one wiser and humbler; and he now even DANTE'S "Vita Nuova" has hardly goes to the opposite extreme of refusing anything more mystical than this, to obey when the Lord would send him. written by Jonathan Edwards of his The undertaking seems too great for him, betrothed: “ They say there is a young and he presents all sorts of excuses with lady in New Haven who is beloved of a view of escaping from the responsibili- that Great Being who makes and rules ty which it involves. Certainly I will the world, and that there are certain be with thee. This assurance ought at seasons in which this Great Being, in once to have determined his course, for some way or other, comes to her and with God's help we can do all things. fills her mind with exceeding sweet deThis shall be a token unto thee ye light, and that she hardly cares for anyshall serve God upon this mountain. The thing except to meditate on Him. She token is the success of the enterprise it- has a singular purity in her affections; self. But how could that be a token, is most just and conscientious in all her that is, a sign of success? The language conduct; and you could not persuade means, according to Bush, "Go now and her to do anything wrong or sinful if try; and you shall find by the event that you would give her all this world, lest I have sent you.' she should offend this Great Being. VERSES 13-14. What is his name? She is of a wonderful calmness, sweetMoses had so little confidence in him- ness, and universal benevolence, espeself now that he would undertake noth- cially after this great God has maniing of himself. Whatever he might fested Himself to her mind. She will do, he would do only in the name and sometimes go about from place to place by the authority of God. And the singing sweetly, and seems to be always divine name was to accredit him also to full of joy and pleasure, and no his people.. Hitherto God had been knows for what. She loves to be alone, known and invoked by different names, walking in the fields and groves, and such as El (strong one), El Elion (most seems to have some one invisible always high), El Shaddai (almighty), and es- talking with her." He married this pecially Elohim, the plural of Eloah. dear girl at seventeen, and of their The name Jehovah seems also to have blessed union, in the second generation, been known before this time, but not came Aaron Burr.-Christian Intelliused very much. I AM THAT I AM. gencer. The self-existent, the eternal, the unchangeable One, who, because He is A FATHER and his little son were unchangeable, keeps His covenant and once riding along a familiar road with performs His promises; hence, the cove- a gentle horse. To gratify the child nant God, or God of revelation. There the father placed the reins in his hand, is a similarity between the self-descrip- but at the same time, unseen, retained tion of God here and the language used his own hold on them. As they rode by our Lord in John viii. 58: "Be- on they saw approaching them, at terfore Abraham was, I am," from which rific speed, a runaway team. The danwe may infer that the being, the subject ger was great and imminent. But the speaking, is the same in both cases. father guided his horse so that a colliClosely connected with this self-utter- sion was avoided, and the danger ance of God, and in Hebrew almost escaped. identical with it in form, is the word Jehovah or Jahveh, which occurs very often in the Old Testament, and in our English Bibles is, with a few exceptions, translated Lord. The name Jehovah, accordingly, designates God as the selfexistent, unchanging, ever-living God, who reveals Himself, enters in covenant with men, and keeps His covenant promises. When all was over, the little son looked up to his father, and with choked utterance said, "I thought I was driving, but I wasn't, was I, papa ?" So often does the child of God, when some peril has been escaped, or some deliverance has been vouchsafed in ways unforeseen and unthought of, have oceasion to say, "Father, I thought I was driving, but I wasn't." It is blessed to feel that the reins are in the hands of One mightier and wiser than we are. JULY 24. 1881. Sixth Sunday after Trinity. KEY-NOTE: According to His mercy He saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost." LESSON XXX. Moses and Aaron.-Exod. iv. 27—v. 4. 27. And the Lord 'said unto Aaron, Go into the wilderness to meet Moses. And he went, and met him in the mount of God, and kissed him. 28. And Moses told Aaron all the words of the Lord who had sent him, and all the signs which he had commanded him. 29. And Moses and Aaron went and gathered together all the elders of the children of Israel: 30. And Aaron spake all the words which the Lord had spoken unto Moses, and did the signs in the sight of the people. 31. And the people believed: and when they heard that the Lord had visited the children of Israel, and that he had looked upon their affliction, then they bowed their heads and worshipped. 1. And afterward Moses and Aaron went in, and told Pharaoh, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, Let my people go, that they may hold a feast unto me in the wilderness. 2. And Pharaoh said, Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice to let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go. 3. And they said, The God of the Hebrews hath met with us: let us go, we pray thee, three days' journey into the desert, and sacrifice unto the Lord our God; lest he fall upon us with pestilence, or with the sword. 4. And the king of Egypt said unto them, Wherefore do ye, Moses and Aaron, let the people from their works? get you unto your burdens. QUESTIONS. What is the Key-note for this day? How is it related to the Gospel and Epistle for the day? Is there any benefit in having been baptized? What is required of those who have been baptized? What is the subject of our lesson to-day? What relationship existed between Moses and Aaron? Which was the older of the two? VERSES 27-28. What did the Lord say to Aaron ? Did he go? Where did he meet Moses? What is meant by the mount of God? What was Moses doing when Aaron met him? What did Moses tell Aaron? What signs are referred to? verses 1-9. What are signs? For what purpose were these given to Moses? verse 5. VERS. 29-31. Whither did Moses and Aaron go? Whom did they gather together? What is meant by elders here? Why did they assemble these? Who spoke to them? Why did Aaron speak? vs. 13-16. What did he say? chap. iii. 15-17. What signs did he do? How were the people affected when they heard and saw these things? What did they do? Was this as Moses had expected? But was it as God had promised? VERSE 1. To whom did Moses and Aaron now go? What was the proper name of this Pharaoh? Where did Pharaoh probably reside at this time? Where was Zoan? What did they say to Pharaoh? What does the word Lord stand for here? Do you remember what Jehovah means? Why is Jehovah called God of Israel? Why does Jehovah call Israel His people? When was the covenant established ? What was the token thereof? What sacrament now corresponds with circumcision? Do all who are baptized now belong to the people of God? For what purpose does Jehovah demand the liberation of Israel? What is meant by feast here? VER. 2. What answer did Pharaoh give to the demand of Moses and Aaron? What did he mean by his question? What by saving, 1 know not the Lord? What sort of gods did Poaraoh know? What did he probably believe concerning Jehovah ? Was his ignorance of Jehovah itself a sin? VER. 3. What did Moses and Aaron here say? Who were the Hebrews? What is meant by the term God of the Hebrews? Whither do they ask permission to go? What was the length of a three days' journey? What did they assign as the end of this journey? Was their demand to go into the wilderness for this purpose a reasonable one? VER. 4. What does the king of Egypt say? What does the word let here mean? What mandate did he utter? What then was the result of this first application to Pharaoh? verses 6-9. Was this as God had foretold? Chap. iii. 19. Would it have been better, then, if no effort had been made to deliver Israel? Is the effort at deliverance from sin often painful too? Is this painfulness salutary? 1. Jesus! I live to Thee, The loveliest and best; My life in Thee, Thy life in me, 2. Jesus! I live to Thee, NOTES. The key-note expresses the the chiefs of families or tribes, who theme of the Epistle for the day, in were generally old men. The Israelites which we are taught how that "better in Egypt preserved their own national righteousness," spoken of in the Gospel, organization. As a body they were subis to be obtained. By baptism, the ject to the Egyptian government, while "washing of regeneration," we are as individuals they obeyed leaders or made members of Christ (baptized into officers of their own people. Any Christ), and therefore partakers of the movement in behalf of the people must merits of His atoning death, and of the therefore be submitted to the elders or power of His risen life; and what is chiefs, and their influence and co-operarequired of us now is that "henceforth tion must first of all be secured. And we should not serve sin," or that we Aaron spake. The last excuse that should "reckon ourselves to be dead in- Moses made for not accepting the divine deed unto sin, but alive unto God commission, was, that he was not elothrough Jesus Christ." quent, but slow of speech and slow of tongue. For this reason God appointed Aaron to be speaker on public occasions, while Moses was the organ for divine communication. "He shall be to thee instead of a mouth, and thou shalt be to him instead of God." In accordance with this arrangement Aaron appears here as speaker, while the subject-matter of his discourse proceeds from Moses. And did the signs. Performed the miracles mentioned above. In the sight of the people. The elders, with whom there may have been assembled also many of the common people. And the people believed. This was contrary to the expectation of Moses. He remembered the disastrous failure of his effort forty years before. He knew that by long bondage their spirit had been broken; and he knew, too, that their religious faith was weak. Therefore he said, They will not believe me, nor hearken unto my voice. But God had promised him a favorable reception; and according to that promise it now happened. Lord had visited the children of Israel. During the period of their residence in Egypt the Israelites preserved, in a measure at least, the faith and worship of the God of their fathers. But this seems not to have been a period of great religious activity. After the first generation was gone, there were no more prophets in Israel, no more revelations, no more signs, and miracles, and visions. But now the Lord had visited His people, a new period of religious activity had commenced, and the people now were ready to believe and to worship. Revivals of the Church, like the Reformation in the sixteenth century, can not be made by the will of man. They must wait until the Lord visits His peo VERSES 27-28. Aaron. A brother of Moses, three years older than the latter, now accordingly eighty-three years of age. He was a man of more eloquence and more popular talents than Moses, but of less force and decision of character. He had hitherto spent his life in Egypt, and knew all about the afflictions of his people; and, like his brother Moses, he no doubt, longed and prayed for their deliverance. The Lord said, Go into the wilderness. Out of his desire for the salvation of his people there grew a desire to go to meet Moses. This was the condition of the divine revelation. The wilderness is the desert of Sinai. He met him in the mount of God. Moses, after much hesitation, had returned the flock to Jethro and started to go to Egypt. At first he took along his wife and children, but for some reason he seems to have changed his purpose and to have sent them back again to Jethro; and he had now arrived again at Mount Horeb, on his journey to Egypt, when Aaron met him. Moses told Aaron all the words of the Lord. The promises and commands which Jehovah had given him. And all the signs. The miracles of the rod, of the leprous hand and of the water, related in verses 1-9. A sign, in the sense in which the word is here used, is a miracle attesting the presence of some supernatural power. Moses was furnished with miraculous power in order to accredit him to the king of Egypt as Jehovah's messenger. VERSES 29-31. Moses and Aaron went. They first went to Goshen in Egypt where the great body of the Israelites were still living. And gathered together all the elders. The elders were The ple. Then the leaders will be provided, and the people will be ready to hear. VERSE 1. And afterward. And afterward. After their meeting with the elders and chief men among the Israelites. Went in, and told Pharaoh. They went into the capital, and then into the palace of the king. This Pharaoh, it will be remembered, was called Amenophis. He is called Menephtha, on Egyptian monuments, and is said to have been a son of Rameses II. at the beginning of whose reign, as we remember, Moses was born. The residence of the Egyptian kings, at this time, seems to have been Zoan or Tanis, in lower Egypt, on the eastern side of the Tanitic arm of the Nile. There Moses and Aaron met Pharaoh, and there most of the marvellous events connected with the history of the Exodus occurred. Compare Ps. lxxviii. 12. Thus saith the Lord God of Israel. It will be remembered that the word Lord is a translation of Jehovah, which is connected with that self designation of God, "I am that I am," and served afterwards as a proper name for the eternal, selfexistent, living God of revelation, who had entered into covenant with Israel. The time with which we have here to do was an age of Polytheism. Many gods were acknowledged and believed. Every nation or tribe had its own god or gods, to which it gave proper names, thus distinguishing them from the gods of other nations or tribes. Thus the names of some of the Egyptian gods were Osiris, Isis, Serapis, Mnevis; while Baal and Moloch were favorite names for their imaginary divinities among the Canaanites. In this condition of things it was necessary that the Hebrews also should have a proper name for their God; and that name was Jehovah, than which a better could not have been used, as it expresses the eternal, self-existent being of God, in distinction from the merely imaginary divinities of the heathen. Jehovah, however, is called the God of Israel, not simply because Israel is the only people that knows Him, but because He has become their God in the covenant of circumcision. Therefore also Jehovah calls Israel His people, let my people go. For the history of the institution of the covenant of circumcision, see Gen. xvii. The sacrament now corresponding to circumcision, and Who is the Lord? serving as the token of the covenant, is baptism; and all who are baptized belong to the people of God. That they may hold a feast unto me. The first demand is not for an unconditional surrender of the people, but simply for a temporary furlough, with a view to celebrating a religious festival, consisting in worship and sacrifice. VERSE 2. I know not the Lord. No doubt Pharaoh was perfectly honest in saying that he did not know the Lord or Jehovah. He had probably never heard the name of Jehovah until now. But his declaration here is not an expression of disbelief in the existence of Jehovah. He probably looked upon Jehovah, as he looked upon any one of his own gods, as being only one among many, the national god of the Israelites, who if be ever did amount to much, had now lost his power and was not of much account. He probably measured the diguity of Jehovah by the dignity of the Israelites groaning under their burdens, from whom he thought he had not much to fear. But this ignorance itself was something sinful. Not to know the Lord, is a state of ignorance in which no one can long remain without fault. Besides, Pharaoh as a Polytheist, a believer in many gods, was as much obliged to grant freedom of worship to the Israelites. as to any other part of his subjects. His conduct, therefore, possesses the quality of tyrannical intolerance. VERSE 3. The God of the Hebrews. Hebrews is another name for the children of Israel, especially the one by which foreigners were in the habit of designating them. Here Moses and Aaron use the term by which Pharaoh himself has been accustomed to designate the people of Israel. Three days' journey. A three days' journey, encumbered with women, children, and cattle, could not be more than forty-five or fifty miles; and this distance would bring them into the desert of the Sinaitic peninsula, beyond the borders of Egypt. Sacrifice unto the Lord our God. This demand was a reasonable one even from an Egyptian standpoint. The Egyptians would have admitted that it was necessary for the Hebrews to worship their god, where and in what manner he might choose to demand. But this the laws regulating religion in Egypt did not permit them to do there. In Egypt the Hebrews could have sacrificed only to Egyptian gods. In order to sacrifice to Jehovah they must go beyond the borders of Egypt. Hence the request to be permitted to go into the wilderness was a reasonable one. VERSE 4. Wherefore do ye let the people from their work? i. e. Wherefore do ye hinder the people from their work? Pharaoh looks upon the demand simply as a device for obtaining respite from their labors. He thinks all they are after is to gain a holiday. and therefore roughly orders them off to their burdens. He regards Moses and Aaron as demagogues, who, if they were left alone, would cause the Egyptians much loss, and who must therefore be put down without much ceremony. The immediate result of this first application to Pharaoh, then, was not a favorable one. Their burdens, instead of being diminished, were increased. Compare verses 6-9. This was as God had foretold. See chap. iii. 19, 20. To many shortsighted Israelites it may have seemed that it would have been better were closed. As one who ministered to the sufferer bent over him, he at first thought him dead; but the white lips moved, and slowly in weak tones he repeated: "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray Thee, Lord, my soul to keep; pitying gaze of a brother soldier, he ex- but before I die I want to send a mes- He was carried to a temporary hospital, and a letter was written to his mother, which he dictated, full of Chris tian faith and filial love. Just as the "I pray Thee, Lord, my soul to take; The prayer of childhood was the prayer of manhood. He learned it at his mother's knee in infancy, and he whispered it in dying, when his manly life ebbed away on a distant battlefield. God bless the saintly words, loved and repeated alike by high and low, rich and poor, wise and ignorant, old and young. Happy the soul that can repeat them with the holy fervor of the dying soldier.-Dr. H. Bonar. if no effort at all had been made for their deliverance. Their condition now was worse than before. But after a was worse than before. But after all it was not so. Their burdens were increased for a little while, but only that they might be thrown off altogether. This is a type of our deliverance from sin, and of the effects which the Gospel often produces. Christ said, "I came not to send peace on earth, but a sword." But after the conflict, after all, comes peace. The process of repentance is a painful one. The "mortification of the A YOUNG lady has a Sunday-school old man" is not a pleasant process, but class of rather bright boys, ranging is the necessary condition of the "quick-between seven and nine years. Recently ening of the new man," and is therefore a salutary process. The Soldier's Prayer. she requested each pupil to come on the following Sunday with some passage of Scripture bearing on love. The lads heeded the request, and in turn recited their verses bearing upon that popular topic; such as "Love your enemies," It was the evening after a great bat-"Little children, love one another," tle. Among the many who bowed to the conqueror death that night was a youth in the first freshness of mature life. The strong limbs lay listless, and the dark hair was matted with gore on the pale broad forehead. His eyes etc. The teacher said to the boy whose turn came last: " Well, Robbie, what is your verse?" Rising, he responded, "Song of Solomon, second chapter, fifth verse: 'Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples; for I am sick of love."" |