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“Beginnings and Endings, Part VII”
We are continuing in our Series, “Beginnings and Endings.” This is Part 7. We have, thus far, made it into the Book of Psalms. We still have a few Psalms to review and examine before we move into the Book of Proverbs, and the rest of the Old and New Testaments.
So... let's begin, shall we?
We are going to start tonight in Psalm 73, a Psalm which is helpful for all of us to read during those times when Satan whispers doubts in our ears about God. He encourages us to doubt God, and to doubt serving God, and to doubt believing “that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6). We look around us at the prosperity of the wicked, and the seeming carefree life and “smooth road” of those who live as if there is no God, no Commandments, and no punishment for sin. Psalm 73 puts things back into a proper perspective for us. We read first in Psalms 73:1-2: “Truly God is good to Israel, even to such as are of a clean heart. But as for me, my feet were almost gone; my steps had well nigh slipped. For I was envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.”
Matthew Henry writes of this, “This psalm begins somewhat abruptly: Yet God is good to Israel (so the margin reads it); he had been thinking of the prosperity of the wicked; while he was thus musing the fire burned, and at last he spoke by way of check to himself for what he had been thinking of. “However it be, yet God is good.” Though wicked people receive many of the gifts of his providential bounty, yet we must own that he is, in a peculiar manner, good to Israel; they have favours from him which others have not.
The psalmist designs an account of a temptation he was strongly assaulted with - to envy the prosperity of the wicked, a common temptation, which has tried the graces of many of the saints. Now in this account, I. He lays down, in the first place, that great principle which he is resolved to abide by and not to quit while he was parleying with this temptation. Job, when he was entering into such a temptation, fixed for his principle the omniscience of God: Times are not hidden from the Almighty. Jeremiah's principle is the justice of God: Righteous art thou, O God! when I plead with thee. Habakkuk's principle is the holiness of God: Thou art of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. The psalmist's, here, is the goodness of God. These are truths which cannot be shaken and which we must resolve to live and die by.
Though we may not be able to reconcile all the disposals of Providence with them, we must believe they are reconcilable. Note, Good thoughts of God will fortify us against many of Satan's temptations. Truly God is good; he had had many thoughts in his mind concerning the providences of God, but this word, at last, settled him: “For all this, God is good, good to Israel, even to those that are of a clean heart.” Note, 1. Those are the Israel of God that are of a clean heart, purified by the blood of Christ, cleansed from the pollutions of sin, and entirely devoted to the glory of God. An upright heart is a clean heart; cleanness is truth in the inward part. 2. God, who is good to all, is in a special manner good to his church and people, as he was to Israel of old. God was good to Israel in redeeming them out of Egypt, taking them into covenant with himself, giving them his laws and ordinances, and in the various providences that related to them; he is, in like manner, good to all those that are of a clean heart, and, whatever happens, we must not think otherwise.
II. He comes now to relate the shock that was given to his faith in God's distinguishing goodness to Israel by a strong temptation to envy the prosperity of the wicked, and therefore to think that the Israel of God are no happier than other people and that God is no kinder to them than to others.
1. He speaks of it as a very narrow escape that he had not been quite foiled and overthrown by this temptation: “But as for me, though I was so well satisfied in the goodness of God to Israel, yet my feet were almost gone (the tempter had almost tripped up my heels), my steps had well-nigh slipped (I had like to have quitted my religion, and given up all my expectations of benefit by it); for I was envious at the foolish.”
Note, 1. The faith even of strong believers may sometimes be sorely shaken and ready to fail them. There are storms that will try the firmest anchors. 2. Those that shall never be quite undone are sometimes very near it, and, in their own apprehension, as good as gone. Many a precious soul, that shall live for ever, had once a very narrow turn for its life; almost and well-nigh ruined, but a step between it and fatal apostasy, and yet snatched as a brand out of the burning, which will for ever magnify the riches of divine grace in the nations of those that are saved.”
Next, let's look at verses 12-13: “Behold, these are the ungodly, who prosper in the world; they increase in riches. Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocency.”
Matthew Henry continues, “See what the excess of pleasure is; the moderate use of it enlightens the eyes, but those that indulge themselves inordinately in the delights of sense have their eyes ready to start out of their heads. There are many who have a great deal of this life in their hands, but nothing of the other life in their hearts. They are ungodly, live without the fear and worship of God, and yet they prosper and get on in the world, and not only are rich, but increase in riches. They are looked upon as thriving men; while others have much ado to keep what they have, they are still adding more, more honour, power, pleasure, by increasing in riches. They do not die of sore and painful diseases: There are no pangs, no agonies, in their death, but their strength is firm to the last, so that they scarcely feel themselves die.
They are not bound by the terrors of conscience in their dying moments; they are not frightened either with the remembrance of their sins or the prospect of their misery, but die securely. We cannot judge of men's state on the other side death either by the manner of their death or the frame of their spirits in dying. Men may die like lambs, and yet have their place with the goats. (2.) He observed that they made a very bad use of their outward prosperity and were hardened by it in their wickedness, which very much strengthened the temptation he was in to fret at it. If it had done them any good, if it had made them less provoking to God or less oppressive to man, it would never have vexed him; but it had quite a contrary effect upon them.
[1.] It made them very proud and haughty. Because they live at ease, pride compasses them as a chain. They show themselves (to all that see them) to be puffed up with their prosperity, as men show their ornaments. Pride ties on their chain, or necklace; so Dr. Hammond reads it. It is no harm to wear a chain or necklace; but when pride ties it on, when it is worn to gratify a vain mind, it ceases to be an ornament. It is not so much what the dress or apparel is (though we have rules for that, (as we read in 1 Timothy 2:9), as what principle ties it on and with what spirit it is worn. And, as the pride of sinners appears in their dress, so it does in their talk; they affect great swelling words of vanity, bragging of themselves and disdaining all about them. Out of the abundance of the pride that is in their heart they speak big.
[1.] It made them oppressive to their poor neighbours: Violence covers them as a garment. What they have got by fraud and oppression they keep and increase by the same wicked methods, and care not what injury they do to others, nor what violence they use, so they may but enrich and aggrandize themselves. They are corrupt, like the giants, the sinners of the old world, when the earth was filled with violence. They care not what mischief they do, either for mischief-sake or for their own advantage-sake. They speak wickedly concerning oppression; they oppress, and justify themselves in it. Those that speak well of sin speak wickedly of it. They are corrupt, that is, dissolved in pleasures and every thing that is luxurious (so some), and then they deride and speak maliciously; they care not whom they wound with the poisoned darts of calumny; from on high they speak oppression.
[3.] It made them very insolent in their demeanour towards both God and man: They set their mouth against the heavens, putting contempt upon God himself and his honour, bidding defiance to him and his power and justice. They cannot reach the heavens with their hands, to shake God's throne, else they would; but they show their ill-will by setting their mouth against the heavens. Their tongue also walks through the earth, and they take liberty to abuse all that come in their way. No man's greatness or goodness can secure him from the scourge of the virulent tongue. They take a pride and pleasure in bantering all mankind; they are pests of the country, for they neither fear God nor regard man. [4.] In all this they were very atheistical and profane. They could not have been thus wicked if they had not learned to say, How doth God know? And is there knowledge in the Most High?
So far were they from desiring the knowledge of God, who gave them all the good things they had and would have taught them to use them well, that they were not willing to believe God had any knowledge of them, that he took any notice of their wickedness or would ever call them to an account. As if, because he is Most High, he could not or would not see them. Whereas because he is Most High therefore he can, and will, take cognizance of all the children of men and of all they do, or say, or think. What an affront is it to the God of infinite knowledge, from whom all knowledge is, to ask, Is there knowledge in him? Well may he say, 'Behold, these are the ungodly.'”
The whole matter comes full circle, as God gives Asaph (the writer of Psalm 73) a fuller and clearer understanding of the temporary “prosperity” and “advantage” of the wicked in verses 16-20: “When I thought to know this, it was too painful for me; Until I went into the sanctuary of God; then understood I their end. Surely thou didst set them in slippery places: thou castedst them down into destruction. How are they brought into desolation, as in a moment! they are utterly consumed with terrors. As a dream when one awaketh; so, O Lord, when thou awakest, thou shalt despise their image.”
Matthew Henry continues his comments: “There is nothing that can give more general offence to the generation of God's children than to say that we have cleansed our heart in vain or that it is vain to serve God; for there is nothing more contrary to their universal sentiment and experience nor any thing that grieves them more than to hear God thus reflected on. Those that wish themselves in the condition of the wicked do in effect quit the tents of God's children.
{Asaph writes} 'I endeavoured to understand the meaning of this unaccountable dispensation of Providence; but it was too painful for me. I could not conquer it by the strength of my own reasoning.' It is a problem, not to be solved by the mere light of nature, for, if there were not another life after this, we could not fully reconcile the prosperity of the wicked with the justice of God. Verse 17: 'he went into the sanctuary of God;' he applied to his devotions, meditated upon the attributes of God, and the things revealed, which belong to us and to our children; he consulted the scriptures, and the lips of the priests who attended the sanctuary; he prayed to God to make this matter plain to him and to help him over this difficulty; and, at length, he understood the wretched end of wicked people, which he plainly foresaw to be such that even in the height of their prosperity they were rather to be pitied than envied, for they were but ripening for ruin.
Note, There are many great things, and things needful to be known, which will not be known otherwise than by going into the sanctuary of God, by the word and prayer. The sanctuary must therefore be the resort of a tempted soul. Note, further, We must judge of persons and things as they appear by the light of divine revelation, and then we shall judge righteous judgment; particularly we must judge by the end. All is well that ends well, everlastingly well; but nothing well that ends ill, everlastingly ill. The righteous man's afflictions end in peace, and therefore he is happy; the wicked man's enjoyments end in destruction, and therefore he is miserable.
1. The prosperity of the wicked is short and uncertain. The high places in which Providence sets them are slippery places, where they cannot long keep footing; but, when they offer to climb higher, that very attempt will be the occasion of their sliding and falling. Their prosperity has no firm ground; it is not built upon God's favour or his promise; and they have not the satisfaction of feeling that it rests on firm ground.
2. Their destruction is sure, and sudden, and very great. This cannot be meant of any temporal destruction; for they were supposed to spend all their days in wealth and their death itself had no bands in it: In a moment they go down to the grace, so that even that could scarcely be called their destruction; it must therefore be meant of eternal destruction on the other side death - hell and destruction. They flourish for a time, but are undone for ever. (1.) Their ruin is sure and inevitable. He speaks of it as a thing done - They are cast down; for their destruction is as certain as if it were already accomplished. He speaks of it as God's doing, and therefore it cannot be resisted: Thou castest them down. It is destruction from the Almighty, from the glory of his power. Who can support those whom God will cast down, on whom God will lay burdens?
(2.) It is swift and sudden; their damnation slumbers not; for how are they brought into desolation as in a moment! It is easily effected, and will be a great surprise to themselves and all about them. (3.) It is severe and very dreadful. It is a total and final ruin: They are utterly consumed with terrors, It is the misery of the damned that the terrors of the Almighty, whom they have made their enemy, fasten upon their guilty consciences, which can neither shelter themselves from them nor strengthen themselves under them; and therefore not their being, but their bliss, must needs be utterly consumed by them; not the least degree of comfort or hope remains to them; the higher they were lifted up in their prosperity the sorer will their fall be when they are cast down into destructions (for the word is plural) and suddenly brought into desolation.
3. Their prosperity is therefore not to be envied at all, but despised rather. As a dream when one awaketh, so, O Lord! when thou awakest, or when they awake (as some read it), thou shalt despise their image, their shadow, and make it to vanish. In the day of the great judgment (so the Chaldee paraphrase reads it), when they are awaked out of their graves, thou shalt, in wrath, despise their image; for they shall rise to shame and everlasting contempt. See here, (1.) What their prosperity now is; it is but an image, a vain show, a fashion of the world that passes away; it is not real, but imaginary, and it is only a corrupt imagination that makes it a happiness; it is not substance, but a mere shadow; it is not what it seems to be, nor will it prove what we promise ourselves from it;
it is as a dream, which may please us a little, while we are asleep; but, how pleasing soever it is, it is all but a cheat, all false; when we awake we find it so. God will awake to judgment, to plead his own and his people's injured cause; they shall be made to awake out of the sleep of their carnal security, and then God shall despise their image; he shall make it appear to all the world how despicable it is; so that the righteous shall laugh at them. How did God despise that rich man's image when he said, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee! We ought to be of God's mind, for his judgment is according to truth, and not to admire and envy that which he despises and will despise; for, sooner or later, he will bring all the world to be of his mind.”
The Preacher's Homiletical adds: “The true place in which to form a right estimate of life is where Asaph found it-in the sanctuary of God; because from its elevation and the purity of its atmosphere, one can take into view the unseen as well as the seen, the eternal as well as the transient. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we may dwell upon our losses with disappointment and regret. But if the future is taken into consideration, what Lazarus would exchange his lot with Dives {the rich man in the parable}? When once the soul crosses the frontier between this life and the next, it finds that the current-coin on this side is valueless on that.
One day as Asaph, more bowed down than usual, entered the sanctuary, deliverance came. Whether it was when the sacrifice was being offered, or when the holy psalm was being sung, the clouds suddenly broke and the burden rolled away. He saw that God did not reward goodness with things, but with Himself, and he turned to Him with adoring love. Even in the present life the righteous may count on the constant presence of God. His hand holds them; His counsel guides. He is our strength and our portion; and when we change worlds, we shall only enter more fully and absolutely on our inheritance.”
Let's move further into the Book of Psalms and read Psalms 119:111-112: “Thy testimonies have I taken as an heritage for ever: for they are the rejoicing of my heart. I have inclined mine heart to perform thy statutes alway, even unto the end.”
Of this Matthew Henry writes, “The psalmist here in a most affectionate manner, like an Israelite indeed, resolves to stick to the word of God and to live and die by it. I. He resolves to portion himself in it, and there to seek his happiness, nay, there to enjoy it; “Thy testimonies (the truths, the promises, of thy word) have I taken as a heritage for ever, for they are the rejoicing of my heart.” The present delight he took in them was an evidence that the good things contained in them were in his account the best things, and the treasure which he set his heart upon. 1. He expected an eternal happiness in God's testimonies. The covenant God had made with him was an everlasting covenant, and therefore he took it as a heritage for ever. If he could not yet say, “They are my heritage,” yet he could say, “I have made choice of them for my heritage; and will never take up with a portion in this life.”
God's testimonies are a heritage to all that have received the Spirit of adoption; for, if children, then heirs. They are a heritage for ever, and that no earthly heritage is; all the saints accept them as such, take up with them, live upon them, and can therefore be content with but little of this world. 2. He enjoyed a present satisfaction in them: They are the rejoicing of my heart, because they will be my heritage for ever. It requires the heart of a good man to see his portion in the promise of God and not in the possessions of this world.
II. He resolves to govern himself by it and thence to take his measures: I have inclined my heart to do thy statutes. Those that would have the blessings of God's testimonies must come under the bonds of his statutes. We must look for comfort only in the way of duty, and that duty must be done, 1. With full consent and complacency: “I have, by the grace of God, inclined my heart to it, and conquered the aversion I had to it.” A good man brings his heart to his work and then it is done well. A gracious disposition to do the will of God is the acceptable principle of all obedience. 2. With constancy and perseverance. He would perform God's statutes always, in all instances, in the duty of every day, in a constant course of holy walking, and this to the end, without weariness. This is following the Lord fully.”
We are now going to leave the Psalms and stop at Proverbs 5:1-5: “My son, attend unto my wisdom, and bow thine ear to my understanding that thou mayest regard discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge. For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil: But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a twoedged sword. Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell.”
Matthew Henry writes, “The young man in the text increases the guilt of the “strange woman” by yielding to her enticements. He burdens her with new guilt and intensifies her iniquity, and therefore helps to treasure up for her a greater remorse when her conscience shall awake and arise from the grave of sensuality. 2. Because it is a sin against a man’s own body. That which is our own is generally valued by us, and there is nothing material which is ours in a more exclusive sense than our bodily frame. It is nearer to us than any other material possession, and to sin against it is to sin against that which stands in the nearest relation to our personal moral individuality. There are sins done in the body by the mind which are purely mental, from which the body does not suffer; but adultery forces the body into a relation which brings misery and disease upon it, and in due season consumes and destroys it like a devouring flame.
“Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body” 3. Because it is a sin against human nature in general, and national life in particular. Human nature is like the human body, every man is linked to his fellow-men as the several members of the body are parts of one whole. This solidarity—this union of interests—is more obvious when considered in relation to a particular community or nation; and, as no member of the human body can be disfigured without bringing the whole frame into a state of imperfection and loss of dignity, so no man can degrade himself without bringing degradation upon the whole race. The fornicator is a plague-spot upon the body of humanity; and although other sinners bring disfigurement upon the body universal, there is none who defiles it as he does. God has written His mark upon the crust of the earth against this enormous sin.
4. Because it makes God, in a sense, to bear the iniquity with the transgressor. The youth who spends the money his father gives him in furthering his own wicked purposes makes his father an unwilling partaker of his crimes, because the money was supplied by him. God made this complaint against sinners in the olden time. The good gifts of the earth which God bestowed upon the Hebrew people were used by them in their debasing idol-worship. God gave them the means of honouring Him, and they used His gifts in dishonouring His name. So God gives to every man power to glorify Him and to bless himself and the world by the formation of right relations. When the power thus given is used in an unlawful manner, God’s own gift is used against Himself. The sinner turns the Divine gift against the Divine Giver; and while in God he lives, and moves, and has his being, he lives and moves but to sin against his Maker. Thus in Scripture language God “is made to serve” with the sinner, while He is “wearied with his iniquities.”
Our next examination of an “ending” is Proverbs 14:12: “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.”
The Preacher's Homiletical writes, “What seems to be, and what is: I. Human nature needs more light than is found in the human conscience. The way which “seems right unto a man” may be “the way of death.” A mariner who has insufficient light to observe correctly the needle in the compass, may think he is steering for the haven when he is taking the vessel straight upon the rocks. He may be very sincere in his conviction that he is going right, but his thinking so will not make it so. He needs more light than he has. So the light of conscience is not enough to guide a man with certainty in the true and right way. If conscientious sincerity was an infallible guide Paul would not have “delivered to prison” men and women for being followers of Jesus of Nazareth. The way that in his ignorance seemed right to him, was felt by him to be a “way of death” when his conscience was enlightened.
Conscience may be deadened by sin, or warped by prejudice or self-interest; it is not a reliable and certain guide. If it were, it was needless for the Son of God to visit the earth and make known the will of His Father—the revelation of God’s will in the books of the Old and New Testaments is a superfluity. The existence of the Bible is explained by the fact which is found to be true by all God-taught men, that “the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.” God, by speaking unto men in “sundry times and in divers manners,” and especially “in these last days by His Son” declares plainly that man needs something outside of himself to guide him into that path of righteousness which alone is a way of life. The history of the world confirms this truth. Observation of every-day life tells the same tale.
II. The need of human nature has been fully met. All that the mariner needs in order to keep the vessel’s head right is light to see the compass. God in Christ is a sufficient light to man. Paul says: “God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” Christ Himself tells us that it is those only who “follow Him” who have the “light of life.” That the way thus revealed is fully adapted to meet man’s need is proved by the results which follow from walking in it. The light which is shed upon men by the revelation of God, and especially by the Gospel, has been proven by its result upon individuals and upon nations, to be all-powerful to turn men from “darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God.”
The way of sin is the way of death—death morally, socially, and physically. The way of holiness is the only way of spiritual life to the soul and to the community, and ensures victory over the penalty of bodily death. There are some ways which can hardly “seem right” to any man—the ways, namely, of open and flagrant wickedness. But there are many ways, which, under the biassing influence of pride and corruption, “seem right,” and yet their “end” is “death.” Good intentions are not a justification for wrong doing gives an awful illustration of the end of “every man doing that which is right in his own eyes.” —Fausset. The self-delusion of one ends in death by the sentence of the judge, that of another in self-murder; of one in loathsome disease, of another in slow decay under the agony of conscience, or in sorrow over a henceforth dishonoured and distracted life.—Delitzsch.
There is no way which doth not seem right in his eyes who liketh to go in it. For man is led in all things by a seeming good; and such is the foulness of doing amiss, that it must put on the painted colours of doing right, or else it cannot draw the eyes of man’s mind unto it. But it is the not seeing the end which causeth the seeming rightness of the way, and it is to man that it seems so, who is so apt to be deceived. He that hath a long fight, and in the beginning can see the end, he maketh the shortest journey and speedeth the best in it. If the beginning be a due consideration of the end, the end will be a beginning of true joy and comfort. It is not so in the way which seemeth to be right. For being but a way, it is passed and ended, and then begin the ways of death, which are said to be many, because there is an endless going on in them.—Jermin.”
Our next Proverb is found in Proverbs 19:20: “Hear counsel, and receive instruction, that thou mayest be wise in thy latter end.”
Of this, Matthew Henry writes, “Note, 1. It is well with those that are wise in their latter end, wise for their latter end, for their future state, wise for another world, that are found wise when their latter end comes, wise virgins, wise builders, wise stewards, that are wise at length, and understand the things that belong to their peace, before they be hidden from their eyes. A carnal worldling at his end shall be a fool, but godliness will prove wisdom at last. 2. Those that would be wise in their latter end must hear counsel and receive instruction, in their beginnings must be willing to be taught and ruled, willing to be advised and reproved, when they are young. Those that would be stored in winter must gather in summer.”
John Gill adds, “Hear counsel, and receive instruction,.... Of parents, masters, and ministers; especially the counsel and instruction of Wisdom, of Jesus Christ, the Wisdom of God, the wonderful Counsellor; and of his Gospel and of the Scriptures, which are able to make a man wise unto salvation;
that thou mayest be wise in thy latter end; in the latter end of life, at death; that then it may appear a man has been so wise as to be concerned for a future state, for the good of his soul in another world; by listening to the counsel and instruction of Christ, in his word; by looking to him, and believing in him, for life and salvation; by leaning and living upon him; and committing the affairs of his soul, and the salvation of it, to him.”
We move, now, into the next Book, and we read in Ecclesiastes 7:8: “Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof: and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.”
Of this The Sermon Bible tells us, “The text expresses the general principle or doctrine that by the condition of our existence here, if things go right, a conclusion is better than a beginning. It is on the condition of our existence in this world that this principle is founded. That condition is that everything is passing on toward something else in order to, and for the sake of, that something further on, so that its chief importance or value is in that something to be attained further on. And if that ulterior object be attained, and be worth all this preceding course of things, then "the end is better than the beginning." We have to consider the year on the supposition of our living through it. And it is most exceedingly desirable that in the noblest sense "the end" should be "better than the beginning."
Consider what state of the case would authorise us at the end of the year to pronounce this sentence upon it. I. The sentence may be pronounced if at the end of the year we shall be able, after deliberate conscientious reflection, to affirm that the year has been in the most important respects better than the preceding. II. The sentence will be true if during the progress of the year we shall effectually avail ourselves of the lessons suggested by a review of the preceding year. III. The text will be a true sentence if then we shall have good evidence that we are become really more devoted to God. IV. It is but putting the same thing in more general terms to say, The end will be better than the beginning if we shall by then have practically learnt to live more strictly and earnestly for the greatest purposes of life.
V. If we shall have acquired a more effectual sense of the worth of time, the sentence will be true. VI. It will, again, be true if with regard to fellow-mortals we can conscientiously feel that we have been to them more what Christians ought than in the preceding year. VII. Another point of superiority we should hope the end may have over the beginning of the year is that of our being in a better state of preparation for all that is to follow. VIII. It will be a great advantage and advancement to end the year with if we shall then have acquired more of a rational and Christian indifference to life itself.
J. Foster, Lectures; 1st series, p. 1.
References: Ecc_7:8.—J. Hamilton, The Royal Preacher, p. 165; Spurgeon, Morning by Morning, p. 366.”
Ecclesiastes 12:12: “And further, by these, my son, be admonished: of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh.”
John Gill writes, “And further, by these, my son, be admonished,.... Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, may be intended, for whose sake, more especially, this book might be written; though it may take in every hearer of this divine preacher, every disciple of this teacher, every subject of his kingdom, as well as every reader of this book, whom he thus addresses, and for whom he was affectionately concerned as a father for a son; that they might be enlightened with divine knowledge, warned of that which is evil, and admonished and advised to that which is good; "by these" words and writings of his own, and other wise men; and by these masters of assemblies, who, and their words, are from the one and chief Shepherd; to these they would do well to take heed, and to these only or chiefly.
of making many books there is no end; many books, it seems, were written in Solomon's time; there was the same itch of writing as now, it may be; but what was written was not to be mentioned with the sacred writings, were comparatively useless and worthless. Or the sense is, should Solomon, or any other, write ever so many volumes, it would be quite needless; and there would be no end of writing, for these would not give satisfaction and contentment; and which yet was to be had in the word of God; and therefore that should be closely attended to: though this may be understood, not only of making or composing books, but of getting them, as Aben Ezra; of purchasing them, and so making them a man's own.
A man may lay out his money, and fill his library with books, and be very little the better for them; what one writer affirms, another denies; what one seems to have proved clearly, another rises up and points out his errors and mistakes; and this occasions replies and rejoinders, so that there is no end of these things, and scarce any profit by them; which, without so much trouble, may be found in the writings of wise men, inspired by God, and in which we should rest contented;”
We next move into our first Book of Prophecy which includes a very positive “ending:” Isaiah 9:6: “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end...”
Of this Matthew Henry writes, “See the dominion he is advanced to, and the throne he has above every throne (Isa_9:6): The government shall be upon his shoulder - his only. He shall not only wear the badge of it upon his shoulder (the key of the house of David, but he shall bear the burden of it. The Father shall devolve it upon him, so that he shall have an incontestable right to govern; and he shall undertake it, so that no doubt can be made of his governing well, for he shall set his shoulder to it, and will never complain, as Moses did, of his being overcharged. I am not able to bear all this people.
Glorious things are here spoken of Christ's government.
[1.] That it shall be an increasing government. It shall be multiplied; the bounds of his kingdom shall be more and more enlarged, and many shall be added to it daily. The lustre of it shall increase, and it shall shine more and more brightly in the world. The monarchies of the earth were each less illustrious than the other, so that what began in gold ended in iron and clay, and every monarchy dwindled by degrees; but the kingdom of Christ is a growing kingdom, and will come to perfection at last. [2.] That it shall be a peaceable government, agreeable to his character as the prince of peace. He shall rule by love, shall rule in men's hearts; so that wherever his government is there shall be peace, and as his government increases the peace shall increase. The more we are subject to Christ the more easy and safe we are. [3.] That it shall be a rightful government. He that is the Son of David shall reign upon the throne of David and over his kingdom, which he is entitled to. God shall give him the throne of his father David. The gospel church, in which Jew and Gentile are incorporated, is the holy hill of Zion, on which Christ reigns. [4.] That it shall be administered with prudence and equity, and so as to answer the great end of government, which is the establishment of the kingdom: He shall order it, and settle it, with justice and judgment. Every thing is, and shall be, well managed, in the kingdom of Christ, and none of his subjects shall ever have cause to complain. [5.] That it shall be an everlasting kingdom: There shall be no end of the increase of his government (it shall be still growing), no end of the increase of the peace of it, for the happiness of the subjects of this kingdom shall last to eternity and perhaps shall be progressive in infinitum - for ever. He shall reign henceforth even for ever; not only throughout all generations of time, but, even when the kingdom shall be delivered up to God even the Father, the glory both of the Redeemer and the redeemed shall continue eternally. [6.] That God himself has undertaken to bring all this about: “The Lord of hosts, who has all power in his hand and all creatures at his beck, shall perform this, shall preserve the throne of David till this prince of peace is settled in it; his zeal shall do it, his jealousy for his own honour, and the truth of his promise, and the good of his church.” Note, The heart of God is much upon the advancement of the kingdom of Christ among men, which is very comfortable to all those that wish well to it; the zeal of the Lord of hosts will overcome all opposition.”
This concludes this evening's Discussion, “Beginnings and Endings, Part VII.”
This Discussion was presented “live” on August 16th, 2018.