes his presence to his peopls. He does not only give a house of worship; EZEKIEL, o 194 THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET EZEKIEL, [arr. x1. 1-25,
he comes himself. 2. G<>d's presence sanctifies. It is a sanctuary. The place whero Moses stood before the burning bush was "holy ground," for God was there (Exod. iii. 5). Chaldea was far from the " Holy Land; " yet if God were there he would mako light in tho centre of heathen darkness. Wherever God visits us he makes a sanctuary, 'l'he workshop is a holy place when God is in it. 3. God's presence saves, The templo was regarded with a false confidence and a foolish superstition as a charmed asylum but the event proved the delusiveness of such an assumption. Whon God is with u~ anywhere, however, we are safe; for he is "a Sun and a Shield." II. THIS SA~CTUARY rs TO BE FOUND IN EXILE. 1. In exile from the native land. The colonist far removed from the home and Church of his fathers, may find God in the bush or on the prairie. Though no "place of worship" may be within his reach he need not feel banished from gracious influences. If his heart turn to God, God wili be with him as his Sanctuary. 2. In e:r,ilefrom the old delights. When trouble comes a rnan is, as it were, driven from the land flowing with milk and honey out into a wa,;te howling wilderness. But One is with him, and the God who met the poor fugitive Jacob will make a Bethel in the desert of trouble. 3. In exilefrom heaven. We seek another country. H&re we are pilgrims and strangers ; our citizenship is in heaven. N cvertheless, God is with us here and now to train and guard and cheer us with the sanctuary of his presence. 4. For a short season. God would be the Sanctuary in exile " for a little time," not because he would soon desert the banished, but because he would bring t!3em_ home again. If God is with us in trouble, he will bring us out of trouble. Re 1s with us here for a. season, that he may lead us to be with him in heaven for ever. Christ came into exile from heaven to be with us here on earth that he might bring us back to God. He "tabemacled with us," was our Sanctuary in exile during his earthly ministry. Now he has gone to prepare a. place for us in the eternal home.