LECTURE I.—MIDIANITES IN POSSESSION.
For forty years after Deborah had celebrated the triumph over Sisera in her glorious song, the land of Israel had had rest. This period of tranquillity receives such brief mention in the Scriptures, that we are in danger of forgetting for how long a time God granted the blessing of peace. And thus is it in our own lives, my brethren: times of trouble stand out, as it were, like rugged crags, shutting out from memory’s view the vines and the fig-trees, the olive-yards, the green pastures and still waters, with which our gracious God for long may have blessed us.
Seven years of trouble to Israel succeeded the forty years of repose: not causeless trouble—such is never known in the experience either of Israelite or of Christian. But we do not always search out the actual cause of affliction. With God’s ancient people the punishment was clearly traced to the sin. When the Midianites, like a swarm of locusts, came up against them, destroying and wasting, driving the inhabitants of the land to hide in dens of the mountains, strongholds, and caves, it was because the stain of idolatry lay upon Israel; and mercy, to save the sinners, required that justice should chastise the sin.
The Midianites, who were thus made an instrument of punishment to Israel, were, like themselves, descendants of Abraham, but by his union with Keturah. When Moses guided God’s people towards Canaan, the Midianites drew down vengeance on themselves by their too successful efforts to lead Israel into sin. Then perished the wicked prophet Balaam amongst the enemies of God’s people. But Midian, though punished, had not been destroyed; and now, after the lapse of nearly two hundred years, we find it a very powerful nation, against whose numerous hordes the Israelites seem to have made no attempt to defend their homes—so completely was the warlike spirit crushed in the descendants of those who had triumphed under Moses and Joshua when they fought the battles of the Lord.
When the Israelites were in trouble, then they cried aloud to the God of their fathers, and He heard and answered their prayer: not yet by sending a deliverer—the sense of sin must be deepened before the judgment be removed. A prophet was sent to the people, with a message, not of promise, but of reproof:
“Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, I brought you up from Egypt, and brought you forth from the land of bondage, and I delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians, and out of the hand of all that oppressed you, and drave them out from before you, and gave you their land. And I said unto you, I am the Lord your God; fear not the gods of the Amorites in whose land ye dwell: but ye have not obeyed My voice.”
The great and glorious deliverance of Israel from Egypt we may regard as a type of the redemption of Christ’s Church from the dominion of Satan—the triumph achieved once and for ever by the mysterious sufferings of our Saviour, His sacrifice offered upon the Cross. This is the central truth of the Christian religion. But though Egyptian darkness be left behind—though Christians be received into the enjoyment of privileges purchased by the death of their Lord—their backslidings, like those of Israel, often draw upon them heavy troubles, resembling the devouring hordes of Midian.
I am not, my brethren, speaking of the afflictions and bereavements which are the common lot of all. During the forty years of blessed peace, sickness and sorrow must have been known in homes of Israel, and faithful servants of God have wept over new-made graves. Such trials are crosses appointed by a heavenly Father—crosses which each and all must take up at some period of life, if life be not early cut short. But I am speaking of troubles directly or indirectly brought on us by our sins: the Midianites who destroy our peace, and bring upon us miseries from which more earnest faith, more perfect obedience, might have preserved us. We are accustomed to speak of this life as “a vale of tears;” but let us search and examine whether the valley owe not the greater part of its desolation and gloom to foes to our peace whom we might have kept out, and over whom faith may yet give us a victory glorious as that of Gideon.
To explain my meaning more clearly, let me draw your attention to a few of what we may call chiefs—leaders of hordes of troubles, Midianites in the heart, that trample down our happiness and destroy our comfort in life. I shall mention four names but too familiar—Disappointment, Discontent, Dissension, Distrust. Let us see whether the sufferings which they inflict are not more severe and perpetual than those brought upon us by what are called visitations of Providence; whether many griefs which we term “crosses” are not rather burdens laid upon us by enemies to the soul, to whose yoke we should never have stooped.
The first Midianite chief whom I shall bring before you is Disappointment—the intruder who cuts down the green crop of hope, and leaves a famine in the soul. Whence is it that even the Christian is constantly subject to disappointment? Is it not from habitual disobedience to the divine command, Set your affections upon things above, not on things beneath? We eagerly fix our heart on some worldly object—ambition, pleasure, or gain: like children, we build our houses of delight on the sand within reach of the tide, which must sooner or later sweep them away, and then sit down and weep when the flood rolls over the spot which we had unwisely chosen. Let each of us who in the bitterness of disappointment has mournfully repeated the words of the Preacher, Vanity of vanities, all is vanity, see whether the idol in the heart has not been the cause of the Midianites’ invasion; and whether that faith which builds on the Rock of Ages, beyond the reach of desolation or decay, may not yet overcome the power of disappointment to harass the soul. Hopes fixed upon Christ know not disappointment; treasures laid up in heaven can never be lost; ties formed by faith endure throughout eternity; the less our joys are of the earth, earthy, the less danger there is that the spoiler can ever wrest them away from our grasp.
And whence cometh Discontent, who robs his slave of all his peace?—for peace and discontent cannot abide in the same soul. Can he who says to his most bountiful God, not only with his lips but from his heart, “I am unworthy of the least of Thy mercies,” ever know discontent? Must not the peevish, envious, rebellious spirit be ever kept far from his gates? We should deem so; and yet, Christian brethren, do we practically find that it is so? Are we not too often inclined to compare our lot with that of others, and, if not openly, yet secretly, repine, as if Providence had done us a wrong? No true servant of Christ can desire to have his portion here; and yet does not the inheritor of heaven too frequently murmur because not all the good things of earth are showered upon him in addition? How different his spirit from that of the apostle! He who had suffered the loss of all things, yet could affirm, I have learned in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. Had we also learned this lesson, we should find it less impracticable to obey his command, Rejoice in the Lord alway; and again I say unto you, rejoice.
“You have not your due,” were the words which I once heard a wife address to a husband who had been deprived of some advantage which she considered to have been his right. “Nay, God be praised that I have not my due,” he replied. “What is my due as a sinner before God? what is my due from a world which I have renounced for His sake? Had I chosen my portion in this life, then only might I complain of not receiving my due!” Here was a man whom discontent could not rob of his heritage of peace.
To pass on to Dissension, the third enemy to our happiness, who invades many a home, and makes goodly dwellings miserable abodes,—to what shall we trace his invasion? Is it not written in Scripture, By pride cometh contention?—would not the soft answer that turneth away wrath often prove as a strong bar to keep him from entering our habitations? But here I must guard myself from being misunderstood. It is possible that dissension may come where the fault lies on one side alone. The Christian may be—not unfrequently is—called to brave opposition, and draw upon himself the anger of men by defending the truth, or taking up the cause of the oppressed. The command, Live peaceably with all men, is qualified by if it be possible; for in some cases it is not possible to preserve harmony without giving up principle. Under such circumstances the sacrifice of peace is a sacrifice for God, and the cross is one which is borne for His sake. But in the majority of cases dissension follows on the footsteps of pride, and is the leader of malice, hatred, and all uncharitableness. Then, indeed, is he the true Midianite who pours gall into the very springs of enjoyment, who casts his venomed arrows on every side, and maketh a wilderness of that which might have been as the Garden of Eden. Better a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith. Could we, through the grace of God’s Spirit, purge from our souls all malice, all bitterness and wrath—could we love one another as Christ hath loved us, what heart-burnings, what heart-achings might be spared, and how often would the brightness of heaven appear to be reflected even upon earth!
Disappointment, Discontent, and Dissension have, as we have seen, much to do with the train of sorrows which have given to God’s fair world the name of “a vale of tears.” But I believe that the most dangerous enemy of all to our peace, the one who has most often pressed his iron yoke on the hearts of my hearers, is the fourth whose name I have mentioned, Distrust of the love and wisdom of God. This assertion may cause surprise in those who are unconscious of a doubt; but examine yourselves closely, my brethren, observe what has most often clouded your brows, saddened your spirits, drawn the deep sigh from your hearts. Has it been regrets for the past? Has it been the trials of the present? Has it not rather been care for the future, fears of what the morrow might bring? Would not perfect obedience to the injunction of our blessed Redeemer, Take no thought for the morrow, sweep away at once more than half of the troubles that weigh on our souls?
And why take thought for the morrow? We too often appear to forget that the future lies in the hand of One “too wise to err, too good to be unkind.” We act as if we could not, or would not, believe that all things work together for good to them that love God: we are needlessly restless, anxious, unhappy, and exclaim in our trouble, “How heavy a rod the Lord lays upon me!” Nay, poor weak unbelieving heart, thou art smitten less by the rod of thy Father, than by the scourge of the Midianite within. If faith could drive out mistrust, if thou couldst in deed and in truth cast thy cares upon Him who careth for thee, then—even here—might God give thee beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. Perfect trust would bring perfect submission, and the peace that passeth understanding.
Gideon, the future deliverer of Israel, first appears before us in Scripture engaged in threshing corn beside the wine-press in order to hide it from the rapacious Midianites who held possession of the land. From the necessity of concealment he cannot employ, after the custom of the East, his father’s oxen to trample out the wheat; he must himself wield the flail with the strength of his own right arm. Gideon is employed in a task of lowly toil, unconscious at first of the presence of the heavenly Being who has descended to earth, and who is now beside him under the shadow of the oak at Ophrah. And here for the present we will pause, and defer till our next meeting the consideration of God’s merciful promise to Gideon, and the effect which it produced on his soul. If we regard Faith under the emblem of a tree, we have hitherto viewed it as such tree may appear in winter, when there is not a blossom on the bough or a leaf on the spray. There is no outward evidence of life; and though we hope that spring will draw up the sap, and clothe the bare branches with beauty, we see no present sign of the change. Such may have been the state of Gideon’s faith when he thought on the sufferings of his miserable country. The flail of the Lord was upon it, but we know from the result that it was not to crush—not to destroy the wheat, but to separate the chaff from the grain, and so render the latter more fit for reception into the garner of the Lord.
GIDEON THRESHING CORN.
