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Zechariah
Chapter Five
Zechariah 5
Chapter Contents
The vision of a flying roll. (1-4) The vision of a woman
and an ephah. (5-11)
Commentary on Zechariah 5:1-4
(Read Zechariah 5:1-4)
The Scriptures of the Old and New Testament are rolls, in
which God has written the great things of his law and gospel; they are flying
rolls. God's word runs very swiftly, Psalm 147:15. This flying roll contains a
declaration of the righteous wrath of God against sinners. Oh that we saw with
an eye of faith the flying roll of God's curse hanging over the guilty world as
a thick cloud, not only keeping off the sunbeams of God's favour, but big with
thunders, lightnings, and storms, ready to destroy them! How welcome then would
the tidings of a Saviour be, who came to redeem us from the curse of the law,
being himself made a curse for us! Sin is the ruin of houses and families;
especially the doing hurt to others and false witness. Who knows the power of
God's anger? God's curse cannot be kept out by bars or locks. While one part of
the curse of God ruins the substance of the sinner, another part will rest on
the soul, and sink it to everlasting punishment. All are transgressors of the
law, so we cannot escape this wrath of God, except we flee for refuge to lay
hold on the hope set before us in the gospel.
Commentary on Zechariah 5:5-11
(Read Zechariah 5:5-11)
In this vision the prophet sees an ephah, something in
the shape of a corn measure. This betokened the Jewish nation. They are filling
the measure of their iniquity; and when it is full, they shall be delivered
into the hands of those to whom God sold them for their sins. The woman sitting
in the midst of the ephah represents the sinful church and nation of the Jews,
in their latter and corrupt age. Guilt is upon the sinner as a weight of lead,
to sink him to the lowest hell. This seems to mean the condemnation of the
Jews, after they filled the measure of their iniquities by crucifying Christ
and rejecting his gospel. Zechariah sees the ephah, with the woman thus pressed
in it, carried away to some far country. This intimates that the Jews should be
hurried out of their own land, and forced to dwell in far countries, as they
had been in Babylon. There the ephah shall be firmly placed, and their
sufferings shall continue far longer than in their late captivity. Blindness is
happened unto Israel, and they are settled upon their own unbelief. Let sinners
fear to treasure up wrath against the day of wrath; for the more they multiply
crimes, the faster the measure fills.
── Matthew Henry《Concise Commentary on Zechariah》
Zechariah 5
Verse 1
[1] Then I turned, and lifted up mine eyes, and looked, and
behold a flying roll.
A flying roll — A volume, or book spread out at
large, flying in the air, swiftly.
Verse 3
[3] Then said he unto me, This is the curse that goeth forth
over the face of the whole earth: for every one that stealeth shall be cut off
as on this side according to it; and every one that sweareth shall be cut off
as on that side according to it.
This — This roll or book containeth the curse, due to
sinners.
The whole earth — Either the whole land of Judea,
or all the world, wherever these sins are found.
According to it — According to the threats
inscribed thereon.
Sweareth — Profanely, or falsely.
Verse 4
[4] I will bring it forth, saith the LORD of hosts, and it
shall enter into the house of the thief, and into the house of him that
sweareth falsely by my name: and it shall remain in the midst of his house, and
shall consume it with the timber thereof and the stones thereof.
It shall enter — This curse shall come with
commission from me.
It shall remain — It shall stick close to them and
theirs like Gehazi's leprosy.
And the stones — Nothing shall remain, as when
both the timber and stones of a house are consumed.
Verse 6
[6] And I said, What is it? And he said, This is an ephah
that goeth forth. He said moreover, This is their resemblance through all the
earth.
He — The angel.
An ephah — A measure which held about three bushels.
Goeth forth — Out of the temple.
Their resemblance — This is an emblem of
this people everywhere. Thus there is limited time and measure for them, while
they sin, and are filling the ephah with their sins, they will find that the
ephah of wrath is filled up also, to be poured out upon them.
Verse 7
[7] And, behold, there was lifted up a talent of lead: and
this is a woman that sitteth in the midst of the ephah.
And behold — Here is another part of this
vision.
Lifted up — Brought thither to cover it.
A talent — A piece of lead of a talent weight, as large as the
mouth of the ephah.
A woman — A woman, the third in the vision. Perhaps this vision
was purposely obscure, least a plain denunciation of the second overthrow of
the state and temple, might discourage them from going forward in the present
restoration of them.
Verse 8
[8] And he said, This is wickedness. And he cast it into the
midst of the ephah; and he cast the weight of lead upon the mouth thereof.
This — This woman represents the wickedness of the Jews.
He cast it — The angel cast down this woman.
On the mouth — And so shut her up, to suffer the
punishment of all her sins.
Verse 9
[9] Then lifted I up mine eyes, and looked, and, behold,
there came out two women, and the wind was in their wings; for they had wings
like the wings of a stork: and they lifted up the ephah between the earth and
the heaven.
There came out — From the same place whence the
ephah came.
Their wings — They had wings, like the wings of
storks, large and strong, and flew before the wind with great swiftness. The
judgments came thus flying, and so bore away with them those that were
incorrigible.
Verse 11
[11] And he said unto me, To build it an house in the land of
Shinar: and it shall be established, and set there upon her own base.
To build — Not in mercy, but in judgment.
Of Shinar — Of Babylon whither many of the
Jews fled, and others of them were forced by the Romans.
Set there — There they shall be confined
without hope of release.
Her own base — They are settled upon the lees of
their own unbelief: their wickedness is established on its own bases.
── John Wesley《Explanatory Notes on Zechariah》
05 Chapter 5
Introduction
Verses 1-4
And I turned . . . and looked, and behold a flying roll
The flying roll
The object of this discourse is to present to you the
Scriptures as a phenomenon of the world around us.
Consider them as an appearance in the circle of our observation, a fact in the
history of our race, and ask, what account is to be given of it? The attention
of our age is taken up much and wisely with the study of phenomena. We may
interpret the Scriptures in one way or another; we may study or neglect, revere
or despise them; we may consider them to be the dictates of observation, or
below the level of human intelligence; we may call them a word of delusion, or
the Word of God; but in the extremest varieties of opinion no one can escape
from this,--that they are a leading phenomenon in the history of civilisation
and religious thought, in the aspect of the moral world as it now stands and
moves before us. In the text an angel speaks in vision to one of the last of
the prophets, and asks, as if in the very spirit of modern research, “What
seest thou?” The prophet raises his eyes and sees a winged book, “a flying
roll.” It is of gigantic dimensions. It is of restless speed. It “goeth forth
over the face of the whole earth.” It was the roll of the Lord’s judgments--a
consuming fire. In this respect the Bible corresponds with it only in one of
its parts, but in that part perfectly: in its testimony against,
unrighteousness, its sentence upon those who love and practise dishonour, its
“fiery law.” Dealing with the “flying roll” more generally, what are the points
that we discover in it?
1. The extraordinary dimensions of the book, “its length twenty
cubits, and its breadth ten.” What a space does the Bible fill in the gaze of
mankind, though it can be carried about in the hand of the feeblest wayfarer!
Do we not speak truly of its wonderful dimensions when it holds on its ample
pages such a widely scattered wisdom, and is discerned from so far?
2. Its preservation and continuance through so long a sweep of time.
This is remarkable even at a first glance. Since faithful Abraham came out from
Chaldaea vast tribes and strong nations have risen to renown and passed away
into silence. Founders of states have not so much as secured the name of what
they founded. Dispensers of religion have left neither a priest for their
successor nor a shrine for their monument. Oracles of wisdom have grown
forgotten as well as dumb. Genius and learning have gone down into the dust,
and there is not a finger track of an inscription upon it for their posterity
to read. Whole literatures have disappeared, their tongues having ceased, and
their characters become illegible or blotted entirely out. But here is writing,
from many hands, and in a long series of instructions, dating as far back as
the school lessons of human improvement. It has defied time. It has repelled
decay. The linen, or the parchment, or whatever frail material it was confided
to, held fast its trust, while brazen trophies were melted down and marble
columns were pulverised. The temple of the Lord protected its archives; though
its huge stones were unable to hold themselves together, and its sacred vessels
served at last but for the ornaments of a heathen triumph.
3. Its spread. It is, indeed, a “flying roll.” The Scriptures move
rapidly. They are not only preserved, but incredibly multiplied. They were
addressed for the most part to one people, and they now speak to all people.
They were written in their own peculiar tongues, and now they call all tongues
their own. Have they not “gone forth over the face of the whole earth”? They
are among the studies of learned men, who find there a wisdom higher than all
else they know; while the ignorant and the simple, reading as they run, are
made wise to life everlasting.
4. The honour with which they have been received as they have flown
along. They are recognised in the public worship of most of the civilised
tribes now under heaven. They are enshrined in cathedrals. They are revered, at
least with all outward forms of homage, in the courts of the proudest empires.
They are sworn upon when the most solemn vows by which we can be bound are to
be attested. The patient fingers of holy recluses could for centuries find no
better task than to copy them; and countless presses are now perpetually busy,
that they may be distributed over the globe. The rarest genius and the
profoundest learning are employed upon the illustration of them. It may be
objected that we have said nothing of the disrespect and derision with which
the Scriptures are regarded by multitudes, and have always been. We may admit
this, but press the consideration, that they have withstood even this trial.
Familiarity and levity have not subjected them to contempt. Nothing could
better show how deeply they are seated in the veneration of mankind.
5. Their influence, their surprising power. There may be a high
repute without any true efficiency. But that roll of the Divine covenants has
always been of a Divine force. It has acted upon communities, wherever it has
been introduced, so as to accomplish the most astonishing consequences. Are you
inquiring what overthrew many of the massy oppressions, the enormous abuses, of
the elder times? It was its paper edges that smote upon all that dark strength,
and before those thin leaves buttress and battlement went down. How much has it
done for individual minds.
6. Their immeasurable superiority, as mere traditions, above
everything that has been handed down to us from the ancient world. There is in
their contents a deep spring of instruction, such as the old generations
nowhere furnish, and the coming ones are not likely soon to exhaust. Your own
minds will surely leap to the inference: the finger of God was here. You may be
perplexed with many passages in your Bible. You may slight some things as
unimportant, and repel others as uncongenial. You may think you discern great
blemishes and errors here and there. But what of that? It should throw no
mistrust over the spontaneous conclusion: the finger of God was here. Yes, the
Divine providence ordained and protected this charter of man’s truest liberty
and highest good. Let us look thoughtfully at it, then, as it flies on its holy
errand. (N. L. Frothingham.)
The flying roll
The import of this vision is threatening, to show that the object
of the prophet was to produce genuine repentance. The parts are significant. A roll,
probably of parchment, is seen, 30 by 15 feet, the exact dimensions of the
temple porch; where the law was usually read, showing that it was authoritative
in its utterance, and connected with the theocracy. Being a written thing, it
showed that its contents were solemnly determined beyond all escape or repeal.
It was flying, to show that its threats were ready to do their work, and
descend on every transgressor. It was unrolled, or its dimensions could not
have been seen, to show that its warnings were openly proclaimed to all, that
none might have an excuse. It was written on both sides, to connect it with the
tables of the law, and show its comprehensive character. One side denounced
perjury, a sin of the first table, the other stealing, a sin of the second; and
both united in every case where a thief took the oath of expurgation to acquit
himself of the charge of theft. This hovering curse would descend in every such
case into the house of the offender, and consume even its most enduring parts,
until it had thoroughly done its work of destruction. The immediate application
of this vision was to those who were neglecting the erection of God’s house to
build their own, and thus robbing God and forswearing their obligations to Him.
On such the prophet declares a curse shall descend that will make this selfish
withholding of their efforts in vain, for the houses they would build should be
consumed by God’s wrath. The teaching of this vision is that of the law. It
blazes with the fire, and echoes with the thunder of Sinai, and tells us that
our God is a consuming fire. We learn thus a lesson of instruction to those who
have succeeded the prophets of the Old Testament, as the authorised expounders
of God’s will under the New. It is needful to tell the love of God, to unfold
His precious promises, and to utter words of cheer and encouragement. But it is
also needful to declare the other aspect of God’s character. There is a
constant tendency in the human heart to abuse the goodness of God to an
encouragement of sin. Hence ministers of the Gospel must declare this portion
of God’s counsel as well as the other. They must declare to men who are living
in neglect of duty, that withholding what is due to God, either in heart or
life, is combined robbery and perjury. For those who thus sin, God has prepared
a ministry of vengeance. There is something most vivid and appalling in this
image of the hovering curse. It flies viewless and resistless, poising like a
falcon over her prey, breathing a ruin the most dire and desolating, and when
the blind and hardened offender opens his door to his ill-gotten gains, this
mystic roll, with its fire tracery of wrath, enters into his habitation, and,
fastening upon his cherished idols, begins its dread work of retribution, and
ceases not until the fabric of his guilty life has been totally and
irremediably consumed. (T. V. Moore, D. D.)
The flying roll
I. The man who is
marked as a special transgressor is marked also for special judgment. The curse
went “forth over the face of the whole earth,” but it was to cut off the thief
and the false swearer. In the Hebrew nation there were many sinners, but there,
as everywhere else, there were sinners who had not yet filled up the measure of
their iniquity, and there were others who had passed all bounds, whose
transgressions were so great as to make them marks upon which the lightnings of
God’s displeasure must fall.
II. Escape from the
consequences of unrepented sin is impossible. It is not necessary that the sin
should reveal itself in action to ensure the entail of the certain penalty. If
it never passes the boundary of the inner man there will be a reaction upon the
man’s spirit as certainly as night follows day, and more so because, though God
has suspended the laws of nature, we have no reason to suppose He has ever
interposed to prevent the consequences of sin, unless the sinner has come under
the power of another law,--the law of forgiveness by confession and repentance.
However hidden the transgression, the curse will find out its most secret
hiding place.
III. Theft and
perjury include all other sins. The son who forges his father’s name includes
in that one act every other crime that he can commit against him except that of
taking his life. He only needs occasion to reveal his readiness for any other
act of dishonour toward his parent. The man who deliberately appeals to God to
uphold him in his false statements forges the name of the Eternal Himself, and
seeks to turn the God of truth into the Father of lies.
IV. The special
sins of some bring suffering upon many. The curse went forth “over the whole
earth,” or land. It is a truth proclaimed by God and verified by experience,
that many may suffer by the sin of the few to whom they are in no way related.
See this principle, and its bright reverse, illustrated by St. Paul in Romans 5:18. (Outlines by London
Minister.)
The flying roll
The threatenings here are directed against the defects and
transgressions of the Jewish people at that time. God gives them to understand
by this vision that whilst it was His purpose to make His promise good, in the
establishment of His Church, He would by no means connive at their sins and
corruptions, but would visit them with present punishment, and with future
extirpation, if they persisted in their unbelief and rebellion.
I. The sins more
especially condemned.
1. Theft and sacrilege.
2. Perjury and false swearing.
II. The punishment
threatened. Partly personal and partly domestic.
1. A personal judgment is denounced. Everyone shall receive his
reward and punishment according to his sins, and according to the sentence of
the roll.
2. It was to extend to his relative and domestic interests. “It shall
enter into the house of the thief.” “It shall remain in the midst of his
house.” “And shall consume it with the timbers thereof, and the stones
thereof.” This subject may well teach heads of families a lesson of religious
caution, lest by an undue anxiety for their own worldly success, or that of
their children, they frustrate their most cherished purposes, and entail a
curse rather than a blessing. We shall do well to remember that no external
evil which may befall a particular class of mankind, in consequence of the
faults of their progenitors, renders any individual of that class less
acceptable to God, if he turn from his wickedness and repent. But the very
curse may become a blessing, if it operate to warn an individual against the
sin by which it was brought down upon him. On the other hand, let no children
of religious parents suppose that the piety of a long line of ancestors will
avail in their behalf, unless they are themselves the possessors of religious
principle. And since all are exposed to an infinite danger on account of sin,
how deep should be our gratitude to that Divine Redeemer, who bore the curse
for us, that we might escape the impending penalty, and inherit the unspeakable
blessings of His salvation. (S. Thodey.)
The flying roll--Divine retribution
I. As following
sin.
1. The particular sins which retribution pursues.
The sins here mentioned are not mere specimens, but root or
fountain sins. The “flying roll” of Divine retribution followed sin with its
curses. There is a curse to every sin, and this is not vengeance, but benevolence.
It is the arrangement of love.
2. The way in which just retribution pursues them.
II. As abiding with
sin. “It shall remain in the midst of his house.” Not only does it rule the
house of the sinner, “it remains in the midst of it” like a leprosy, infecting,
wasting, consuming, destroying. It abides in the house to curse everything,
even the timber and the stones. Guilt, not only, like a ravenous beast,
crouches at the door of the sinner, but rather, like a blasting mildew, spreads
its baneful influence over the whole dwelling. The sin of one member of a
family brings its curse on the others. The sins of the parents bring a curse
upon the children. (Homilist.)
Judgment with consolation
The angel shows, in this chapter, that whatever evils the Jews had
suffered, proceeded from the righteous judgment of God; and then he adds a
consolation--that the Lord would at length alleviate or put an end to their
evils, when He had removed afar off their iniquity. Interpreters have touched
neither heaven nor earth in their explanation of this prophecy, for they have
not regarded the designs of the Holy Spirit. Some think that by the volume are
to be understood false and perverted glosses, by which the purity of doctrine
had been vitiated; but this view can by no means be received. There is no doubt
but that God intended to show to Zechariah that the Jews were justly punished,
because the whole land was full of thefts and perjuries. As their religion had
been despised, as well as equity and justice, he shows that it was no wonder a
curse had prevailed through the whole land, the Jews having by their impiety
and sins extremely provoked the wrath of God. This is the import of the first
part. And then, as this vision was terrible, there is added some alleviation by
representing iniquity in a measure, and the mouth of the measure closed, and
afterwards carries to the land of Shinar, that is, into Chaldea, that it might
not remain in Judea. Thus, in the former part the prophet’s design was to
humble the Jews, and to encourage them to repent, so that they might own God to
have been justly angry; and then he gives them reason to entertain hope, and
fully to expect an end to their evils, for the Lord would remove to a distance,
and transfer their iniquity to Chaldea, so that Judea might be pure and free
from every wickedness, both from thefts and acts of injustice, by which it had
been previously polluted. (John Calvin.)
This is the curse that
goeth forth over the face of the whole earth--
The Lord’s curse
This type is expounded to signify the Lord’s curse going forth to
do execution in all the land of Judah, and to cut off sinners against the first
and second tables of the Law. Doctrine--
1. Whatever be the particular punishment inflicted by God for sin,
yet this is seriously to be laid to heart, that every such punishment hath in
its bosom a curse, till the sinner, awakened thereby, flee to Christ, who
became a curse, that His own may inherit a blessing.
2. The Lord is an impartial avenger of sin, when it is persevered in
without repentance; and when other means are ineffectual, He will not spare to
cut off the desperate sinner; for the curse goes forth “over the face of the
whole earth,” or land; and “everyone shall be cut off,” without exception, who
are guilty.
3. The Lord will not spare but indifferently punish sin, whether
against the first or second tables, in avoiding of both which the Lord’s people
are to testify their sincerity. This is signified by “cutting off everyone that
stealeth, and everyone that sweareth.”
4. When a people are delivered out of sore troubles, and yet their
lusts are not modified, they ordinarily prove covetous, false, and oppressing,
as labouring by all means to make up these things that trouble hath stript them
of; therefore is there a particular threat against everyone that stealeth,
it being a rife sin at their return from captivity, for they went every man
to his own house (Haggai 1:9), were cruel oppressors (Nehemiah 5:1-3), yea, and robbed God of
tithes and offerings (Malachi 3:8).
5. Covetous and false men, in their bargains with men, will make no
bones of impiety and perjury, if that may help to gain their point; for with
the former is joined “everyone that sweareth,” which is expounded, Zechariah 5:4, to be “swearing falsely by
God’s name.” (George Hutcheson.)
It shall remain in the
midst of his house--
A curse in the family
As certain as the ordinances of nature, is the law that ill-gotten
gain will bring a curse. The following is a startling illustration of the
truth, gathered from the history of a rural town:--“In 1786, a youth, then
residing in Maine, owned a jackknife, which he, being of a somewhat trading
disposition, sold for a gallon of West India rum. This he retailed, and with
the proceeds purchased two gallons, and eventually a barrel, which was followed
in due time with a large stock. In a word, he got rich, and became the squire
of the district, through the possession and sale of the jackknife, and an
indomitable trading industry. He died, leaving property, in real estate and
money value, worth eighty thousand dollars. This was divided by testament among
four children, three boys and a girl. Luck, which seemed the guardian angel of
the father, deserted the children; for every folly and extravagance they could
engage in seemed to occupy their exclusive attention and cultivation. The
daughter married unfortunately, and her patrimony was soon thrown away by her
spendthrift of a husband. The sons were no more fortunate, and two died in
dissipation and in poverty. The daughter also died. The last of the family, for
many years past, has lived on the kindness of those who knew him in the days of
prosperity, as pride would not allow him to go to the poor farm. A few days ago
he died, suddenly and unattended, in a barn, where he had laid himself down to
take a drunken sleep. On his pockets being examined, all that was found in them
was a small piece of string and a jackknife! So the fortune that
began with the implement of that kind left its simple duplicate. We leave the
moral to be drawn in whatever fashion it may suggest itself to the reader;
simply stating that the story is a true one, and all the facts well known to
many whom this relation will doubtless reach.” (A. J. Gordon, D. D.)
A plague in the house
How terribly those words have been fulfilled in the case of people
and families we have known! It has seemed as though there were a plague in the
house. The fortune which had been accumulated with such toil has crumbled; the
children turned out sources of heartrending grief; the reputation of the father
has become irretrievably tarnished. “There is a plague spread in the house; it
is a fretting leprosy, it is unclean.” No man can stand against that curse. It
confronts him everywhere. It touches his most substantial effects, and they
pulverise, as furniture eaten through by white ants. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
Verses 1-11
Verses 1-4
And I turned . . . and looked, and behold a flying roll
The flying roll
The object of this discourse is to present to you the
Scriptures as a phenomenon of the world around us.
Consider them as an appearance in the circle of our observation, a fact in the
history of our race, and ask, what account is to be given of it? The attention
of our age is taken up much and wisely with the study of phenomena. We may
interpret the Scriptures in one way or another; we may study or neglect, revere
or despise them; we may consider them to be the dictates of observation, or
below the level of human intelligence; we may call them a word of delusion, or
the Word of God; but in the extremest varieties of opinion no one can escape
from this,--that they are a leading phenomenon in the history of civilisation
and religious thought, in the aspect of the moral world as it now stands and
moves before us. In the text an angel speaks in vision to one of the last of
the prophets, and asks, as if in the very spirit of modern research, “What
seest thou?” The prophet raises his eyes and sees a winged book, “a flying
roll.” It is of gigantic dimensions. It is of restless speed. It “goeth forth
over the face of the whole earth.” It was the roll of the Lord’s judgments--a
consuming fire. In this respect the Bible corresponds with it only in one of
its parts, but in that part perfectly: in its testimony against,
unrighteousness, its sentence upon those who love and practise dishonour, its
“fiery law.” Dealing with the “flying roll” more generally, what are the points
that we discover in it?
1. The extraordinary dimensions of the book, “its length twenty
cubits, and its breadth ten.” What a space does the Bible fill in the gaze of
mankind, though it can be carried about in the hand of the feeblest wayfarer!
Do we not speak truly of its wonderful dimensions when it holds on its ample
pages such a widely scattered wisdom, and is discerned from so far?
2. Its preservation and continuance through so long a sweep of time.
This is remarkable even at a first glance. Since faithful Abraham came out from
Chaldaea vast tribes and strong nations have risen to renown and passed away
into silence. Founders of states have not so much as secured the name of what
they founded. Dispensers of religion have left neither a priest for their
successor nor a shrine for their monument. Oracles of wisdom have grown
forgotten as well as dumb. Genius and learning have gone down into the dust,
and there is not a finger track of an inscription upon it for their posterity
to read. Whole literatures have disappeared, their tongues having ceased, and
their characters become illegible or blotted entirely out. But here is writing,
from many hands, and in a long series of instructions, dating as far back as
the school lessons of human improvement. It has defied time. It has repelled
decay. The linen, or the parchment, or whatever frail material it was confided
to, held fast its trust, while brazen trophies were melted down and marble
columns were pulverised. The temple of the Lord protected its archives; though
its huge stones were unable to hold themselves together, and its sacred vessels
served at last but for the ornaments of a heathen triumph.
3. Its spread. It is, indeed, a “flying roll.” The Scriptures move
rapidly. They are not only preserved, but incredibly multiplied. They were
addressed for the most part to one people, and they now speak to all people.
They were written in their own peculiar tongues, and now they call all tongues
their own. Have they not “gone forth over the face of the whole earth”? They
are among the studies of learned men, who find there a wisdom higher than all
else they know; while the ignorant and the simple, reading as they run, are
made wise to life everlasting.
4. The honour with which they have been received as they have flown
along. They are recognised in the public worship of most of the civilised
tribes now under heaven. They are enshrined in cathedrals. They are revered, at
least with all outward forms of homage, in the courts of the proudest empires.
They are sworn upon when the most solemn vows by which we can be bound are to
be attested. The patient fingers of holy recluses could for centuries find no
better task than to copy them; and countless presses are now perpetually busy,
that they may be distributed over the globe. The rarest genius and the
profoundest learning are employed upon the illustration of them. It may be
objected that we have said nothing of the disrespect and derision with which
the Scriptures are regarded by multitudes, and have always been. We may admit
this, but press the consideration, that they have withstood even this trial.
Familiarity and levity have not subjected them to contempt. Nothing could
better show how deeply they are seated in the veneration of mankind.
5. Their influence, their surprising power. There may be a high
repute without any true efficiency. But that roll of the Divine covenants has
always been of a Divine force. It has acted upon communities, wherever it has
been introduced, so as to accomplish the most astonishing consequences. Are you
inquiring what overthrew many of the massy oppressions, the enormous abuses, of
the elder times? It was its paper edges that smote upon all that dark strength,
and before those thin leaves buttress and battlement went down. How much has it
done for individual minds.
6. Their immeasurable superiority, as mere traditions, above
everything that has been handed down to us from the ancient world. There is in
their contents a deep spring of instruction, such as the old generations
nowhere furnish, and the coming ones are not likely soon to exhaust. Your own
minds will surely leap to the inference: the finger of God was here. You may be
perplexed with many passages in your Bible. You may slight some things as
unimportant, and repel others as uncongenial. You may think you discern great
blemishes and errors here and there. But what of that? It should throw no
mistrust over the spontaneous conclusion: the finger of God was here. Yes, the
Divine providence ordained and protected this charter of man’s truest liberty
and highest good. Let us look thoughtfully at it, then, as it flies on its holy
errand. (N. L. Frothingham.)
The flying roll
The import of this vision is threatening, to show that the object
of the prophet was to produce genuine repentance. The parts are significant. A
roll, probably of parchment, is seen, 30 by 15 feet, the exact dimensions of
the temple porch; where the law was usually read, showing that it was
authoritative in its utterance, and connected with the theocracy. Being a
written thing, it showed that its contents were solemnly determined beyond all
escape or repeal. It was flying, to show that its threats were ready to do
their work, and descend on every transgressor. It was unrolled, or its
dimensions could not have been seen, to show that its warnings were openly
proclaimed to all, that none might have an excuse. It was written on both
sides, to connect it with the tables of the law, and show its comprehensive
character. One side denounced perjury, a sin of the first table, the other
stealing, a sin of the second; and both united in every case where a thief took
the oath of expurgation to acquit himself of the charge of theft. This hovering
curse would descend in every such case into the house of the offender, and
consume even its most enduring parts, until it had thoroughly done its work of
destruction. The immediate application of this vision was to those who were
neglecting the erection of God’s house to build their own, and thus robbing God
and forswearing their obligations to Him. On such the prophet declares a curse
shall descend that will make this selfish withholding of their efforts in vain,
for the houses they would build should be consumed by God’s wrath. The teaching
of this vision is that of the law. It blazes with the fire, and echoes with the
thunder of Sinai, and tells us that our God is a consuming fire. We learn thus
a lesson of instruction to those who have succeeded the prophets of the Old
Testament, as the authorised expounders of God’s will under the New. It is
needful to tell the love of God, to unfold His precious promises, and to utter
words of cheer and encouragement. But it is also needful to declare the other
aspect of God’s character. There is a constant tendency in the human heart to
abuse the goodness of God to an encouragement of sin. Hence ministers of the
Gospel must declare this portion of God’s counsel as well as the other. They
must declare to men who are living in neglect of duty, that withholding what is
due to God, either in heart or life, is combined robbery and perjury. For those
who thus sin, God has prepared a ministry of vengeance. There is something most
vivid and appalling in this image of the hovering curse. It flies viewless and
resistless, poising like a falcon over her prey, breathing a ruin the most dire
and desolating, and when the blind and hardened offender opens his door to his
ill-gotten gains, this mystic roll, with its fire tracery of wrath, enters into
his habitation, and, fastening upon his cherished idols, begins its dread work
of retribution, and ceases not until the fabric of his guilty life has been
totally and irremediably consumed. (T. V. Moore, D. D.)
The flying roll
I. The man who is
marked as a special transgressor is marked also for special judgment. The curse
went “forth over the face of the whole earth,” but it was to cut off the thief
and the false swearer. In the Hebrew nation there were many sinners, but there,
as everywhere else, there were sinners who had not yet filled up the measure of
their iniquity, and there were others who had passed all bounds, whose
transgressions were so great as to make them marks upon which the lightnings of
God’s displeasure must fall.
II. Escape from the
consequences of unrepented sin is impossible. It is not necessary that the sin
should reveal itself in action to ensure the entail of the certain penalty. If
it never passes the boundary of the inner man there will be a reaction upon the
man’s spirit as certainly as night follows day, and more so because, though God
has suspended the laws of nature, we have no reason to suppose He has ever
interposed to prevent the consequences of sin, unless the sinner has come under
the power of another law,--the law of forgiveness by confession and repentance.
However hidden the transgression, the curse will find out its most secret
hiding place.
III. Theft and
perjury include all other sins. The son who forges his father’s name includes
in that one act every other crime that he can commit against him except that of
taking his life. He only needs occasion to reveal his readiness for any other
act of dishonour toward his parent. The man who deliberately appeals to God to
uphold him in his false statements forges the name of the Eternal Himself, and
seeks to turn the God of truth into the Father of lies.
IV. The special
sins of some bring suffering upon many. The curse went forth “over the whole
earth,” or land. It is a truth proclaimed by God and verified by experience,
that many may suffer by the sin of the few to whom they are in no way related.
See this principle, and its bright reverse, illustrated by St. Paul in Romans 5:18. (Outlines by London
Minister.)
The flying roll
The threatenings here are directed against the defects and
transgressions of the Jewish people at that time. God gives them to understand
by this vision that whilst it was His purpose to make His promise good, in the
establishment of His Church, He would by no means connive at their sins and
corruptions, but would visit them with present punishment, and with future
extirpation, if they persisted in their unbelief and rebellion.
I. The sins more
especially condemned.
1. Theft and sacrilege.
2. Perjury and false swearing.
II. The punishment
threatened. Partly personal and partly domestic.
1. A personal judgment is denounced. Everyone shall receive his
reward and punishment according to his sins, and according to the sentence of
the roll.
2. It was to extend to his relative and domestic interests. “It shall
enter into the house of the thief.” “It shall remain in the midst of his
house.” “And shall consume it with the timbers thereof, and the stones
thereof.” This subject may well teach heads of families a lesson of religious
caution, lest by an undue anxiety for their own worldly success, or that of
their children, they frustrate their most cherished purposes, and entail a
curse rather than a blessing. We shall do well to remember that no external
evil which may befall a particular class of mankind, in consequence of the
faults of their progenitors, renders any individual of that class less
acceptable to God, if he turn from his wickedness and repent. But the very
curse may become a blessing, if it operate to warn an individual against the
sin by which it was brought down upon him. On the other hand, let no children
of religious parents suppose that the piety of a long line of ancestors will
avail in their behalf, unless they are themselves the possessors of religious
principle. And since all are exposed to an infinite danger on account of sin,
how deep should be our gratitude to that Divine Redeemer, who bore the curse
for us, that we might escape the impending penalty, and inherit the unspeakable
blessings of His salvation. (S. Thodey.)
The flying roll--Divine retribution
I. As following
sin.
1. The particular sins which retribution pursues.
The sins here mentioned are not mere specimens, but root or
fountain sins. The “flying roll” of Divine retribution followed sin with its
curses. There is a curse to every sin, and this is not vengeance, but
benevolence. It is the arrangement of love.
2. The way in which just retribution pursues them.
II. As abiding with
sin. “It shall remain in the midst of his house.” Not only does it rule the
house of the sinner, “it remains in the midst of it” like a leprosy, infecting,
wasting, consuming, destroying. It abides in the house to curse everything,
even the timber and the stones. Guilt, not only, like a ravenous beast,
crouches at the door of the sinner, but rather, like a blasting mildew, spreads
its baneful influence over the whole dwelling. The sin of one member of a
family brings its curse on the others. The sins of the parents bring a curse
upon the children. (Homilist.)
Judgment with consolation
The angel shows, in this chapter, that whatever evils the Jews had
suffered, proceeded from the righteous judgment of God; and then he adds a
consolation--that the Lord would at length alleviate or put an end to their
evils, when He had removed afar off their iniquity. Interpreters have touched
neither heaven nor earth in their explanation of this prophecy, for they have
not regarded the designs of the Holy Spirit. Some think that by the volume are
to be understood false and perverted glosses, by which the purity of doctrine
had been vitiated; but this view can by no means be received. There is no doubt
but that God intended to show to Zechariah that the Jews were justly punished,
because the whole land was full of thefts and perjuries. As their religion had
been despised, as well as equity and justice, he shows that it was no wonder a
curse had prevailed through the whole land, the Jews having by their impiety
and sins extremely provoked the wrath of God. This is the import of the first
part. And then, as this vision was terrible, there is added some alleviation by
representing iniquity in a measure, and the mouth of the measure closed, and
afterwards carries to the land of Shinar, that is, into Chaldea, that it might
not remain in Judea. Thus, in the former part the prophet’s design was to
humble the Jews, and to encourage them to repent, so that they might own God to
have been justly angry; and then he gives them reason to entertain hope, and
fully to expect an end to their evils, for the Lord would remove to a distance,
and transfer their iniquity to Chaldea, so that Judea might be pure and free
from every wickedness, both from thefts and acts of injustice, by which it had
been previously polluted. (John Calvin.)
This is the curse that
goeth forth over the face of the whole earth--
The Lord’s curse
This type is expounded to signify the Lord’s curse going forth to
do execution in all the land of Judah, and to cut off sinners against the first
and second tables of the Law. Doctrine--
1. Whatever be the particular punishment inflicted by God for sin,
yet this is seriously to be laid to heart, that every such punishment hath in
its bosom a curse, till the sinner, awakened thereby, flee to Christ, who
became a curse, that His own may inherit a blessing.
2. The Lord is an impartial avenger of sin, when it is persevered in
without repentance; and when other means are ineffectual, He will not spare to
cut off the desperate sinner; for the curse goes forth “over the face of the
whole earth,” or land; and “everyone shall be cut off,” without exception, who
are guilty.
3. The Lord will not spare but indifferently punish sin, whether
against the first or second tables, in avoiding of both which the Lord’s people
are to testify their sincerity. This is signified by “cutting off everyone that
stealeth, and everyone that sweareth.”
4. When a people are delivered out of sore troubles, and yet their
lusts are not modified, they ordinarily prove covetous, false, and oppressing,
as labouring by all means to make up these things that trouble hath stript them
of; therefore is there a particular threat against everyone that stealeth,
it being a rife sin at their return from captivity, for they went every man
to his own house (Haggai 1:9), were cruel oppressors (Nehemiah 5:1-3), yea, and robbed God of
tithes and offerings (Malachi 3:8).
5. Covetous and false men, in their bargains with men, will make no
bones of impiety and perjury, if that may help to gain their point; for with
the former is joined “everyone that sweareth,” which is expounded, Zechariah 5:4, to be “swearing falsely by
God’s name.” (George Hutcheson.)
It shall remain in the
midst of his house--
A curse in the family
As certain as the ordinances of nature, is the law that ill-gotten
gain will bring a curse. The following is a startling illustration of the
truth, gathered from the history of a rural town:--“In 1786, a youth, then
residing in Maine, owned a jackknife, which he, being of a somewhat trading
disposition, sold for a gallon of West India rum. This he retailed, and with
the proceeds purchased two gallons, and eventually a barrel, which was followed
in due time with a large stock. In a word, he got rich, and became the squire
of the district, through the possession and sale of the jackknife, and an
indomitable trading industry. He died, leaving property, in real estate and
money value, worth eighty thousand dollars. This was divided by testament among
four children, three boys and a girl. Luck, which seemed the guardian angel of
the father, deserted the children; for every folly and extravagance they could
engage in seemed to occupy their exclusive attention and cultivation. The
daughter married unfortunately, and her patrimony was soon thrown away by her
spendthrift of a husband. The sons were no more fortunate, and two died in
dissipation and in poverty. The daughter also died. The last of the family, for
many years past, has lived on the kindness of those who knew him in the days of
prosperity, as pride would not allow him to go to the poor farm. A few days ago
he died, suddenly and unattended, in a barn, where he had laid himself down to
take a drunken sleep. On his pockets being examined, all that was found in them
was a small piece of string and a jackknife! So the fortune that
began with the implement of that kind left its simple duplicate. We leave the
moral to be drawn in whatever fashion it may suggest itself to the reader;
simply stating that the story is a true one, and all the facts well known to
many whom this relation will doubtless reach.” (A. J. Gordon, D. D.)
A plague in the house
How terribly those words have been fulfilled in the case of people
and families we have known! It has seemed as though there were a plague in the
house. The fortune which had been accumulated with such toil has crumbled; the
children turned out sources of heartrending grief; the reputation of the father
has become irretrievably tarnished. “There is a plague spread in the house; it
is a fretting leprosy, it is unclean.” No man can stand against that curse. It
confronts him everywhere. It touches his most substantial effects, and they
pulverise, as furniture eaten through by white ants. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
Verses 5-11
And this is a woman that sitteth in the midst of the ephah
The woman in the ephah
This vision, like the preceding, is of a warning character, and
somewhat more obscure in its symbolical apparatus.
A dim outline rises to the eye of the prophet, to which the angel calls his
attention, but which he cannot at first distinctly make out. The angel tells
him that it is an ephah, a very common dry measure, containing about three
pecks. He then sees a mass of lead, containing about a hundredweight, lifted up
above the measure, and on looking more closely he sees a woman in the measure.
This woman is then violently thrust down into the measure, and the mass of lead
laid upon its mouth, after which two winged women carry it away into the land
of Shinar, where it was to be permanently deposited in a house prepared for it
there. The general meaning of this is to show that when the measure of the
people’s wickedness became full, then their punishment should come, and they
should again be carried into the land of their enemies in exile, not for
seventy years, but for a long time. As the flying roll symbolised the certainty
and completeness of their punishment, so this vision indicated its swiftness
and mode. The ephah is selected simply as a common dry measure, to symbolise
the thought that there is a certain measure of sin beyond which the people
cannot go with impunity. The woman sitting in it represents the Jewish people,
by a common figure. The phrase, “this is their appearance (Heb. eye) in
all the land” (Zechariah 5:6), simply means, this
represents that to which the people are looking, or tending, namely, to fill up
the measure of their sin, and when they have done that, God will lay upon them
their punishment. When the prophet perceives the woman in the measure, he is
told that this is (represents) wickedness, even that of the Jewish people.
Henderson thinks that the wickedness here represented was idolatry, and that
the vision predicted the removal of idolatry from Palestine to Babylon. But there
is no reason at all to limit it thus, but rather the contrary. Idolatry had not
been a sin of the Jews for a century, and would hardly be represented as an
existing thing, as this vision does. It did not exist in the land, and so could
not be removed out of it. Moreover, it was not removed to Babylon, in any
sense, literally or figuratively, and did not remain there as the vision
declares (Zechariah 5:11), for the Mohammedan
occupants of that region were not idolaters. Hence the explanation that refers
it to the entire wickedness of the Jewish people of all kinds, is more
consistent with the preceding vision, and gives a better sense. The mass of
lead symbolises the heavy judgments that God was holding over them, and which
at the fulness of time He would allow to fall. Accordingly, the wicked woman is
thrust down into the small measure, crushed and doubled together, and the heavy
weight laid upon her to keep her thus prostrate. Then there appear two winged
messengers, with outstretched pinions, as if the wind was raising them up, and
their wings were strong for flight like those of the stork. There were two,
because it required two persons to lift such a measure. They symbolised the messengers
of God’s wrath that should desolate Judea, and banish the people. They were to
carry it into Shinar, which is here the symbol for an enemy’s country, and not
the exact country to which they were to be exiled. There it was to be put in a
house, shut up, and this house to be built strongly and securely for a
permanent habitation, to show that this exile would not be, like the first, a
brief sojourn, but a long, weary, and enduring banishment from the land of
their fathers; when their resting should not be on God, or on the rock Christ
Jesus, but “on their own base”; they should be left to themselves, weighed down
like lead with judicial blindness, stupidity, darkness, and hardness of heart.
The vision predicted what happened four hundred years afterwards, when the
measure of their iniquity being full by the rejection and murder of the
Messiah, their hearts being gross, and their care heavy, the hour of vengeance
came. Then appeared the Roman eagles, and after the most desperate struggle,
the Jewish nation was crushed, and scattered to the four winds, wandering in
enemies’ countries, not resting on the promise of God, but weighed down with
leaden obstinacy, and resting on their own works and righteousness. Learn--
1. Every individual, and every nation, has a measure of sin; and
until that measure is filled up, God’s longsuffering will wait for repentance
and reformation.
2. There hangs above every sinner a crushing weight of wrath, poised
and ready to descend with overwhelming destruction.
3. If the measure is filled up, the weight shall fall, and crush the
sinner with its ponderous mass of punishment.
4. The finally impenitent shall be driven from God into loomy exile,
and left to himself, “to rest on his own base,” to be subject to the thrall of
his own lawless lusts that he has so long pampered into strength, and to reap
as he has sowed, through a long and limitless banishment. (T. V. Moore, D.
D.)
Vision of the ephah
There are some portions of Old Testament prophecy which, at first,
appear in meaning. But upon closer examination they are found to contain
important lessons, profitable for all times. Such a prophecy is Zechariah’s
vision of the ephah. Look--
1. At the symbol as seen by the prophet. The ephah was a well known
Jewish measure, represented by our word “bushel.” The prophet saw’ such a
measure moving forth as if it were a thing of life, and in the midst of it sat
a woman with a talent of lead lifted up before her. The whole picture was a
composite symbol, in which were prominent the measure, the woman, and the
talent of lead.
2. The meaning of the symbol. In verse 8 the Hebrew emphatic ally
declares--“This is the wickedness.” The most obvious suggestion is, that form
of wickedness most likely to ensnare and ruin the people to whom Zechariah
prophesied. The symbols point most naturally to the sin of unrighteous traffic,
the root and essence of which is covetousness (1 Timothy 6:10; Colossians 3:5). Why a woman rather than
a man appears in the symbol is somewhat difficult to say, but probably because
of her power as a temptress. The ensnaring images which have been most
prominent in the great systems of idolatry have borne the female form. This
woman’s throne was an empty measure, and her sign an uplifted talent of lead,
thus aptly representing the sin of those who would “swallow up the needy, and
cause the poor of the land to fail” (Amos 8:4-6). This iniquity of unrighteous
traffic appears to have ever been a besetting sin of the Jewish people. The
preceding oracle of this prophet (verses 1-4) was directed against thieves, and
those who swore falsely by Jehovah’s name; and the obscure expression in verse
16 (lit., “this is their eye in all the land”) is perhaps best explained as
alluding to the fact that in all the land the eyes of thieves, extortioners,
and false swearers, turned longingly towards this tempting goddess of
covetousness.
3. The removal of this ephah to the land of Shinar indicates some
kind of retribution which will visit this form of wickedness. The woman was
cast down into the empty measure, and the leaden weight was cast upon her mouth
(or on the mouth of the ephah), and ephah, woman, and talent were lifted up,
and carried off into a foreign land; and the removal was effected by two women,
who had wings like the stork, and who were helped by the force of the wind.
This part of the vision sets forth God’s penal judgment upon this sin and its
devotees. Among the various elements of this judgment we note the following--
4. The land of Shinar is to be understood as the opposite of the land
of Israel, which in Zechariah 2:12 is called “the holy land.”
It was the Babylonian plain, where the descendants of Noah settled after the
flood, and builded the city and tower, which was the occasion of their being
confused and scattered by the curse of Jehovah (Genesis 11:2). It was a land of idolatry,
whither the Jewish people had, according to Zechariah 2:6, been scattered as by the
four winds of heaven. So this vision symbolised the penal scattering abroad
into an unclean land of all whose eye admired the goddess of weights and
measures more than Jehovah. The great moral lesson of the vision is therefore a
warning against covetousness and unrighteous traffic. Where the love of money
is so strong as to employ “balances of deceit,” and make “the ephah small and
the shekel great,” there will come curse and exile. The covetous man will
suffer in ways he little dreams of, and the very instruments of his sin may be
turned into modes of punishment. He who will serve Mammon must leave the house
and land of the Lord, and so all those Jews who loved the wages of
unrighteousness might expect sooner or later to be again scattered as by the
winds of heaven. Their aiders and abettors might come to their help, and even
build for them a house in the foreign land; but, like the tower of Babel, built
by selfish ambition in the plain of Shinar, even that house will be likely to
prove a curse. This process of separating and removing the lovers of this world
from truth and holiness is ever going on in the development of the kingdom of
God. Judas loved silver, and was cut off and went to his own place. Demas
forsook the Apostle Paul from love of the world. John, the apostle, speaks of
those who went out from the godly because they were not of them (1 John 2:19), and Jude significantly
mentions the sensual, having not the Spirit, as they who separate themselves,
or make separations. So, by the necessary antagonism of opposite natures, the
covetous must remove from the holy; for the narrow-minded, self-centred
worldling cannot inherit the kingdom of God. (Milton S. Terry, D. D.)
The woman in the ephah
The question of the angel, and the answer of the prophet,
suggest--
1. That the medium of Divine thought may be obscure to human
understanding.
2. That which we are to communicate to others must be seen clearly by
ourselves.
3. That what is difficult to one servant of God may be clear to
another. The vision probably refers to the general sin of the nation, which
reached its height in the rejection of Messiah, after which the nation was entirely
removed from the land. It suggests--
I. That time is
needed for a nation to complete its destruction, as well as for its
construction. The ephah is a measure of considerable size; the idea conveyed is
that, when it is full, it is lifted up and carried away. The filling takes
time, and the nation to which the vision pointed did not all at once fill up
the measure of its iniquity. Wickedness is allowed to go on unchecked for a
certain period, but only to give space for repentance.
II. Sin first
imprisons the sinner, and then separates him from the Divine presence. A talent
of lead shuts the woman into the ephah, which is then borne into the land of
Shinar. This foretells the constant dwelling of the Jews among the Gentile
nations. The man who finds himself in a condemned cell is really shut in and
banished from his own choice. So it was with the Jewish nation, and so it is
with every man who rejects God’s plan of regenerating him. He is
self-imprisoned and self-banished.
III. Those who
reject God’s plan of restoration will be left to their own. God offered to the
Jewish nation a sure foundation upon which to rebuild their national greatness
(see Isaiah 28:16). This they would not accept.
Therefore they were banished from their land, and, in the words of this
prophecy, “set there upon their own base.” They were left to be their own
national architects and defenders, and the history of their bitter sufferings
for many centuries, and their present inability to gather themselves into a
national whole, shows how ill they succeed who prefer their own way to that
which God offers to them. This truth applies equally to every man who rejects
the only foundation upon which his character can be rebuilt into its original
greatness. (Outlines by London Minister.)
A materialistic community
Utter mercenariness is an abhorrent object to an angel’s eye. The
prophet still looks, and what does he see? The meaning of the new scene may be
easily discovered. The ephah, with the woman in it, is carried away between
earth and heaven, i.e. through the air. Women carry it because there is
a woman inside; and two women, because two persons are required to carry so
large and heavy a measure, that they lay hold of it on both sides. These women
have wings, because it passes through the air; and a stork’s wings, because
these birds have broad pinions, and not because the stork is a bird of passage
or an unclean bird. “The wings are filled with wind, that they may be able to
carry their burden with greater velocity through the air. The women denote the
instruments or powers employed by God to carry away the sinners out of His
congregation, without any special allusion to this or the other historical
nation. This is all that we have to seek in these features, which only serve to
give distinctness to the picture.”--Thiel and Delitzsch.
I. Such a
community is encased by the material. This woman, the emblem of the worldly
Jews, was not only “in the midst of the ephah,” but was closely confined there.
“He cast the weight of the lead upon the mouth thereof.” To an utterly worldly
man matter is everything. He is utterly shut out from the spiritual; there is
no glimpse of it, no interest in it. Like the woman in the ephah, he is encompassed
by that which shuts him in. The bright heavens and the green fields of the
spiritual world are over and around him, but they are nothing to him. He is in
the ephah.
II. Such a
community is being disinherited by the material. This woman in the ephah,
emblem of the worldly Hebrew, is borne away from Palestine, her own land, into
a foreign region. Materialism disinherits man. His true inheritance as a
spiritual existent is “incorruptible, undefiled, that fadeth not away.” But
materialism carries him away from it, away to the distant and the gross.
Verse 8
And he said, This is wickedness
Worldliness
This is the ruin of thousands and tens of thousands.
It is not at all necessary to insure a man’s perdition that he either “steal”
or “swear falsely.” A man may be a thorough worldling, without the practice of
these or any gross iniquities. Whatever shuts God out from His place in the
heart as the object of fear and love, and from His place in the conscience as
the authoritative regulator of the life, that, be it what it may, is the ruin
of the man. In the parable of the marriage feast, the men who declined the
invitation, and went away to their farms and to their merchandise, are not
charged with any selfish and fraudulent dealings in the management of their
farms or the prosecution of their merchandise. What was their sin? Worldliness.
They preferred the world to God. They declined the blessings of the Gospel for
something more to their taste. They chose the world and the things of the
world--no matter in how innocent a form--even the sweets of domestic life
itself--to God and the things of God. And in the enjoyment of these, as their
chosen portion, they “had their reward.” Thus it was of old; thus it is still.
Let no man deceive himself by fancying it necessary to his forfeiture of the
blessings of God’s salvation, that he give himself up to the practice of
dishonesty and of open vice. If his heart is in the world, with the world he
must have his portion. Let Christians be on their guard against “the love of
this present world.” It is as insinuating and perilous principle. In proportion
as it gains upon the heart, it tends to enfeeble the energies, and deaden the
sensibilities, of the Divine life in the soul. God will not have a divided
heart. “Ye cannot serve God and Mammon.” (Ralph Wardlaw, D. D.)
──《The Biblical Illustrator》