I. They are resources in Jehovah himself. It is from the very being of Jehovah that his works flow forth, whether those works be considered as illustrating his power, his wisdom, or his understanding. When a prophet of Jehovah has to speak of human resources, he speaks of things outside the man. Apart from the soil on which he stands, the world in which he lives, what can man do? His very body is derived from the soil, and to the soil returns. His chosen treasures, the things on which he leans, are treasures upon earth. But when a prophet comes to speak of Jehovah, he can think ol him separated from all the visible and tangible. He does not depend on these things, for they would have had no existence but for him. We may, in a certain qualified sense, speak of human power, wisdom, and understanding ; we must indeed use such terms, for some men are so weak that others must be spoken of as powerful, some so foolish that others must be spoken of as wise, some so shallow and ignorant that others must be spoken of as men of understanding. But the very power of a man reveals in time Ws essential weakness, his very wisdom his essential folly, his very understanding his essential ignorance. God alone is power, and in him is no weakness, at all ; God alone is wisdom, and in him no folly at all ; God alone is understanding, and in him nothing of the limited and erroneous knowledge which is so often a humiliation to human pride.
II. Thbt abb BE80UR0E8 UNITED IN ONE Beino. Judged according to human stan- dards, some men are powerful, some men wise, and some are men of understanding ; but very seldom, even according to the human standard, are all three qualities united in one man ; and it is not very often that even two of them are found. Man may have power, mere muscular strength, the power of the athlete, the power of the ox, without anything worthy the name of wisdom. So there may be wisdom without power ; and there may be a very high degree of wisdom apart from large knowledge or a powerfiil understanding. Men are made so that what is defective in one may be supplied by another. The greatest human works are done when the power of one is joined with th<
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wisdom of a aecond and the understanding of a third. But with Jehovah all these qualities, in their highest degree, are found united in One. The only account after all that man can give of the making of matter is that it has beea made by a God. And iheu his wisdom has reduced everything to order, arranged the world in all its grades, organisms, and mutual connections. The natural man comes nearest to God when he can combine the power of one, the wisdom of another, and the understanding of yet a third, to make as it were one new man for the doing of special work ; and the spiritual man comes nearest toGodwhen, siill preserving his iadividuality of action, he exchanges for his natural weakness the spiritual power of Christ, for his natural folly the spiritual wisdom of Christ, and for his often useless and deluding knowledge of the things of this world that knowledge which comes in the revelation of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. — Y.
Ver. 19. — Ute Portion of Jacob contrasted with the confidences of Babylon. L The NAME BT WHICH Jehovah IS HEBE iNDiOATED. The Portion of Jacob. So the psalmist says, " My flesh and my heart faileth . . . but God is my Portion for ever " (Ps. Ixxiii. 26 ; see also Ps. xvi. 5). Men had their appointed portions, and no doubt they varied in value. But few were those who could rise above mere external things and look on the invisible God as their real Portion. And yet these were the only ones who had a portion and inheritance in the fullest sense of the words. For only so were they lifted above all temptation to envy, and above all the consequences of terrestrial impair- ments and losses. True, we have an inheritance of invisible and everlasting things, of which the present visible possessions give the preparatory conditions ; but to possess these things we must possess God, must be sure of his interest, his spiritual providence, his sufSciency, for only in him can even spiritual possessions have their beginning aLd continuance. Nor must we fail to note what may be called the mutual character of this portion and inheritance. Jehovah being the Portion of Jacob, it is equally true that Jehovah's portion is his people (Deut. xxxiL 9). Even the best possessions of a natural man are not mere legal property, not mere intellectual knowledge, but those human beings whom he can call friends. Such a one is rich according to the quality of his friends, those on whom he has claims and who have claims on him. He is rich according to the opportunities he has of getting service from them ; richer still according; to his opportunities fur rendering service, on the principle that it is more blessed to give than to receive. And so God will be our Inheritance just in proportion as we are God's inheritance. We cannot get satisfaction out of God unless he is getting satisfaction out of us. Our faith, our obedience, our devotion, are the conditions of his peculiar and richest bounty.
II. The contrast of Jacob's Poetion with the pobtion op othebs. They inherit a barren land. It may look promising ; it may yield the appearance of fruit ; but real and abiding fruit there is none. Babylon has taken Bel for its portion, and now the portion and the possessors are alike turned to confusion. Indeed, the portion has vanished into nothingness ; for never was it anything but a name, an imposing fiction, a proof both of man's need of a portion and how incompetent he is to make such a portion for himself. But Jehovah always remains a Portion. The typical Jacob, the typical people of God that is, were unable to keep Jehovah as their Portion ; they never had any real grasp of him, never more than the merest external acquaintance. But for those who can lay hold of him he is surely a Portion still. — Y.
Vers. 26, 26. — The destroying mountain destroyed. I. The debtboyino UOVSTAJs. The mountain is a very fitting symbol of a people eminent among the nations and seeming easily to dominate over them. In such a symbol there is involved the undis- puted assertion of superiority. The mountain looks down on the plains, and the plains accept tlie position. But whereas, in nature, the mountain looks down upon the plains with a mingling of benefits and injuries, of which even the injuries are seen to be benefits when looked at more closely, here we have a destroying mountain spoken of — 1, mountain that destroys the whole earth. Gud is against Babylon, not merely for the liurt it has inflicted on his own people, but because destruction is the very element I Q which it lives. Wheresoever Babylon name it brought spoliation, enslavement, and miiwn'. Man and nationn ar« uwHe ammeut that, like the mountains in the natura'