Deuteronomy 6:23 And he brought us out from there, that he might bring us in, to give us the land which he swore to our fathers. Israel, brought out of Egypt, for awhile wandered in the wilderness. But they were not left in the wilderness; it was no part of God's purpose to leave them there; He brought them out from the house of bondage that He might give them the land large and good. I. The text has direct teaching for us WHEN THE DIVINE SPIRIT LEADS US OUT OF THE CARNAL LIFE. "He brought us out from thence." The redeeming God finds us in the Egypt of the fleshly, mind and the worldly life; finds us under a harsh, debasing rule; finds us full of bitterness; and by His good Spirit He moves us to go forth to a freer, brighter life. Let us be sure that we permit Him to bring us thoroughly out of the sordid, sensual past. To a large extent it was the ruinous mistake of Israel that they never truly and fully got out of Egypt. They remembered it too frequently, they talked about it too much, they recalled far too often and too vividly its coarse pleasures. Conversion, regarded etymologically or Scripturally, means a total change, an emphatic turning of the back on the far country, the steadfast setting of the face to Jerusalem. See to it that you cast no lingering look behind; drop the entangling friendships, the compromising habits, the unseemly tempers of the old guilty, godless life. But be absolutely sure that if you heartily renounce the carnal life God will bring you into a rich inheritance. The first experiences of the wilderness were very strange to the Israelites. All their habits of life had been suddenly changed: they had lost the leeks without getting the pomegranates; and in those days of transition they became impatient and disobedient. Had they persevered a little all would have come gloriously right. It is often thus with newly-converted men and women; there is an intermediate state in which the old world has been renounced, and in which the new world has not been realised, and this intermediate state is full of peril to the pilgrim soul. Wait, trust, hope, persevere, and the inheritance shall grow upon you. It is grand enough to be worth a little waiting for. We are all familiar with a certain class of emigrants who go forth with rosy expectations to distant lands, and who soon return utterly disappointed. In starting the higher life we have need of patience, patience that will not make us ashamed. Following on to know the Lord, new interests will spring up, new friendships will inspire, new hopes will dawn, new activities absorb and delight, new charms will disclose themselves in work and worship, new and richer meanings will shine through all things. II. The text is a message for us WHEN THE DIVINE PROVIDENCE SUDDENLY AND RADICALLY CHANGES OUR CIRCUMSTANCES. Life is continually changing, but in some periods its whole aspect is changed by some unexpected event, and we go out as Israel went out of Egypt, as their father went out not knowing whither he went. Some event occurs breaking up the business which seemed so well established, and the merchant driven from his old anchorage is in fear of quicksands amid strange waters. The working man with the least ceremony is discharged from the berth in which he has been able to secure for himself and others daily bread, and in the crowded labour market must find himself a fresh job as best he may. We are familiar with facts like these in this world of vicissitude, but who can express all the uncertainty and solicitude and sorrow they imply? It is a time of peculiar exposure, suffering, and peril to the creatures of the sea who have shed their old shell, and not yet got a new one; and birds of passage often perish in multitudes on their journey from one land to another. So the Christian, turned out of his nest, stripped of his shell, experiences a phase of life full of peril to faith and temper and character. The disruption of our circumstances is frequently followed by serious and even fatal moral and religious consequences. But be sure that if you fear God and follow His leading He has brought you out of the familiar life that He may give you a richer inheritance. "When one door shuts another opens." But you say, "Will the door that opens, open upon a situation as pleasant as the old?" It may open upon one a great deal better. Most men who have found their way to fortune owed their success to the fact that some door or other was once slammed in their face; but even should the opening door open on a more sombre situation, be sure that it opens up to you possibilities of far grander character and experience. I say, then, if God is leading you out of the old set of associations, do not be afraid; He is preparing you for something better, preparing something better for you. When God brought the Pilgrim Fathers out of this country they tasted to the full the bitter sorrows of dispossession; for dreary months they were tossed in the Mayflower, and then found it hard work to get foothold upon the strange coast. But in due time God brought them into the good land, giving them liberty of conscience and all else that makes life worth living. Whatever else may come to pass you shall finally acknowledge that disinheriting you, transporting you, God has brought you into a deeper faith, a stronger character, and set your feet in a large place of moral wealth and spiritual blessing. III. The text is full of encouragement AS THOUGH THE DIVINE GRACE WE PASS INTO A NEW YEAR. Time is even a greater leader than Moses, conducting us out of the familiar into the unknown. "We attempt to settle ourselves in what we conclude to be a fairly happy condition of things, to adjust our ideas, interests, and hopes to a fixed and permanent environment, but it is all in vain. But let us not repine. He brings us out from thence that He may bring us in to give us the land. Dispossessed so many times, it is that we may be made meet for an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away. Sir Samuel Baker writes in his diary as he penetrates the great unknown land, "It is curious in African travel to mark the degrees of luxury and misery; how one by one the wine, spirits, bread, sugar, tea, etc., are dropped like the feathers of a moulting bird, and nevertheless we go ahead contented." And despite the fact of their constantly dropping the conveniences of civilised life they might well go ahead contented, for were not their eyes every day looking upon the wonders of a new land of surpassing wealth and splendour? Our earthly losses are richly compensated in the growing wealth of our spirit. Let us take care that by our discontent and unbelief and disobedience we do not permit some painful and perilous hiatus to come between the losses of the material life and the accessions of the grace and glory of the higher life; let us grow into the diviner as we grow out of the coarser. IV. The text has gracious consolation for us WHEN THE DIVINE WILL ENDS THIS MORTAL LIFE. We do not take kindly to that last dispossession. "We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain that we can carry nothing out." We cannot take out as much as Israel took out of Egypt. But let not our faith fail us. He brings us out from this terrestrial life that He may bring us into the celestial. Cicero tells of a prisoner who had always lived in prison; he had never once seen the outer world. And so when he had become an old man, and they began for some reason or other to pull down the walls of his prison, he broke into bitter lamentings because they would destroy the little window through whose bars he had got the only bit of light that had ever gladdened his eyes. He did not understand that the falling of the walls would let him into a broad, bright world, would open to him the wide glories of sun and sky and summer. And so when we see the body sinking ruinous in decay it seems as if we were about to lose everything, forgetting that the senses are but the dim windows of the soul, and that when the body of our humiliation is gone the walls of our prison-house are gone, and a new world of infinite light and beauty and liberty bursts upon us. (W. L. Watkinson.) Parallel Verses KJV: And he brought us out from thence, that he might bring us in, to give us the land which he sware unto our fathers. |
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