1 Samuel 4:22

REFLECTIONS

THOUGH I have incorporated several suitable thoughts as they seemed to arise from the several verses in the Chapter opening before me; yet I have not said all that might be said by way of devout reflections in the perusal of it, nor superseded the necessity of adding more. Various are the improvements this chapter affords, and under the blessed Spirit's teaching, many are the precious practical observations which ought to result from it.

Who is there that beholds the ark of God as the symbol and token of the divine presence, and of the covenant engagements of our God in the person of his dear Son, but while reading in this chapter the just judgments of God upon his people in the loss of the ark, must feel deep concern for the transgressions of the people in all ages, and especially in the present day of infidelity, and the many crying abominations of the land. Did the Lord give up Israel of old for their sins into the hands of their enemies; and are his people Israel now more secure from his judgments? Was there just cause for this awful dispensation then, and is there no cause for a similar visitation now?

You that are the people of God! do you not feel yourselves deeply affected in the contemplation of the spiritual miseries that seem to be hanging over his church? Doth not our Jesus speak, as he did once to the church of Ephesus; Repent, or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place. Oh! should our eyes be brought to see the gospel taken from us: the sun going down upon our ordinances, and all our precious sabbaths and gospel feasts cut short: might we not, like the daughter-in-law of Eli, write, Ichabod upon all that would then remain, when the glory was departed.

Ye parents of tenderness, and masters of houses and families, mark in Eli's mistaken indulgence the dreadful consequence of honouring our sons or our households before God, and by a sinful compliance with the corrupt desires and irreligious dispositions of those about us, make shipwreck of the faith and of a good conscience. If we set not up religion in our houses; if we neglect both by precept and example to lead our little ones to the ark of God's presence in his house of prayer; if our servants or our children make themselves vile and we restrain them not? Oh! think of Eli, behold the melancholy close of his life, and be assured that God will not pass over the iniquities even of his people.

But chiefly, ye ministers of my God, be very jealous for his honour who hath so honoured you, as to appoint you for watchmen on the walls of Zion. Cry aloud! spare not! lift up your voices like trumpets, and show the people their transgressions, and the house of Israel their sins. Be very jealous for the ark of God's sake. And oh, thou dear Redeemer! do thou, for to thou alone the glorious work belongs, do thou ever dear, ever precious Jesus, continue to us thy presence, thy love, thy pardoning, renewing, reviving, quickening, strengthening, and confirming grace. We would say in the language of thine own most holy word, to the holy undivided Three which bear record in Heaven, Arise, O Lord, into thy rest: thou and the ark of thy strength. Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness, and let thy saints shout for joy.