Jeremiah 31

31:1 At that time, saith the LORD, will I be the God of all the families of Israel, and they shall be my people. Thus saith the LORD, The people which were left of the sword found grace in the wilderness; even Israel, when I went to cause him to rest. The LORD appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee. Again will I build thee, and thou shalt be built, O virgin of Israel: again shalt thou be adorned with thy tabrets, and shalt go forth in the dances of them that make merry. Again shalt thou plant vineyards upon the mountains of Samaria: the planters shall plant, and shall enjoy the fruit thereof. For there shall be a day, that the watchmen upon the hills of Ephraim shall cry, Arise ye, and let us go up to Zion unto the LORD our God. For thus saith the LORD, Sing with gladness for Jacob, and shout for the chief of the nations: publish ye, praise ye, and say, O LORD, save thy people, the remnant of Israel. Behold, I will bring them from the north country, and gather them from the uttermost parts of the earth, and with them the blind and the lame, the woman with child and her that travaileth with child together: a great company shall they return hither. They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them: I will cause them to walk by rivers of waters, in a straight way wherein they shall not stumble: for I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my firstborn. Hear the word of the LORD, O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off; and say, He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock. For the LORD hath ransomed Jacob, and redeemed him from the hand of him that was stronger than he. And they shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and shall flow together unto the goodness of the LORD, to the corn, and to the wine, and to the oil, and to the young of the flock and of the herd: and their soul shall be as a watered garden; and they shall not sorrow any more at all. Then shall the virgin rejoice in the dance, and the young men and the old together: for I will turn their mourning into joy, and will comfort them, and make them rejoice from their sorrow. And I will satiate the soul of the priests with fatness, and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness, saith the LORD. Thus saith the LORD: A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping, Rachel weeping for her children; she refuseth to be comforted for her children, because they are not. Thus saith the LORD: Refrain thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears: for thy work shall be rewarded, saith the LORD; and they shall come again from the land of the enemy. And there is hope for thy latter end, saith the LORD; and thy children shall come again to their own border. I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus. Thou hast chastised me, and I was chastised, as a calf unaccustomed to the yoke: turn thou me, and I shall be turned; for thou art the LORD my God. Surely after that I was turned, I repented; and after that I was instructed, I smote upon my thigh: I was ashamed, yea, even confounded, because I did bear the reproach of my youth. Is Ephraim my dear son? is he a pleasant child? for as often as I speak against him, I do earnestly remember him still: therefore my bowels are troubled for him; I will surely have mercy upon him, saith the LORD. Set thee up waymarks, make thee guide-posts: set thine heart toward the high way, even the way by which thou wentest: turn again, O virgin of Israel, turn again to these thy cities. How long wilt thou go hither and thither, O thou backsliding daughter? for the LORD hath created a new thing in the earth, A woman shall encompass a man. Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Yet again shall they use this speech in the land of Judah and in the cities thereof, when I shall bring again their captivity: The LORD bless thee, O habitation of justice, O mountain of holiness. And Judah and all the cities thereof shall dwell therein together; the husbandmen, and they that go about with flocks. For I have satiated the weary soul, and every sorrowful soul have I replenished. Upon this I awaked, and beheld; and my sleep was sweet unto me. Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the

28 seed of man, and with the seed of beast. And it shall come to pass, that like as I have watched over them to pluck up and to break down, and to overthrow and to destroy, and to

29 afflict; so will I watch over them to build and to plant, saith the LORD. In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on

30 edge. But every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge.

31. Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of

32. Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD.

33. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the LORD; I will put my law in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write it; and I will

34 be their God, and they shall be my people: and they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their

35 iniquity, and their sin will I remember no more. Thus saith the LORD, which giveth the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night,

36 which stirreth up the sea, that the waves thereof roar; the LORD of hosts is his name: If these ordinances depart from before me, saith the LORD, then the seed of Israel also shall

37 cease from being a nation before me for ever. Thus saith the LORD: If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, then will I also cast

38 off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done, saith the LORD. Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that the city shall be built to the LORD from the tower

39 of Hananel unto the gate of the corner. And the measuring line shall yet go out

40 straight onward unto the hill Gareb, and shall turn about unto Goah. And the whole valley of the dead bodies, and of the ashes, and all the fields unto the brook Kidron, unto the corner of the horse gate toward the east, shall be holy unto the LORD; it shall not be plucked up, nor thrown down any more for ever

Chap. 31. This chapter continues the same subject, freshly glowing with promise and hope for the exiles. Remarkably the discourse is of Israel and Ephraim throughout verses 1-22. (See verses 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 18, 21); and then of Judah (verses 23-26), and finally of both Israel and Judah jointly (verses 27-40). This fact I take not as a prediction of the literal restoration of the Ten Tribes to Canaan, which would be all too little for promises so great, and withal would quite miss the Messianic tone and bearing of this entire portion (chaps. 30 and 31), but the fact should be taken as an index of the great depth of God’s love and of the wealth of His purposed blessings for the kingdom of His anointed. H. C.

2-40. The second part of this prophecy begins (chap. 31:2), and is marked by a sudden transition to a distant period of time, represented in a vision, and embellished with a variety of beautiful scenes and images. God announces the renewal of His ancient love for Israel, and promises, in consequence thereof, a speedy restoration of their former privileges and happiness (verses 2-5). Already the heralds have proclaimed on Mount Ephraim the arrival of the joyful day; they summon the people to reassemble once more in Zion, and promulge by special command the glad tidings of salvation which God had accomplished for them. God Himself declares His readiness to conduct home the remnant of Israel from all parts of their dispersion, to compassionate and relieve their infirmities and to provide them with all necessary accommodations by the way (verses 6-9). The news is carried into distant lands, and the nations are summoned to attend to the display of God’s power and goodness in rescuing His people from their stronger enemies, and in supplying them after their return with all manner of good things to the full extent of their wants and desires (verses 10-14). Here the scene changes, and two new personages are successively introduced, in order to diversify the same subject and to impress it more strongly. Rachel first, who is represented as just risen from the grave, and bitterly bewailing the loss of her children; for whom she looks about her in vain, but none are to be seen. Her tears are dried up, and she is consoled with the assurance that they are not lost forever, but shall in time be brought back to their ancient borders (verses 15-17). Ephraim comes next. He laments his past undutiful ness with great contrition and penitence, and professes an earnest desire of amendment. These symptoms of returning duty are no sooner discerned in him than God acknowledges him once more as a darling child, and resolves with mercy to receive him (verses 18-20). The virgin of Israel is then earnestly exhorted to hasten the preparations for her return, and encouraged with having the prospect of a signal miracle wrought in her favor (verses 21, 22). And the vision closes at last with a promise that the Divine blessing should again rest upon the land of Judah, and that the men of Judah should once more dwell there, cultivating it according to the simplicity of ancient institutions, and fully discharged from every want (verses 23-26). In the third part, by way of appendix to the vision, the following gracious promises are specifically annexed: that God would in time to come supply all the deficiencies of Israel and Judah, and would be as diligent to restore as He had ever been to destroy them, and would not any more visit the offences of the fathers upon the children (verses 27-30). That He would make with them a better covenant than He had made with their forefathers (verses 31-34). That they should continue His people by an ordinance as firm and as lasting as that of the heavens (verses 35-37). And that Jerusalem should again be built, enlarged in its extent and secure from future desolation (verses 33-40). Blayney.

1. The God of all the families.** Amid all the vicissitudes of nations and governments, the institution of the family has been perpetuated. Moral and spiritual forces travel along this road rather than any other. It is God’s great highway for those principles which, when fully embraced by men’s hearts, shall bring in the kingdom of God itself. And it is by the natural increase of the family that God designs His truth should spread and His way come to be known upon earth, and His saving health among all nations. But ere this be accomplished the family will have developed into the Church. When one and another household are possessed of a common spirit, share a common faith and hope and render obedience to one Divine law, it is in accordance with all spiritual instincts that these should meet together for their mutual comfort, edification and support. “Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another.” And such holy convocations have reacted on the family, and, deepening the hold of those sacred principles which first drew the members of the

Church together, have made more firm the faith and hope which already existed. Thus by the Church the spirit of the family is not only preserved, but strengthened, and its perpetuation and reproduction made more certain in the future. And the process goes on. Divine principles, faith in God, fear and love of His name, established in the family, expand and develop into the church, and there slowly, with ever accelerating force, surely and irresistibly they make their way until at length it will be seen that the godly seed has the start of the seed of the wicked one, and is ever pushing it out of the way, driving it forth from its long-held but usurped dominion. In illustration of this see how the Christian races do even now inherit the earth. “The character of the family lies at the very foundation of all permanent moral improvement in the human race generally, and in Christian churches in particular; and until it be intelligently and, under the influence of right principles, practically attended to, all the preaching and all the religious machinery with which we are furnished will fail, as they have hitherto failed, to improve materially the moral condition of the world.” C.

2. In the wilderness.** Though God, on the passage of the Israelites from Egypt, cut off many of them by the sword for their iniquities—some by the Amalekites, some by the hands of their brethren—yet the survivors found grace and were conducted by Him into the land of rest. God here parallels His future gracious purposes with His former merciful providences. Poole.—Through the great wilderness that lay between their country and Babylon the Lord led those captives, conducting them to a peaceful repose in Chaldea, and watching over them for good, till in due time He could bring them home again. It is no great evil to go into a wilderness, provided only that the Lord leads you, and leads from a state of sinning and turmoil to a state of peace and rest. H. C.—The afflictions of the present may not only be the punishment for past transgressions, but much more—a preparation for future blessedness and usefulness, a grace in germ if not in formation. In the case of the Church they may bring back to a study of the title-deeds of faith; in that of the individual they may promote humility, heart-searching and efforts to amend. However hard to bear, they should be endured as a grace preparing for grace. M.

3. The people are introduced as speaking here, and they cite the words of the Lord. The word rendered “of old” usually refers to place, and means from afar; but can be used of time, as our translation has it here. The sense of place would not be bad. The Lord appeared in the remote distance as one repelled and withdrawn because of my sins; yet He reveals Himself from afar with these precious words, affirming His enduring love. H. C.

I have loved thee with an everlasting love, therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee. The Bible is constantly advancing from the domain of threatening and outward promise to that of free and unselfish love. Its strength of appeal from the very beginning lies in the mercy of God pardoning unconditionally—a mercy which, when the clouds are severed, is seen to be the face of the son of God, and the Man of Sorrows devoting Himself for those who had no claim on Him but that of guilt and misery. He comes from a throne to a cross for them, and we see written on it, “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that God loved us.” This love comes from a Divine fountain through a human heart, that human hearts may feel the responsive throb, “We love Him who first loved us.” Ker.

God loves with an everlasting love. He loves Israel, not only in the days of prosperity and wealth and beauty, but in the days of downfall and despair. His thought penetrates through to the abiding worth of humanity. We do not slander human affection, or in any way underestimate it, when we say that man cannot love his fellow-man as God loves him. God it is who first of all shows man what love really is. Y.—It is wonderful that God should ever love such unworthy creatures as we are, but it is “passing strange” that He should not cease to love us after all our provocations of His wrath, that He should love us with “an everlasting love,” and should “have continued His loving-kindness unto” us. Adeney.

If the Lord have “drawn you with loving-kindness,” it is because He hath “loved you with an everlasting love.” This grace of God is no purpose of yesterday, which may change with the perpetual changes of which you are conscious, and which rob you of your peace and joy. It was laid up for you from eternity with God. Then His heart was toward you before creation started into being. Then it was His plan to bring you to Himself. Then your Divine Surety pledged Himself to all that was necessary for your redemption, and the blessed Spirit of God engaged to perfect this grace in you till you were ripe for glory. No ages have altered this everlasting design of God; no multitude of counsels have diverted His thoughts from its accomplishment; no aggravated offences have caused Him to repent of His purpose. His eye saw you when as yet you were not; His providence has brought you into being; and His grace, beginning in eternity, has brought you into second being, and will presently issue in never-ending blessedness and glory, in the immediate vision of your God. Goode.

Love may have many objects, but it must select them one by one. Love affects not masses, but individuals; not humanity, but men. “Jesus loves me,” truly sings the child. “Who loved me and gave Himself for me,” justly says Paul. The human heart demands the element of personal choice. The sinner needs to know and feel that God’s love is fixed on him. This means personal selection. Redemption without this feature could not proceed from love; love refuses to work by any other process. Occident.—Salvation is personal. It is a relation constituted by God’s love for an individual, and that individual’s love for God. It finds expression in personal communion. “He is mine and I am His.” It involves personal choice. All this is clear in thought, and it is the sole basis of the Christian’s joy and peace in God. But the source of this definite love is the Divine nature. God would be love if there were not an intelligence in the universe beside Himself. He so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him might not perish. He is quick to hear and sure to save all who will come unto Him in the only way that can be taken without trampling upon His own immaculate righteousness. He is not willing that any should perish. Interior.

He that loves may be sure that he was loved first; and he that chooses God for his delight and portion may conclude confidently that God hath chosen him to be one of those that shall enjoy Him, and be happy in Him forever; for that our love and electing of Him is but the return and repercussion of the beams of His love shining upon us. Leighton.

The greatness of “the love of Christ” appears in the benefits which He bestows. These are such as would never have entered into the conception of created minds. To have sin pardoned, to be set free from eternal death, this is an unspeakable deliverance; but the benefits are not only negative; they are positive in the highest degree. He accepts us, adopts us into His family; He gives His children portions of

His own Spirit in their hearts; He makes them members of His body, fits them to dwell with Himself in a vast eternity, gives them to rejoice in the hope of the glory to be revealed, purifies them from their defilements, instructs them in heavenly truth, in death sustains their spirits, and after death preserves them in His holy presence for the great day when all shall be united in heaven! Christ’s love, in its duration, extends from eternity to eternity. “I have loved thee with an everlasting love, therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee.” Before the mountains were brought forth, before the earth and the world were created—then His delights were among the sons of men. This earth exists chiefly as the theatre of this love. Nothing short of having His people to dwell with Himself forever can satisfy His generous and immense benevolence. He cannot be content unless they are where He is. “Father, I will that those whom Thou hast given to Me may be with Me where I am.” They partake with Him of His glory, and He says to each at the hour of death, “Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord!” R. Hall.

You were upon His heart from eternity; you are upon His heart this day in heaven; for you His eternal Son came to the world; for you He lived, for you He died; your love to Christ is a reflex of His and His Father’s love to you. Erskine.

The love of God is changeless and eternal. Heaven and earth may pass away, but the kindness of the Lord shall never depart from any of His children. Let us try to grasp this truth. Then, come what may, joy or sorrow, prosperity or adversity, we shall know always that the love of God abides unchanging—that we are held in its clasp with a hold that never can be severed. J. R. M.

That there is one Being in the universe who, with no taint in His ineffable purity, can look down upon this world with mild, pitying, forgiving eyes—this one thought of God in Christ is the conception of Him against which guilt has been contending for six thousand years. The power which conquers guilt is the omnipotence of love. Let it be repeated and reiterated therefore—God is the sinner’s friend. Throw open the windows to the light of heaven. Let the glory of God stream in from golden skies! The whole Godhead is the sinner’s friend. “I will rejoice to do them good with my whole heart and with my whole soul.” God is never more the sinner’s friend than in the very quickening of conscience which he resists. Phelps.

The secret of the love of God and of its eternal nal endurance is to be sought in His nature and in His relations to us. “God is love.” He loves because He cannot but love, because He delights to love, because His love must be ever flowing and is so vast that it must needs flow out eternally in all directions. It is not the attraction of the object, but the character of the love, that accounts for its perpetual endurance. Adeney.

Love hath for its nature to make itself known and to have itself believed. The infinite love of God to the soul is not satisfied until it pours itself into the consciousness, saying, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love, therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee.” There must be a distinct act of the Spirit to carry this home to the individual consciousness. And so many are the doubts and misgivings engendered by indwelling sin, that we need our beloved Saviour to tell us again and again that He is at peace with us and loves us still. The words which He employs for this purpose are the very words which stand recorded in His written testament; but they are uttered with a new tone of personal love and a voice trembling with individual compassion. J. W. A.

The most wonderful thing in the universe is our Saviour’s love for His own. Christ bears with all our infirmities. He never tires of our inconsistencies and unfaithfulnesses. He goes on forever forgiving and forgetting. He follows us when we go astray. He does not forget us when we forget Him. Through all our stumbling and sinning, through all our provocation and disobedience, through all our waywardnesses and stubbornnesses, through all our doubting and unfaithfulness, He clings to us still, and never lets us go. Having loved His own, He loves unto the end. J. R. M.

The old taunt of His enemies, as they stood beneath His cross, might have been yielded to—“If Thou be the Son of God, come down, and we will believe.” I ask why did not He? The only thing that kept Him there, the only answer to that question is—Because He loved me with an everlasting love, and died to redeem me. Because of that love, He came to earth; because of that love, He tabernacled among us; because of that love, He gazed all His life long on the cross of shame; because of that love, He trod unfaltering, with eager haste and solemn resolve, the rough and painful road; because of that love, He listened not to the voice that at the beginning tempted Him to win the world for Himself by an easier path; because of that love, He listened not—though He could have done it—to the voices that at the end taunted Him with their proffered allegiance if He would come down from the cross; because of that love, He gave up His Spirit. And through all the weariness and contumely and pain, that love held His will fixed to its purpose, and bore Him over every hindrance that barred His path. Many waters quench it not. That love is stronger than death; mightier than all opposing powers; deep and great beyond all thought or thankfulness. It silences all praise. It beggars all recompense. To believe it is life. To feel it is heaven. A. M.

“I will draw all men unto Me.” No demonstration of duty, no motive of interest, no portents of hell, no pictures of virtue, can win men to God like a sight of Jesus on His cross and His throne. It is when we see that He first loved us that we love Him, and we delight to serve Him because He so loved us as to give Himself for us. Then it is that the enmity of our minds against God is slain, and the penitent clings to Him like a loving child; then the root of sin, from which the works of the flesh spring with such vigor and plentifulness, is cut, and the soul, grafted into the Living Vine, Christ Jesus, brings forth grateful praise in the spiritual virtues of a Christian life. Bethune.

Our safety and security lie not in our weak holding upon Christ, but in Christ’s holding us fast in His everlasting arms. This is our glory and our safety, that Christ’s left hand is always under us, and His right hand doth always embrace us. T. Brooks.

To make Christ’s forgiving love our own there must be the personal contact of my soul with the loving heart of Christ, the individual act of my own coming to Him, and, as the old Puritans used to say, “my transacting” with Him. Like the ocean of the atmosphere, His love encompasses me, and in it I live, and move, and have my being. But I must let it flow into my spirit and stir the dormant music of my soul. I can shut it out, sealing my heart love-tight against it. I do shut it out unless by my own conscious, personal act I yield myself to Him, unless by my own faith I come to Him and meet Him, secretly and really as did the penitent apostle, whom the message that proclaimed the love of His Lord emboldened to meet the Lord who loved, and by His own lips to be assured of forgiveness and friendship. It is possible to stumble at noontide as in the dark. A man may starve outside of barns filled with plenty, and his lips may be parched with thirst though he is within sight of a broad river flowing in the sunshine. So a soul may stiffen into the death of self and sin, even though the voice that wakes the dead to a life of love be calling to it. Christ and His grace are yours if you will, but the invitations and beseechings of His mercy, the constant drawings of His love, the all-embracing offers of His forgiveness, may be all in vain if you do not grasp them, and hold them fast by the hand of faith. A. M.

Too late I loved thee, O thou beauty of ancient days, yet ever new; too late I loved thee. For thou wert within and I abroad; there I searched for thee, I in my deformity plunging among the fair forms which thou hast made. Thou wert with me, but I was not with thee. Things held me far from thee, which unless they were in thee were not at all. Thou didst call and shout, and didst burst through my deafness. Thou didst flash and shine and scatter my blindness. Thou didst breathe forth odors, and with every breath I draw I pant for thee. I tasted, and I hunger and thirst. Thou didst touch me, and I yearn for thy peace. Where hast thou not walked with me, O Truth, teaching me what to beware and what to desire, when I referred to thee whatever I could discover in this earthly state? Nor in all these things can I find a safe place for my soul but only in thyself; there may my scattered members be gathered, so that nothing of me shall be separated from thee. And sometimes thou admittest me to an unusual affection, felt in my inmost soul, and rising to a strange sweetness, which if it were perfected in me, I know not what in it would not belong to the life to come.

O Truth who art Eternity, and Love who art Truth, and Eternity who art Love, Thou art my God; to Thee do I cry night and day! Augustine.

7. We cannot fail to notice how much this verse and indeed the greater part of this chapter is in the glowing, joyous strain of Isaiah. The blessedness and glory of Zion’s latter days thrill the prophet’s heart, and he cannot do less than call for paeans of praise to God, and implore men to publish these glad tidings among the great nations of the earth, and stir up the people of every land to prayer and to praise.

8,9. To speak of “bringing them from the north country” links the glorious future to the sad and suffering past, showing that the Church of God is one in every age, and that from the remnant of these exiles God proposes to evolve a more glorious Church that shall embosom the mightiest nations of the earth. When He so wills it and lends His hand to do it, it will be easy to bring the captives home; the blind and the lame, the enfeebled and those of most delicate situation—all alike are borne along with ease as if on the strong arms of God’s ministering angels. What are human weaknesses, and what is a dreary and vast wilderness to Him or to His people when He stands for their help! He can make their way straight and smooth, and can pour rivers of water alongside their wilderness paths; so be it their hearts are broken and humbled before Him. It is beautiful and very significant to see the returning exiles weeping and praying as they set forth and press onward in their long desert journey; but God turns their mourning to joy; makes their desert pathway a blooming paradise; and gives as His reason that great truth—good for all His people in every age: “For I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is My first-born.” Does not the great God love His people? When their hearts are humble and tender before Him, is anything too much for Him to do for their prosperity and joy? H. C.

The most solemn spiritual relations, and the most comforting promises, are presented in the Old Testament in figurative language derived from the family relationship. Jehovah is both husband and father; the Jewish Church His bride, Israel His children. The paternal training, watchfulness, goodness and mercy; the maternal tenderness; and the filial reverence, love and obedience which His children owe Him, are among the most familiar imageries employed by the prophets in their message. Thoughts like these must, surely, have shed heaven’s light and sanctity around the life of the family. And so, when they speak to us of the merely earthly character of the Old Testament institutions and promises, we answer, that there are two modes of viewing the spiritual: that in which the earthly is lifted into the heavenly, which is that of the New Testament, and that in which the heavenly is brought down into the earthly, which is characteristic of the Old Testament, as preparatory to and preceding the New. A. E.

10-14. It adds to the interest of this magnificent strain of promise that God would have it proclaimed among all the Gentile nations and published in the distant islands—i.e., in all the countries lying beyond the great sea. Let them all behold and see what God will do for His people. H. C.

The redemption of Israel is to be proclaimed as of universal import and consequence. The scattering of Israel may be alluded to in speaking of “the nations” and “the isles,” or these may be addressed simply as onlookers of the mighty drama. What happens to God’s people must concern the whole world.

It betokened the restoration of God’s favor (verse 10). The term of punishment was to draw to a close, and the era of reconciliation to commence. Just as He had “scattered” the Israelites, now He was about to recall them to Canaan. In the one act, as in the other, the Divine intervention and its moral significance would be made manifest. The greatest judgments of God on earth have their limits. “He will not always chide, neither will He keep His anger forever.” How carefully should the times of Divine discipline and reconciliation be observed by those who are concerned in them! The power of God would be displayed in it (verses 10, 11; cf. verse 8). As Sovereign. The words used, “He that scattered Israel will gather him,” would seem to mean—He that scattered Israel would alone know where to discover them again. The figure of a shepherd and his flock is also suggestive of skill and authority. As the restored unity and national life of Israel were to be a marvellous phenomenon, much more would the spiritual unity of God’s people throughout the world, of which the former was but the prototype. “The Lord knoweth them that are His.” Another proof of the Divine power was afforded in the fact that Israel was to be delivered from one “that was stronger than he.” The power of Nebuchadnezzar was to be broken. So the world-power which prevents the true freedom and unity of the Church from being realized will be destroyed. Indeed, already Christ has declared Himself as “Him that overcometh the world;” and in view of this the “little flock” are not to be dismayed. The day is coming when all enemies will be put under the feet of Christ, the Lord of the Church.

It was not only to be a restoration of the people to their own land (verses 12-14). God does nothing by halves. The industry, social and national development, and the spiritual life of Israel would be abundantly blessed. The well-being of God’s people is viewed as connected—the spiritual with the material, and the material with the spiritual. There is no austerity in the religion of the restored, and yet their life is full of the spirit and practice of religion. The blessing of God upon the fruits of the earth is gratefully recognized, and as with a common thankfulness the people “flow together” to the great festivals of the Temple. It is only as men exhibit this spirit—the spirit of righteousness and thankfulness—that the earth will yield the fulness of her increase. Other things being equal, the good man will succeed better than the wicked, even in secular pursuits. “Godliness is profitable unto all things,” etc. (1 Tim. 4:8). It is to be complete and glorious. How spontaneous the piety of the redeemed! In the picture here sketched we seem to catch a glimpse of the fulness of the millennial joy. It is a state of overflowing, ecstatic blessedness. The religious and the secular pursuits of men are to be harmonized. Age is to forget its weakness, and the bereaved their grief. The Church is to share in the general prosperity, and, as a consequence of the efficiency and fervor of its ministrations, the people are to be “satisfied with My goodness.” When shall this vision of human life in its wholeness and its glory be realized? Our own times exhibit few signs of such a golden age. Yet the Word of the Lord has spoken it, and we should with patience both labor and look for its fulfilment. M.

12-14. The deepest meaning of this prophecy is that spiritual men only can really praise God, because they are praising Him out of hearts that are being sustained by the richness of spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. The satisfied heart must praise, else there is a proof that the heart is not really satisfied. Satisfaction can no more be concealed than dissatisfaction. When in the writings of the apostles we come across outbursts of doxology, it is just what we might expect as being in harmony with the greatness of the blessings received. And this is just what often makes the praise part of worship eminently unsatisfactory, that men are thanking God for what they have not received. All compositions having praise and thanksgiving for their elements, and being successful compositions, must, by the very nature of the case, owe their origin to some actual experience of God’s goodness. Hence it is important in this passage to notice how three things are bound together in the one prediction. 1. There is the gift of God. 2. The consequent satisfaction. 3. The irrepressible joy. And what greater gift can we have from God than a heart filled with pure, abiding joy, free from reproach, free from apprehension? Y.

14. Shall be satisfied.** There is a satisfaction which suffices. That of trust, which prevents all murmuring at the dispensations of God, and which says, “I will trust, and not be afraid.” That of meekness, which says, “It is the Lord; let Him do what seemeth good in His sight.” That of experience—the consciousness that God is carrying on His work within us, deepening the hold of that which is good, loosening more and more the power of that which is evil. Consciousness of growth in grace. C.

15-17. Ramah, the home of the prophet Samuel (1 Sam. 7:17), was very near the sepulchre of Rachel, as may be seen in 1 Sam 10:2. Samuel said to Saul, “When thou art departed from me this day, then thou shalt find two men by Rachel’s sepulchre in the border of Benjamin.” On the poetic conception in this passage, J. D. Michaelis makes this comment: “An exquisite figure. Rachel, during all her life ardently desirous of children, dying in childbirth and buried on the border of Benjamin, lifts her maternal head from her tomb, looks around on the wide waste of ruin, and sees not one of her children in all the land! She pours out her heart in most bitter tears; then God appears for her consolation.” It was indeed exceedingly natural for the prophet to think of Rachel who so loved her children as being inconsolable when she saw them all gone from their native land. Her sorrow doubtless represented the sorrow of many Hebrew mothers, then bewailing their dead and mourning the desolation of their long-loved country. To hearts so borne down with grief, the words of Divine consolation come as cold water to a thirsty soul. “Thy works shall be rewarded,” seems to mean: All thou hast borne of pain and grief, and all thou hast done with toil in thy love for Zion, shall find its due reward. Thy children shall return again; thine end is full of hope; a glorious future awaits thy sons and daughters. So timely and so precious are the words of God’s consolations. H. C.

15. A voice was heard in Ramah. Ramah was a city of Benjamin, near which Rachel, the mother of Joseph and Benjamin, was buried; who is here, in a beautiful figure of poetry, represented as come forth out of her grave, and lamenting bitterly for the loss of her children, none of whom presented themselves to her view, being all either slain or gone into exile. The evangelist applies these words to Herod’s massacre of the infants at Bethlehem, and in its environs (Matt. 2:17, 18). Blayney.

This figurative representation was, in a great measure, literally true, when Herod slew the infants at Bethlehem, not far from Ramah, and therefore Matthew tells us that this prophecy was fulfilled in that event; several other instances may be alleged where the sense of the prophecies which relates to the times of the Gospel is the interpretation that most exactly answers the natural and genuine import of the words. Lowth.

It was the sad death of Rachel’s which made her the typical mother in Israel. It was not an unclouded, merely prosperous life which could fitly have foreshadowed the lives of those by whom the promised seed was to come; and least of all of the virgin to whom it was said, “A sword shall pierce through thine own soul also.” It was the wail of Rachel that poetical minds among the Jews heard from time to time mourning their national disasters—“Rachel weeping” for her children, when by captivity they were separated from their mother country, or when, by the sword of Herod, the mothers of Bethlehem were bereaved of their babes. But it was also observed that that which brought this anguish on the mothers of Bethlehem was the birth there of the last son of Israel, the blossom of this long-growing plant, suddenly born after a long and barren period, the son of Israel’s right hand. Dods.

18. Having promised the return of the people from their exile, the prophet here speaks of the manner and spirit of this return. The essential point in it is, that the heart is touched. It begins with serious thought upon God’s chastising hand under a conviction of personal stubbornness and guilt, and with some deep moving of heart toward return to God. With exquisite beauty and force the Lord here represents Himself as hearing the plaintive, solitary moans of Ephraim as he begins to think upon his ways and sets his face toward his long-forsaken God: “I have surely heard.” Then let no sinner imagine that God cares not for his soul, and never takes note of his penitential tears. If only those tears betoken humiliation, confession, sorrow and shame for sin, then surely the eye and the heart of God are upon them, and those bemoanings of sin and folly will come up into his ear. An untamed and unbroken bullock fitly represents the stubborn, refractory spirit of the unhumbled sinner. He rebels against the judgments of the Lord, and thus compels the Lord to yet sterner blows. But sober thought comes at last, and with it an entire change in his views of himself and of his God. Is not his soul overwhelmed now with shame and grief? Oh, might he only turn to God thoroughly and acceptably! Nothing can more befit his case than this uplifting of his heart in prayer: “Turn Thou me; for Thou art the Lord my God.” H. C.

Ephraim says, “Thou didst correct me, and I received correction.” Herein is one of the chief ends of suffering; even when deserved for sin it is not to give penal deserts and only satisfy justice, but rather to urge the wrongdoer to see his fault and repent. Chastisement leads to reflection, humbles, makes us feel our need and helplessness, shows the want of God and His consolations, and so inclines us to return to Him. To profit us, however, it must be rightly endured. We must receive correction, not harden our hearts against it.

The Divine life in man begins with the turning round of the soul toward God. This “conversion” is the first step. It may not be suddenly discernible. It may not be indicated by any one epoch in our history. But it must take place. We have been wandering further and further from God. The most momentous step is the first step back to Him. We have to learn the necessity of this; to understand that while we remain in the old way, however pleasant it may be, it is leading us away from God, our mission, and our home; to see the importance of a change, a revolution, a regeneration, a new creation. Religion cannot begin with a sinful man in a mere improvement, much less in a natural development. He must turn round.

God only can turn His children back to Himself. Ephraim prays, “Turn Thou me, and I will return.” We lack the desire to return until He “from whom all good desires proceed” implants the earnest wish in our hearts. We have not the strength to return. Old habits of sin are fetters that bind us down to the old life. The will is corrupt, and therefore we cannot will aright. But God does move us to return and give us power to return. The Gospel is not only an invitation; it is the power of God. By His Spirit God gives us new birth and the free life of His children. Yet for this grace we must seek in faith and penitence. Ephraim prays that God will turn him. We cannot turn ourselves. God will not turn us against our will. If we seek His grace, He will turn us to Himself. Adeney.

19. Godly sorrow worketh repentance unto life, not to be repented of. It is not itself repentance, because this is a practical change; but it is a grand means of producing this change, and it arises from the view of sin in its true light, as contrariety to God, neglect of the highest good, ingratitude to the best Friend, rebellion against our Maker—the view of sin as sin, independent of its effects. This sorrow produces an abhorrence of sin; he who feels it will have no idea of retaining a single sin in his heart. The elements of repentance are found in the mourner’s mind; he turns to the Lord in earnest, yields himself up to be guided by the Lord, and utters the language of Ephraim: “Surely after I was turned, I repented, I was ashamed, yea, confounded.” R. Hall.

20. Is Ephraim my dear son? Rather the sense is, “Is not Ephraim My dear son? Is he not a pleasant child?” That is, Is he not one that I have set my affections upon, as a parent does upon a child in whom he delights? God proceeds to say, Ever since I have so severely reproved and chastised him, I have still retained for him a fatherly kindness; I am moved with compassion toward him, and will in due time pardon and receive him into favor. W. Loveth.—In all exigencies of His children He is overcome with their complaints, and cannot hold out against their moanings; He may, as Joseph, seem strange for a while, but cannot act that strangeness long; His heart moves and sounds to theirs, gives the echo to their griefs and groans. Is Ephraim a dear son? Oh, the unspeakable privilege to have Him for our Father, who is the Father of mercies and compassions, and those not barren, fruitless pityings, for He is withal the God of all consolations. Do not think that He can shut out a bleeding soul that comes to Him, and refuse to take, and to bind up, and heal, a broken heart that offers itself to Him, puts itself into His hand, and entreats His help. Doth He require pity of us, and doth He give it to us, and is it not infinitely more in Himself? Leighton.

This inimitably precious passage closes fitly with the promise, “I will surely have mercy upon him, saith the Lord.” Nothing can be more sure than God’s mercy to the really humbled penitent. His infinite love forbids that mercy should fail to reach such a sinner. The showing of such mercy to such souls is the chief delight He finds in this revolted world. Oh, would sinners only believe this, then would they not turn from all sinning and press to His open arms to pour out their warm tears of sorrow for sin and of gratitude for such free and abundant pardon! H. C.

22. How long will thou go about? According to the first evangelical promise concerning “the seed of the woman,” followed this prediction of the prophet, “The Lord hath created a new thing in the earth, A woman shall compass a man.” That new creation of a man is therefore “new,” and therefore “a creation,” because wrought in a woman only, without a man, compassing a man. This interpretation is ancient, literal and clear. The words import a miraculous conception; and the ancient Jews acknowledged this sense, and applied it determinately to the Messiah. This prophecy is illustrated by that of Isaiah, chap. 7:14. Bp. Pearson.

23. The cities shall be habitations of justice; the mountain of Israel (so the whole land is called—Ps. 78:54), and especially Mount Zion, shall be a mountain of holiness. Justice toward men and holiness toward God must go together. Godliness and honesty are what God has joined, and let no man think to put them asunder, or to make one to atone for the want of the other. It is well with a people when they come out of trouble thus refined, and it is a sure presage of further happiness.

25. This is applicable to the spiritual blessings God has in store for all true penitents, for all that are just and holy; they shall be abundantly satisfied with Divine graces and comforts. In the love and favor of God the weary soul shall find rest, and the sorrowful soul joy. H.

26. If we look attentively at the contents of chaps. 30 and 31, we find very sufficient causes for the sweetness of the prophet’s sleep. Jehovah makes one long announcement of favor, restoration and comfort. Hitherto when the prophet has had to listen to Jehovah, if there have been consolatory utterances, they have been mingled with denunciation and words of the most melancholy import. But now there is one unbroken stream of good tidings, and the effect is shown even in sleep. And if in sleep, how much more in waking hours! The whole round of the day becomes different when God looks favorably on the life. Sweetness of sleeping hours must come from all being right in waking hours. Now, with Jeremiah, as to his own personal life, all was right in waking hours, but with his nation all was wrong; and so through the day he went about seeing sin and foreseeing suffering, and at night his vivid imagination must often have kept him awake or peopled what broken sleep he got with the most terrible dreams. Bad men may sleep better than good ones, so long as there is nothing to awaken their selfish fears, and good men spend restless nights over the troubles of those in whom they are interested. Yet the restlessness must come from the failing to see the abiding goodness of God. Here, for a little, God drove every cloud from the sky of His servant, and showed him how heavenly brightness was a thing entirely above earthly confusions; and then His servant could get sweet sleep. And God will give to all that wait upon Him that quiet calm of the heart which is to our higher life what sweet sleep is to the body. It is God’s will that our present life, with all its varied needs, should have all the refreshment He can give. Y.

29, 30. “The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” There would have been truth in this saying had it been used only in reference to the mere natural consequences of their fathers’ sins. In this sense their teeth were set on edge by the sour grapes their fathers had eaten. But the prophets pointed out the falsehood involved in the proverb as it was understood by the people. They showed that it was utterly false when applied to the spiritual relation in which each person stands in the judgment of Him who is no respecter of persons (Ezek. 18:2-4 sqq.). Clark.

30. “Every one shall die for his own iniquity.” “Circumstances,” “bodily organization,” “temperament,” “the maxims of society,” “the conventionalities of the time”—all these things have something to do with shaping our single deeds and with influencing our character; but after we have made all allowances for these influences which affect me, let us ask the philosophers who bring them forward as diminishing or perhaps annihilating responsibility, “And what about that me which these things influence?” After all, let me remember that the deed is mine, and that every one of us shall, as Paul puts it, give account of himself before God. A. M.

31. The Old Testament itself, while it regards the decree of salvation revealed in it, and the kingdom of God founded thereupon, as eternal, as extending to all times and to all races of men, acknowledges that the manifestation of God’s kingdom at that time was imperfect and temporary; for it points forward to a new revelation, in which that which is demanded by the letter of the law and signified by its ordinances shall become a reality through Divine communication of life; indeed, at the very time in which the old form of the theocracy was overthrown, it predicts the new eternal covenant which God would make with His people. O.

31-34. The remaining verses of this chapter have but one theme—the richer spiritual blessings of the Gospel age, surpassing those of the age before Christ came. They are presented under the phrase, “a new covenant.” In the first covenant the Lord proposed to Israel to enter into relations of special alliance, service and trust with Himself, and prescribed minutely the terms and conditions of this relationship.

He delivered them from their bondage in Egypt, and on the basis of this deliverance exhorted them to become His people, and promised on His part to become their God. They assented, and then He gave them His moral law of Ten Commandments, and next His ceremonial and civil institutes which were designed as means of religious culture and of protection specially against idolatry and generally against sin. As is indicated in our passage, those agencies were mainly external; the law itself was written on tables of stone. But the “new covenant” in its agencies for begetting and maintaining the religious life was to be inward and spiritual. The Lord would write it, not on stone tables, but on living hearts. There can be no doubt that this refers to the great, the special and distinguishing feature of the Gospel age—the gift of the Spirit. By this Divine agency the law of God is written on the very hearts of men: “They are all taught of God” (Isa. 54:13). They are taught the spiritual nature and bearings of the Divine law as never otherwise, and what is yet more, they not only understand it, but they love it, and joyfully obey it. They respond to its perceived claims with joyful promptness, and find their supreme delight in learning and doing the will of God. As here so tersely and beautifully expressed, the result of this new covenant and of this writing of God’s law upon their heart is that the Lord becomes their God and they His people. God is theirs and they are His. All that God is, all that He can do for His creatures, He becomes to them and does for them. All that is involved in being His own—controlled and used by Him they become toward their God. These relations are exceedingly broad and intensely rich and blessed. God gives them His love and protection; and they give Him their heart’s best love and the whole service of their life. As appears more fully in verse 34, this new covenant makes special account of the forgiveness of sin: “For I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember their sin no more.” This forgiveness implies the atoning sacrifice of Christ, and shows that this sacrifice also was embraced in the new covenant. So that under this phrase must be included the great essential blessings of the Gospel dispensation—the gift of God’s Son as teacher and sacrifice for sin; and the gift of God’s Spirit as also a spiritual teacher and an agent of spiritual power on human hearts unto holiness. The scope of this passage puts this new covenant somewhat in contrast with the old. The new is not like the old. Its prominent features are different; its main agencies are new and peculiar. This must not be pressed too far, for it cannot imply that there was no forgiveness of sin under the old economy, or that there was no Holy Spirit there. But it does imply that the prominent religious agencies in that were external; were in the letter; made up largely of ritual forms; the law itself being written on stone; while under the new covenant the great religious agencies are the mission and death of Christ and the permanent work of the Divine Spirit on human hearts. H. C.

The first covenant had been repeatedly and flagrantly broken. As a system of morals, it was perfect and without flaw; but human nature, being corrupt, was unable to keep its conditions (Rom. 7: 12). Universal corruption witnessed to the hopelessness of salvation by such a method. And yet the transgressions of men were not thereby excused. The essential depravity of man was revealed in a stronger and more definite character; but it already existed, and was an occasion of the Divine anger. As the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews phrases it, God, “finding fault with them” (Heb. 8: 8), reminds Judah and Israel of His delivering mercy (“I took them by the hand,” etc.), and declares His constancy and uninterrupted tenderness (“I was an husband,” etc.). In strict justice the transgressors of the law had no claim to any consideration. They had incurred the righteous displeasure of God. But His merciful purpose was not laid aside. Another opportunity of salvation was afforded, and when the first covenant failed, a second covenant was designed of grander conception and more universal adaptation. The love of God affronted does not withdraw itself, but busies itself with new schemes to supplement human frailty and diminish the occasions and possibilities of failure. M.

The old covenant starts with law; the new one springs out of life. Verse 33 gives one of the Old Testament ways of expressing the doctrine of regeneration. God writes the laws of spiritual life on the heart, just as He writes the laws of natural life on every natural germ; and then all the rest is a matter of unfolding, of growth, of encouragement, of culture. The old covenant was one long, exhaustive, thorough experiment by which the fact became clear that in the natural man there was nothing to unfold. The new covenant established within a very brief period that, given a new life-principle working within him, man is indeed a being of glorious capabilities. Y.

The new covenant is a promise, is the assurance ance indeed, that God has taken the matter of our salvation into His own hands. It is all of grace; He gives everything; nothing is left to our own solitary effort. If we read over the words of the covenant as they are given here from first to last, there is not a single word about anything to be done by us. The whole covenant is not so much between man and His Maker as between Jehovah and man’s Representative, the Lord Jesus Christ. The human side of the covenant has been already fulfilled by Jesus, and there remains nothing now but the covenant of giving, not the covenant of requirements. The whole covenant with regard to us, the people of God, now stands thus: “I will give this; I will bestow that; I will fulfil this promise; I will grant that favor.” The old covenant said, “Do this, and thou shalt live.” The new says, “I will do all.” C.

This covenant is a revelation of positive and uplifting truth in a time of negations and false refuges. It is as evangelical as any disclosure of Isaiah; it is indeed a foretelling of the regenerative outpouring of Pentecost, the New Testament set in the heart of and contrasted with the Old (Heb. 8). The new covenant is spiritual. It begins in the heart, and works from within outward. The law of life and of influence is as atomic as leaven and as voluntary as the choices of man. If any man will do the Divine will, he shall know it. Whosoever will may take the water of life freely. The terms of the new covenant are universal in their sweep. No welcoming soul is excluded from them or by them. They are so easy to understand that any child may apprehend them. Their criterion is not intellectual culture, but a willing heart enlightened by the Spirit of God. Forgiveness is perfectly free under these conditions; it has only to be sincerely accepted; and forgiveness is the first of these terms to be received. We are saved by faith, and faith is God’s gift to us. The new covenant is sure, surer than the ordinances of earth or sky, as sure as the character of the unchangeable God. It is final and eternal, for the Lord of hosts has witnessed it. McPherson.

The prophet was not commissioned to give them any new commandment, still less to admonish to strict observance of the old, but to bring the promise, which characteristically was to this effect, that God would give them a new heart to know Him that He was Jehovah. And that it was not in any wise connected with ignorance of the law, nor, on the other hand, expected in conjunction with a return to its merely outward ordinances, appears from this, that the great promise of “the latter days”—of the Messianic time of completion—was that Jehovah would then make a new covenant with Israel, not according to that when He brought them out of Egypt, but one in which He would put His law in their inward parts, and write it on their hearts. And most important as adding yet another element: then would one man no longer teach his neighbor, but all be taught directly of God. This indicates the existence of the old elements, while at the same time it points to an entire change in the future. Then would not only the old covenant and the old law, but even prophetism be superseded, or rather fulfilled. All this in the “latter days,” or Messianic time, when, as Zechariah predicts, all ritual ordinances would merge in that universal consecration to God, in which “Holiness unto Jehovah,” the inscription on the high priest’s mitre, would, so to speak, be that on all vessels in common use in Jerusalem (14:20). But what does all this mean, when translated into the prose language of history, but the fulfilment of the law in its spiritual aspect, such as we find it described in the Epistles of Paul and, indeed, throughout the whole New Testament? But even this is not all. Jeremiah connects with the prediction of the new law, which was to be written on the heart when man’s teaching would give place to universal knowledge of God, this promise deeply significant, even if in its then form it applied to Israel: “For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more” (verse 34). Similarly Ezekiel, the priest-prophet, speaks of the time when God would sprinkle clean water upon them, and cleanse them from their filthiness, give them a new heart, put His Spirit within them, take away their stony heart, and make them to walk in His statutes (36:25-27). And that these promises would find their fulfilment in the time of the Messiah, the Son of David, is thus expressly stated by the same prophet in the following chapter of His predictions: “And David My servant shall be king over them, and they all shall have one shepherd; they shall also walk in My judgments, and observe My statutes, and do them.” And this is what Ezekiel emphatically designates as the covenant of peace, the everlasting covenant which God would make (37:24-26). Lastly, with this also agrees both the saying of Zechariah (13:1): “In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness,” and this of Micah (7:19, 20), that God would cast all their sins into the depths of the sea, and thus “perform the truth to Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham” which He had “sworn unto our fathers from the days of old.” A. E.

To what time or person the promises made here by Jeremiah and by Ezekiel (chaps. 34:23, 26; 36:26) related might be uncertain before Malachi prophesied; though they have internal marks which point to the Messiah. But Malachi, by his prophecy concerning “the Messenger of the covenant” (chap. 3:1), put it out of all doubt. This was to say, in other words, that Messiah should be the declarer, the publisher, the mediator of that better covenant, as Moses was of the old covenant; and that a law should be given by Him. Bp. Chandler.

33. Says Jeremiah, speaking of the “new covenant,” or gracious relation between God and His people, and uttering the very words of God, “I will put My law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.” This relation between God and His people is identical with His dwelling in them, as the gift of His Spirit, and He produces this relation by putting His law in their inward parts, and by writing it in their hearts. The law here evidently means a knowledge of God and His will. The writing it in their hearts is the work of the Spirit, giving inward effect to the truth; and the resulting relation between God and His people is all they need or can have of Him, save the sacred peace, the holy delight, the Divine communings which follow on that relation. J. S. Stone.

In their heart will I write it. It lies in the nature of the case that the law at the time in which it was given did not present itself as a law to be abrogated, for thereby the law would have weakened itself. Certainly the Mosaic regulations are given very positively, as everlasting regulations, from which Israel was not to deviate; but that the position of the people toward the law shall in the future be different from what it is in the present time, is stated in the Pentateuch very distinctly—viz., De. 30:6, where it is declared, that in the last times God will circumcise the heart of the people, and so will not meet them merely in the way of command, but will awaken in them a susceptibility for the fulfilment of the law. Thus the germ of the prophecy of a new covenant of an essentially different character, as it was uttered by Jeremiah in those very days when the battlements of the old city of David sank in the dust, lies already in the Pentateuch, O.

The law shall be written in their hearts by the finger of the Spirit, as formerly it was written in the tables of stone. God writes His law in the hearts of all believers, makes it ready and familiar to them, at hand when they have occasion to use it as that which is written in the heart (Prov. 3 : 3). He makes them in care to observe it, for that which we are solicitous about is said to lie near our hearts. He works in them a disposition to obedience, a conformity of thought and affection to the rules of the Divine law as that of the copy to the original. This is here promised, and ought to be prayed for that our duty may be done conscientiously and with delight. H.

Furthermore, there is wrought in the heart by God a love to the law as well as a consent to it, such a love that the man thanks God that He has given him such a fair and lovely representation of what perfect holiness would be; that He has given such measuring lines, by which he knows how a house is to be builded in which God can dwell. The law is fully written on the heart when a man takes pleasure in holiness, and feels a deep pain whenever sin approaches him. It is not so much what you do as what you delight to do, which becomes the clearest test of your character. The main point of the whole is this, that whereas our nature was once contrary to the law of God, so that whatever God forbade we at once desired, and whatever God commanded we therefore began to dislike, the Holy Spirit comes and changes our nature, and makes it congruous to the law, so that now whatsoever God commands our will commands. How much better to have the law written upon the heart than upon tablets of stone! Anon.

“The word” must not only be heard and received, but “engrafted” in us. It is God’s gracious promise, “I will put My laws in their hearts, and write them in their inward parts”—that is, He will enlighten our minds to the understanding of His will, and frame our hearts and affections to the obedience of it. This is the true engrafting of the word. Then “the root of the matter is within us.” If it be engrafted by the Master’s hand, you will know it by this token, it will be fruitful, it will spring up and be visible in your life, conduct, and conversation. The graft draws all the sap of the stock to itself; your affections, your purposes, your cares, your thoughts, will serve the word. T. Manton.

Afflictions of the flesh, such as watchings and fastings and subjecting of the body, have no tendency in themselves to make men better; they often have made them worse. They are no test of holiness and true faith, taken by themselves. A man may be most austere in his life, and by that very austerity learn to be cruel to others, not tender. It should ever be borne in mind that the severest and most mortified life is as little a passport to heaven or criterion of saintliness as benevolence is, or usefulness, or amiableness. Self-discipline is a condition, but not a sign of holiness. It may leave a man worldly or make him a tyrant. It only ministers to God’s purposes when God uses it. It is only when grace is in the heart, when power from above dwells in a man, that anything outward or inward turns to his salvation. Newman.

I will be their God, and they shall be My people. “I will—I will be to them a God;” so, also, He says of them, “They shall—they shall be to Me a people.” It is a provision of this perfect covenant, wherein all spiritual blessings are made over, no less surely, than freely, to the heirs of promise, that God’s power, wisdom and goodness shall effectually work together to overcome all difficulties and opposition in the way—first, of establishing, and then of maintaining to the end, this blessed relationship between Himself and them. Whether these difficulties arise from the power and subtlety of spiritual enemies from without or from the strength of natural depravity in the hearts of His children—let what will stand in the way to prevent, God declares, “I will be their God, and they shall be My people.”

His people owning God as theirs. “They shall be My people”—that is, they shall so demean themselves; their spirit and deportment among men shall witness for them that they stand to Me in this relation. We may specify four unquestionable marks by which the people of God evidence this relation to Him; and whereby they that are such may assure themselves, again, of His eternal foreknowledge and choice of them so to be, “holy, and without blame before Him, in love.” They yield themselves to His authority. They separate themselves from an evil world. They devote themselves to His service. They live on Him for protection and happiness. Unalterable is that relation into which they are brought who have come to God for mercy to their unrighteousness, through Christ. He puts them among His children; He contends with their remaining corruptions by the power and grace of His spirit; He disciplines them by afflictions; He warns them, and inspires them with godly fear, by the admonitions of His word and Spirit; He departs from them, in sensible comforts, for a season, that they may not depart from Him, nor He from them, forever. By these, as well as by direct allurements of His love, He keeps them in obedience; weans them from the world; wins their affections; and having caused them to be a people to Him on earth, He ministers to them “an abundant entrance” into His everlasting kingdom and glory. There that word has its complete accomplishment, “I will be to them a God, and they shall be to Me a people.” Goode.

34. Is it not remarkable that almost at the very point when it attained its full development the seeds of dissolution in the old economy begin to show themselves? The prophet gives the promise of another covenant; thereby the first one is declared now to be growing old, and soon about to disappear. “I will forgive their iniquities, and remember their sins no more”—so runs the promise in the covenant—“for they shall all know Me, from the least to the greatest.” Thou morning of a brighter day, how long thou dost delay beneath the rim of earth! Lo, heaven opens for the sweet angelic song, “Good-will to men!” Another revelation is beginning now. But there is being instituted, too, a new kind of communion between heaven and earth; and while Moses dedicated the old covenant by blood of bulls and goats, Christ dedicates the new one in His own, and by His offering fills up the chasm that separates a holy God from an unholy world. Yea, the propitiation which could but be dimly shadowed forth by Moses in those sacrificial rites—prophetic, though mysterious—that grand atoning work, Christ shows in its reality. Van O.

No one will contend that until the Gospel is known universally, it will ever cease to be the duty of Christians to say to all around them, “Know the Lord;” or that we have any reason to expect that the Bible will ever be superseded by a miraculous dispensation which shall flash Divine illumination on the mind, and thus raise mankind above the use of means. The import of the prediction appears to be simply this, that when the reproach of indolence shall have been wiped away from the Church, and every man shall have said to his neighbor, “Know the Lord” (verse 34), the reproach of ignorance shall be wiped away from the world; for the Spirit of God will so graciously and universally bless the means employed as to render their continuance comparatively unnecessary. This amnesty from heaven having been universally preached and received, the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea. J. Harris.

35-37. After promises so rich, it is a merciful condescension to the weakness of human faith that God should append such sublime assurances and asseverations. These are made doubly strong by the choice of their terms and figures. We are reminded that the God who gave these glorious promises is He who gave the sun for our light by day, and can not He make another sun arise on the darkness of our souls? It is also the same who ordained the courses of the moon and of the stars for our light by night; and cannot He break up the otherwise dense and hopeless darkness of the human soul by the rays of heavenly light? Things impossible to be done are adduced to show that this casting off of Israel can never be. The things thus adduced certify to us the vastness of His power who has made these promises, and may be taken as His pledge that Omnipotence can surely accomplish what His love has devised and his veracity stands pledged to perform. The Lord touches the point of man’s worst fear when He says, “I will not cast off Israel for all her great sins.” When we think of Israel as representing the visible Church of God, and then look at her great corruptions and the infinite trial the Lord must have felt under her waywardness and backslidings, it is exceedingly comforting to read this promise and find in it the assurance that the Lord will never cease to have a people, but will purify and discipline, redeem and save, till they shall be a people to His praise, and be fitted to do His appointed work on earth.

38-40. In these verses Jerusalem, the ancient city of the Lord, represents His Church and kingdom in the latter days. It is here rebuilt, considerably enlarged, and what is much more significant, so enlarged as to include the unclean and loathsome localities outside but near its former walls. It now encloses all these, yet not as unclean and repulsive, but as now cleansed and made holy to the Lord. That is, the Church of God makes aggressions upon the kingdom of darkness. She goes down into the valley of Sodom, and having cleansed it out, converts it into a paradise. The figure corresponds to Ezekiel’s river of waters from under the sanctuary (chap. 47) flowing down into the desert, bearing verdure, fertility and beauty on its bosom and pouring healing virtue into the Dead Sea. So this enlarged city becomes all “holy to the Lord,” and enduring also, “for it shall not be plucked up nor thrown

down any more forever.” To this the Lord God of Hosts pledges His omnipotence and signifies that when His Spirit shall have written His law on the very hearts of men, the thing will be done! It deserves special notice that these two prophecies illustrate each other. What is promised in the “new covenant” paves the way for what is done in the “new city” built to the Lord. The writing of God’s law upon human hearts by His Spirit supplies the power that is to transform all that is vile and unclean in our world to moral beauty and holiness. The gospel goes down into the deep-

est sinks of human pollution to diffuse there the sweetness of love and the fragrance of piety—to redeem those wrecks of humanity from the loathomeness and the curse of sin and restore them to the purity and bliss of paradise. And shall we not praise God for all this? Shall not the promise and prophecy of it be a joy and a strength to His people in their gospel mission, sustaining their hearts in the “work of faith and the labor of love and the patience of hope” until prophecy shall become history, and “not one good word shall fail of all that the Lord has spoken?” H. C.