2 Samuel 14:14

"Handfuls of Purpose"

For All Gleaners

"For we must needs die, and are as water spilt on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again; neither doth God respect any person: yet doth he devise means, that his banished be not expelled from him." 2 Samuel 14:14 .

Is this an illustration of the kind of inspiration which is often granted to woman in contradistinction to the degree and quality granted to man? We have two distinct views of life in this verse: (1) There is the commonplace meditation upon human mortality, and a very simple but graphic figure of water spilled upon the ground which cannot be gathered up again; as true as this is of water so is it of the body of man when he falls back into his elemental dust. The decree of death is universal: God doth not respect any person; the old and the young die on the same day, and the weak man has as much security as the strong man against the fatal arrow. (2) Yet here is a singular suggestion by which some hint of immortality is given; God devises means that his banished be not expelled from him: however many local and narrow meanings these words may have, the heart will not refuse to see in them some groping after the immortality of the soul. That immortality does not fall within the scope of human conjecture, yet it comes within the range of religious faith: the woman remits the question to God; she knows what his resources are, and she pays to providence the tribute of being able to find means by which even death shall be vanquished. What was a dim imagining to her instinct is a glorious truth to our Christian faith. We have no doubt whatever respecting immortality, and we should act as if we had no such doubt; but on the contrary how often we act as if we had no prospect beyond the tomb. We speak of those who die as poor creatures, we weep over them as if they had fallen into nothingness, we speak of them as mere shadows and memories; yet all the while by a most perverse irony we profess to believe in the immortality and blessedness of the righteous. Thus we contradict our own faith, and expose our own theology to remorseless criticism and contempt. Those who believe in Christ's view of the future should rejoice over death; or whatever mournfulness enters into their feeling and their tone should relate to themselves and not to the sainted and glorified dead. Jesus Christ hath brought life and immortality to light: the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. Let us know the exact limit of death, and we shall find that it is restricted to the body, and has no reference whatever to the redeemed and sanctified spirit. The destiny of that spirit is undertaken by Jesus Christ himself, and because he has triumphed, that spirit shall have triumph, and so long as he is enthroned that spirit shall have joy in ever-increasing and ever-blessed service. Christians ought to be jealous lest pagans excel them in faith; that is to say, lest the conjectures of Paganism should be turned into more comforting realities than are the revelations of Christianity itself. The New Testament saint should take care lest his faith be eclipsed by the trust of Old Testament believers. The Church of today should be an advance upon the Church of every former day, in the clearness of its faith, in the intensity of its love, in the assurance of its appropriated blessings. Grow in grace.