Part 7

"I will set my bow in the cloud," says Jehovah. There, in the midst of the very elements which have caused alarm; there, where the lightnings flashed and the thunders pealed, and wrath and darkness gloamed overhead, there will I write my covenant in lines of beauty, and you and your posterity shall read it and rejoice.

But we need not stop with interpreting this symbol as a pledge against a mere physical overthrow of the world by water.

We seek for a deeper spiritual significance in it. Although in its primary application it was a sign of God's covenant with Noah, it leads our minds forward to a more perfect covenant, a covenant of grace, in which are contained the promises of God which shield his people from all spiritual evils which threaten them.

The import of the rainbow in its spiritual signification is worthy of special notice. We do not explain it so generally as some who regard it as a symbol of God's willingness to receive men into favor again, or that it only indicates the Almighty's faithfulness in fulfilling his promises. We interpret it more specially as a symbol of divine protection to God's people from imminent and threatening dangers--that protection pledged in the covenant of grace in Christ Jesus to those who have fled for refuge to him. Such seems to be the idea conveyed by it in the vision of Ezekiel, where he speaks of what he saw over the throne above the heavens "as the appearance of the bow that is in the cloud in the day of rain." A similar sight was enjoyed by John in Patmos, where in vision he beheld the throne in heaven: "And there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald."

These references to the rainbow justify us in interpreting it as a symbol of grace returning after judgments; a pledge of God's promise to stay the course of vengeance, to limit threatening evils that they shall not destroy, to arrest impending dangers, and succor his people when they are most exposed to destruction.

The bow in the cloud then is not a mere sign of God's fidelity to his promises in general, but a particular token of his grace nigh at hand in emergencies, a sign for the hour of trouble and distress and alarm, a token of grace--not when the sky is clear, but when the heavens frown, when fear comes to the soul and it looks anxiously round for help. As a physical phenomenon it had this significancy. God set it in the cloud. It was brought forth only in the darkened heavens. It was nursed and cradled in the storm.

When therefore, at summer's sunset, I gaze upon the beautiful iris arching the eastern horizon and resting on its dark background of clouds, my thoughts go out beyond the covenant of Noah to a richer covenant of grace, and I read in its gorgeous colorings a pledge of those provisions against spiritual dangers made in the mediatorial work of Jesus Christ. While the physical eye is delighted with the beauteous spectacle in the lower heavens, faith soars upward and sees around the throne of the Almighty's glory a brighter bow set there through the mediation of the incarnate Son. It is the pledge and token of grace to sinners. It is the sign of the covenant of redemption.

When, upon the apostasy of man, the heavens gathered blackness and the clouds of divine wrath swept overhead, portending a deluge of divine justice; when the guilt of our transgressions left us with no covering from the eternal storm, the eternal God placed himself between us and hell, and by his own sacrifice upon the cross drew upon himself those magazines of vengeance. The divine law was satisfied in his atonement; the clouds broke and scattered around the Almighty's throne. Light streamed athwart the gloom, and the Sun of righteousness, with healing in his beams, threw out its rays upon the retiring storm, and arched the clouds of justice with the brilliant bow of peace and reconciliation. Every rainbow painted in the natural heavens points us to what Christ has done in the spiritual world. The physical eyeball sees the one, faith gazes upon the other. Both are associated with the idea of danger, both bespeak security and deliverance.

You perceive then the spiritual lesson conveyed to us by the rainbow in the clouds. It tells of God's covenant of grace with his people, and the promises under that covenant of safety in the midst of fears.

How adapted is this lesson to the condition of believers in their present state. Oh, what could faith do without the bow in this stormy, troubled world? How many are the clouds which darken the believer's way! But God has set his bow in every one of them--his pledge of deliverance and support.

Sometimes the dark cloud of his own transgressions settles terribly upon the Christian's soul. The convictions of his heinous guilt almost drive him to despair. He asks himself, How can mercy reach so vile a sinner? how can such iniquity as mine be pardoned? Vainly does he look within himself for any thing to hope for. Ashamed and speechless, he has no satisfaction for the law's demands. That law condemns him, conscience condemns him; but faith discovers deliverance in the atonement of the Lord Jesus. The covenant breaks upon his soul--his Saviour has died for him. His guilt is fully atoned for; and there is the bow of the covenant promises lighting up the cloud. "I will set my bow in the cloud," says God, and when Sinai thunders in the soul I will arch its summit with the iris from the cross.

Again, how do the clouds of temptation sometimes thicken over the Christian's way--temptations from within and without. And what discouragements press upon him from the rising corruptions of his heart and the onsets of the world. How often does he groan under his own weakness, and ask, Can such a one ever get through to heaven? But lo, in the covenant there are promises exactly meet for his condition, that he shall be held up to the end; and faith discovers bows in all these clouds, which whisper to him of final triumph.

In those clouds of temporal disappointment which frequently overshadow him, marked by the failure of business enterprises, want of success in one and another undertaking, and which doom him to the lot of toil and poverty--in those clouds which stamp the seal of failure upon his mere earthly life, God sets his bow to comfort all his people. It is the promised inheritance of heaven; the recompense of the reward--the treasures which wax not old. Here is the Christian's comfort under the reverses of earthly fortune, and the clouds soften and break while faith gazes upon the bow above them.

When life's blackest clouds gather, in the forms of bereavement and death, there are promises enough in the covenant to gild them all. "It shall come to pass when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud." This is God's covenant promise to his people. And would you know how faithfully he keeps it, contemplate the experience of God's true people in trials, when the world was dim with shadows. Call to mind your own experience, faithful one. Did you not find treasured in the promises of grace such comforts as you never knew before--a power in prayer, a drawing near to Christ, a witness of the Spirit--all producing a peace and resignation which kept you from despair?

In all this discipline of trials, God reveals his resources to his people; and in the abundant consolations provided for them, and which Christian faith appropriates, in the strength given in trials, in the clear shining of the promises athwart the clouds of adversity, they discover the beautiful significancy and the actual fulfilment of Jehovah's pledge and token to the patriarch, that he would set his bow in the cloud, and when he should bring a cloud over the earth, the bow should be seen in the cloud.

Have you, my friend, a vital interest in that covenant of grace, which arches life's stormiest days with the bow of peace, and contains the pledge of salvation in the future life? These blessings are _covenant_ blessings. They come not to us naturally, as a matter of course. They are secured only by a special stipulation--an arrangement which God has made through Jesus Christ, as a Saviour and a Mediator. They belong to us only by faith in Him who purchased them. Have you accepted the conditions of grace: repented, sought forgiveness, given your heart to God, solemnly embraced the covenant? Only by so doing can you enjoy the benefits. Only by resting under the everlasting covenant can you look up and see the bow.

Ah, you may stubbornly persist in impenitence, but you will find dark days ere long. Ere life be through, the skies will grow dark and troubled. Clouds of divine wrath will hang overhead. Clouds black as those which gloomed on Sinai's summit, will marshal their fearful elements, and fill you with alarm. Persist in impenitence, and you will hear naught from them but thunder-voices of a violated law, and see naught but vivid flashes of retributive justice. No promises of deliverance fringe their edges with a thread of silver light; no sunshine of hope breaks between them to scatter them; no bright bow of safety spans the firmament, and publishes Jehovah's pledge of reconciliation. Outside the covenant they are clouds of wrath, portending an eternal deluge of fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries of God. Fly then for refuge; fly to the shelter of the covenant. Come to Christ Jesus for salvation. Come before the storm breaks in fury. Come where you can stand and see the bow when life's tempests sweep; when the heavens are dark; when the night of death settles.

IX.

The Smoking Furnace and Burning Lamp.

AND IT CAME TO PASS, THAT WHEN THE SUN WENT DOWN, AND IT WAS DARK, BEHOLD A SMOKING FURNACE, AND A BURNING LAMP THAT PASSED BETWEEN THOSE PIECES. GEN. 15:17.

The scene here described between Jehovah and the patriarch is one of awful and mysterious interest. Long ago, when he came out of Ur of the Chaldees, God promised blessings to Abram and his posterity. But as yet there were no signs of the fulfilment. Many years had since rolled by, years of fluctuations and trials. The stirring events of the war of the four kings and the deliverance of Lot were brought to a close; and Abram had once more retired to a quiet pastoral life, rich, honored, powerful among the surrounding tribes.

But though he had grown great, there was one corroding care which preyed upon his heart. Ah, what condition of human life is there, which has not its secret sorrow? What house so bright as never to have a shadow across its hearth? Abram was treading along the vale of years, childless and a stranger. Eliezer of Damascus seemed likely to inherit his vast possessions.

At this period, when Abram's anxiety deepened, and hope began to grow impatient, God appeared again to him in vision, and renewed his covenant promises. And in answer to the patriarch's request for some outward sign or ratification, the Most High directed him to slay a heifer, a she-goat, and a ram, and divide the parts, and set them the one over against the other, that one might pass between the parts.

In ancient times the ratification of covenants was attended by the most solemn rites, in which the contracting parties participated. In the 34th chapter of Jeremiah there is an explicit reference to a ceremony like the one here described: "And I will give the men that have transgressed my covenant, which have not performed the words of the covenant which they made before me, when they cut the calf in twain and passed between the parts thereof--the princes of Judah, and the princes of Jerusalem, the eunuchs, and the priests, and all the people of the land, which passed between the parts of the calf--I will even give them into the hand of their enemies." In these solemnities the contracting party or parties passed between the parts of the slain victim, in token of their full assent to the stipulations made, imprecating upon themselves a most bitter curse if they should violate them. The ceremony was of the nature of a most solemn oath.

Nor was it confined to the Israelitish nation alone, but similar rites were observed among other people. In the third Book of the Iliad, Homer describes the solemn ratification of the covenant between the Greeks and the Trojans, according to the terms of which Menelaus and Paris were to determine the great quarrel between them in single combat. Victims were slain, their heads distributed among the chiefs of the hostile parties, their palpitating limbs placed opposite to each other on the ground, while the officiating priest uttered a prayer to Jupiter, accompanied by a most awful imprecation upon any one who should break the solemn oath. Livy also, the Roman historian, records a like solemnity on the occasion when the Roman and Alban nation agreed to settle their contest by the combat of the three Horatii and the three Curiatii. Then too the Roman priest slew the victim, and called Jupiter to witness their vows, and strike the violator as he struck the victim.

In this fifteenth chapter of Genesis, the sacred writer describes a sacred institution, which Homer, a thousand years later, found among the Greeks; and the Roman historian, still later, records as in use among his countrymen. The intent, or meaning of the solemnity, was evident. Abram well understood it; for without any particular instruction recorded, he prepared the sacrifice.

It must have been a day of overwhelming interest to the patriarch. Early in the morning God directed him to make his preparations. He obeyed with promptness, and slew the animals, and arranged their parts upon the ground. Having passed between them himself, thus acknowledging his obligations in the covenant, he sat down alone to wait for Jehovah to signify his presence. What strange, unearthly thoughts revolved in his anxious mind! What a condition for a creature to be in--a lonely man watching for God to come!

The day wore by; the sun was far down the west; the shadows were deepening on the earth: the weary patriarch dropped his head upon his breast, and slept. A horror of great darkness fell upon him; and then came a vision and a voice, which revealed to him the future. When this had passed, night had set in; and in the darkness the weary watcher waited, near the limbs of his slain victims, for Jehovah to reveal his presence and seal his promises, till at length, through the thickening gloom and spectral silence, the Shechinah is discovered, moving in awful majesty near the sacrifice. A smoking furnace and a burning lamp passed between those pieces.

Abram understood it all: God's visible presence was before him; Jehovah had ratified his covenant; the deed was done. The patriarch was satisfied. He had not been imposed upon by his fancy; he had not been deceived by some _ignis fatuus_. It was Jehovah's presence he had looked upon; it was Jehovah's own doings, making his covenant sure to him.

Yet all he saw was a smoking furnace and a burning lamp pass between the pieces. He heard no voice; he saw no living personal form: but that appearance before him was Jehovah's sign. He doubted not a moment; he asked for nothing more. It is evident that the manner in which God signified his presence on this occasion had a peculiar significance in it, that there was a peculiar fitness in the form which he assumed--_a smoking furnace and a burning lamp_--rather than some other visible form.

We believe that these signs indicated not only that Jehovah was there, but who that Jehovah was. They exhibit God as _hiding, and yet revealing_ himself. The smoking furnace, dimly visible, and followed by the burning lamp, presents the side which the Almighty turns towards us, marked by _obscurity, and light_. The Most High is known, and yet unknown; revealed to us, and yet concealed.

And we believe that a correct view of God, as exhibited to us in his word and providence, will correspond with the view which the patriarch had of him in the loneliness and darkness of that night, when He sealed His covenant with him.

We hold that in the goings forth of his providential government for thousands of years, and in the utterance of his word, there are the same traces of light and obscurity, of concealment and illumination, which were symbolized to Abram; and the same God who passed between the pieces of his sacrifice under the form of a smoking furnace and a burning lamp, is still passing before us all in a like manner.

Such is the Almighty whenever he turns himself towards us. And while I gaze with the patriarch upon the awful solemnities of that hour, that smoking furnace and burning lamp seem to move, not only across that spot, but over the ages and the world, and indicate the presence and the doings of God in all the conduct of his government.

Turn first to the _written revelation_ which he has made to us through prophet and evangelist. In the very first promise made to man after the fall, so dim yet cheering, did he not pass before Adam much as he did before the patriarch? In that promise of the seed of the woman bruising the serpent's head, so vague, so indefinite and obscure, there seems at first only the smoking furnace; but while we steadily look at it, it brightens into a burning lamp, which beckons faith to look down the future and hope for deliverance from the curse.

In all that God has revealed of himself and his purposes in his word, he passes before us in mystery as well as light. He lifts the veil but a little way; he allows us to see but a part of his plans and doings.

The prophetic parts of the Old Testament Scriptures illustrate this blending of obscurity and light. The predictions of a coming Messiah were clear, and yet mysterious; so that the Jews failed utterly to interpret them aright, or to recognize Him when He appeared as "He of whom Moses and the prophets did write." Those predictions now appear plain to us, for we study them in the clear light of their fulfilment.

In like manner, other prophecies of great events which have already been accomplished--as the Babylonish captivity, the overthrow of ancient cities and kingdoms, and the destruction of Jerusalem--now seem to us most graphic and distinct, because history and facts have thrown their light upon them. But of those prophecies which yet await their fulfilment, how true is it that a veil of obscurity still rests upon them. How various and conflicting have been the theories of those who have anxiously studied them. The restoration of the Jews, the destruction of antichrist, the second coming of Christ, the millennium reign--these and the like subjects have taxed the ingenuity of the learned for ages. Yet all have failed to find out the Almighty's specific programme, or to tell beforehand what shall be the exact fulfilment. The God of prophecy passes before us as a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp.

The strictly doctrinal portions of God's word exhibit him to us in this twofold attitude of obscurity and of light. Plainly enough has he revealed to us our duty. Clear and authoritative is his voice, speaking to us in the Decalogue. The burning lamp shines clear and steady through all the preceptive deliverances of the Scriptures; but ah, the great questions and paradoxes which have perplexed the human soul in all ages, the unsolved problems of natural religion over which thought has wearied and despaired, are left unanswered. How sin could be allowed to enter a moral system; the harmony of the divine foreknowledge with human freedom; the election of grace; man's moral helplessness and responsibility--these and such like subjects remain unexplained. Revelation does not attempt to lift the mysterious cloud which still hangs over them. Jehovah condescends to no explanation of his doings; nor by a single word does he seek to vindicate the infinite wisdom of his administration. Clouds and darkness are round about him. With none of us does he take counsel. The great truths of revelation reach beyond our grasp. We see but in part, and we know but in part. The gospel brings us near to God; but even there he covereth the face of his throne. The intermingling of obscurity and light which was symbolized by the smoking furnace and the burning lamp, characterizes the entire field of the Almighty's revelations.

2. God, as manifested in his _providential_ government, is properly exhibited to us in the imagery of the text. His ways are past finding out. When we contemplate the world at any particular period, we are lost in confusion and perplexity. We feel assured that the Almighty governs; but his purposes are hidden. Mankind seem scarcely to notice his presence. Seldom can we detect his controlling hand. It is only by extending our observation over a wider field, and taking in the grand sweep of providence through successive generations, that we attain to the clear conceptions of his moral government. At first view, we see little of his movements, and they are indefinite and obscured, like the dim smoking furnace passing by us; but by a more patient and careful study we are enabled to discover that all the events which take place in the world are under the Almighty's superintendence, and that, back of all the derangement and confusion of human affairs, there is an unseen but mighty hand bending the current of events, which by the interposition of checks and restraints and judgments makes the wrath of man to praise him.

Thus in the midst of all the darkness of providence, there is discoverable a plan of infinite wisdom. And he who humbly and devoutly meditates upon the progress of human events, detects the presence of the Almighty, ofttimes indeed vaguely, like the feeble glimmerings of the smoking furnace, but often distinctly and clearly, like the burning lamp. Thus does Jehovah, in his providence, move through the ages in much the same manner as he appeared to the patriarch, when the furnace and the lamp passed between the pieces of his sacrifice.

But why need we range abroad? Why look far away? Who that devoutly studies the ways of Providence towards himself, who that habitually contemplates what he has passed and is passing through, does not discover the Almighty wrapped in the same mysterious drapery which he wore when he appeared to Abram?

Yes; the smoking furnace and the burning lamp still pass before us, and shape our lives. How many times has God touched the hidden springs of action, and turned the current of our history! How often has he mysteriously hedged up our way, and disappointed us; made our surest calculations fail, our favorite plans miscarry! How has he led us by a way we knew not, and caused us to stand perplexed, bewildered, and alarmed at his unlooked-for interpositions! What sudden calamities have befallen us; what sore chastisements have come upon us! How many times has God's face been hid in clouds! How often have we asked, What can his doings mean? Why does he scatter our possessions? Why is health prostrated, and we left to languish amid pains and sicknesses? Why did he let death make those little graves in the churchyard, where our darlings are sleeping, who used to fill our homes with sunshine, and paint rainbows in the clouds of life's pilgrimage? Oh how many times are we perplexed at the Almighty's doings! In such seasons of disappointment and affliction, we think upon God and are troubled. He passes before us in the thick gloom and darkness of the night of sorrow: about all we can see of him is a smoking furnace, with its smouldering embers, scarcely emitting from within a pale, faint, spectral gleam, while dim wreaths of clouds whirl and roll above it. God's ways seem dark and impenetrable. Such are our first impressions.