Exodus 34:24

RELIGION NO LOSS

‘Neither shall any man desire thy land, when thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God thrice in the year.’

Exodus 34:24

I. The bravery expected—‘ Thrice in the year shall all your men-children appear before the Lord God.’ History has no parallel to this—the entire male population, from twelve years and upwards, leaving field and homestead, village and town, stripped bare of all its able-bodied male defenders, for a space of eight to ten days! this, too, not once in a while, but three times a year; and always when the plunderer’s spoil would be richest! And, worst of all, these dates were fixed, and must have been known, long before, by the neighbouring and hostile nations. What madness, what an inviting of overwhelming disaster, it must have seemed! Let us not be surprised if occasionally we, too, are called to what, in worldly eyes, are acts of madness,—to risk all for conscience and for truth, with an almost certain prospect of disaster.

II. The blessedness of the brave—God Himself was pledged to be their defence. Never were they so safe as when their homes lay apparently exposed to every invader. He promised to work a perpetual miracle on their behalf, saying:—‘ Neither shall any man desire thy land, when thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God.’ Oh, there is a glorious security, and an indescribable blessedness, in stepping boldly forth to do what looks like an act of sheer insanity, solely on the ground of a clear mandate from the Eternal.

Illustration

(1) ‘These gatherings would promote the bond of unity throughout the country, making it felt everywhere that though they were twelve tribes they were but one people, a sentiment especially needful to keep alive in a nation constituted as Israel was, composed of a number of cantons, separated from, as well as connected with, one another by blood and descent, organisation and traditions. Psalms 122, for example, is very expressive from this point of view; and we well remember how Jeroboam the son of Nebat so dreaded the binding effect of these pilgrimages that he was prompted to establish those rival worships at Dan and Bethel, which have for all time pointed him out as the man ‘who made Israel to sin.’

(2) ‘The picture, conceived in its normal idea and according to the divine intention, is exceedingly beautiful and captivating to the imagination. A scene of saintly pilgrims going up from all sides of a Holy Land to worship and serve the Creator in a sacred city with all the tokens of religious gladness, leaving the defence of their houses and lands to their heavenly King, according to His special promise; approaching from the more distant borders to assist in, and, as it were, to have a nearer view of, and to perpetuate the symbolic ritual of a half-disclosed revelation, until the fulness of time and the Messiah should arrive, just as they had once of old assembled round the awful mount to hear the first utterance of the Law, is indeed divine.’