MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Exodus 23:20-25
DIVINE GUIDANCE
I. There is a divine way. There is a divine way for individuals. Joseph, Abraham, Daniel, and David were led in the right way. The saints of the Old and New Testaments were guided in the divine way. And all those who seek divine guidance may hope to be led in the right divine way. There is a divine way for nations, and those nations that seek to walk in the way of national uprightness, and recognition of God’s supremacy, will attain a true national greatness and perpetuity. And there was such a way for the Israelites.
1. This way was through the wilderness. Such are the conditions of our present existence. Every way to greatness, to glory, and to divinely-prepared places is through the wilderness. This is the law of nature as well as of grace.
2. This way was beset with enemies. There are always seen and unseen forces and powers opposing the onward and upward course of those who are striving after nobility and the accomplishment of divine purposes. The march of the Israelites was opposed, and the nearer they came to the realisation of their hopes the more numerous did their foes appear. The greatest struggle takes place just before the final victory. The valley of decision is the valley of stern conflict. The fact that the powers of evil concentrate their skill and their strength may be taken as a sign that we are in the right way.
3. This divine way was one of many privations. Travellers must not expect the pleasures and comforts of home. The march of the Israelites was not a summer’s holiday. We must expect privations, and maintain a quiet faith and a spirit of patient and heroic endurance.
4. This divine way, then, was contrary to mere human liking. Notice the frequent complainings of the children of Israel. And oh, God’s way is not our way! Ours may be pleasant at first but bitter at last, but God’s way is the reverse; and yet not exactly, for sweets are graciously mingled with the bitters. There is hunger, but there is manna. There is thirst, but there is clear water from the smitten rock. There is perplexity, but there is an angel to guide and protect.
II. This way leads to divinely-prepared places. All is well that ends well, and this way is well, for it brings to a prepared place. Many are willing to endure if they are certain of securing rich results. Hopes are blasted in mere human pursuits; but if we faithfully fulfil divine conditions we shall come to divinely-prepared places. The Almighty has prepared all lands. His wisdom planned, and His power built up, the goodly frame of this terrestrial universe. He has made the green earth, and stretched above the blue sky in striking contrast. His Divine hand has shaped every form of loveliness. But the Almighty seemed to come forth in the greatness of His love, in the depth of His wisdom, and in the energy of His power, in order to make Palestine the most fruitful and beautiful of lands, the joy of all climes, the song of all countries, the goodly heritage of the host of nations. How eminently fitting that this lovely land should be selected to be the dwelling-place of His chosen people, and the magnificent stage on which should be enacted the most glorious transactions of all time. Palestine was a specially prepared place, and to it the wilderness way was the course for the Israelites. Heaven is a specially prepared place. “I go to prepare a place for you.” A place in the best of all places. A home in the best of homes. A dwelling-place where all the abodes are mansions. A seat where all the seats are thrones. A city where all the citizens are kings. What matters it though the way be long and sometimes dreary, so long as the place is so attractive; and we cannot fail to reach it if we obey divine directions.
III. The travellers on this way are favoured with a Divine Guide. We cannot tell whether this angel was a created angel, or the second person in the Trinity—the angel that was with the Church in the wilderness. But we learn his greatness. The divine name was in him. The divine name is indicative of the divine character We presume the name was in him as a reflection of the divine glory, as a granted prerogative, as a token of delegated authority, as investing with glorious attributes, and imparting unusual dignity and majesty. This name was in him as a power to inspire religious awe, and to restrain irreverent trifling. “Provoke him not; for My name is in him.” This angel was competent. Unerring wisdom never appoints the incompetent to important offices. And this angel was appointed by infinite wisdom. He knows all the way, understands all its dangers and difficulties, and is competent both to guide and to protect. Jesus Christ, the angel of the new covenant, is a perfect guide, fully competent to direct and protect. He has trodden every inch of the way. He has personally inspected the course. He gives ample directions to those who are to go before us to keep us in the way, and to bring us to the divinely-prepared place.
IV. Divine promises are contingent on the faithful pursuits of divine methods. God promises seed-time and harvest, but we only expect harvest as the result of prepared soil and planted seed. Many of those to whom the promises were given did not enter the promised land because they did not carry out the conditions. “Ye shall serve the Lord your God, and He shall bless thy bread and thy water”—is a law and a promise rightly read for all economies. We must obey the voice of the angel; and then God will be an enemy to our enemies, and afflict those who afflict us. Retribution must fall sooner or later upon the heads of all persecutors.
The divine methods may be thus summarised—Caution, obedience, self-restraint, and the entire destruction of all that has the remotest tendency to damage the moral nature. Caution—“Beware of him.” Watch with intense interest as you would watch a guide in some difficult pass. “Obey his voice.” Listen attentively to the utterance. Interpret as to the spirit. Eagerly catch the solemn whisper of the infinite. Self-restraint. “Provoke him not.” Do not trifle with your guide. He is very merciful, but there is a period when even mercy seems to expire. “He will not pardon your transgressions.” The doom of triflers is sealed. The despisers have only a gloomy prospect. “For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries.” “Provoke him not.” “Kiss the Son, lest he be angry.”
Thou shalt not only refrain from bowing down to the gods of the heathen; but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images. The material and the moral are strangely interblended. The very presence of the suggestive material image will surely damage the moral nature. The spiritual requires to be carefully guarded. We cannot be too watchful.
Amid the din of human voices let us have an ear open to the Divine voice. Let us believe in angelic ministry. Amid many seductive ways that present themselves, let us cleave to the one divine way; and through divine grace, and through faith in the Redeemer, we shall come to the prepared place.
—W. Burrows, B.A.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
THE ANGEL OF THE COVENANT.—Exodus 23:20-23
The people had prayed for a mediator. (See on Exodus 20:19.) God now appoints a greater than Moses to act in that capacity. The present section reveals the nature and office of the mysterious person, the proper attitude towards, and the reward of obedience to Him.
I. His nature was divine.
1. Equal with God.
(1.) Bearing the divine name; “My name is in Him.” The incommunicable covenant name of Jehovah.
(2.) Performing divine actions; “Mine angel shall go,” &c., “I will cut them off.” So New Testament, “I and My Father are one.”
2. Distinct from the personality of the speaker, “I send,” so New Testament, “The Father which sent Me.”
For an able resume of this argument for the Divinity of Christ, see Liddon’s “Bampton Lectures,” pp. 52–56. (See also Genesis 32; Hosea 12:3-4; Joshua 5:14; Judges 2:12; Malachi 3:1, &c.)
II. His office was to conduct the covenant people to the fulfilment of God’s covenant engagement.
1. Providence. “To keep thee in the way.” So Christ “upholds all things by the word of His power.” “In Him all things consist.” Generally and particularly He preserves those who trust in Him (John 10:28).
2. Redemption. “To bring thee into the place which I have prepared.” Israel’s redemption is only half accomplished as yet. So Christ’s eternal redemption is not complete till the last enemy is destroyed (John 14:2-3).
III. The proper attitude towards Him.
1. Fear. Carefulness not to displease Him. Christ is the Saviour of those only who believe in Him. To others He is a “savour of death unto death.”
2. Obedience. “Obey His voice.” So says the Father in the New Testament (Matthew 17:5); and Himself (Matthew 28:20). This implies—
(1.) Trust in His person.
(2.) Subjection to His authority.
(3.) The prosecution of His commands.
IV. The reward of obedience to Him, Exodus 23:22-23.
(1.) Identification and sympathy with us in our cause. “I will be an enemy,” &c.
(2.) Victory over our foes (1 Corinthians 15:57), world, flesh, devil, death, &c.
(3.) Inheritance in the promised land.
Learn—
i. (2 Timothy 1:9), That God’s grace has been manifested in Jesus Christ from the beginning of the world. ii. That God’s grace has been, through Jesus Christ, with His people up to the present moment. iii. And will be till the end of the world.—J. W. Burn.
ILLUSTRATIONS
BY
REV. WILLIAM ADAMSON
Covenant Angel! Exodus 23:20. When the Israelites were delivered from Egypt, how were they guided on their way to Canaan through the trackless desert? “The Lord went before them.” In chapter 14 this glorious One is called “The Angel of God”—Isaiah speaks of him as the “Angel of His Presence.” This verse shows that the only-begotten Son is referred to for four reasons.
(1) “My name is in Him;” whereas we are told that Jehovah is the Lord, and that His glory He will not give to another.
(2) “Obey His voice;” which counsel answers to that on the Mount of Transfiguration, “Hear ye Him.”
(3) “Provoke Him not;” an expression gathering deep and awful meaning when we read the warning of the Apostle, “Let us not tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted.”
(4) “He will not pardon your transgressions;” a monition singularly harmonised by the inquiry, “Who can forgive sin but God only?” Christ was the Angel who was with the Church in the wilderness. This was that Christ of God, who, in all the Church’s wanderings and dangers, has evermore been her Leader and Defender.
“Anywhere with Jesus, says the Christian heart;
Let Him take me where He will, so we do not part.”
Obedience and Observance! Exodus 23:21.
(1) Nothing, says Robertson, can be love to God which does not shape itself into obedience. We remember the anecdote of the Roman commander who forbade an engagement with the enemy, and the first transgressor was his own son. He accepted a challenge from the leader of the other host, slew and spoiled him. He then, in triumphant feeling, carried the spoils to his father’s tent; but the Roman father refused to recognise the instinct which prompted this as deserving of the name of love. Disobedience contradicted it.
(2) Whereas love is the fulfilling of the Law. The other graces shine like the precious stones of nature, with their own peculiar lustre and varied hues; but the diamond is white. In white all the other colours are united; and in love all the other graces and virtues are centred. Love is the only source of true obedience to the commands of God. If Israel only learned to love God with all their heart, they would necessarily love His Law, which is the transcript of His Divine Mind.
“Nay, man’s chief wisdom’s love—the love of God.
The new religion—final, perfect, pure—
Was that of Christ and love. His great command—
His all-sufficing precept—was it not love!”
—Bailey.
Pilgrim Path! Exodus 23:23. Goethe, the world’s favourite, confessed, when he was 80 years old, that he could not remember being in a really happy state of mind even for a few weeks together; and that, when he wished to feel comfortable, he had to veil his self-consciousness. The following is the closing sentence of his autobiography: “Child! child! no more. The coursers of time, lashed, as it were, by invisible spirits, hurry on the light car of our destiny; and all that we can do is, in cool self-possession, to hold the reins with a firm hand, and to guide the wheels, now to the left, now to the right, a stone here, a precipice there. Whither it is hurrying, who can tell? And who indeed can remember the point from which it started?” What a contrast to Israel’s position! “Mine Angel shall go before thee.” Happy Christian Israelite, he knows he traverses his pilgrim path under Divine guidance, and that there is no uncertainty as to the “whither.”
“Though in the paths of death I tread,
With gloomy horrors overspread,
My steadfast heart shall fear no ill,
For Thou, O Lord, art with me still.”
—Addison.
Worldliness. Exodus 23:24-25. Pope gives us an affecting account of the death of Villiers, Duke of Buckingham. After having been master of £50,000 per annum, he was reduced to the deepest distress by his vice and extravagance, and breathed his last moments in the mean apartment of an inn. Such is often the end of worldliness. It is said that the Duke of Alva starved his prisoners, after he had given them quarter, saying, “Though I promised your lives, I promised not to find you food.” In the same manner does the world deceive its votaries. The Persians, writes Buck, when they obtained a victory, selected the noblest slave, and made him a king for three days. They clothed him with royal robes, and ministered to him all the pleasures he could choose; but at the end of all he was to die as a sacrifice to mirth and folly. So worldliness is shortlived; and when its feast is ended, the guests are only like those who have partaken of poisoned food, or who “have fed on ashes.”
“Ay, beauteous is the world, and many a joy
Floats through its wide dominion. But, alas!
When we would seize the winged good, it flies,
And step by step, along the path of life,
Allures our yearning spirits to the grave.”
—Goethe.