The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee
Trees employed in the service of the Church
It is difficult to say whether the reference he to building materials for the sacred edifice, or to ornamental trees planted in the temple-courts.
(Prof. J. Skinner, D. D.)
Variety in unity
Variety of instrumentality and operation subordinate to unity of purpose is a striking feature in all the works of God. This law provides for beauty as well as use. The text teaches us that the method by which God works in nature is also the method by which He works in grace--that the law of variety in unity is the law according to which Heconsolidates and extends His kingdom among mankind. The allusion and the doctrine are equally clear. The allusion is to the various trees of Lebanon employed by Solomon for utility and beauty in the erection of the temple in Jerusalem. Varying in size, and quality, and appearance of wood, they were all deemed necessary for the purpose of beautifying the place, that was to be made more beautiful and glorious still by the majesty and grace of the indwelling God. The doctrine is that, in like manner, various agencies--men of different periods and nations, men of different positions, talents, and attainments, men of opposite creeds and mental tastes--are used by God in the erection and adornment of that spiritual temple which He makes His special abode, the magnificence and glory of which, outliving the desolations of time, shall shine to His praise through the ages of eternity. (W. Waiters.)
Diverse agencies in the Church
I. THE ILLUSTRATIONS OF THIS DOCTRINE ARE MANIFOLD.
1. The first I notice is that which is supplied us in the structure of the Bible. To a superficial observer the Bible seems a collection of small books bound together without any connecting-link. But if we come to study this collection of books carefully, we shall see, underlying all diversities, a unity which indicates that all have been originated and guided by one supreme mind.
2. Certain periods require certain orders of men and certain gifts, not necessary at other times.
3. Further, the peculiar qualities of various races and tribes serve to extend the truth of God, and promote the growth and perfection of His Church. Christianity does not recognize nationalities as such Jew and Gentile,
Greek and Barbarian, European and African, American and Asiatic,--all are one in Christ Jesus. Still, God sanctifies all national characteristics to His gracious purpose of making Christianity universally triumphant. Jewish reverence, Grecian intelligence and taste, Roman courage and honour, Scandinavian enterprise, the practical energy of the Anglo-Saxon, the speculative inquiry and patient toil of the German, the Frenchman’s brilliant vivacity and grace, the Italian’s glowing imagination, the ardent negro, and the Oriental full of subtlety and disputation--all are wrought by the Master-Builder into the strength and beauty of the structure He is rearing to His honour.
4. Nor can denominational distinctions be regarded as altogether an evil; for God makes them all subserve the complete manifestation of His many-sided Gospel, and the wider extension of His kingdom.
5. Original differences of mental constitution and temperament have also their place and function. There arc diversities of gifts, yet there is the same Spirit; there are differences of administrations, yet there is the same Lord; there arc diversities of operations, yet it is the same God which worketh all in all.
II. PRACTICAL REMARKS.
1. We may be sure that where God has designed and qualified men for work in His Church He will prepare the way for their usefulness.
2. Every man should try to find his true position, and prove faithful in it.
3. The subject affords encouragement to the feeblest of the Lord’s servants. All have their place and use.
4. Are we not reminded of the duty of charity towards all engaged the work of the Lord? Too often the diversities of Christian men are occasions for jealous; let and strife. If we are Christians, we are all plants of God’s right hand planting; let us be content to bloom after our kind, and rejoice in that we all contribute something to the glory of the Master’s garden. (W. Waiters.)
I will make the place of My feet glorious
“The place of My feet”
I. THE SCENE OF THIS SPECIAL DIVINE GLORY. “The place of My feet.” The sacred writers speak of God’s feet as indicating His personal presence. The place of God’s feet, or His footstool, was, in ancient times, the temple at Jerusalem. The allusion of the language is to a royal throne. Jehovah is conceived of as the King of Israel, the King of kings, whose throne is in heaven, but His footstool in the earthly temple; and thither the Israelites as His true subjects were required to repair, to render homage to their great King, and bend lowly before His footstool. All this was, in turn, a figure of the better things reserved for us. The Jewish particularity has been broadened out into the compass of the great household of faith, whose sons and daughters are drawn from all the earth’s kindreds, and peoples, and tongues. The true Church, composed of all believers of whatever name or nation, is God’s temple--“the place of His feet I” In a real and important sense the wide earth, and the whole material creation, is His footstool, marked everywhere by the broad footprints of the Creator revealing His eternal power and Godhead. The signs of Providence reveal the movements of a present and ever-working God, exercising wise, and righteous, and benignant control over His creatures.
II. THE GLORY OF THE SCENE. It was the glory of Eden that there God talked with man face to face. So it is the glory of heaven that there He replenishes His saints with the joys of His eternal fellowship. It was the glory of Sinai that there He displayed His grandeur and proclaimed His law; and of Tabor and Calvary that there He unfolded His hidden majesty, and the fulness of His mercy. And it is the glory of the Church that it is distinguished by the clearest manifestations of the Divine presence and grace. What are these manifestations? God makes the place of His feet glorious--
1. By the worship that is there rendered and accepted.
2. By the spiritual glory that is there created. “The glory of Lebanon, etc. The glory of the Church lies in the possession and exercise of the grandest and noblest moral principles--those that are most assimilated to the Divine nature. The true purpose of the Church, the final end of its warfare, is to be a living witness to mankind of these moral principles, to be an embodied protest against all the money-worship and pleasure-worship, and therefore worship of the world; to be a revelation to man of higher interests and blessings, and a Diviner greatness. It is when she is most distinctly Godlike and Christlike that men fall down and confess that God is in her of a truth. The glory of the Lord is then risen upon her.
3. By attracting immense and various multitudes from all quarters of the globe to His Church. Though numbers be not the chief, they are a real element of glory.
4. By the blessedness there conferred. All the elements of the Church’s glory hitherto enumerated are elements of blessedness; but there are other special sources of that blessedness.
(1) There is the blessedness of inviolable security. The greatest earthly monarchy has no power to protect itself against assault, against even successful assault. It is the glory of God’s house that it is safe. It is founded on a rock, and the gates of hell cannot prevail against it.
(2) The absolute and unspeakable splendour of the Church--the splendour of her purity--the splendour of her joy. (J. Riddell.)