THE REMEMBRANCE OF THE EXODUS.
(2) And thou shalt remember. — The whole of the remainder of this exhortation, to the end of Deuteronomy 10, is chiefly taken up with this topic. Israel must remember (1) the leading of Jehovah, and (2) their own rebellious perversity in the journey through the wilderness. The same recollection is made the occasion for a separate note of praise in Psalms 136:16 : “To him which led his people through the wilderness; for his mercy endureth for ever.”
The way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years. — Not so much the literal journey, but “the way:” i.e., the manner. The details of the actual journey are of course included, but only as incidents of “the way.” In the Acts of the Apostles the Christian life is in several passages called “the way.” In all these things the Israelites were types of us.
To humble thee, and to prove thee. — The way in itself is described as “three days’ journey into the wilderness,” so far as the leading to Sinai is concerned (Exodus 3:18), and “eleven days’ journey from Horeb to Kadesh-barnea” (Deuteronomy 1:2). It was in the power of Jehovah to bring Israel from Egypt to Canaan, had He so willed it, without delay, in a very little time. And just so with “the way” of salvation. There is no intrinsic or necessary impossibility in the immediate turning of mankind, or of any individual, from darkness to light. And this change might be followed by immediate removal from “this present evil world” into the place which Christ has gone before to prepare for us. But manifestly the formation of human character by probation and training would vanish in such a process as this. There could be no well-tried and deliberate purpose to serve our Creator and Redeemer in any of us — or, at least, no proof of our deliberate preference for His service — under such circumstances. Nor, again, could there be that humility which arises only out of self-knowledge. The transitory nature of all mere human resolutions and impressions for good demonstrates to the man who knows himself, better than anything else could do, the power and patience of his Redeemer, and the moral cost of his redemption. This human transitoriness and feebleness is strikingly illustrated by the story of the Exodus.
To know what was in thine heart. — “To know” is not simply that He might know (“Hell and destruction are before the Lord; how much more then the hearts of the children of men! “), but that the knowledge may arise — to determine, disclose, discover. So in 2 Chronicles 32:31 : “God left him (Hezekiah) to try him, to know all that was in his heart.” What God Himself knows by omniscience He sometimes brings to light by evidence for the sake of His creatures. (Comp. Ephesians 3:10 : “To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by (by means of) the church the manifold wisdom of God.”)