The third stage of the new course is Naphtali, who “is a hind.” Here the idea of conflict continues” My wrestling,” —and weakness; it is a hind, not a hart. The hind however expresses cleanliness (Deut. xii. 15); devotion (Psa. 42:1); activity (Isa. 35:6); grace (Sol. 2:9); swiftness (2 Sam. 2:18); exaltation and security (Hat. iii. 19); tender love (Prov. 5:19); especially of the young (Job 39:1). The twenty-second Psalm is called Aijeleth Shahar, the Hind of the Day-break; and many of these qualities are found expressed in it.
“Naphtali is a hind let loose, he giveth goodly words.” The chief thoughts are Liberty, Ministry, and—in Deut. 33—Satisfaction. It is not merely a free hind, but a freed hind; one that had been kept in bondage, but now is “let loose,” with all that delightful sense of liberty which only the once-imprisoned can feel, who are not so likely voluntarily to enter some fresh bondage as those who have never been galled by its chain: though in truth the hind is not very intelligent in such matters, and never can be quite depended upon. That is to say, that persons who have passed through the bitter experience of Rom. 7, who have turned in despair to all religious expedients to relieve their troubled consciences in vain, and at last have cried, “Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” —that such persons have a much keener appreciation of the “liberty with which Christ hath made us free,” a much higher estimate of the value of the gospel in its enfranchising power than others who have not passed through such experiences, though there is that general tendency in all to become “entangled again within the yoke of bondage,” which we see rebuked so sternly in the Epistle to the Galatians.
There is a lower grade, too, of those who are willing to surrender their consciences to the keeping of others because of the ease which it affords them (for liberty increases responsibility); or even for the more sordid price of temporal benefits, like the dog in Aesop that boasted of the fine fare and easy times he had, till the wolf asked him what that thing round his neck meant; and on learning that the collar was his badge of servitude, the wolf continued that he preferred scarcity and freedom (it might have been a conversation between Naphtali and Issachar). “Beware of dogs” and the canine spirit, which returns to what it has rejected, and submits to a human chain.
And this “glorious liberty of the children of God” may be, and often has been, the portion of those who are galled with outward chains, slavery and imprisonment. There were many Christian slaves who were Christ's freedmen. Peter sleeps calmly “between two soldiers, bound with two chains.” Paul and Silas sing hymns of praise with their feet in the stocks, in that “inner prison.” In Rutherford's “sea-beat prison,” his Lord and he “kept tryst.” The Countess de Roeulx wondered how de Bray could sleep or eat with such fetters as she saw upon him: but he said, “These shackles are more honorable to me than golden rings and chains And as I hear them clank, methinks I hear the music of sweet voices and the tinkling of lutes.". When they led him and la Grange out to execution, his companion said, “We are here for preaching the word of God:” whereat the hangman pushed him off the ladder, and as the rope tightened round his neck his enfranchised soul sprang into a liberty as boundless as the universe. “His lifeless body lay, A worn out fetter which the soul Had broken and thrown away.” Though its body be caged yet the voice of “the lark at heaven's gate sings.” Zenobia's golden chains meant slavery: de Bray's clanking irons meant freedom.
When this condition is reached, and these qualities (indicated in the first paragraph) attained, there is a natural development of ministry, “he giveth goodly words.” This ministry may not be public nor official, yet it is true Ministry none the less. It is a less to us that we are so accustomed to associate the thought of ministry with an official position, or a distinctive dress—something formal and authoritative. The New Testament applies the word in a very comprehensive way, and sometimes applies the word—διάκονος—to a woman. A course of this sort, simple and sincere service to the people of God as opportunity offers, is a course above all others to lead to Satisfaction, though not unmixed with griefs. “He that watereth shall be watered also himself.” “Of Naphtali he said, O Naphtali, satisfied with favor, and full with the blessing of the Lord.”
And this, though there can hardly be anything in the universe more difficult to satisfy than the human heart; for in it live the horseleech's two daughters, incessantly crying, Give, give. It is more insatiable than the grave: the maw of the sea and the yawning earthquake are less greedy. Apicius killed himself because he had only eighty thousand pounds left; Ahab had all Israel, but sickened for Naboth's vineyard; a “little corporal,” having all the best parts of Europe, must also try and rob the Muscovite of his frozen plains; “a little stooping man,” having conquered the whole world, sits down and weeps for another to conquer. “To be equal with God” would not satisfy the Antichrist: he will exalt himself “above all that is called God.” Though “Ambition hath one heel nailed in hell, She doth stretch her fingers to touch the heavens.”
That πλήρωμα or “Fullness,” which the ancient sages ever sought but never found, has been discovered by the fishermen of Galilee—the land of Zebulun and Naphtali, those two who “jeoparded their lives unto the death in the high places of the field,” of old against the enemies of God—whence arose the great Light that illumines those that sit in darkness and the shadow of death. They have revealed to us “the fullness of Him that filleth all in all “; and “of His fullness have all we received.”
God, thine everlasting portion,
Feeds thee with the mighty's meat;
Price of Egypt's hard extortion,
Egypt's food, no more to eat.
Art thou weaned from Egypt's pleasures?
God in secret thee shall keep,
There unfold His hidden treasures,
There His love's exhaustless deep.