Life Given for a Prey 2
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III. But I pass on to my next point, which is God's solemn DENUNCIATION– "Behold, I will bring evil upon all flesh."
This is a very comprehensive declaration from the mouth of God. Taking it in its widest extent, it embraces many circumstances, in fact, well near every circumstance, which is not connected with the kingdom of God, and the graces of his Spirit. Let me explain myself. God was about to bring evil upon all flesh in the days of Baruch– not moral evil, but evil in the way of wide and general distress, heavy national judgments, destruction of the city, and desolation of the whole land, with terrible slaughter of the inhabitants, and all those horrors which take place when a city is taken by storm. We cannot read the prophecies of Isaiah and Jeremiah, without seeing what denunciations they contain against all flesh, that is, not merely all who are in the flesh, as men and women, but against every thing carnal, earthly, and distinct from what was of God.
You will see this especially declared in chapters 2 and 3 of Isaiah, in which, after pronouncing that "the day of the Lord of hosts should be upon every high tower and upon every fenced wall," the prophet adds– "Your men shall fall by the sword, and your mighty in the war. And her gates shall lament and mourn; and she being desolate shall sit upon the ground." (Isa. 3:25, 26.) Now when that evil was to be brought upon all flesh, what benefit would it have been to Baruch, if he could have gotten his great things? Say that he had risen very much in the world, had added house to house and field to field, and had become the wealthiest or most honored man in Jerusalem– what would it benefit him when the Chaldeans rushed through the breach in the wall with wrath in their faces and swords in their hands? Or if he was richly endowed with, and highly esteemed for his prophetical gifts, what would those gifts have availed him unless proportionate grace had accompanied them to support his soul when his prophecies came to pass? What became of those false prophets who buoyed the people up with false hopes? They were slain by the sword of the Chaldeans, and they and their prophecies perished together.
But, leaving the case of Baruch, let us take the words in another sense and view them as having a spiritual bearing. There is no use looking back through the vista of years at Baruch and his troubles; it is better to look at home and see how far the words are applicable to ourselves. God means to bring evil upon all flesh, and if so, taking the words in their full extent, there is not a single fleshly thing upon which he will not bring evil.
Now he brings evil upon all flesh in two ways– first, by bringing down his heavy hand upon it in the way of judgment; and secondly, by manifesting unto us the evil that is in it.
Have you found your airy dreams and cherished projects realized? Have your ambitious projects been crowned with success? Have you not had repeated disappointments, and have not others, who seemed inferior to you in ability or in promise, outstripped you in the race? Here was God bringing evil upon all flesh. Your fleshly projects, your carnal hopes, your airy castles, your dreams of happiness, your romantic expectations of a little earthly paradise, have all been cruelly, as you have thought in the bitterness of your soul, disappointed; the buds dropped off just when they began to promise flower, and a blight fell upon your whole life, or at least, until you could recover from the blow. This was bringing evil upon your flesh so that you could not reap the harvest you had been indulging anticipations of.
But take the words in the other sense which I named. God shows us sooner or later the evil of all flesh– the evil of a fleshly confidence, of fleshly faith, of fleshly hope, of fleshly love, in a word, of all religion that stands in the flesh. Now when we begin to see the evil that God thus brings upon all flesh, and upon our flesh in particular, so as to cut up root and branch all our fleshly confidence, fleshly hopes, fleshly religion, it makes us look out for something which is not flesh, which bears the stamp of God upon it; in other words, which is spirit and life. And we usually find, when we make the search, that that which is spiritual in us lies in a very small compass, and that which is fleshly takes a very wide circumference.
Take away from you all the knowledge which stands in the flesh; take away all your faith, all your hope, all your love, which has not been wrought in your heart by a divine power; cut down into your religion and dissect it minutely, so as to get into its deepest center; weigh and examine it in the light of God's countenance, so as to reduce it to its actual dimensions, and separate its constituent parts, putting on your right hand what is of the Spirit, and on your left what is of the flesh– how much real, living faith will you find in your soul? How much of a good hope through grace, and how much love of God's own shedding abroad? How much of your long profession is there which weighed in the balance of the sanctuary is found to be good weight? How much is there of your daily life and walk which has God's approbation, or even your own upon it, when you lie upon your bed at night and look through with searching eye the transactions of the day?
Don't you marvel sometimes when you look at your religion to see how small and scanty it is– when you weigh your experience by the word of God and its daily practical effect upon you, to see how short it comes? When you compare your religion, your actions, your life and conduct with the Bible standard, with what godly men have done and suffered of old, with books written by gracious men that are commended to your conscience– when you compare your poor, scanty religion with theirs, does it not make you tremble with fear and apprehension lest you have none at all?– lest you be a presumptuous hypocrite and not a real child of God?
Now do not think that this earnest and anxious spirit of inquiry is legal, full of hard and heavy bondage, contrary to the spirit of the gospel and the liberty with which Christ makes his people free. If you really possess the liberty of God's giving, and the love of his shedding abroad, such a searching of your heart will not damp or destroy them. But if you have not been exercised about your religion, and had it settled by the Lord himself in your favor, you may depend upon it, that sooner or later, you will be put into the furnace; for "the fire is to try every man's work of what sort it is." God has "chosen Zion in the furnace of affliction," and you will find that he will put you into circumstances in which your fleshly faith and confidence will be burnt up. When, then, you get into the furnace and begin to look out for something that is of God, that he has done for you and in you by his Spirit and grace, you will find how scanty it seems to be, so that in the confusion and darkness into which you will fall you may scarcely be able to lay your hand upon anything which seems to be truly and really of God.
This is the effect of the Lord bringing evil upon all flesh; that he may search you and try you, and by burning up everything which is not his own gift and work, strip you of all that vain confidence in which you may have so often sought to rest. O when the Lord searches Jerusalem as with candles, what hidden evils he brings to light; and as our sins are thus laid open to view, what little grace we may have seems as if buried and lost out of sight.
IV. But now comes the gracious PROMISE!"But your life will I give unto you for a prey in all places where you go."
The Lord had told Baruch that he was not to seek great things. He would not allow him to go on in a path which would bring destruction and death into his soul. He warned him that he would bring evil upon all flesh; that he would pluck up what he had planted, even the whole land. But he gives him a gracious promise, that amid all this destruction he would give him his life for a prey.
Now this life might have been in Baruch's case, and most probably was, his 'natural' life, and that he should not perish in the destruction of Jerusalem. But the life which most concerns us, taking the text in an experimental sense, is the 'spiritual' life, the life of God in the soul. Where the Lord has begun a gracious work, he has deposited deep in the heart his own life. However surrounded, therefore, this life of God may be by the flesh; however it may seem at times buried in the dust and chaff of this wretched world and of this evil heart, there it is, in all its holy beauty, in all its heavenly nature, in all its blessed reality, in all its divine origin. And remember this, that it is a life not only spiritual, but eternal; a life that can never die. Our gracious Lord, therefore, said to the woman of Samaria, that the water which he gives is a well of water springing up into everlasting life. John the Baptist also testified that "he who believes on the Son has everlasting life;" not shall have, but "has," that is, has it now.
A. But this life is given in a very peculiar way; it is "given for a prey." But what is life given for a prey? It is, as it were, snatched out of the very paw of the bear and the lion; something which is rescued out of the hand of an enemy that would destroy it in a moment, and valued all the more as a precious gift of God, because taken out of the hand of the spoiler.
Now examine your religion and your experience, and the way you have been led by the light of this testimony. You have, you hope you have, the life of God in your soul; you have, you hope you have, a divine principle in your bosom. But now see how it is surrounded by everything which has evil in it, and all ready to prey upon it. Here is the flesh surrounding it on every side. God then brings evil upon this flesh. He cuts to pieces by his keen strokes your fleshly confidence, fleshly faith, fleshly hope, fleshly religion. By shining into the dark recesses of our mind, he shows us evil in all we say, think, and do. Then we find what little religion we have is God's special gift and work, that the little we possess is snatched out of the hand of the spoiler, and is kept in the soul only by the mighty power of God.
Have you never seen with dismay this troop of wild beasts, all hungering after this life of God, that they may tear it to pieces? Here is sin, the world, Satan, and what is worse than all, our own vile nature, all seeking to lay violent hands upon the life of God in the soul, like so many wild beasts at the Zoological Gardens at feeding time, roaring after the food to be given to them. Yet it is kept by the power of God in a miraculous way out of their mouths. The life he gives he maintains; the hope he imparts he encourages; and the love which he has shed abroad he never takes away, but now and then shines upon it and renews it.
B. But observe, further, for I must be brief now, how this life is "given for a prey in all places where you go." Baruch could never go out without wild beasts being after him. Yet the life of God remained firm in his soul, nor did he get into any place in which that life was not preserved. So you may sometimes get into dark places, dead places, rebellious places, unbelieving places, places of great affliction, desertion, desolation, trouble and sorrow; and yet if the Lord has put life into your soul, he has given that life for a prey in all places where you go. You may change your station in life; you may change your house, your employment, your circumstances; but it will still be the same– life given for a prey in all places where you go.
"O," you may think, "it will be better with me by and by; I shall get a better religion, a better faith, or I shall be in a better state of soul, when I shall not be so much tried and exercised." You are mistaken– it will always be the same. Life is given for a prey. You may change your trial; you cannot change your heart. You may change your situation, but you cannot change your nature. Wherever you go, you will still find circumstances after you, the world after you, SELF after you, and all seeking to prey upon the life of God. Wherever you go it will always be the same life given for a prey. Thus you will have to carry your life in your hand to your dying day, and prove that nothing but the grace of God can save your soul.
But, amid it all, you will find his faithfulness to endure to the end, his strength to be made perfect in your weakness, and his love to support and bear you up until it brings you to himself. What a mercy it is that though given for a prey, the life of God can never be destroyed. Don't expect, therefore, to have it on any other terms. It is for the express purpose that he may have the honor and the glory of securing it entirely for himself!
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