It has been observed by those who have acquired a competency to speak on such subjects, that hieroglyphics went before letters, and parables before arguments. Nature suggested this order, rather demanded it; and it is to be seen that Scripture has observed it, thus following where nature led the way.
The divine volume opens with parables, and closes with arguments. It begins with illustrative teaching, and ends as with rudimental or dogmatic. But the things taught in these different methods are the same. We find the narratives of Genesis in the reasonings of the epistles.
And thus, the earliest and the latest books are linked together in the most attractive and persuasive manner. All, I may say, are welcoming each other’s presence and company. They converse together; they understand each other’s language, though one speak in the artless style of childhood, and the other in the grave, sententious wisdom of age. And the whole is thus wondrous as well as precious, hearing its own self-evidencing light to this great fact, that it is the same Spirit which has quickened and filled the whole volume from first to last.
And let me further say, that in this wondrous combination, nothing can exceed the sweetness and simplicity of the child’s language, as we listen to it in Genesis; and nothing can be more sound and sure than the reasoning of the man, as we follow it in the epistles; and yet, as we said, the stories of the Patriarch combine with the arguments of the apostles. Each of them announces the like mysteries. I would instance what I mean, and look, first, at Abraham in Gen. 15.
As we may say, on a fine, clear, starry night, in the land of Canaan, Abraham is called forth, by the voice of the Lord, to look to the sky and mark the number of the stars if he can; and this simple circumstance, with the intercourse between him and the Lord which accompanied it, serves the apostle’s close and conclusive treatise on the justification of a sinner, in the epistle to the Romans. See chap. 4.
Abraham, dead in himself, believing, as he looked on the sky, that God could and would, according to the promise then made him, give him a seed as numerous as the stars on which he was then gazing, is used by the apostle as illustrative of the faith which justifies the sinner. The patriarchal story is thus found to be a parable as well as a story; or, mystery as well as history, and to join with the reasonings and conclusions of the apostle, in giving us sinners holy confidence before God.
Let us now look at Sarah, in Gen. 21. Can any circumstances, I ask, be more homely, more commonplace, amid the events of human life, than the dismissal of a servant because she had, perhaps, forgotten what she owed her mistress? A female servant discharged for disrespectful behavior! And yet, this is the fact in the history of the family of Abraham which is wrought into that argument of the apostle which proves a sinner’s title to walk before God in the spirit of adoption, or the liberty of a child. See Gal. 4
Surely there is something both affecting and attractive in this. What illustrations, I ask, can be more inartificial, more level to the young or to the untutored mind, than those which the early book of Genesis is thus seen to supply? And what reasonings on some of the profoundest inquiries which the heart of man can entertain, more satisfactory than those which the epistles conduct to their conclusions? And yet these things are found together! Who, I then ask again, has been the artificer of such a book? Who has woven together those hieroglyphics and letters, these parables and arguments? Surely “the key of this inquiry lies at the door.” The parable went before the argument in the order, as we have said, which nature suggested. The stories of the patriarchs have answered well for the treatises and discussions of the apostles; and if, as another has said, we get “the sweet harmonies and deep analogies of nature,” surely we may add after all this, that we get likewise the sweet harmonies and deep analogies of Scripture.
But I must give another instance. It is the Abraham of Gen. 14. The victor-patriarch, on his return from the battle, is there met by the priest of Salem, with suited refreshments sent to him as from God Himself with a blessing, by the hand of that august stranger. Abraham accepts it, and so feeds upon what Melchizedec had brought him, so deeply drinks into the very spirit and virtue of the occasion, that he is able to give the king of Sodom and all his offers an answer, a triumphant answer, on the spot.
But this striking scene in the book of Genesis is wrought into an argument in the epistle to the Hebrews. It stands there as a testimony to us, of the effective priesthood of the true Melchizedec, the Son of God, the Lord Jesus; and we are called to enjoy, by faith, the virtues of that priesthood, as Abraham enjoyed his communion with the royal priest of Salem, and proved the power of it.
Surely all this makes the divine volume wonderful and attractive. What authority it acquires and maintains, what delight it awakens! Would that one used the mysteries and communications of it as one does the book, that contains and conveys them. Abraham and Sarah were beyond us, if one may speak for others, in this.
How simply and at once, with a believing mind, did Abraham accept the promise of God in Gen. 15, not considering his own death-estate, nor that of Sarah, but believing in God as a quickener, he came forth as justified by faith. How, with full decision of faith, did Sarah accept the spirit of liberty, the privilege of adoption, when she sent Hagar and Ishmael out of the house, that she might enjoy her weaned Isaac alone. And with what fervency and grasp of soul did Abraham accept the refreshments and the blessing of Melchizedec, going forth from that communion to gain a victory over all that the world could have made him or given him! And we are to be like-minded in all this. We are to be simple in our acceptance of the fruits of grace; we are to walk with God in the certainty of justification, in the liberty of children, and in the sure hope of accomplished warfare, and of the refreshments of the kingdom.
But we are not in the glow of these mysteries as grace would have us to be; we need the exhortation, “be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus,” and again, “stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.” Let me rather ask, do we not very feebly image these circumstances, these narratives to ourselves, and thus lose much of the force of those blessed truths which they contain and convey? They are strange and somewhat out of the way, it may be. Yes; and so are the mysteries they illustrate. What a strange thing to see an aged couple, after a life of disappointment, embracing a child! What a strange thing to see a sinner, who has involved himself in death and judgment, glorying in the assured possession of life and righteousness! It is death rejoicing in life. It is exultation in resurrection form: and yet, strange and out of the way as all this is, in the reckoning of flesh and blood, this is the believer’s condition, as once it was our father Abraham’s. We must live this parable if we would rightly understand it.
So, in Sarah’s case. The inmates of the house who, for fourteen years and more, had lived with the family (yea, and in such relationship, too,) sent off at a moment’s warning, for such a slight offense! What a strange thing, and more than strange! Would not a respectable neighborhood be indignant at such conduct? Would not the dismissal of a servant under such terms be resented by all who heard of it? Sent away at once, without getting time, even if she had affronted, to restore herself and seek forgiveness! And in like manner does not respectable flesh and blood resent the thought of a sinner freeing himself, through faith in the Son of God, from the spirit, and fears, and bondage of the law? Does not the moral sense denounce such pretension?
Surely, we may say all this. We do not realize these scenes and narratives in the strangeness that attaches to them, nor their great originals; I mean the mysteries which they exhibit. We are cloudy in our apprehension where we should be bright, and feeble and cold in our faith and affections when we should be bold and fervent, we are too little like Abraham in Gen. 15. and Sarah in Gen. 21; and too much like Abraham in Gen. 21, and Sarah in Gen. 18.
Here, however, we must distinguish things that differ; and we shall find our relief and comfort in doing so. We may he indisposed, like Abraham, in Gen. 21, to send Hagar away at the demand of Sarah, but this is not the same as if we brought her back after she had been sent away. I may but feebly act on my liberty in Christ, and linger still, in a legal spirit, over myself; but this is not as if I were advisedly to turn again to the rudiments of the world or of the law, again putting myself, as the apostle speaks, under “bondage” to “beggarly elements.” Abraham never did this. He never brought hack Hagar after the demand of Sarah had taught him to dismiss her. The Lord came and gave him counsel when, through weakness, he hesitated about listening to Sarah’s requirement that the bondwoman should be sent away; but how, I may ask, would He have dealt with him, had he attempted to bring her home again after she had been sent away? It is interesting and instructive to see, that the epistle to the Galatians answers this question. For the Galatians were doing this. They were reviving ordinances; they were returning to fleshly confidences; they were proposing to sustain their conscience before God by religious doings, thereby to perfect what Jesus had begun for them; and the fervency and holy anger which glows in the epistle to them, may stand before us as the counterpart or expression of what the Lord’s way with the patriarch would have been, had he attempted to bring home again the dismissed Hagar and her son.
All this, which we get in the word, is surely excellent. What a combination of moral glories! What a harmony of sweet voices! All we need is, eyes to see, and ears to hear the wonderful works and words of God.