Expositions of Holy Scripture: Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, and First Book of Samuel, Second Samuel, First Kings, and Second Kings chapters I to VIIMaclaren, Alexander
Religion
Expositions of Holy Scripture: Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, and First Book of Samuel, Second Samuel, First Kings, and Second Kings chapters I to VII
We need not cry, 'Sun! stand still!' but rather, 'Come quickly, Lord
Jesus!'
Then Time shall be 'the lackey to eternity,' and Death be the porter of
heaven's gate, and we shall pass from the land of setting suns and
waning moons and change and sorrow, to that land where 'thy sun shall
no more go down,' and 'there shall be no more time.'
UNWON BUT CLAIMED
'There remaineth yet very much land to be possessed, ... them will I
drive out from before the children of Israel; only divide thou it by
lot unto Israel for an inheritance'--Joshua xiii. 1-8.
Joshua was now a very old man and had occupied seven years in the
conquest. His work was over, and now he had only to take steps to
secure the completion by others of the triumph which he would never
see. This incident has many applications to the work of the Church in
the world, but not less important ones to individual progress, and we
consider these mainly now.
I. The clear recognition of present imperfection.
That is essential in all regions, 'Not as though'; the higher up, the
more clearly we see the summit. The ideal grows loftier, as partially
realised. The mountain seems comparatively low and easy till we begin
to climb. We should be continually driven by a sense of our
incompleteness, and drawn by the fair vision of unattained
possibilities. In all regions, to be satisfied with the attained is to
cease to grow.
This is eminently so in the Christian life, with its goal of absolute
completeness.
How blessed this dissatisfaction is! It keeps life fresh: it is the
secret of perpetual youth.
Joshua's work was incomplete, as every man's must be. We each have our
limitations, the defects of our qualities, the barriers of our
environment, the brevity of our day of toil, and we have to be content
to carry the fiery cross a little way and then to give it up to other
hands. There is only One who could say,' It is done.' Let us see that
we do our own fragment.
II. The confident reckoning on complete possession.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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