The Wilderness and its Fruits

Next Part The Wilderness and its Fruits 2

"Therefore, behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her. And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; and she shall sing there as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt." Hosea 2:14-15

The prophecies of the Old Testament are often very obscure, and some almost unintelligible. This arises partly from the very nature of the subject, and partly from the highly figurative language in which they are couched. But, what adds to the difficulty, is our ignorance for the most part of the circumstances under which they were delivered, of the times to which they apply, and of the events which they dimly foreshadow.

But taking a broad view of prophetical Scripture, I consider that it admits for the most part of three distinct interpretations—historical, experimental, and unfulfilled; corresponding with the three times—past, present, and future.

1. HISTORICAL (past). Many prophecies of the Old Testament are already fulfilled; such as the sufferings, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ; the casting off of Israel; the calling of the Gentiles; the dispersion of the Jews. These prophecies have been fulfilled, their interpretation is strictly historical, and relates altogether to the past.

2. UNFULFILLED (future). But there is a large portion of prophecy which is still unfulfilled; such as the calling of the Jews; the second coming of Christ; and that glorious period stillfuture, when "the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea."

3. EXPERIMENTAL (present). But, besides the interpretation of those prophecies which are past and therefore fulfilled, and those which are future and therefore unfulfilled, there is that which bears more immediately and directly upon the present—experimental interpretation. And indeed, without this, this part of God's word would be to us a dead letter. If it did not bear upon our own experience; if there were not a spiritual interpretation as well as a literal; if prophecy were not descriptive of God's dealings with the soul now, we might as well put our Bible into the drawer. We might almost take a thread and needle, and sew up the prophetical part of God's word; or tear it out of the Bible, if it has no reference to us. To the past we look back with admiration; to the future we look forward in hope; but the present, the spiritual and experimental interpretation of prophecy as bearing upon our own soul, is that which most deeply concerns us. Living under the dispensation of the Spirit, we need a spiritual interpretation.

These three interpretations we find sometimes in the very same chapter. We have an instance in the one before us. (Hos. 2.) In it we find a prophecy already fulfilled; "I will cause all her mirth to cease, her feast-days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts; and I will destroy her vines and her fig-trees, whereof she has said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me; and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them." The present state of Judea stands forth as a literal fulfillment of these words. The new moons, the sabbaths, and solemn feasts of Israel have ceased in the land, and her vines and fig-trees are destroyed. But we have reason to believe that this chapter also contains prophecies which one day will be literally fulfilled; that when the Lord brings back his captive Zion, he will "betroth her unto him forever in righteousness, in judgment, in loving-kindness, and in tender mercy; he will betroth her unto himself in faithfulness, and she shall know the Lord." And, united with these two, we have the spiritual, experimentalinterpretation shining throughout the whole chapter, as bearing upon the experience of God's children. It is in this latter point of view, that I shall, with God's blessing, now consider the words before us. We may observe in them two leading features.

First; the bringing of Israel into the wilderness.

Secondly; what God does to her when he has brought her there.

I. The bringing of Israel into the wilderness. "Behold," he says, "I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness."

A. But what are we to understand by "the WILDERNESS"? I think we may understand by it two things. First, the world; secondly, the human heart. For, we shall find, if the Lord enable, that to a child of God both the world, and the human heart as dissected and laid bare by the Spirit of God, bear marks and characters of "a wilderness."

But what is "a wilderness?" We must comprehend the word literally, before we can understand it spiritually.

1. A "wilderness," then, is, first, a place where no food grows. That is the very character of the Arabian desert. No grain grows there fit for man.

2. But secondly, it is a place where no food can be made to grow. Now, you know, in this country there are commons and heaths that do not bear grain in their present state; but they might be brought under cultivation and made to produce it. But there are wild, waste districts in the Scottish Highlands, which could not by any cultivation be made to grow grain. So with the "wilderness." You might plough, sow, harrow, and roll it, but you would never have a crop. The sun would dry it up; there is no soil in which the plant could grow. It might spring up for a time; but with all our attempts, it would soon utterly wither away.

3. And the third idea to make up a desert, and flowing out of the two former features, is, that it is a place of which the inhabitants are always rovers, without a settled habitation. They have no home, house, nor building, but live in tents; and are continually shifting the spot on which for a time they dwell.

Do not these three ideas very much make up the figure of a "wilderness?" See whether they are not applicable to two things in the experience of a child of God—the world, and hisown heart.

1. The WORLD is not "a wilderness" to a worldling. To him it is a beautiful estate, enclosed in a ring fence, with land easily cultivable and soil of the best quality, producing the richest crops, laden with golden harvests. But to a child of God, as I shall show you by and by, (if led into it,) the world is but a "wilderness;" from which no crop grows to feed his soul; from which by no exertions of his own can food be made to grow; and in which he is, and ever must be, a wanderer, not a settled inhabitant.

2. And this, too, with the HUMAN HEART. We shall find, I think, these three ideas of "a wilderness" meeting also in the human heart, as laid bare by the keen dissecting knife of the Spirit to the spiritual eye of a child of God. Out of his heart no food can come, for "in him, that is, in his flesh, dwells no good thing;" there is no food in it for his new nature; nothing of which he can say, 'This is what my soul can feed upon.' And though he may seek to cultivate it, and is bidden and admonished to do so; and though he has tried often to put in the plough, to clean it with the hoe, to rake it with the harrow, to sow good seed, and to water it perhaps with the waterpot, yet, after all his attempts, the harvest is only a heap of sand in the day of desperate sorrow, the soil being absolutely barren, totally uncultivable and unproductive, with all his fairest exertions. He is tossed up and down, in consequence, finding nothing in his heart on which he can set his foot, on which he can build for eternity, or in which he can safely and happily dwell, as a fixed resting-place.

Now, bear these things in wind, and when I come to the "wilderness," as the Spirit of the Lord has promised to bring his people there, you will then see whether you have an experimental knowledge of these two things for yourselves.

B. The Lord says, "Behold, I will ALLURE her." Does this mean the first work of the Spirit upon the soul? I believe not. The first work of the Spirit, we read in Scripture, and we find confirmed by experience, is, to convince of sin, to pierce to the heart, to wound, to make the soul sensible of its state before God, and its utter alienation from him. Therefore, the word "allure," cannot apply to the first work of the Spirit upon the soul. Men may talk of being drawn by love; but what is the religion of those who are thus drawn by love? What depth, what reality, what power, what life, what godliness is there in it? The word "allure" is not applicable, then, to the first beginning of a work. That first work usually commences with conviction, a sight and sense of sin, a cry for mercy, a feeling of wretchedness and ruin, and a despair of salvation in self.

But after the Lord has been pleased thus to pierce, to wound, to convince, and bring down, he often, perhaps usually, drops down some sweetness, blessedness, and consolation into the soul. He gives it to taste a few 'dewdrops of his love', some 'honey-drops from the Rock of Ages'. This I call the "Spring of the soul". You know what a beautiful season spring is; when the leaves are clothing the trees, when the birds are singing upon the branches, when the flowers are springing out of the ground, when the chilly winds of winter are gone, when the balmy breezes blow from the south, when the sun rises high in the sky, and sheds gladness over the face of the renewed earth. Thus the soul has, generally speaking, a Spring; and, as there is but one spring in nature, so for the most part there is but one spring in grace. As regards our natural life, it is only once that we are young; and it is so spiritually; we only once enjoy that sweet season of which Job speaks, "As I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle." (Job 29:4.)

During, then, this youth of the soul, this Spring season, this "day of espousals," there is an "alluring" of the heart unto God. Now this we need. And why? Perhaps we are bound up with carnal companions, or by snares we cannot break; hampered by worldly relations, and their persecutions we cannot face; tied down with lusts and sins, and the chain of these we cannot burst; in the world, and unable to come out of it. Notwithstanding all the frights, terrors, alarms, and convictions that the soul may experience, (though these for a time may operate, and that powerfully); yet when their effect has ceased, it slips back into the old spot; it is not fairly or fully brought out. We need something beyond law and terrors to do that; we need something besides thunder and lightning to bring the soul fully unto God.

There is an old fable of the 'Sun' and 'North wind', once having a strife as to which could first make a traveler throw aside his coat. The 'North wind' had the first trial. But though he sent forth his chilling blasts, trying to blow the traveler's coat off, yet the more that powerful cold wind blew, the tighter and closer did the traveler wrap his cloak around him. But when he had blown his worst and last, and was defeated, then the 'Sun' tried what he could do. He burst from the clouds in all his warmth and brightness, and shot his rays with such fervor, that the traveler soon threw aside his cloak, and fled to the woods. I dare say, the fable was meant to illustrate the difference between 'harshness' and 'kindness'; but it seems to bear upon our subject also.

Law terrors, convictions, and alarms—these are like old 'North wind', with his blustering cheeks; they will not bring the great coat off; you wrap the old cloak tighter round you. Something melting is wanted; something warming, cheering, reviving, comforting, and blessing. And when the Sun begins to shine, and a few rays of righteousness, warmth, light, life, and love beam upon the heart, then it does in a moment what law and terrors could not do in a century—it melts off the old garment, brings the soul unto Jesus, and into sweet union and communion with him.

There is felt and seen, then, a beauty, a blessedness, a reality, a sweetness in the things of God, which the tongue cannot describe. By it the heart is drawn unto the Lord Jesus, to the truth as it is in Jesus, to the people of Jesus, and to the service of Jesus. The world, friends, foes, relations are all disregarded; neither frowns nor smiles have any effect. There is such a sweetness then felt in the things of God, such a blessedness and reality, that the soul is "allured" by them out of everything that before held it back from union with a living Head.

Under these blessed feelings, a soul will do anything for Christ; will make any sacrifice, give up anything, bear anything, endure anything for the Lord Jesus. The 'Spring of nature' is beautiful to see; but the 'Spring of grace' is more beautiful to feel. Early days, if not the most profitable, yet are often the best days in our feelings.

Now, by these "allurements," sweetness, and blessedness, the Lord draws the soul into a profession of religion, into perhaps joining a church, taking up the cross, walking with the people of God, putting itself forward, and that in the utmost sincerity, to serve the Lord Jesus. And perhaps, we think, we shall enjoy this all our days. At this season, when we see old professors carnal and worldly-minded, and we feel full of life and zeal; some mourning and sighing, and we singing and dancing; others complaining of their bad hearts, when we scarcely know that we have a bad one; others cast down with temptations, and we not exposed to them; or groaning under trials, and we ignorant of them; we think that they must be deceived. We say, 'That is not religion; the religion we have is a very different thing; there is a sweetness in ours; there is a comfort, a blessedness in it.'

Perhaps we write very hard things against these old professors; think they have been doing something very bad, and have sinned away their comforts; or that it is their own fault they are not so lively, so happy, and so comfortable as we. But we do not know what the Lord is doing by this "alluring," nor what his purposes are; that all this is to bring us "into the wilderness." And when he has got us there fairly and fully, then to show us what the "wilderness" really is.

Next Part The Wilderness and its Fruits 2

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