And let the reader mark the force of those words of Hezekiah, "If _ye_ turn again unto the Lord, _your brethren and your children shall find compassion_ before them that lead them captive." Does not this approach very near to that precious truth of the New Testament times, that we are members one of another, and that the conduct of one member affects all the rest? Unbelief might raise the question as to how this could possibly be--as to how the actings of one could possibly affect others far away; yet so it was in Israel, and so it is now in the Church of God. Witness the case of Achan, in Joshua vii. There, one man sinned; and, so far as the narrative informs us, the whole congregation was ignorant of the fact; and yet we read that "_the children of Israel_ committed a trespass in the accursed thing." And again, "_Israel_ hath sinned." How could this be? Simply because the nation was one, and God dwelt among them. This, plainly, was the ground of a double responsibility, namely, a responsibility to God, and a responsibility to the whole assembly and to each member in particular. It was utterly impossible for any one member of the congregation to shake off this high and holy responsibility. A person living at Dan might feel disposed to question how his conduct could affect a man living at Beersheba; yet such was the fact, and the ground of this fact lay in the eternal truth of Israel's indissoluble unity and Jehovah's dwelling in the midst of His redeemed assembly. (See Exodus xv. 2, and the many passages which speak of God's dwelling in the midst of Israel.) We do not attempt even to quote the numerous scriptures which speak of God's presence in the congregation of Israel--His dwelling in their midst. But we would call the attention of the reader to the all-important fact that those scriptures _begin_ with Exodus xv. It was when Israel stood, as a fully redeemed people, on Canaan's side of the Red Sea that they were able to say, "The Lord is my strength and my song, and He is become my salvation: He is _my God_, and I will prepare Him a _habitation_." Redemption formed the ground of God's dwelling among His people, and His presence in their midst secured their perfect unity. Hence no one member of the congregation could view himself as an isolated independent atom. Each one was called to view himself as part of a whole, and to view his conduct in reference to all those who, like himself, formed part of that whole.