I. The remembrance of the way. There will be (1) the remembrance of favour, and by consequence of joy. (2) There will be the remembrance of sin, and by consequence of sin the remembrance of sorrow.
II. Notice the purposes of Divine providence in the journey. (1) The first purpose is to induce humility. (2) The second purpose is to prove us. (3) The third purpose is to know what is in our heart.
III. If you have thus travelled in the way, there will be many uses of the memory. You will know more of God at the conclusion of your journey than you did at the commencement. You will behold both the goodness and the severity of God: the severity which punishes sin wherever it is to be found; the goodness which itself provides a Substitute and finds a Saviour.
W. Morley Punshon, Three Popular Discourses,No. 1.
The intention of "the way in the wilderness" is twofold: humiliation and probation.
I. All things are humbling. A much shorter period than forty years will be enough to make every one feel the deep humiliation of life, (1) It is a very humbling thing to receive kindness. (2) There are very humbling sorrows: sickness and bereavement; nothing can be more humiliating than these. (3) Sin is the great abaser. Failure is marked upon a thousand things. No thought is more humbling to the Christian man than the remembrance of his sins.
II. With humiliation is probation. "To humble thee, and to prove thee."It was God's plan when He made this world to make it a probationary world. Probation is God's putting a man to the test to see whether He loves Him, and how much he loves Him. That which is a temptation on the part of Satan for the malevolence with which he uses it is a probation on God's part for the love wherewith He permits it. God always proves His child, and the more He gives him, the more He proves him. Whenever He bestows a grace, He puts that grace to the test.
J. Vaughan, Sermons,14th series, p. 156.
(1) Emphasise the word all,for on that word the emphasis of the sentence truly lies. (2) Consider that it isa way. The character of the path is to be estimated, not by present difficulty or danger, but by the importance of the end. (3) Consider the infinite variety of the way. (4) Consider the beauty of the way. (5) Consider the bread of the wilderness. The miracle of the manna is repeated every day before our eyes. (6) Remember the perils of the wilderness. (7) Remember the sins of the wilderness. (8) Remember the chastisements of the wilderness. (9) Remember the Elims of the way. (10) Consider the end of the way.
J. Baldwin Brown, Contemporary Pulpit,vol. vi., p. 371.
There are two main considerations suggested by this passage.
I. What we should be chiefly occupied with as we look back. (1) Let memory work under the distinct recognition of Divine guidance in every part of the past. (2) We are to judge of the things that we remember by their tendency to make character, to make us humble, to reveal us to ourselves, and to knit us in glad obedience to our Father God.
II. Turn now to the other consideration which may help to make remembrance a good, viz., the issues to which our retrospect must tend if it is to be anything more than sentimental recollection. (1) Let us remember and be thankful. (2) Let us remember and let the memory lead to contrition. (3) Let us remember in order that from the retrospect we may get practical wisdom. (4) Let us remember that we may hope.
A. Maclaren, A Year's Ministry,1st series, p. 151.
References: Deuteronomy 8:2. Congregationalist,vol. vii., p. 530; T. Binney, Weighhouse Chapel Sermons,1st series, p. 13; T. Kelly, Pulpit Trees,p. 309.