The Patriarchs

And what is the longing here but that the day should break? And what is the longing of the same soul in the words of the Gospel? "Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly," – so largely and so exactly do the teachings and the breathings of the New Testament, in these and kindred ways, measure the affections of the heart in this book? Christ dwells in the heart by faith. Christ lies all night between the breasts. Eph. iii. 17; Cant. i. 13. And has not the saint attuned his heart over Jesus in language of like fervour, such as we all use without shame?

"How tedious and tasteless the hoursWhen Jesus no longer I see,Sweet prospects, sweet birds, and sweet flowers,Have lost all their sweetness for me;The midsummer sun shines but dim,The fields strive in vain to look gay,But when I am happy in Him,December's as pleasant as May."His name yields the richest perfume,And sweeter than music His voice,His presence disperses my gloom,And makes all within me rejoice:I should, were He always so nigh,Have nothing to wish or to fear,No mortal so happy as I,My summer would last the whole year."

These are among the seals set upon this beautiful portion of God's Word by the spiritual mind of the believer, and also by kindred truths and principles found in other scriptures. And it has been happily said, that "if there be no express allusion to this book in the New Testament, the same allegory, as portraying the same truth, evidently appears to have been familiar to the minds of the writers of it, and to the minds also of the people whom they addressed. Not more abruptly does John the Baptist, for instance, refer to our Lord as 'the Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of the world,' as being the character of the Messiah which all would know and understand, than he does to the same blessed Person in the character of the Bridegroom of the Church-'he that hath the Bride is the Bridegroom.'"

And is it not seasonable, in these days of growing irreligiousness and worldliness, to warn one another, beloved, to keep our minds incorrupt in the simplicity that is in Christ? In the preparation-season, which the present age is, and which the Canticles contemplate, Eve was getting ready, under the forming hand of God, for Adam, and for Adam only. Adam slept for Eve, and Eve was made for Adam. So with Christ and the Church. He slept in death for us, and we are preparing, under the Holy Ghost, for Him. "I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ." As he says also in another place, "My little children, of whom I travail in birth again till Christ be formed in you," Christ, and Christ only, Christ in His precious sufficiency for a sinner, in answer to the Hagar or Galatian thought of "days, and months, and times, and years," that other gospel which yet is not another.

But this is assailed. The Gospel, in its claim on the sinner to give his undivided confidence to Christ, has been abroad on the lips of a thousand witnesses, to the gladdening of thousands of souls. The enemy has watched and hated this. Working in the scene in which he goes "to and fro" and "up and down" (Job i. 7), he is busy to seduce the heart from this Gospel. And is not his success far beyond the measure of the fears of any of us? The religion of fleshly confidences or of ordinances is to this hour among us. It admits of worldliness; and worldliness is, at this same hour, flourishing in company with it. There is the erection of temples for worship, and of palaces for the worshippers; stricter care to observe, in its season, due attendance in the sanctuary, together with unparalleled skill and energy and enterprise in advancing the indulgence and elegance of human life, so as to make the world a desirable and safe place to live in-a place where religion may now be seen to be observed and honoured.

This is all seductive from the principle of faith-this is corruption of the mind from the simplicity that is in Christ. The Gospel addresses itself to man, not only as a guilty but as a religious creature. It finds him under the power of superstition or religiousness, as well as of sin. It is as natural for man to refuse to go into the judgment-hall lest he should be defiled, as it is, in very enmity to God, to cry out, "Crucify Him, crucify Him." And the Gospel gets as stern a refusal from the religiousman as from the lustful man. As the Divine Teacher tells us, the harlot goes into the kingdom before the Pharisee.

Religious vanities are deeply playing their part in our day, and fascinating many souls. What answer, beloved, do you and I give them? Is Jesus so precious that no allurement has power? Is the virgin purity of the mind still kept? and as chaste ones are we still betrothed to Christ only? Like the newly-formed Eve, are we in our place of earliest, freshest presentation to our Lord? or have we, apart from His side, opened our ear to the serpent?

The kingdom of heaven is as a supper, a royal, joyous feast got ready for sinners, that they might taste and see that the Lord is good, and that blessed is the man that trusteth in Him. It does not put God in the place of a receiver, for man to bring Him His due; but it puts Him in the place of a giver, and man is called to value His blessing. But the question is, Who listens, with desirous heart, to the bidding? Who wears "the wedding garment"? Who prizes Christ? Who triumphs in His salvation? Who longs for the day of His espousals? John had this garment on him, knowing, as he did, the joy of being the Bridegroom's friend. It was flowing at liberty on Mary's shoulders, as she sat at her Lord's feet and heard His words. Paul tucked it tight about him when he said, "God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." The eunuch had just put it on as "he went his way rejoicing" in the faith of the name of Jesus. Every sinner adorns himself with it the moment his heart values Christ. And what joy is it thus to know that when we put on Christ it is not "sackcloth" we put on, nor is it "the spirit of heaviness" we enter into, but "a wedding garment" has clothed us, and with "the garment of praise" we array our spirits!

Have we thus learned "the kingdom of heaven"? Have we, in spirit, entered it as a banqueting-hall where both magnificence and joy welcome us? Are we, consciously, guests at the marriage of a King's Son? Have we learnt the mysteries of the faith? Have we gazed at them? Has the musing over them kindled a fire in the heart to burn up the chaff of worldly rudiments? Paul had this element in his soul as he travelled through Greece. And how did the glow of these mysteries address itself to "the princes of the world" there? It consumed them all. "Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world?" Precious ardour of the Spirit! What a pile was thus fired in the famed cities of the learned and the wise! and how were all the thoughts of men thrown as rubbish into it!

And how did he treat the rudiments of the religiousworld? He bore the same fervent sense of Christ with him into their regions, to test what chaff and dross were there. In Galatia he found much of it; but he spared none of it. Though an angel from heaven gather such rubbish; though Peter himself help in the work; though the Galatians, who once would have plucked out their eyes for him, be enticed, nothing should stand before the heat of the Spirit that bore him onward. "O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you?.. Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years. I am afraid of you."

Could he do less? Could he carry Jesus in his heart, and calmly stand and measure his light with the lights of Greece, or God's great ordinance with man's traditions?

It is to make much of Christ we want, beloved-much of Himself, and His glorious achievements for sinners. We want simplicity in that sense of the word-the breathings of a soul content with Him, and the peace of a conscience for ever at rest in His sufficiency. "What think ye of Christ?" is the test, as a dear hymn well known among us has it-

"Some call Him a Saviour, in word,But mix their own works with His plan,And hope He His help will afford,When they have done all that they can:If doing prove rather too light(A little they own they may fail),They purpose to make up full weightBy casting His name in the scale."Some style Him the pearl of great price,And say He's the fountain of joys,Yet feed upon folly and vice,And cleave to the world and its toys-Like Judas, the Saviour they kiss,And, while they salute Him, betray-Ah, what will profession like thisAvail in His terrible day!"If asked what of Jesus I think,Though all my best thoughts are but poor,I say, He's my meat and my drink,My life, and my strength, and my store;My Shepherd, my Husband, my Friend,My Saviour from sin and from thrall,My hope from beginning to end,My portion, my Lord, and my all."

May these thoughts and affections be ours. They are the sweet witness of the one faith, the one Lord, the one Spirit (Eph. iv.), for they express the leading, ruling mind of the Canticles. There the soul in kindred affection has but one object, but that one is enough. It is satisfied, and never for a moment looks for a second. It has the "Beloved," and cares for nothing else. If it grieve, it is over the want of capacity to enjoy Him. It seeks for nothing but Jesus, lamenting only that it is not more fully and altogether with Him. And this is the experience we have to desire-to find in the Lord a satisfying object, a cure for the wanderings of the poor heart, which, till it fix on Him, will go about and still say, "Who will show us any good?" "The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them, because he knoweth not how to go to the city."

"That unsatisfiedness with transitory fruitions which men deplore as the unhappiness of their nature is indeed the privilege of it." Just indeed, and truly to be prized, is such a sentiment. For this thirsting again, this spending of "labour for that which satisfieth not," casts the heart on Jesus, As this has ever been, so is it now. The building of palaces, the planting of vineyards, the getting of singing-men and singing-women, the multiplying of the delights of the children of men, all these efforts and travails of the heart take their course and have their way still. Eccles. ii. But Jesus revealed to the heart, as in this book, commands these thoughts and purposes away. It speaks the language of the blessed Lord Himself; and the experience in it is the experience of the poor woman who was able to leave her pitcher at the well-"Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life."

"I am the Root and the Offspring of David, and the Bright and Morning Star… Even so, come, Lord Jesus."

HEAVEN AND EARTH

"In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." The scene of the divine handiwork was twofold; and, accordingly, "in the dispensation of the fulness of times," God will display Himself again, both in heaven and on earth.

I would begin my meditation on this divine subject with Genesis i-xlvii., which presents, I judge, a beautiful view of the Lord acting, by turns, as in heaven and on earth, till, at the close, we find them together in a way typical of what their connection and yet distinctness will be in that coming dispensation of the fulness of times. May our meditations be always submitted to His truth and Spirit, and conducted in the temper of worshippers.

Genesis I. II.– It was only of the earth that Adam was made lord. The garden was his residence, and he was to replenish and subdue the earth. This was the limitation of his inheritance and of his enjoyments. He knew of heaven only as he saw it above him, and by its lights dividing his day and his night. But he had no thoughts which linked him, personally, with it.

III. – But Adam transgressed and lost the garden, and became a drudge in the earth, instead of being the happy lord of it. Gen. iii. 17-19. He was now to get a bare existence out of it, till he was laid down in death upon it.

IV. V. – Such was his changed condition. To cling to the earth now as one's delight and portion was to act in bold defiance of the Lord of judgment. And such was the spirit of Cain and his family. He thought the earth good enough for God, and desired nothing better for himself. He gave God the fruit of it, and built a city for himself on the face of it, furnishing it with desirable things of all sorts, unmoved by the thought of the blood with which his own hand had stained it, and of the presence of the Lord, on whom he had turned his back. But such was not Adam, or Abel, or Seth, or that line of worshippers who "call on the name of the Lord." They have in the earth only a burying-place. But grace having provided a remedy for them as sinners, and righteousness having separated them from a cursed earth, they believe in the remedy, and seek no place or memorial in the earth, and the Lord gives them a higher and a richer inheritance, even in heaven with Himself, as signified in the translation of Enoch.

VI. – IX. – But though the Lord is thus removing the scene of His counsels and the hopes of His elect from earth to heaven, yet the earth is not given up. It is, we know, destined to rejoice, by-and-by, in the liberty of the glory; or, as I have already quoted, in "the dispensation of the fulness of times." Eph. i. 9, 10. And, accordingly, this purpose the Lord will at times rehearse and illustrate, as He does now, in due season, in the history of Noah.

The heavenly family, as we have just seen, only died both to and in the earth. They could speak, it is true, both of its coming judgment and blessing. Enoch foretold of the one, and Lamech of the other. Jude 14; Gen. v. 29. But they were, neither of them, in the scenes they thus talked about. But Noah, who comes after them, is a man of the earth again. In his day the earth re-appears as the scene of divine care and delight. God has communion with man upon it again. It has passed through the judgment of the water, and God makes a covenant with it, has the prophet, priest, and king upon it, providing for its continuance and godly government. Noah's connection with it was quite unlike that of either Cain or Seth. He did not, like the former, fill it and enjoy it in defiance of God; nor did he, like the latter, take merely a burying-place in it; but he enjoyed the whole of it under the Lord. The Lord sanctioned his inheritance of it, his dominion over it, and his delight in it.

X. XI. – Thus the earth, in its turn, again takes up the wondrous tale, and is the care and object of the Lord. But again it becomes corrupt before Him. Noah himself, like Adam, begins this sad history, and the builders of Babel, like another family of Cain, perfect the apostasy, seeking to fill the earth with themselves independently of God. They were mighty hunters before the Lord. They scoured the face of the earth, as though they asked, in infidel pride, "Where is the God of judgment?"

XII. – XXXVI. – This, however, was not allowed. Another judgment comes upon them. They are scattered, and the whole human social order is awfully broken up. But Abram is called out to find his fellowship with God, apart from the world. His family dwelt in Mesopotamia beyond the Euphrates. He came from the stock of Shem, but was a worshipper of idols, as all the nations were. But sovereign grace distinguishes him, and the God of glory calls him forth from kindred, from home, and from country.

It is a call, however, that does not interfere with the order of the earth, or government among the nations. He is called to be a stranger, and not a rival of "the powers," or a new-modelled governor of any people. He walks with God as the God of glory-a higher character than that of the one by whom "the powers that be are ordained." He is a pilgrim and stranger on earth, and walks as a heavenly man. He has promise that his seed and inheritance in the earth shall become linked together by-and-by; but he, with Isaac and Jacob, dwell in tents all their days, and a tent life is that of a stranger here, of one that is not at home and at rest.

Here, then, we have a heavenly people again-heavenly in the character of their walk, and heavenly, like Enoch or Lamech, in their intelligence about the earth's future history, and the promise to their seed of inheritance in it in due season. But we have still deeper and fuller mysteries in the history of him who comes after them.

XXXVII. – XLVII. – Through the wickedness of his brethren, as we all know, for it is a favourite story, Joseph is estranged from the scene of the promised and covenanted inheritance, and becomes first a sufferer, and then a husband, a father, and a governor, in the midst of a distant people; till at last his brethren, who once hated him, and the inhabitants of the earth, are fed and ruled by him in grace and wisdom.

Nothing can be more expressive than all this. It is a striking exhibition of the great result purposed of God "in the dispensation of the fulness of times." Joseph is cast among the Gentiles; and there, after sorrow and bondage, becomes the exalted one, and the head and father of a family with such joy, that his heart for a season can afford to forget his kindred in the flesh. This surely is Christ in heaven now, exalted after His sorrows, and with Him the Church taken from among the Gentiles, made His companion and joy during the season of His estrangement from Israel. But in process of time Joseph is made the depositary and the dispenser of the world's resources; his brethren, as well as all beside, become dependent on him; he feeds them and rules them according to his pleasure. And this as surely is Christ, as He will be in the earth by-and-by, with Israel brought to repentance and seated in the fairest portion of the earth, and with all the nations under His sceptre, when He will order them according to His wisdom, feed them out of His stores, and re-settle them in their inheritance in peace and righteousness.

Surely the heavens and the earth are, in type, here seen, as they will really be in "the dispensation of the fulness of times," when all things, both in heaven and on earth, shall be gathered together in Christ. Surely this is a rehearsal of the great result, and the heavens and the earth tell out together the mystery of God!

And I cannot but observe the willing, unmurmuring subjection which the Egyptians yield to Joseph. He moves them hither and thither, and settles them as he likes, but all is welcome to them; and so, in the days of the kingdom, the whole world will be ready to say, Jesus has done all things well. What blessedness! Subjection to Jesus, but willing and glad subjection! His sceptre getting its approval and its welcome from all over whom it waves and asserts its power!

And again I observe that all this power of Joseph is held in full consent of Pharaoh's supremacy. The people, and the cattle, and the lands, are all bought by Joseph for Pharaoh. It is Pharaoh's kingdom still, though under Joseph's administration-as in the kingdom of which this is the type, every tongue shall confess Jesus Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

These features give clear expression and character to the picture. But there is one other touch (the touch of a master's hand, I would reverently say) in this picture which is not inferior in meaning or in beauty to any. I mean, that in all this settlement of the earth, Asenath and the children get no portion. They are not seen; there is no mention of them even. Jacob may get Goshen; but Asenath, Ephraim, and Manasseh, nothing. Is it that the wife and children were loved less, and the father and brethren more? Nay, that cannot be. But Asenath and the children are heavenly, and have their portion, the rather in and with him who is the lord and dispenser of all this, and they cannot mingle in the interests and arrangements of the earth. Even Goshen, the fairest and fattest of the land, is unworthy of them. They are the family of the lord himself. They share the home, and the presence, and the closest endearments of him who is the happy and honoured head of all this scene of glory.

Is not this the great result, in miniature or in type? Have we not in all this that promised "dispensation of the fulness of times," when God will gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven; and which are on earth? Are not the heavens and the earth here seen and heard together in their millennial order? I surely judge that they are. "Known unto God are all His works, from the beginning of the world."

But as we go on in the course of the divine dispensations, earthly and heavenly scenes and purposes still unfold themselves. Israel, in their turn, and after these scenes in the hook of Genesis, become the witness of God, and an earthly people. A portion of the world is sanctified for God's possession and dwelling-place again. As the deluge had purified the whole of it for the divine power and presence in Noah's day, so the sword of Joshua now purifies a portion of it for the same divine power and presence in Israel. God has His sanctuary and His throne in the land of Canaan. He is worshipped in Jerusalem, and there His law is dispensed. The glory is again in the earth. As Lord of the earth, the God of Israel keeps court and rule on the earth again. But all is corrupted again. Canaan was defiled by the apostasy of Israel, as the Noah-earth had been defiled by the tower of Babel. Ezekiel, who was set as a watchman in the day of this apostasy, sees therefore the glory on its way from Jerusalem to heaven. It does not seek any other spot on earth, but, being disturbed at Jerusalem by the defilements there, it retreats to heaven. Ezekiel xi.

Up to this day of Ezekiel the glory had communicated with Israel in power. It was a glory, or divine presence, that had judged Egypt, guided the camp through the desert, smitten the nations of Canaan, divided their land among the tribes, and then seated itself in the temple and on the throne at Jerusalem. All this was the glory in power. But, as we have seen, Israel had now forfeited it, and it returns to heaven. But it had another character in which to show itself. This same glory, or the divine presence, God Himself, returns veiled in the person of Jesus; in whom, as a rejected Galilean, or carpenter's son, having not where to lay His head, worse off in the world than the birds or the foxes, it went about in the land of Israel in fullest grace, healing, preaching, toiling, watching; poor, yet enriching others; thirsty and hungry, yet feeding thousands, and in every thing as simply and surely declaring itself to be the glory, as it did when it divided the waters of Jordan, or threw down the walls of Jericho. Only it was the glory in its grace now, as it had been the glory in its power then. In this form, however, Israel, or the earth, forfeited it also, though it did not leave the earth in the same way. Of old, when rejected in its power, it left the earth of itself, in righteous anger resenting the affront done to its majesty, and withdrawing itself in judgment (Ezek. i. – xi.); but now, being rejected in its grace, it is at last rather sent away than withdraws itself. But still, whether we see the glory in power or in grace, the earth has forfeited it, and it is now hid in the heavens. See Acts vii. 55.

This is the history of the glory since Ezekiel xi. to the ascension of Jesus. And it is again where the prophet of God saw it going in that chapter, that is, in heaven. Only it is now gathering the fulness of the Gentiles there, receiving to itself the "holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling." The Holy Ghost has come forth to tell us here of the glory there, to form us into association with its own wondrous history, or to make its portion our portion.

Such is the place, and such the action, of the glory now.

But there is another stage in its history still. Ezekiel sees it return to the very spot from whence it set out. Ezekiel xliii. It had never sought any other place on earth. If Zion be unprepared for Jesus, the earth must lose Him, for of Zion alone has He said, "This is my rest for ever." But the glory does return, as we see in that chapter of Ezekiel. And then will arise that system commonly known by the name of "the millennium," when Jesus will become the centre, the true ladder which Jacob saw, the sustainer of all things in heaven and on earth, reconciling all by His blood, and then gathering all in Himself to spread His glories over all. See Isaiah iv. 5, 6.