God's Thoughts of Peace, and Our Expected End

END.

May 29, 1887.

“For I know the tliouglits that I think to-irard you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” — Jeremiah xxix. 11.

I HAVE already explained to yon, while expounding the twenty-fourth and twenty-ninth chapters of this prophet, that these words were written by Jeremiah in a letter to the captives in Babylon. A considerable part of the people of Israel were carried away by Nebuchadnezzar into a far country. They w’ere exhorted by the prophet to build houses, form families, and to abide peaceably there till the Lord should lead them back at the end of seventy years. But at that time there was a general uneasy feeling among the Jews and other subjected nations, who did not rest cpn’etly under the iron yoke of Babylon They were plotting and planning continual rebellions, and certain false prophets in Babylon worked with them, stirring up - the spirit of revolt among the exiles. Jeremiah, on the other hand, assured them that they had been sent of God into the land of the Chaldeans for good, bade them seek the peace of the city wherein they now dwelt, and promised them that in due time the Lord would again plant them in their own land.

A people in such a position as the Jews in Babylon

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144 GOirS THOUGHTS OF PEACE.

were in danger in two ways: either to be buoyed up with false hopes, and so to fall into foolish expectations; or, to fall into despair, and have no hope at all, and so become a sullen and degraded race, who would be unfit for restoration, and unable to play the part which God ordained for them in the history of man<. kind. The prophet had the double duty of putting down their false hopes, and sustaining their right expectations, lie, therefore, plainly warned them against expecting more than God had promised, and he aroused them to look for the fulfilment of what he had promised. Sead the tenth verse, and note that pleasant expression’” and perform my good word unto you.” At the present time the Church has need of both admonitions. ‘Expectations which are not warranted, are being raised in many quarters, and are leading to serious delusions. We hear men crying, “Lo here!” and “Lo there!” This wonder and that marvel are cried up. It would seem that the age of miracles has returned to certain hot heads. Take ye no heed of all this. Go not beyond the record. On the other hand, we need to be urged to believe our Lord implicitly, and to hold on to his word with a strong, hearty, realizing faith; being assured that while God will not do what we propose to him, yet he will do what ho has promised. False prophets will be left in the lurch, but the word of the Lord will stand.

This morning my desire shall be to comfort any of God’s people who are in a state of perplexity, and thus are carried away captive. I would assure them of the Lord’s kindliness to them, and urge them to trust and not be afraiVI. God’s thoughts towards them are good, though their trials may be gri(jvou8.

The text puts me upon two tracks. First, let us consider the Lord’s thoughts toioards his people. “I know the thoughts that I think towards yon, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” Secondly, let us consider the believer’s yojjer cdtitiide toward his Lord. What should we think of our gracious God who thus unveils his heart to us? V I. First, then, dear friends, consider the lord’s

THOUGHTS TOWARDS HIS PEOPLE.

It is noteworthy, first of all, that he does thinh of them, and towards them. Observe that this Scripture saith not, “• I know the thoughts that I have thought toward you.” That would be a happy remembrance; for the thoughts of God concerning his people are more ancient than the everlasting hills. There never was a time when God did not think upon his people for good. He saith, “1 have loved thee with an everlasting love, therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.” But the point here brought forward is, that he still thinks of tlieyti It would be possible for you to have thought out a plan of kindness toward a friend, and you might have so arranged it that it would henceforth be a natural fountain of good to him without your thinking any more about it; but that is not after the method of God. His eye and his hand are towards his people continually. It is true he did so think of us that he has arranged everything about us, and provided for every need, and against every danger; hut yet he has not ceased to think of us. His infinite mind, whose thoughts are as high above our thoughts as the heavens are above the earth, continues to exercise itself about us. “I am poor and needy,” saith David, “yet the Lord thinketh upcm me.” We love to be thought of by cur frien.ls: indeed, thought enters into the essence of love. Delight yourselves this morning, 0 ye who belieTS your God, in this heavenly fact, that the Lord thinketh upon you at this moment. “The Lord hath been mindful of us,” and he is still mindful of us.

The Lord not only thinks of you, but toimrds you. His thoughts are all drifting your way. This is the way the south wind of his thoughts of peace is moving: it is towards you. The Lord never forgets his cwn, for he has graven them upon the palms of his hands. Never at any moment does Jehovah, turn his thoughts from his beloved, even though he has the whole universe to rule. He saith of his churcfa, “I the Lord do keep it; I wU water it every moment: lest any hurt it, I wall keep it night and day.”^

This truth, although it is easily spoken, is not readily comprehended in the fulness of its joy; nor is it always believed as it should be. These people in captivity were likely to fear that their God had forgotten them: hence the Lord repeats his words in this place, and speaks of thoughts and thinking three times. His words are so repeated as to seem almost redundant, out of a desire to make his people feel absolutely sure that not only did he act towards them, but that he still thought towards them. To the banished this Vvoidd be a grand consolation. The Lord thought of them when they walked the strange streets of “the golden city,” and heard a language which they understood not. He thought of them when they were buffete(|^ as aliens by those who marched in the proudest pomp, and danced in cruel derision to the sound of their viols. The Lord thought of his exiles when their sole solace was solitude by the brink of the Baby

Ionian canals, “where among’ the willows they remembered Zion.

All that the Lord was doing towards them was done thoughtfully. His thoughts of peace, and not of evil, towards them, had suggested their captivity and the continuance of it for seventy years. If any of you are in trouble and sorrow to-day, do not doubt that this is sent you according to the thoughtful purpose of the Lord. It is in this fixed intent ‘and thoughtfulness that the real character of an action lies. A person laay happen to do you a good turn; but if you are sure that he did it by accident, or with no more thought than that wherewith a passing stranger throws a penny to a beggar, you are not impressed with gratitude. But when the action of your friend is the result of earnest deliberation, and you see that he acts in the tenderest regard to your welfare, you are far more thankful; traces of anxiety to do you good are very pleasant. Have I not heard persons say, “It was so kind and so thoughtful of him!” Do you not notice that men value kindly thought, and set great store by tender consideration! Remember, then, that there is never a thoughtless action on the part of God. His mind goes with his hand: his heart is in his acts. He thinks so much of his people, that the very hairs of their heads are all numbered: he thinks not onKy of the great thing, but of the little things which are incidental to the great thing; as the hairs are to the head. Every affliction is timed and measm-ed, and every comfort is sent with a loving thoughtfulness which makes it precious in a sevenfold degree. 0 believer, the great thoughtfulness of the divine mind is exercised towards you, the chosen of the Lord. Never has anything happened to you as the result of a re-

148 GOD’S THOUGHl^S OF PEACE.

morseless fate; but all your circumstances have been ordered in wisdom by a living, thoughtful, loving Lord.

Brethren, if I said no more you might go on your way rejoicing. Remember that the infinite God has thoughts of peace towards you, and your own thoughts will be thoughts of peace all the day.

To go a step further, let us next note that the tliouglds of God arc only perfectly hioion to himself. It would be a mere truism for God to say, “I know the thoughts that I think toward yon.” Even a man usually knows his own thoughts; but the meaning is this: when you do not know the thoughts that I have towards you, yet / know them. Brethren, when we cannot * know the thoughts of the Lord because they are too high for our conception, or too deep for our understanding, yet the Lord knows them. Our heavenly Father knows what he is doing; when his ways towards us appear to be involved and complicated, and we cannot disentangle the threads of the skein, yet the Lord sees all things clearly, and knows the thoughts that he thinks towards us. He never misses his way and becomes embarrassed. We dare not profess to understand the ways of God to man: they are past finding out. Providence is a great deep. Its breadth exceeds the range of our vision, and its depth bafiies our profoundest thought. “Thy way, 0 Lord, is in the sea, and thy path in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known.” When we are overwhelmed with wonder at what we see, we are humbled by the reminder, “Lo, these are parts of his ways; but how little a portion is heard of him!” “Truly the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.” God ah)ne understands himself and his thoughts. We stand by a powerful machine, and we see the wheels moving this way and that, but we do not understand its working. What does it matter? He who made the engine and controls it, perfectly understands it, and this is iractically the main concern; for it does not matter whether ice understand the engine or not, it will work its purpose if he who has the control of it is at home with all its bands and wheels. Despite our ignorance, nothing can go wrong while the Lord in infinite knowledge ruleth over all. The child playing on the deck does not understand the tremendous engine whose beat is the throbbing heart of the stately Atlantic liner, and yet all is safe; for the engineer, the captain and the pilot are in their places, and well know what is being done. Let not the child trou ble itself about things too great for it. Leave you the discovery of doubtful causes to him whose understanding is infinite; and as for yourself, be you still, and know that Jehovah is God. Unbelief misinterprets the ways of God; hasty judgment jumps at wrong conclusions about them; but the Lord knows his own thoughts. We are doubtful where we ought to be sure, and we are sure where we have no ground for certainty: thus we are always in the wrong. How should it be otherwise with us, since vain man would be wise, and yet he is born like a wild ass’s colt? We are hard to tame and to teach; but as for the Lord, “his way is perfect.”

‘’ His tliougbts are Mgh, bis love is wise,
His wounds a cure intend;
And though he does not always smile,
He loves unto the end.”

Let US go a step further still: the Lord would have us know that his thoughts toioard us are settled and definite. This is part of the intent of the words, “I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord.”

Sometimes a man may hardly know his own thoughts, because he has scarcely made up his mind. There are several subjects now upon the public mind, concerning which it is wise to say little or nothing, because it is not easy to decide about them. Upon a certain matter one asks you this question, and another asks you another question; and it is possible that you have so carefully weighed and measured the arguments both fro and con that you cannot come to a conclusion either way. Your thoughts differ from day to day, and therefore you do not yet know them. You need not be ashamed of this: it shows that you have a just sense of your own imperfect knowledge. A fool soon makes up his mind, because there is so very little of it; but a wise man waits and considers. The case is far otherwise with the only wise God. The Lord is not a man that he should need to hesitate; his infinite mind is made up, and he knows his thoughts. With the Lord there is neither question nor debate; “He is in one mind, and none can turn him.” His purpose is settled, and he adheres to it. He is resolved to reward them that diligently seek him, and to honor those that trust in him. He is resolved to remember his covenant for ever, and to keep his promises to those who believe him. His thought is, that the people whom he has formed for himself shall show forth his praise. The Lord knoweth them that are his; he knows whom he gave to his Son, and he knows that these shall be his jewels for ever and ever. Beloved, when you do not know your own mind, God knows Ms mind. Though you believe not, he abideth faithful; when you are in the gloom, he is light, and in him is no darkness at all. Your way may be closed, but his way is open. God knows all when you know nothing at all. When

GOD’S Til OUGHTS OF PEACE. ;51

Moses came out of Eyypt, he had no plan as to the march of” Israeh He knew that he had to lead the children of Israel to the promised land, but that was all. He probably hoped to take them by the shortest cut to Palestine at once. Their journey was far otherwise, but it was all pre-arranged by the divine mind. It was by no error that the tribes were told to turn and encamp before Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the ea. The Lord knew that Pharaoh would say, “They are entangled in the land, the wilderness hath shut them in.” There was no going back, for the Egyptians were there, and no going forward, for the Red Sea was there: but the Lord had the way mapped out in his own mind. He was not taken by surprise when the enemy said, “I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil;” since for this purpose had he raised him up, that he might show forth his power in him. The passage of the Ked Sea was no hurried expedient: Jehovah knew what he would do. When our blessed Lord was surrounded by the hungry crowd, he asked his disciples, “How many loaves have ye?” But “Jesus knew what he would do.” He had his thoughts, and he knew them. “Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.” “Many, 0 Lord my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast done, and thy thoughts which are to usward.” Thou hast said, “My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure;” and it is even so. Brother, you do not know what is to be done, but the Lord knows for you. 0 body of Christ, let thy head think for thee 1 0 servant of Christ, let thy Master think for thee. “I know,” saith God,” the thoughts that I think toward you.’’

Now we have advanced some distance into the meaning of our text, and wo are prepared to go a step further, namely, that Gods thoughts towards his people are ahvaijs thoughts of peace. He is at peace with them through the atoning blood of Jesus Christ. He regards them in Christ with perfect complacency. The Spirit of God speaks peace to their troubled conscience, and works in them the spirit of adoption and desires after holiness: thus the holy God is able to commune with them, and have thoughts of peace toward them. The Lord delights in them; he seeks their peace, he creates their peace, he sustains their peace, and thus all his thoughts towards them are peace. Note well the negative, which is expressly inserted. It is very sweet to my own heart. It might have appeared enough to say, “My thoughts are thoughts of peace.” Yes, it would be quite sufficient when all things are bright with us; bvit those words,” and not of evil,’’ are admirably adapted to keep off the goblins of the night, the vampires, of suspicion which fly in the darkness. When under affliction we are sorely depressed, and when conscience perceives that there are reasons why the Lord should contend with us, then the enemy whispers, ‘• The Lord has evil thoughts towards you, and will cast you off for ever.’’ No, beloved, his thoughts are riOt of evil. Though the Lord hates thy sin, he does not hate thee. Though he is the enemy of thy follies, he is thine own firm fiiend; yea, he is all the truer friend, because he fights against thy faults.

He would have thee pure and holy, therefore doth he bathe thee in the rivers, and baptize thee in the fires. Not in anger doth he afflict thee, but in his dear covenant love. The hardest blow that he ever laid upon his chikl was infiicted by the hand of love.

Thou mayest rise from thy bed in the morning to he chastised, and ere thou dost fall asleep in the night thou majest smart under the rod, and yet he none the less, but all the more, the favorite of heaven; therefore, beloved, lay hold upon the negative, “not of evil.” God has no evil thought towards his chosen; he has no desire to grieve us, but to save us.

There shall not a hair of your head perish, but yet that head may ache with weariness. It is for good, and only for good, that God thinks of us, and deals with us. Oh, that we could settle this in our hearts, and have done with dark forebodings! Though thy way may now lie through dark ravines where the crags rise so steep above thee as to shut out the light of day, yet press thou onward, for the way is safe. Follow the Lord, for where the road is rough, thou wilt be less likely to slip than in more smooth and slippery places. If the way be steep, thou wilt the sooner ascend on high; or if thy way inclines dovvuward, thou wilt the sooner feel the needful humiliation, and the more readily cease from thyself, and cast thyself upon thy Lord. Though I am not yet so old and gray-lieaded as many here present, yet one thing I know: that God hath done unto me good, and not evil, all the days of my life; and 1 bear my public witness at this hour, that in very faithfulness lie hath afflicted me, and not one good thing hath failed of all that he hath, promised me.

No, his thoughts are “not of evil.” The next time the devil comes to you with a dark insinuation, tell him that the Lord’s thoughts are “not of evil.” Drive him away with that. When he hisses his foul suggestions, say, “Not of evil.” God cannot have an evil thought towards his own elect. He that gave his own Son to die for us cannot think anything but good towards us.

Once more, and then we shall have fully compassed this text. TliG Lords thoughts are oil working toicards “ail expected end,’’^ or, as the Revised Version has it, “to give you hope in your latter end.” Some read it, “a future and a hope.” The renderings are instructive. God is working with a motive. All things are working together for one object: the good of those who love God. We see only the beginning; God seeth the end from the beginning. We spell the al[)habet out, Alpha, Beta, Gamma, but God reads all, from Alpha to Osnega, at once. He knows every letter of the Book of Providence; he sees not only what he is doing, but what will come of what he is doing. As to our present pain and grief, God seeth not these things exclusively, but he seeth the future joy and usefulness which will come of them. He regardeth not only the tearing up of the soil with the plough, but the clothing of that soil with the golden harvest. He sees the after consequences of affliction, and he accounts those painful incidents to be blessed Vvhich lead up to so much of happiness. Let us comfort ourselves with this. God meant in Babylon to prepare a people that should know him, of whom he could say, “I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” At the end of seventy years, he would bring these people back, to Jerusalem like a new race, who, whatever their faults might be, would never again fall into idolatry. He knew what he was driving at in their captivity; and in our case the Lord is equally clear as to his purpose. We do not ourselves know, for “it doth not yet appear what we shall be.” You have never seen the Great Artist’s masterpiece: you have seen the rough marble, you have marked the chippings that fall on the ground; you have felt the Q<^ii of his chisel, you know the weight of his hammer, and you are full of the memory of these things; but oh, could you see thai glorious image as it will be when he has put the finishing stroke to it, you would then understand the chisel, and the hammer, and the Worker better than you now do! O brethren, w« should not know ourselves, if we could see ourselves as we are to be when the Lord’s purpose is accomplished upon us 1 We know that we shall be like him when we shall see him as he is; but what is he like “as he is “? What is that glory of the Lord which is to be ours? We can picture him in his humiliation, but what is he like in his glory? He is the first-born, and we are to be conformed to him. God is working, working, working always to that end, and so all his thoughts tend towards this expected end.

Hero I pause to make a practical application. I may be addressing some person here who is in great distress under conviction of sin. You despair because the Lord is bringing your sin to remembrance, but indeed, there is no cause; the Lord is sending you into captivity for a purpose. You are being shut up by the law, that you may be set at liberty by Christ; you are being stripped in order that you may be clothed, and you are being emptied that you may be filled. If you could see the end from the beginning, you would rejoice tha,t you are made to know the burden of sin; for so shall you be driven to the cross to find rest from your load. This sorrow shall be the death of your pride and self-righteousness. By this way the Lord is working out for you “a future and a hope.” When clean divorced from self, you shall

15G GOD’S rn OUGHTS OF PEACE.

be wedded to Jesus, and dowried with his salvation.

I am also probably addressing many a child of God who is vexed in daily conflict with his inward corruption. Alas! we find the old man yet alive within us. The old nature in the Christian is no better than the old man in the sinner; it is the same carnal mind which is enmity against God, and is not reconciled, neither indeed can be. The new nature has a hard struggle to hold its own against this embodied death. We are, as it were, chained to a rotting carcase, and we cry, “0 wretched man that 1 am! who shall deliver me?” Now, do not despair because of this experience. It is bettor to moin-n over imperfection than to be puffed up with the idle notion that there is no sin in you to be watched and conquered. Certain of the children of Israel remained with Zedekiah at Jerusalem, and boasted of their position, but they were none the better for their pretensions. You have been carried away into captivity, and you are sighing and crying because of indv.^elling sin; but the Lord’s thoughts toward you are thoughts of peace, and not of evil, and he will “give you an expected end.” You will come to true holiness by this painful process, and so shall you glorify God.

I may also be addressing some child of God in very deep trouble. Everything goes wrong with you, at home, in business, and perhaps in the church too. Very well, you will never have to raise that question, “How is it that I am not chastened?” That will never trouble you. Chastening for the present is not joyous; nevertheless afterward it yieldcth the peaceable fruit of righteousness in them which are exercised thereby. Wherefore gladly endure it. God’s thoughts are towards you, for he is refining you; believe also that his thoughts are peaceable, and that he designs jour highest good.

So far have I tried to justify the ways of God to men. May his own spirit make you feel that the thoughts of the Lord are peace!

II. In the second part of my discourse 1 would ask you to consider the proper attitude of God’s people

TOWARDS THEIR LoRD.

You will all agree with me when I say that our attitude should he that of submission. If God, in all that he does towards us, is acting with an object, and that object a loving one, then let him do what seemeth him good. Henceforth let us have no quarrel with the God of Providence; but let us say, “Thy will be done.” Who would not yield to that which works his health, his wealth, his boundless happiness? “Liv son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him: for whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.”

Next, let our position be one of great hopefulness, seeing the end of God, in all he does, is to give us “a future and a hope.” We are not driven into growing darkness, but led into increasing light. There is always something to be hoped for in the Christian’s life. Let us not look toward the future nor regard the present with any kind of dread There is nothing for us to dread.

“If sin be pardon’d I’m secure*,
Death has no sting beside;
The hiw gave sin its damning power
But Christ, my ransom, died,”

The death of Christ is the death of evil to the child of God. Let us trust, and not be afraid. Let us not be content with sullenly making up our minds to stoical endurance. We must not only bear the will of the Lord, but rejoice in it. It is a blessed thing when we come to rejoice in tribulations, and to glory in infirjnities. It is line music when we can sing, “Sweet affliction.”

“llai’d work,” says one. Yes, but it is worth the pains; for it secures perfect peace. If thy will is brought to thy circii instances; and if, better still, thy will is brought to delight in God’s will, then the fangs of the serpent are extracted. The sorrow is sucked out of the sorrow by the lips of acquiescence. When thou canst say, “Not my will, but thine be done,” thou shalt have thy will. There is always something “better on before” for those who believe in Jesus. Be you sure of that.

“Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,
The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and shall break
With blessings on your head.”

Welcome clouds, if showers of mercy are to come of them. God ibrbid we should always have sunshine, for that would mean drought. Let the clouds coma if they bring a blessed rain.

Our relation to God should, next, be one of continual expectancy, especially expectancy of the fulfilment of his promises. I call your attention again to the tenth verse: “I will perform my good word toward you.” I do so love that expression; we must have it for a text one of these days: “I will perform my good word toward you.” His promises are good words: good indeed, and sweetly refreshing. When your hearts are faint, then is the promise emphatically good Expect the Lord to be as good as his good word.

Brethren, do not Leap up to yourselves sorrow, as some do in these days, by expecting that which the Lord has not promised. 1 earnestly warn you against those who have been led by a fevered imagination to expect, first, perfection in the flesh, and then perfection of the flesh, and then an actual immortality for the flesh. God will fulfil his promise, but he will not fulfil your misreading of it. I should not wonder if there should arise a race of people who will believe that they can live without eating, because it is said, ‘’ Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God shall man live.” If healed without medicine, why not fed without food? What absolute need of any visible means when God can work without them? Those who think it needful to lay aside all outward means in order to a true faith in God, are on the way to any absurdity. Truly, if God had bidden me to live without eating, I would fast at his command and expect to live; but as he has not done so, I shall not presume. Faith that is not warranted by the word of God is not faith, but folly; and folly is not the faith of God’s elect. The Lord will perform his own word, but he will not perform the delirious declarations of madmen. If it needs a million miracles to fulfil God’s promise they shall be forthcoming; but we are not anxious for miracles, because our larger faith believes that the Lord can overrule the ordinary ways of Providence to perform his good word, and bring us the expected end.

Again, beloved, our position towards God should be one of liappij hope as to Uessed ends being ansicered even noio. In the twenty-fourth chapter we observe one of the ends of the Lord’s sending his people into exile.

I noticed in the fifth verse that the Lord saia, “So will I acknowledge them that are carried away captive of Judah.” Their sorrow would bring about ilie Lord’s achioicleclgment of them. Thus do we, brethren, bear in our body the marks of the Lord Jesus. Affliction is the seal of the Lord’s election. I remember a story of Mr. ]Iack, who was a Baptist minister in Northamptonshire,. In his youth he was a soldier, and calling on Robert Hall, when his regiment marched through Leicester, that great man became interested in him, and procured his release from the ranks. When he went to preach in Glasgow, he sought out his aged mother, whom he had not seen for many years.. He knew his mother the moment he saw her; but the old lady did not recognize her son. It so happened that when he was a child, his mother had accidentally wounded his wrist with a knife. To comfort him she cried, “Never mind, my bonnie bairn, your mither will ken you by that when ye are a man.” AVhen Mack’s mother would not believe that a grave, fine-looking minister could be her own child, he turned up his sleeve and cried, “Mither, mither, dinna ye ken tiat?” In a moment they were in each other’s arms. Ah, brethren, the Lord knows the spot of his children. He acknowledges them by the mark of correction. What God is doing to us in the way of trouble and trial is but his acknowledgment of us as true heirs, and the marks of his rod shall be our proof that we are not bastards, but true sons. He knows the wounds he made when he was exercising his sacred surgery upon us. By this also shall you yourself be made to know that verily you are a. piece of gold, or else you would not have been put into the furnace. This will be one “ex-o pected end” of the Lord towards us; let us rejoice in it

God’s dealings with us work out cur cjood in every way. The Lord said (Jer. xxiv. 5), “1 have sent them out of this pkice into the land of the Chaldeans for their good.” We know that “All things work together for good to them that love God.’’ Thus from day to day the Lord gives us “an expected end.”

In the twelfth verse of the chapter from which we have taken our text, we see that prayer is quickened by the Lord’s work towards them. “Then shall ye call upon me.” Our troubles drive us to our knees. If it had not been for Esau, Jacob had never wrestled at Jabbok. I hope we usually go to our closets of our own accord; but ofttiraes we are whipped there. Many of the most earnest prayers that ever rise to heaven come from us when we are in bondage under grief. Yes, yes, we must thank God that his trying ways with us have produced in us a prayerful spirit,’ and a full conviction that we do not pray in vain.

The Lord’s end with us is also cur sanctijicaiion. “And I will give them an heart to know me that I am the Lord: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.” See the value of sanctified afflictions! God grant that from day to day we may feel the expected ends of his corrections! 0 that we may grow in grace, and may our graces grow! IMay we increase in faith, and hope, and love, and patience, and courage, and joy! Surely our knowledge ought to widen out, our consecration should be confirmed, our insight should be clearer, our outlook steadier. We ought by all our experience to become more Christ-like, better reflectors of the heavenly light, fitter temples of the Holy Ghost. Wherefore let us be of good cheer, and rejoice that from day to day we receive the end of our faith, the salvation of our souls, and thus the Lord’s end is being answered.

But to close. We have kept the best vine until now. The thoughts of God towards us are that he will give us “an expected end.” An end: there is good cheer in that. We do not wish to remain here for ever. We would be diligent in running the race, but we long for the end of it. I should be satisfied to preach here throughout all eternity if 1 might always bring glory to God; but yet I am glad that there is to be an end of preaching, and a season of pure praise. You, ray brethren, love the Lord’s work; but still you look forward to the time when you shall take your wage, and have done. It is a comfort that there is an end.

Blessed be God, it is an expected end. You ungodly people can only look forward to a dreaded end; an end of your foolish mii’th, an end of your carelessness, an end of your boasting. You fear your end. But God will give his people an expected end. Suppose that end should be the coming of Christ! Oh, how we long for it! Oh that the Bridegroom would now appear! Oh that he would descend from heaven with a shout, and gather his chosen from the four winds of heaven! “Even so,. come quickly!” This is onv cx-Ijected end.

If our Lord does not come, and we must be taken home by death, we feel no alarm in looking forward to that expected end. One by one our dear friends go home from this church. As T have often told you, there is never a week without some of our number being taken up. Although I have visited a large number of dying believers, I have never yet visited a member of this church who has expressed the least

GOnS THOUGHTS OF PEACE. I63

fear in bis dying moments, or the slightest dismay in the hour of departure. It makes me feel happy to see how the brethren and sisters die: they pass away as if they were going to a wedding rather than to a tomb — as if it were the most joyful thing that ever happened to them to have reached their expected end. Doubts are all driven away when you see how believers die. Grace is given them, so that they surmount the weakness of the hour. The Lord Jesus in them triumphs over pain and death. Our venerable brother and eider, Mr. Court, who has just passed away at a great age, looked forward to his departure with peaceful hope. He used to speak of it as a thing from which he had no shrinking. There was no discontent or murmuring about him; no feverish eagerness to quit the infirmities of this life; but, on the other hand, a happy foresight of his end, and a joyful expectation of it. Some of the Lord’s saints have not yet received dying grace; but then they are not going to die yet. Brethren, saints are prepared to go before they go. Our Lord does not pluck his fruit unwisely. Foolish people may tear the green apples from the tree with a pull and a wrench, and bruise them as they throw them into the basket; but our Lord values his fruit, and so he waits until it is quite ripe, and then he gathers it tenderly. When he puts forth his hand, the fruit bows down to it, and parts from the bough without a strain. When the believer comes to die, it will not be to an end which he feared, but to an end which he expected.

Brethren, when death is past, then comes that expected end which shall never end. What will the first five minutes hi heaven be? There is a larger question: what will thousands of years in heaven be? What will myriads of ages be? My disembodied spirit will at the first be perfectly happy in the embraces of myLord; but in due time the resurrection day will dawn, that this body may rise again in fuii glory. Then there will be a re-marriage of soul and body, and we shall be perfected, even as our risen Lord. Oh, the glory of that expected end!

What will it be when our completed manhood shall be introduced to the society of angels, to the presence of cherubim and seraphim? What will it be to see him whom we have loved so long? What to hear him say, “Come, ye blessed of my Father”? What joy to sit at his right hand! Yesterday, my heart was ravished with that text, “They cast their crowns before the throne.” If ever I am privileged to have a crown at all, how gladly will I lay it down at the feet of ray Lord! Is not this your mind? How sweetly will we sing, Non nohis, Domine! “Not unto us, O Lord, but unto thy name give glory.” Brethren, what singing it will be when we shall be loosened from the deadening influence of the flesh! How will we praise when we have done with these tongues of clay, which hamper us so much! I would speak greatly to my Lord’s praise, but I fail. Strip me of this house of clay, and I will sing as sweetly as any of the birds of paradise that carol forever in the Tree of Life above. Do you not feel a longing to be up and away? Lidulge these longings, for thus you will be drawn nearer to the understanding of the text, — “to give you an expected end.” All that you are suflei-ing, all that you are enjoying, all that God sends you, has this one design, to make you meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.

Ending this discourse, I would ask you to plight jour troth that jou will meet me where glory clwelleth, iuEtiiinauuers land. We shall soon be with the angels. The Lord is thinking of ns, and lie is expecting lis home. Our Lord Jesus is waiting for his wedding-day, which is his expected end. “My soul, wait thou only upon God, for my expectation is from him.”

‘£UE DEATH OF MOSES.

June 5, 1887.

“So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord.” — Deuteronom”X xxxiv. 5.

What an honorable title! Moses is distinguished as” the servant of JeJiovah.’’’ He was this of choice, for he willed to be the servant of God rather than to be great in the land of the Pharaohs. SticIi he was most perseveringly throughout the whole of his life. Such he was most intensely, for he waited upon God for his directions, as a servant waits upon his master; and he endeavored to do all things according to the pattern which was shown him in the holy mount. Though he was king in Jeshurun, he never acted on his own authority, but was the lowly instrument of the divine will. ]Ioses was faithful to God in all his house, as a servant. You neither see him overstepping his office nor neglecting it. His reverence for the Lord’s name was deep; his devotion to the Lord’s cause was complete, and nis confidence in the Lord’s word was constant. He was a true servant of God from the time when he was appointed at the burning bush until the hour when he surrendered his keys of office to his successor, and climbed the appointed mount to die. Oh that you and I may so live as to approve ourselves servants of God! Unto as many as (166)

have received him our Lord Jesais has given power to become the sons of God, and this is our great joy; but as sons we aspire to serve our Father, even as his great First-born Son has done, who took upon himself the form of a servant that he might accomplish his Father’s good pleasure for his church. Let us with good will do service unto our Father who is in heaven, seeing it is but our reasonable service that we should lay out ourselves for him who has made us his sons and daughters. Redeemed from the slavery of sin, let us, as the Lord’s freemen, cry unto him henceforth, “0 Lord, truly I am thy servant; I am thy servant, and the son of thine handmaid: thou hast loosed my bonds.”

But servant of God as Moses was, lie must die. It is the common lot of njen. Only two have passed out of this world into the abodes of glory without fording the stream of death. IMuses is not one of the two. Even had he crossed the Jordan into Canaan, he would in due course have died in the land. We might have expected that he would live on till the people were settled in Canaan: but it seemed right unto the Lord God that on account of his one slip he should die outside of the Promised Land, like the rest of the people. Caleb and Joshua alone of all that generation who came out of Egypt were permitted to possess the land towards which they had journeyed for forty years. If that one offence lost him the privilege of entering the earthly Canaan, there may have been still more powerful reasons “v’hy he should not enter the heavenly Canaan without experiencing the change of death. He must not make a third with Enoch and Elias, but he must die and be buried. Such will probably be :?iir lot in due season. Brethren, it may be that we shall not die, our Lord Jesus may come before we lall asleep; but if he do not come speedily, we shall find that it is appointed unto all men once to die. We shall pass from this world unto the Father by that common road which is beaten hard by the innumerable feet of mortal men. Since we must die, it is well to meditate upon the solemn future. Moses shall be our teacher in the art of dying. We will consider his decease, in the hope that so our fears may be removed, and our desires may be excited. There is a Pisgah where we must yield up the ghost, and be gathered to our lathers: may we climb to it as willingly as did Moses, the servant of God!

The maimer of Hoses’ death loas exceedingly nmorJmhle. T suppose that no subject presents a finer field for oratory than the sublime decease of the prophet; but we have nothing to do with oratory: our object is spiritual and practical profit. Poets might well expend their noblest powers in depicting this strange scene of the man of God alone on the mountain’s brow, with a view of Canaan at his feet, and himself in holy rapture passing away into the eternal state. We are not poets, but simple believers, desiring to learn some holy lesson from the death of one who, though the greatest of men, knew no higher honor than to be the servant of the Lord. Oh that the Spirit of grace and truth, who has come to us by Christ Jesus, may help us to find instruction in the death of him who brought the law from the mouth of God to m en!

L We are told in the text that “IMoses the servant of the Lord diod there in the land of !Moab, according to the word of the Lord.” This T shall read first, as meaning; that Moses died on Pisgah, according TO TUE WARNING OF THE LORD.

Kis death was Tdnfforeseen. ]Ioses knew some time before that he must die without setting foot in Canaan. Read in the first chapter of Deuteronomy his own account of the sin of the people at Meribah, and the Lord’s sentence then and there pronounced: ‘’ Surely there shall not one of these men of this evil generation see that good land, which I sware to give unto your fathers, save Caleb, the son of Jephunneh; he shall see it, and to him will I give the land that he hath trodden upon, and to his children, because he hath wholly followed the Lord.” “Also,” adds Moses, “the Lord was angry with me ibr your sakes, saying. Thou also shalt not go in thither.”

His death outside the Promised Land did not come upon him at all as a surprise. He ha<l to see his sister Miriam, first of the great trio, fall asleep; and next, he was called to go up to Mount Ilor and disrobe his brother Aaron of Ins priestly garments which he placed upon Eleazar-, his son. Moses had also to see the whole of the generation that came out of Egypt with him buried in the wilderness. The ninetieth psalm is his, and it is a sort of Dead March; fit hymn for a nation whose track was marked by countless graves. Because of unbelief “their carcases fell in the wilderness.” Only Caleb and Joshua remained, the sole survivors of the great host which crossed the Pted Sea. The Great Lavygiver had thus abundant pledges of his own departure, and he must have had in his brother’s death a rehearsal ol his own. Have not we also had many warnings? Are we ready?

Concerning his death in the land of Moab, it is natural to remark that it was exceedmgbj disappointing. He bad been for forty years engaged in leading the people to the land of promise: must be die when that country was within a day’s march? It was bis life’s work, for wbicb be bad been prepared by forty years in Egypt, where be became learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians; and by another forty years in the solitary wilderness, where be kept sheep and held high fellowship with God. His third forty years bad been spent in freeing Israel fi-om Egypt, training them to become a nation, and conducting thejn to the land of promise: must be now expire before the nation entered in? What years his bad been! What a life was that of Moses! How glorious was the man who bad confronted Pbaraob, and broken the pride of Egypt! How tried and troubled a man bad be been while called to carry all that nation in bis bosom, and care for them as a sbepberd caretb for bis sheep! His was a task that welUnigb broke bira down; and had not the man Moses been made very meek by the indwelling Spirit of the Lord, and bad be not also been graciously sustained by fellowship with God, bis task bad proved too heavy even for him. Yet, after all that toil in fashioning a nation, be must die before the long-expected conquest. It was a bitter disappointment when first the sentence pierced bis heart. He bad known one great disappointment before; for Stepben tells us that when be smote the Egyptian, “be supposed his brethren would have understood bow that God by bis band would deliver them: but they understood not.” Then, when bis brethren bad refused Iiim, be fled into the land of iMidian, a rejocted leader, a patriot whose heroism bad only brought forth from his countrymen the contemptuous question, “Who made thee a prince and a judge over us?” But this denial of entrance into Canaan was a greater disappointment still. To have toiled so long, and to reap no harvest; to see the land, but not to enter it; to bring the tribes to the Jordan’s brink, and then to die in Moab after all: it was a grievous disappointment. Brethren, are we ready to say as to our most cherished hope, “Thy will be done “! Are we holding our life’s dearest purpose with a loose hand? It will be our wisdom so to do.

Apparently it teas a severe chastisement. His offence was but one, and yet it excluded him from Canaan. We have not time to describe in detail the sin of Moses. It would appear to have been a sin of unbelief occasioned by his feeling so intensely for and with the people. Moses was thoroughly knit to Israel. When they sinned he interceded as for himself. When Jehovah made him the offer that he would make of him a great nation, he declined it solely from his love to Israel. He lived for the nation, and for the nation he died. Kemember how once he went so far as to say, “If not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written.’” In every way he was of the people, bone of their bone, and flesh of their flesh: Israel was hidden in his heart; and out of that master passion of sympathy with the people came the weakness which at last made him speak unadvisedly with his lips. They strove with God; and though Moses never yielded a point to them in that wicked contest, yet that unbelief so far influenced him that he spake in anger, and said, “Hear now, ye rebels; must we fetch you water out of this rock?” Then, “the Lord spake unto JNIoses and Aaron, Because ye believe me not, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them” (Numb. xx. 12). Three times in the Book of Deuteronomy Moses tells the people, “The Lord was angry with me for your sakes.” It was not so much that which JMoses did personally which involved him in judgment, but he suffered because of his being mixed up with Israel. As the Lord had spared the people aforetime for Moses’ sake, it became necessary that, when he in any measure shared in their great sin of unbelief, he should be chastened for their sake as well as his own. His faith had saved them, and now his unbelief, being backed by theirs, secures for him the sentence of exclusion from the land.

My brethren, when I thiidc of this severity of discipline towards so faithful a servant as Moses, I do exceedingly fear and quake. Truly, “the Lord our God is a jealous God.” We are sure that he is never unjust, we are sure that he is never unduly severe: we do not for a moment impug-n the righteousness or even the love of our God in this or any other act; but he is terrible out of his holy places. How true it is that he will be sanctified in them that come near to him! Behold and wonder! That highly-favored servant, Moses, though accepted always, in the economy of grace, yet must he come under the rule of the house, and feel the chastising hand if he transgresses. Hence the sentence of exclusion is passed. As he had once joined that unbelieving generation by manifesting a measure of hasty unbelief, he must now share their doom, and die on Moab’s side of Jordan. “Ilighteous art thou, O Lord, and upiight are thy judgments.” Oh ibr grace to behave ourselves aright in thine house! Lord, teach us thy statutes, and keep us in thy way.

Beloved, il seemed a great calamity that ]Ioses must die when he did. He was an aged man as to years,’ but not as to condition. It was true he was a hundred and twenty years old, but his father and his grandfather and his great grandfather had all lived beyond that age, tlro {)f them reaching a hundred and thirty-seven, so that he might naturally have expected a longer lease of life. This truly grand old man had not failed in any respect; his eye was not dim, neither had his natural force abated, and therefore he might have expected to live on. Besides, it seems a painful thing for a man to die while he was capable of so much work; when, indeed, he was more mature, more gracious, more wise than ever. The mental and spiritual powers of Moses were greater in the latter days of his life than ever before. Notice Jiis wonderful sons:! Observe his marvellous address to the people! He was in the prime ot his mental manhood. He had been tutored by a long experience, chastened by a marvellous discipline, and elevated by a sublime intercourse with God; and yet must he die. How strange that, when a man seems most fit to live, it is then that the mandate comes, “Get thee up into the mountain and die “!

Naturally speaking, it seemed a sad loss for the people of Israel. Who but Closes could rule them? Even he could scai’cely control them. They were a heavy burden even to his meekness: who else could so successfully act as king in Jeshurun? Without Moses to awe them, what will not these rebels do? It was a grave experiment to place a younger and an inferior man in the seat of power, when the nation was entering upon its great campaign. It would need all the faith and discretion of ]Ioses to conduct the conquest

174 THE DEA Til OF MOSES.

of the country, and to divide their portions to the tribes. Yet so it must be: precious as his life was, the word went forth, “Get thee up into the top of Fisgah: for thou shalt not go over this Jordan.” Even thus to the best and most useful must the summons come. Who woukl wish to forbid the Lord to call home his own when he wills?

The sentence was not to he averted by y’ciyer. jMoses tells us that he besought the Lord at that time, “0 Lord God, thou hast begun to show thy servant thy greatness, and thy mighty hand: lor what God is there in heaven or in earth, that can do according to thy works, and according to thy might? I pray thee, let me go over, and see the good land that is beyond Jordan, that goodly mountain, and Lebanon.” This was altogether a very proper prayer: he did not plead his own services, but he urged the f(U’mer mercies of the Lord. Surely this was good pleading, and he might have hoped to prevail for himself, seeing he had formerly been heard for a whole nation. But no. This boon must bo denied him. The Lord said, “Let it suffice thee; speak no more unto me of this matter.” iMoses never again opened his lips upon the suliject. He did not beseech the Lord thrice, as Paul did, in his hour of trouble; but seeing that the sentence was final he bowed his head in holy consent.

Brethren, he had often asked a greater thing than this of the Lord his God. Once he had even dared to say, ‘’ I beseech thee, show me thy glory,” and he was heard even in that high request. The Lord placed him in the cleft of the rock, and made all his goodness pass before him. Yet now he begs for a comparatively small thing, and it is refused. What a mercy that it is in the small things of this life that our requests may be denied, but in things -which touch the kingdom of the Lord our prayer never returns empty! All heaven is open to our bended knee, though tor wise ends and purposes a Canaan on earth inay be closed against us. All sufficient grace was given though the thorn was not removed: Moses the servant of the Lord died, but triumphed over death.

When I thought of the trial of Moses in being shut out of the laud, I found myrelf unable to read the chapter which lay open before me, for I was blinded by my tears. How shall any of us stand before a God so holy? Where Moses errs how shall we be faultless? Never servant more favored of his Lord, and yet even he must undergo a disappointment so great as a rebuke for a single fault. The Hower of his life is broken ofi” from the stalk for one act of unbelief. To be exalted so near to God is to be involved in a great responsibility. A fierce light beats about the throne of God. He that is the king’s chosen, admitted to continual intercourse with him, must stand in awe of him. Well is it written, “Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling.” An offence which might be passed over as a mere trifle in an ordinary subject, would be very serious in a prince of the blood, who had been favored with royal secrets, and had been permitted to lean his head upon the bosom of the king. If we live near to God we cannot sin without incurring sharp rebukes. Even the common run of the elect must remember that word, “You only have I known of all the families of the earth, therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities.” Much more must the elect out of the elect hear such warning. God did, in effect, say to Moses, “Thou only have I chosen of all mankind to speak with me face to face, and, therefore, since thou hast failed in thy faith after such intercourse with me, it behoves me, in very faitlifuhiess and love towards thee, to mark thy failure with an evident token of displeasure.’’ The discipline of saints is in this life. I doubt not but many a man’s life has come to an end when he wished it to be continued, and he has missed that which he has striven for, because of an offence against the Lord in hiS earlier years. We had need walk carefully before our jealous God, who will not spare sin anywhere, and least of all in his ovn beloved. His love to them never faileth, but his hatred of their sin burns like coals of juniper. Foolish parents spare the rod, but our wise Father acteth not so. Walk circimispectly, 0 ye heirs of life eternal, for” even our God is a consuming fire.’’ The Lord give us to feel the sanctifying power of this passage in the story of the great Lawgiver!

IL But now I have to conduct you to a second point of view. Moses, the man of God, died in the land of Moab, “according to the word of the Lord,” that is,

ACgORDlXG TO TElIl. DIVINE APPOINTMENT.

All the details of the death of Afoses had been ordered of the Lord. Time, place, and circumstances were arranged by God. So, brethren, it is appointed unto us where we shall die, and when we shall die. We speak of certain persons as having “died by accident,” and we sometimes bewail the deaths of Christian men as premature; but in the deepest sense it is not so. God hath marked out for us the place where and the time when we must resign our breath. Let this suffice us. That which is of divine appointment should be to our contentment. We do not believe in the Kismet of blind fate; but we believe in the predestination of infi-THE DEATH OF MOSES. Yil

nite wisdom, and therefore we say,” It is the Lord, let him do what seemeth him good.’’

Moses died according to the divine appointment, that is also according to an appointment loliich is very general amongst GodUs people. He died without seeing the full result of his life-work. If you look down the list of the servants of God you will find that the most of them die before the object which they had in view is fully accomplished. It is true that we are inamortal till our work is done; but then we usually think that our work is something other than it is. It never was the work of Moses to lead Israel into the promised land. It was his wish, but not his work. His work he saw; but his wish he saw not. Moses did really finish his own proper work; but the desire of his heart was to have seen the people settled in their land; and this was not granted him. Thus David gathered together gold and silver wherewith to build the Tem23le, but he was not to build it; Solomon, his son, undertook the work. Even thus great reformers rise and speak the truth, and cause colossal systems of error to tremble; but they do not themselves utterly destroy these evils. Their successors continue the work. Most men have to sow that others may reap. The prayer of Moses is fulfilled to others as well as to himself: “Let thy work appear unto thy servants, and thy glory unto their children.” We must not hope to engross all things: let us be content to do our own part in laying the foundation upon which other men may build in due course. It is according to the divine appointment which links us to each other that one plants and another waters, one brings out of Egypt, and another leads into Cana,an.

And T may here notice that Moses thus “died according to the word of the Lord,” for a deep dispsnsafiona] reason. It was not for Moses to give the people rest, for the law gives no man rest, antl brings no man to heaven. The law may bring ns to the borders of the promise, but only Joshua or Jesus can bring us into grace and truth. If Moses had given them Canaan, the allegory would have seemed to teach us that rest might 1)6 obtained by the law; but as Moses must be laid asleep, and buried by divine hands, so must the law cease to rule that the covenant of grace may lead us into the falness of peace.

“Moses may lead to Jordan’s flood,
But there surrenders his command;

Our Joshua must the waves divide,
And bring us to the promised hind.

Trained by the law, we learn our place,
But gain th’ inheritance by grace.”

Thus there was a mysterious reason why JMoses should die in Moab according to the eternal purpose of God. Not without such divine decree shall any other of the servants of the Lord depart out of the camp of Israel. We also shall in life and death answer some gracious purpose of the Lord. Are we not glad to have it so? Yea, Lord, thy will be done.

III. I have conducted you a little out of the dark now, and the sky is clearing around us. In the third place, Moses died according to the loving wisdom of the Lord. It was a meeT’thihg, “a” wise thing, and a kind thing that Moses should not go over Jordan.

First, by so doing he preserved his identity with the people forwhcm he had cared. For their sakes he had forsaken a princedom in Egypt, and now for their sakes he loses a home in Palestine. He had suffered with them, “esteeming the reproach of Christ greater rilE DEATH OF MOSES. 179

riches than all the treasures of Egypt “; and he had been with them in all that great and terrible wilderness, afflicted in all their affliction, bearing and carrying them in God’s name all his days; was it not meet that he should at last die with them? He had been all along the mirror of self-denial: neither for himself, nor his brother, nor his son had he sought honor: he lived only for others, and never for himself, and his death was agreeable with his whole life; for he leads others to the border of Canaan, but enters it not himself. He sleeps with the older nation; he ends his career on the hither side of Jordan, like all the generation which he had numbered when they came out from under the iron hand of the Egyptian tyrant. It seemed fit that one so identified with the people should ‘say,” Where thou diest I will die.’’ Are not we satisfied to take our lot with the holy men and women who already sleep in Jesus?

JNIoreover, Moses might be well content to die there and then, since he was thus released from allfurtlier trial. Surely he had known enough of sorrow in connection with that rebellious nation! Forty years was enough for a pastorate over a people so fickle and perverse. Surely he must have blessed the hand that removed his shoulder from the burden! His was no life of luxury and ease, but of stern self-denial, and j)crpetual provocation. What trial he endured! What sellrestraint he exercised! What a lonely life he led! Are you surprised to hear me say that? With whom could he associate? Even Aaron, his brothei’, was a poor comrade for such a man. Remember how he failed Moses, when that man of God was absent for forty days upon the Mount with God. It was Aaron that made the golden calf, and this clearly proved his spiritual inferiority to Moses. The man of God had to “watoh even his brother who stood next to him. With whom could he take counsel? Who would talk Alh. him as a friend? He dwelt apart, and shone as a lone star. It is significant that he died alone, for so had he lived. Aaron had tender attendants to disrobe him: he who put the vestments on most fitly aided to take them off; but the crown which Moses wore, God himself had set upon his brow, and no human hand must remove it. Surely this burdened watcher of Israel must have been glad when his watch was over! Surely this lonely man, after one hundred and twenty years of service, must have felt it a happy release to be admitted to the glorious society of heaven! As Noah was a preacher of righteousness for one hundred and twenty years, and then entered into the ark, so Moses, after one hundred and twenty years of service, enters into his rest. Is it not well? Do you grieve that the battle is fought, and the victory is won for ever? We also in our deaths shall find the end of toil and labor, and the rest will be glorious.

Remember, that by his so dying, in the next place he was relieved from afresh strain upon Mm, which woTild have been involved in the conquest of Canaan. He would have crossed the Jordan, not to enjoy the country, but to fight for it: was he not well out of so severe a struggle? You think of the clusters of Eshcol, but I am thinking of the sieges and the battles. Was it so very desirable to be there? Would Moses really haye desired that dreadful fray? Was it not a gracious act on the part of the Commander-in-chief to relieve from his command a veteran who had already served through a forty years’ war? The Lord would not put upon Moses a burden so little agreeable to his age and to his turn of mind as that of executing the condemned Canaanites. Joshua was naturally a man of war; let him use the sword, for Moses was abler at the pen. Recollect that the people of Israel were no better when they reached Canaan than when they were in the wilderness: tlicy suffered defeat through unbelief, and they missed much of their inheritance through self-indulgence. Moses had seen enough of them on one side Jordan, without being troubled with them on the other. The Lord therefore graciously took his servant off the active list, and promoted him to a higher sphere. Let us not be distressed by the fact that he will one day perform the like kindness to us in oiu* turn.

‘But, you will say, surely it might have been as well if Moses had lived to have seen Joshua win the country. Would this have been desirable? Do active men find much delight in sitting still and seeing others take the lead? Moreover, had Moses lived, he would before long have felt those infirmities from which he had for one hundred and twenty years been screened’: is it so very desirable to survive one’s powers, and to be a tottering old man amidst constant battles? Peace suits age: age agrees not with war’s alarms. Had Moses remained the leader of the people, he might have injured the glory of his former days. Have we not seen aged men survive their wisdom? Have not their friends wished that they had closed their career long before? Have we not seen pastors, once able and efficient, holding to their puljoits to the injury of the churches they once edified? Oh that men would have wisdom enough not to undo in their age what they have wrought in their youth! Moses is removed before this evil can happen to him, and it is well.

1-92 THE DEA Til OF MOSES.

“But,” YOU say, “perhaps lie inight have been there to watch with joy the victories of Joshua.” Is that always an easy thing to one who has been in the front rank himself? At least, it is not an nnmixed privilege: there is a mixture of trial in the blessing. Moses did not ‘• lag superfluous on the stage.” He did not survive his work. Who wishes to do so? He passed away on the crest of the wave before any ebb had set in, or any weakness had been discoverable. He died so as to be missed. Israel wept for him, and no man said that he’ had lived too long. That prayer of his, after all, was a mistake. What would have been the particular joy of merely treading the soil of Canaan? The land looked far more beautiful from Pisgah than itwoidd have done had he stood by Jericho; assuredly at the present day you and I, who have never seen Palestine, have a much more delightful idea of it than those who have endured its noonday heats and midnight frosts. illoses had more joy in gazing upon it from above than in actually warring among its hills.

IV. I must hasten on to say that while the death of jNIoses thus exhibits the loving wisdom of God, the V/ay in which he died abundantly displays the grace. ofJGqjx.

After Moses had been well assured that he must die, you never hear a complaint of iV, nor even a prayer against it. Remember, that he himself wrote the story, and it is charming to see how he recorded his own fault, his prayer to be allowed entrance into Canaan, and its denial: had he murmured he would have recorded this also. He seems to me always to write about Moses as if he were somebody he had known: he is strictly impartial in his praise or blame

THE DEATH OF MOSES. Ig3

of himself. He calls himself “king in Jeshunin,” he says that the man Moses was very meek, and yet he records his outbursts of anger. No man was ever less self-conscious, or lived so little for himself, as Moses did: therefore, when once the Lord told him lie must die, he acquiesced without a word.

Most fitly the old man immediately called forth all his energies to finish his worl. You will .find in the thirty-first chapter of the Book of Numbers that he took in hand a war: “And the Lord spake unto ]Ioses saying, Avenge the children of Israel of the Midianites: afterward shalt thou be gathered unto thy people” (Num. xxxi. 1, 2). Ho would die warring with Israel’s adversaries, and obeying Israel’s Lord. Certain ordinances to be observed in war he delivered to Eleazar, and he supervised the division of the spoils. Fearing lest the tribes which had settled east of Jordan might excuse themselves from future labors, he stirred up Reuben and Gad, and gained from them a promise to go,over armed with their brethren till the whole land was conquered. Furthermore, he prepared his manuscr:y)ts, not for the press, but to be put away in the ark and to be preserved. He would have his testimony to future generations complete before his hand was paralyzed by death. He knew that he was to die,l3ut he did not sit down and weep, nor sulk, nor give himself up to bitter forebodings of the hour of departure. He served his God with increased vigor, and was more than ever alive as life neared its close. Then he yreached his best sermon. What a wonderful sermon it was! IIow he poured out his heart in pleading with the people! The sermon over, he began to sing. The swan is fabled to sing but once, and that just before it dies; so did Moses at the last give ns that famous ninetieth Psalm, the song commencing, “Give ear, 0 ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, 0 earth, 1/ie words of my mouth. My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass. Because I will publish the name of the Lord: ascribe ye greatness unto our God.” .Moses had no time for poetry while his whole strength was needed in his government; but now he is about to die, his frame of mind is ecstatic; prose will not content him, he must weave his thoughts into verse. In fine, all the laculties of his manhood were drawn out to their utmost in a final effort to glorify the Lord his God. Brethren, is not this a fine fruit of grace? 0 that we may bear it!

Then he gathered the tribes together and blessed them in prophetic words, pouring out his soul in benedictions. Having already cried to God about his successor, he laid his hands upon Joshua, and charged him, and encouraged him, and bade tle people help him in all his service.

He did all that remained to be done, and then went willingly to Jus end.

“Sweet was the journey to the sky,
The wondrous prophet tried.
‘Climb up the mount,’ says God, ’ and die;’
The prophot climbed, and died.

Softly his fainting head he lay

Upon his Maker’s breast;
His Maker kissed his soul away,

And laid his flesh to rest.”

We, my brethren, also expect to die. Let us not fear it, but let us arouse ourselves to labor more abundantly; let us preach more boldly, let us sing more sweetly, let lis pray more ardently. As flowers before they shed their leaves pour out all their perfumes, so let us pour out our souls unto the Lord. Let us live while we live, and dying, let us die unto the Lord. ]Iay our life-work close as sets the sun, looking greater when he sinks into the west than when he shines at full meridian height!

V. Now let us conclude by noticing, in the last place, that JMoses died “according to the word of the Lord,”

that is, ACCORDING TO THE DiyiI>!EFAVOR.

His death Leaves nothing to regret; neither is any desirable thing lacking. Failing to pass over Jordan seems a mere pin’s prick, in presence of the honors which surrounded his departing hours. His death was the climax of his life. He now saw that he had fulfilled his destiny, and was not as a pillar brolcen short. He was ordered to lead the people through the wilderness, and he had done so. There they stood on the borders of their heritage, a people moulded by his hand. By his instrumentality they were, so to speak, a regenerated race, far more fitted than their fathers to become a nation. The degrading results of long bondage had been shaken off in the free air of the desert. They were all young men, vigorous, hardy, and ready for the fray. It is grand to pass away while there is nothing of infirmity yet seen, nothing left undone, and nothing allowed to fail throuo-h too long persistence in office. We may say of Closes, that he did

“His body with his charge lay doTvn,
And cease at once to work and live.”

Moreover his successor was appointed, and was just below in the plain. It was not his son, but it was his servant who had become his son at leno-th. He did not leave his floclc to be scattered, his building to be thrown down. Happy Moses, to see his Joshua! Happy Elijah, to see his Elisha! No trembling, for the ark of the Lord mars such a departure. The succession of workers lies with the Master, not with the workers. AVe are to traiir men “who can teach others also “; but our own especial work we must leave with the Lord. Yet as Paul was glad of Timothy, so must Moses have rejoiced over Joshua, and felt in his appointment, a release from care.

He died, moreoA’^er, in the best company possible. Some men expire most htly in the presence of their children; their strength has laid in their domestic duties and aiiections, and their cliihlren fitly close their eyes: but for the in an Moses there was no true kindred. You hear that he married an Ethioi)iau Avomau; but you know notliiiig about her. You know that he Jiad sons, but you do not hear a word about them except their names: their father was too engrossed in honoring his God to crave office for them. As we have seen, he lived as to men, idone, and as to men he died alone. But God v>’as with him, and in the peculiarly near and dear society of God he closed his life on the lone peak. If he suffered any weakness no mortal eye beheld it. So far as his people were concerned, “he was not, for God took him.” Pisgah was to him the Vestibule of heaven. God met him at the gates of Paradise.

As he died, the sweetness of his last thought was indescribable. Before his strengthened eye there lay the goodly land and Lebanon. The Lord showed him all the land of Gilead imto Dan. Yonder is Carmel, and beyond it he sees the gleam, of the utmost sea. Through breaks of the mountains h.e sees Bethlehem and Jebus, which is Jerusalem. Then, like Abraham, he saw the day of Christ, and by faith behold the track of the incarnate God. Thy land, 0 Immanuel, appeared before him, and ho saw it in all its spiritual bearings. What a vision! Yet even tJiis melted into a nobler view. As we have seen in our childhood by the light of a magic lantern one view dissolve into another, so did the lower scene gradually melt away into another; and the servant of the Lord found himself removed from the shadows which his eye had seen into the realities which eyes cannot behokl. He had gone from Canaan below to Canaan above, and from the vision of Jerusalem on earth to the joy of the City of Peace in glory. The Babbis say that our text moans that .Moses died at the mouth of God, and that his soul was taken away by a kiss from the Lord’s mouth. I do not know, but I have no doubt that there was in ore sweetness in the truth than even their legend could set forth. As a mother takes her child and kisses it, and then lays it down to sleep in its own bed; so did the Lord kiss the soul of JMoses away to be with him for ever, and then he hid his body we know not where.

Whoever had such a burial as that of Moses? Angels contended over it, but Satan has failed to use it f(n- his purposes. That body was not lost, for in due time it appeared on the Mount of Transfiguration, talking with Jesus concerning the greatest event that ever transpired. Oh that we also may pass away amid the most joyful prospects; heaven coming down to us as we go up to heaven! May we also attain unto the resurrection from among the dead, and be with our Lord in his glory!

Soon our turn shall come. Do we dread it? As we are favored to serve our Lord we shall be favored to be called home in due season. Let us be ever ready; yea, joyfully ready. When we are dying we shall see not the land of iS’aphtali and Ephraim, but the covenant; and the infinite provisions of its promises will be outspread before our soul, as Canaan at the feet of Moses. Wrapt in happy enjoyment of precious promises, we shall with surprise find ourselves ushered into the place where the promises are all fulfilled.

“There shall Tve see his face,
And never, never sin,
But from the rivers of his grace,
Drink endless pleasures in.”

To the believer it is not death to die. Since Jesus has died and risen again, the sting of death is gone; wherefore let us prepare ourselves to climb where Mo’ ses stood, and view the landscape o’er. Amen.