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this talk of an ancient brother, is for them, and they must listen to it and obey it. That the

Great Spirit above the clouds now calls them by you to come and receive his grace by Christ the true star from Jacob, the Shiloh who has come, and to whom the people must be gathered. Inform them that by embracing this true seed of Abraham, you and multitudes of other gentiles, have become the children of that ancient patriarch; and now they must come back as your brothers in the Lord. Unfold to them their superlative line of the entail of the covenant; that

as touching this election, they are beloved for the fathers' sakes;" that they were for their sins excluded for this long period, until the fulness of the gentiles be come in, and so all Israel shall be saved.

Go, thou nation highly distinguished in the last days; save the remnant of my people.— Bring me a present of them" to the place of the name of the Lord of hosts, the Mount Zion."

NOTE-I have lately been informed that a Dr. M'Dounald has published something on this chapter similar to what I have written. What his ideas particularly are, I know not, as I have never been favoured with a sight of the book, nor seen any one who could give any particular account of his scheme.

CONCLUSION.

1. Ir becomes us to be deeply affected with the excommunication of the ancient people of God. In the temporary rejection of those two branches of the Hebrew nation, the truth is solemnly enforced, that the God of Zion is a God of government; and that he will be known by the judgments that he executeth. The casting out of the ten tribes for their impious idolatries, is full of instruction. The wonders God had done for them, and all their privileges in the land of promise, could not save, when they rejected the stated place of his worship, and united in the abominations of the open enemies of God. They should be hurled from the promised land, and abandoned to a state of savage wretchedness, for two and a half millinaries. Their sin in those dark ages of the old dispensation was no trifle. Its consequence is held up as an awful warning to the world. It impresses the following language; "Know thou and see that it is an evil thing and bitter that thou hast forsaken the Lord." To that event people under evangelical privileges ought to turn their eyes and take the solemn warning. The God of Abraham is a God of judgment; while blessed are all they that put their trust in him.

The judgments of Heaven on the Jews were still more dreadful. The Lord of that vineyard did indeed come in a day when they looked not for him, and in an hour when they were not

aware; and did cut them asunder. He came and miserably destroyed those husbandmen, and burned up their cities, as he foretold. Upon their turning him off with hypocrisy and willworship, and rejecting the Saviour, the denunciation, "Cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground?" was fulfilled with unprecedented decision. Let all rejectors of Christ, behold and tremble. The Jews were confident in a fancied security, to the last. But an impious confidence can never save. It is but a dead calm before a fatal catastrophe. Such presumptuous leaning upon the Lord, and saying, "Is not the Lord among us? no evil shall come upon us ;" was so far from saving, that it was a sure precursor of perdition, and of the coming of wrath upon them to the uttermost. Let gospel rejectors beware. "Behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish." "Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall."

2. How evident and rich is the entail of the covenant which will recover the two branches of the house of Israel! Truly they are "a nation of line, line;" (Isai. xviii. 2, in the Hebrew, and margin of the great Bible.) Though they be infidels, and rejected, and as touching the gospel are enemies for our sakes; yet as touching the election, (the entail of the covenant,) they are beloved for the fathers' sakes; Rom. xi. 28.This entail ensures their ingrafting again into their own olive tree, which shall be as life from the dead to the nations. This is the infallible hold upon them, which shall finally recover them again to Palestine, and to the covenant of their God. It is upon this covenant-hold upon them, that the God of Abraham promises to take away their stony heart out of their flesh, and give them

a heart of flesh; to sprinkle them with clean water, and to make them clean; to put his Spirit within them and cause them to walk in his statutes, and make them keep his judgments and do them; Ezek. xxxvi. 24-27. It is upon this entail, that God thus engages to bring them in under his new covenant, or the Christian dispensation; that their children shall be as aforetimes, and their congregations established before him; and that all who see them shali acknowledge they are the seed which the Lord hath blessed;" "that they are the seed of the blessed of the Lord, and their offspring with them." It will then be understood, that though blindness in part had happened to Israel, it was that the gentiles might take their place, and only till the fulness. of the gentiles be come in; and then all Israel shall be saved. The Jewish church will thence be a kind of capital and model of the Christian world; see Isai. lx. 1-5; and many other promises of the same tenor.

The entail of the covenant may be expected thenceforth to have its proper and perfect effect in the fulfilment of such promises as the following, which relate to that period; "I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring; and they shall spring up as among the grass, as willows by the water courses; Isai. xliv. 3, 4. "As for me, this is my COVenant with them, saith the Lord. My spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed's seed, saith the Lord, from henceforth and forever;" Isai. lix. 21. This will indeed bring a season of salvation to man.

3. On reading the prophetic scriptures relative to the restoration of the Hebrews, and the calls of Heaven to aid in the event; the question becomes interesting, What is first to be done relative to this restoration? The first object, no doubt, must be, to christianize them, and wait the leadings of Providence relative to any further event. God will in due time, be (to all who are willing to wait on him) his own interpreter; and to such he will make the path of duty plain. In his own time and way, after his ancient people shall be duly instructed, and taught the Christian religion, God will open the door for the fulfilment of his designs relative to any local restoration; and will bring that part of them, whom he designs, to their ancient home. All the Jews did not return to Palestine from their seventy years captivity. Many chose to continue where they were planted in the east. Something of the same may be realized in the final restoration of Judah and Israel. God will take one of a family, and two of a city, and bring them to Zion! A proportion of that nation will in due time be offered, to return to the land of their fathers, where they may form a kind of centre or capital to the cause of Christ on earth. Relative to many particulars of the event, the holy oracles have not expressed. They have strongly marked the outlines or leading facts of the restoration; and the unrevealed particulars, the events of Providence must unfold. That great numbers will return, there seems not room to doubt. But the actual proposition to return, will doubtless be a free-will offering of those whose hearts God shall incline. The first duty must be to recover them to the visible kingdom of Christ. To

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