our part. But God undertakes for the latter as well as the former-engages to do all that is necessary for his people and in them. Here is the nature of the connection he will establish with them. "I will betroth thee unto me." And the manner of it. In righteousness, &c. 1. In righteousness. He is holy in all his ways, and righteous in all his works. The soul that sinneth shall die. Righteousness, then, seems to require the punishment of the sinner. The awakened soul wants to see how God can be just and the justifier. He has provided for this in the gospel. Though sin is pardoned, yet it is condemned. The transgressor escapes, but the curse falls upon another. The law is magnified and honoured in Christ. In the destruction of sinners justice would have been displayed passively, but now activelywould have been hated, but now loved by them. For righteousness means not only the way in which the guilty are made just, but the depraved holy. This is from the same gracious agency, and equally necessary with the former; for God could not admit men into communion with himself in a state of sin. "How can two walk together except they be agreed?" 2. In judgment. heathens placed Mercury, the god of wisdom, by the side of Venus, the goddess of marriage; and for good reason, for there is nothing in which judgment is so needful. Hence the wretched consequences of hasty matches. But God knows what he does and why he does it has reasons which justify the measure of his infinite understanding, and salvation is called his counsel. This is true in contriving, procuring, and applying it. The place, time, and manner of conversion known to him. We know but little now, yet there are openings which carry the mind in contemplation and surprise, and which assure us more remains for our discovery and rapture in the world of light. This applies also to God's people as well as to God himself. In their choice of him and love to him wisdom is seen. The world may censure, but they can give a reason of the hope within them. The spiritual judgeth all things, though he himself is judged of The no man. 3. In loving-kindness. Without this persons had better never come together it is daily and mutually needed. The law of kindness should rule in looks, words, and actions. This seldom wanting in the female, often in the male side. Hence men commanded to love their wives. God says to his Church, "You shall find me full of tenderness and compassion," &c. Strange to apply the exercise of this quality to them as well as to him, yet he has sanctioned it. "I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth," &c. He takes at their hand everything they do for him; their disposition makes them afraid to grieve his Holy Spirit, and anxious to walk "worthy of him unto all pleasing." 4. In mercies. This is distinguishable from the former. That was the effect, this shows the cause, and mentioned in addition to loving-kindness, to remind us that all we possess, or expect, springs from the free, undeserved grace of God, and to meet discouragement from a sense of unworthiness and ill-deservings. God will not cast away his people, but have mercy upon them according to the multitude of his tender mercies. The more cheerful and vigorous will they be, the more they remember this truth. Fruits that grow in the sun are richer and riper than those which grow in the shade. The best frame we can be in is to be upheld by a free spirit, and act under a full sense of our Divine privileges. Let us therefore sing of God's mercy for ever, and if he seems to have forgotten to be gracious, plead and say, "Where is thy zeal, and thy strength, the sounding of thy bowels, and of thy mercies toward me?" Here again is imported, not only that we receive, but exercise mercy, not towards him personally, but towards his creatures that need it. What is done to them he considers as done to himself. What so just and proper as that they who are forgiven should forgive? And they which live by mercy should be merciful? [Jay]. I will betroth thee unto me for ever. Christians are not only pardoned, but employed in God's service-not only reconciled, but admitted into friendship important any acquisition, the more necessary to our happiness, the more alive we are to keep it; the more averse to its absence, the more painful the loss. Yet whatever we are attached to here, we set our hearts on that which is not. Jews are said always to throw a glass on the ground in their nuptial ceremony, to indicate that the union formed was brittle as glass. The apostle reminds us that time is short, and that they who have wives will be as though they had none. We take each other "till death do us part "-the relation is terminated by the death of either. But Christians can never be in a widowed state-never lose their defence, glory, and joy. Nothing is precarious in the transactions of God with his people. "I know that whatsoever God doeth it shall be for ever," &c. How delightful in a world of changes to know that he changeth not, and therefore we shall not be consumed. Many a persuasion fails, fo the confidence may be strong and the foundation weak. But here the full assurance of faith can never do justice to the certainty of the event. "I am persuaded that neither death nor life,” &c. [Jay]. The Harmony of the Divine Attributes in Salvation. Mercy founded on righteousness, and truth vindicating mercy. Justice honoured in mercy. Loving-kindness which is faithful. "Eternal love and immutable faithfulness are the body-guards of Jesus' throne, and they are both the providers and the preservers of all those who in him are made kings and priests unto God. We cannot keep ourselves, and nothing short of Divine mercy and truth can do it; but these both can and will, nor shall the least of God's people be suffered to perish" [Spurgeon]. HOMILETICS. THE UNIVERSE GOVERNED IN THE INTERESTS OF HUMANITY.-Verses 21-23. In these verses we have an unbroken chain of causation. The prophet represents God as listening to the prayer of the heavens, to allow them to give fertility to the earth. The heavens fulfil the desire of the earth, and the earth yields its increase to the nation; all things in heaven and earth depend upon God, "so that without his bidding not a drop of rain falls from heaven," says Calvin, "and the earth produces no germ, and consequently all nature would be barren, unless he gave it fertility by his blessing." I. All things are subordinate to God. 1. God is the Creator of all things. All things were made by him at first. He only has absolute being and original essence. Creation is derived from him, The Great First Cause. "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." By this simple expression Atheism, Polytheism, Pantheism, and Materialism are denied, and that philosophy which sees nothing apart and distinct from matter is reproved. We have no chance work, no " theory of development" here. Matter is not eternal. The world had a birthday. In the beginning God; God before primordial matter; God before its arrangement into shape and order; God first, and last, and everywhere; God before all things; God the cause of all things, and God the meaning of all things. 2. God is the Conserver of all things. That which was dependent at first cannot afterwards become independent. It requires the same hand to sustain as to create a thing. God did not create the world like a carpenter builds a house, to stand still. Having its very being from him, that being cannot be, or continue to be, without him. "By him all things consist," or stand together. God is "the Conservation and Correlation of forces." Not an atom is permitted to fall out of existence. Things may travel far, and take different shapes; but nothing is destroyed. The tiniest dew-drop is long-lived as the mighty ocean, and the feeblest nebule indestructible as the everlasting hills. As in matter, so in mind and morals. "I know whatsoever Where one step broken, the great scale's destroyed: III. All things are governed in the interests of the Christian Church. "They shall hear Jezreel." Jez. means the seed of God, the nation pardoned and restored to God. All things not only work together, but good is the result, and this good is "to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose" (Rom. viii. 28). The universe in all its operations and departments contributes to the interests of God's people. Events do not happen in human society and the Christian Church as if left to the mere causalities of nature, and were not under Divine control. Human happiness is promoted and human wants supplied, and men in Christ are the objects of God's eternal purpose. 1. Human wants are satisfied. Corn, wine, and oil are given to Jezreel. Chastisements are removed, Divine favour is restored, and men are daily loaded with benefits and blessings. The gifts of nature are emblems of the gifts of grace. Constant bread, common mercies, and spiritual joys are bestowed with a liberal hand. "Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing." 2. There is spiritual increase in the Church. "I will sow her unto me in the earth." Persecution and affliction did not diminish Israel. "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church." God restored her, and in her dispersion she was the means of scattering the knowledge of God and the seeds of Divine truth. Gentiles were converted to God, and the earth will yet be the scene of an increase richer than any yet enjoyed. The fields are already white unto harvest. 3. There is restoration to friendship with God. Mercy for those that were unpitied, that had not obtained mercy, and those that were not God's people were to become his people. God would anew declare them his people, and they would affectionately respond to the call. Jew and Gentile, bond and free, Barbarian and Scythian, will be one in Christ."All that see them shall acknowledge them, that they are the seed which the Lord hath blessed." HOMILETIC HINTS AND OUTLINES. Ver. 21, 22. All nature is closed and would refuse her office to those who rebel against her God, so when he hath withdrawn his curse, and is reconciled to man, all shall combine together for man's good, and by a kind of harmony all parts thereof join their ministries for the service of those who are at unity with him. And, as an image of love, all, from the lowest to the highest, are bound together, each depending on the ministry of that beyond it, and the highest on God. At each link the chain might have been broken; but God, who knit their services together, and had before withheld the rain, and made the earth barren, and laid waste the trees, now made each to supply the other, and led the thoughts of man through the course of causes and effects up to himself, who ever causes all which come to pass [Pusey]. Learn-1. The unworthiness of man. A dependent, sinful creature. 2. The dignity of man. All creatures employed to help him. 1. The abundance of God's gifts 'corn, wine, and oil." 2. The goodness of God in supplying them—“I will hear." 3. The medium through. which they come- "heaven and earth." 4. The certainty of their bestowment"It shall come to pass." Ver. 23. "I will sow her." The Church the channel of blessings to the world. The Church can only bless the world as she is blessed herself. A beautiful earth. 1. The residence of the Church of God-"I will sow her unto me in the earth." 2. The theatre of the mercy of God-“I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy." 3. The scene of obedience and love to God-"Thou art my people... Thou art my God." God's mercy. 1. The sum of human wants- "not obtained mercy," "not my people." 2. The source from which it comes-free grace. "I will have mercy." 3. The result of its bestowment "Thou art my people." 4. The evidence of its possession-"Thou art my God." ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER II. Ver. 1--5. Mothers and children. When a mother once asked a clergyman when she should begin the education of her child, then four years old, he replied, "Madam, if you have not begun already, you have lost those four years. From the first smile that gleams upon an infant's cheek your opportunity begins." The mother lives again in her children. They unconsciously mould themselves after her manner, her speech, her conduct, and her method of life. Her habits become theirs, and her character is visibly repeated in them" [Smiles]. Children may be strangled, but deeds never they have an indestructible life, both in and out of our consciousness [George Eliot]. Ver. 6, 7. Affliction. The hedge stops or gives a turn. God, in pursuance of his covenant, and with a gracious meaning to a revolting people, hedges them up by affliction to stop them from undoing. It is a mercy to be kept out of the pond, though it be by a thorn hedge, sharpest troubles. This stop the Lord doth often give, though not always to sinners; he sometimes lets them run on to fill up their measure of sin and to receive their full measure of punishment. Reproof for sin is a great favour. Though God is angry for what we have done, yet it is a mercy that he will not let us do more, and so make ourselves vile and miserable [Caryl]. Ver. 8, 9. Ingratitude. When I consider how the goodness of God is abused and perverted by the greatest part of mankind, I cannot but be of his mind that said, "The greatest miracle in the world is God's patience and bounty to an ungrateful man." Oh! what would God not do for his creatures, if thankful, that thus heaps the coals of his mercies upon the heads of his enemies? But think not, sinners, that you shall escape thus. God's mill goes slow, but it grinds small; the more admirable his patience and bounty now is, the more dreadful and insupportable will that fury be which ariseth out of his abused goodness [Gurnall]. Ver. 10, 11. Mirth. Mirth is a vain and unprofitable passion, not fit for a wise man's entertainment [Bp. Hall]. Often when in the full enjoyment of all that this world could bestow, my conscience told me, that in the true sense of the word I was not a Christian. I laughed. I sang. I was apparently gay and happy. But the thought would steal across me,-what madness is all this! to continue easy in a state, in which a sudden call out of the world would consign me to everlasting misery, and that when eternal happiness is within my grasp [Wilberforce]. Mirth at a funeral is scarce more indecent or unnatural than a perpetual flight of gaiety and burst of exultation in a world like this; a world which may seem a paradise to fools, but is an hospital with the wise [Dr Young]. Forgetfulness of God, ver. 13. Sucn is the character of all engrossing passion, such is the source of sin to which the soul gives way, in avarice, ambition, worldliness, sensual sin, godless science. The soul at last does not rebel against God; it forgets him. It is taken up with other things, with itself, with the subjects of its thoughts, the objects of its affections, and it has no time for God, because it has no love for him [Pusey]. The gradations of sin. 1. Neglecting God. Neglect of his word, house, and service. 2. Forgetting God. Forgetting his love, goodness, and claims. Departing from God. Departing into danger, error, and punishment. 3. Forgetfulness of God-a sign of carelessness a mark of ingratitude and contempt--springs from unbelief and disobedience to God's command (Deut. iv. 9; viii. 14). Idolatry in the Church-the topstone, the height of all crime-hated by God, and pursued by the sinner. Professed believers are too slow after God, but sinners hasten after their lovers. Let their zeal rebuke our tardiness; their punishment turn our steps to God and duty The two masters. 1. Jehovah forgotten, Baal loved and worshipped. 2. The sacred days of Jehovah turned into festive days of Baal. 3. The gifts of Jehovah devoted to the service and support of Baal. "No man can serve two masters," &c. Which are you serving? "Choose you this day," &c. Ver. 18. Covenant with beasts. To men who dwell in God the most evil forces become harmless; they wear a charmed life, and defy the deadliest ills. Their feet come into contact with the worst of foes; even Satan himself nibbles at their heel, but in Christ Jesus they have the assured hope of bruising |