“Wanderers among the Nations”
At the Exodus the love and thanks of Israel were as delightful to God as grapes in the desert or as the first ripe figs. But they gave themselves up to the idols of the heathen, and soon became as abominable as the impure gods which they chose.
The prophet does not hesitate to speak plainly of the effects of the awful license of that age. He says that a nation which sins as Israel had sinned must, in the very nature of things, cease to exist. The birth-rate declines and the family-life is stricken at its roots. So long as the home is reverenced, and there is a pure and holy love between man and woman, so long, and only so long, is the nation safe. All the battalions that tyrant ever mustered, break on that rock of chrysolyte in vain. But sin is like dry-rot, which eats out the vitality and virility of a people. It is an awful verdict when God says, They shall bear no fruit, Hosea 9:16. We all know the fate of the unfruitful bough. It is only as we yield fruit that we are worth sparing. Will the nations of today learn this lesson? And may we not all question whether the lack of spiritual children does not betoken some degeneracy of our secret life?