We are continually liable to difficulties and sorrows, from which nothing but a superior skill to our own can extricate us: "The way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.' Are we at a loss in present circumstances to descry the path of duty and safety, when our way appears to be hedged in on every side; is darkness set in our paths, and we know not how to proceed?"Let us ask wisdom of God." Do we feel ourselves habitually overpowered by the force of temptation; do we feel evil present with us, or are we in danger of being carried [along] by the [violence] of our sensual appetites, against which we have hitherto struggled in vain?-[Let us ask wisdom of God.]

Enforce the exhortation of seeking it of God in the following considerations :—

I. As it is of indispensable necessity, so it is in vain to seek it elsewhere.

II. It resides in him in its utmost perfection.

III. He is willing to communicate: "For the Lord giveth wisdom: out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding. He layeth up sound wisdom for the righteous." "Giveth liberally," λs, with a liberal mind, bountifully.

The caution," nothing doubting."

XXV.

ON ENGAGEDNESS OF HEART IN APPROACHING
UNTO GOD.

JEREMIAH XXX. 21.-For who is this that engaged his heart to approach unto me? saith the Lord.

In this chapter is contained an illustrious prophecy of the restoration of the ancient Israelites to their own land: first, from their captivity in Babylon, whither a part of the nation were already, and the remainder were shortly to be removed; next, from their long captivity and dis persion through all the countries of the earth, which has now subsisted for near eighteen hundred years. As a standing record of the faithfulness of God to his promises, as well as his infallible foreknowledge of all events, the prophet is commanded to commit to writing all the words which God had spoken to him during the whole time he had exercised the prophetic office.

Those who had presumed to speak in the name of the Lord, without being commissioned, had flattered the people with the assurances that the residue of the people should not be carried into Babylon, and that the part of the nation which were already sent thither should speedily be restored to their native country. In opposition to these false sug

gestions, Jeremiah was commanded to send a message to the captives in Babylon, saying, "Build ye houses in Babylon, and dwell in them; and plant gardens, and eat the fruit of them; take ye wives, and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons.' "In that message

he delivered the famous prediction respecting the precise time of the duration of their captivity, which he limits to seventy years, and the study of which enabled Daniel to perceive its approaching termination. "In the first year of his reign (i. e. of Darius), I Daniel understood by books the number of the years whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish seventy years in the destruction of Jerusalem."t

As a part of the distinguishing favours which God said he had in reserve for the people, he promises that at their restoration the oppression of a foreign yoke should be broken, and they should be again ruled by princes of their own race, agreeable to the language of Isaiah respecting the same event; when the people shall first be purified and reformed by divine chastisement, and afterward reinstated in a happy and prosperous condition. "And I will turn my hand upon thee, and purely purge away thy dross, and take away all thy tin: and I will restore thy judges as at the first, and thy counsellors as at the beginning: afterward thou shalt be called the city of righteousness, the faithful city. Zion shall be redeemed with judgment, and her converts with righteousness." It is not only foretold that a native governor should be set over the house of Israel, but that he should be distinguished for his piety. "The Lord will cause him to draw nigh unto him." The words of the text may be considered in three points of view. I. As descriptive of the character of Zerubbabel, they were accomplished in the restoration of the Jews, after the seventy years' captivity, when a governor was appointed over them named Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, the great grandson of Jehoiachim. He was a person eminently devoted to God, who exerted himself with much zeal in rebuilding the altar and the temple, and establishing the worship of God. Under his auspices the services of the sanctuary were renewed, after a cessation of seventy years. The feast of tabernacles was

established in the seventh month. Masons and builders were hired from Sidon to assist in erecting the temple, the foundation of which was laid amid confused expressions of joy and lamentation: joy on the part of the young men at witnessing the house of God rising up from its ruins; and lamentation on the part of the old, who had beheld the superior glory of the former.

When the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin, envying their prosperity, hired counsellors against them, and procured an order from the King of Persia to put a stop to the work, it was of necessity suspended for a while; but he lost no time in resuming it at the first opportunity, till it was completed in the sixth year of Darius Hystaspes. A feast of dedication was kept on this joyful occasion, and afterward the feast of the passover was celebrated on the fourteenth of the first month,

* Jer. xxix. 5, 6. † Dan. ix. 2.

Isa. i. 25-27.

See Ezra iii. 11-13.

.

with great joy, as Ezra observes: "The Lord made them joyful, and turned the heart of the King of Assyria unto them, to strengthen their hands in the work of the house of God, the God of Israel."

He and Joshua the high-priest were represented in the visions of Zechariah as the two candlesticks supplied through pipes from olivetrees, to indicate the plenitude of that juice with which they were endued, which is thus explained by the angel ::-"Then said he, These are the two anointed ones, that stand by the Lord of the whole earth."t The difficulties attending the work, which were very great in themselves, were extremely heightened by the malice and opposition of the enemies of God, particularly of the Samaritans; but the strength and fortitude with which he was endowed from on high enabled him to surmount them. "Who art thou, O great mountain?" said the prophet; "before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain. Moreover, the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house; his hands also shall finish it; and thou shalt know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto you."‡

II. The words of the text admit of being applied, with the greatest propriety, to the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophecy contained in the thirtieth and thirty-first chapters looks forward to gospel times, and has an ultimate respect to the final restoration of the Jews, and their conversion to the Messiah, of whom Zerubbabel was an illustrious type. The prophet was wont, in connexion with the assurances of divine favour to the Israelites, in restoring their temple after the captivity, to mix predictions of the coming of the Messiah:-"Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Behold the man whose name is The Branch; and he shall grow up out of his place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord: even he shall build the temple of the Lord; and he shall bear the glory, and shall sit and rule upon his throne; and he shall be a priest upon his throne; and the counsel of peace shall be between them both."

The prophet, foreseeing the coming of the Messiah, and descrying his character, spake with an air of surprise: "And who is he that has engaged his heart to approach unto God?" None ever approached unto God so nearly, or under the same character, as he did. He, considered as man, was taken into an intimate personal union with the Deity, so as to become Immanuel, or "God with us;" and he approached to God, in the office of a Mediator, to make peace between the offended Majesty of Heaven and his sinful creatures. He came, like Aaron, with incense, between the living and the dead, to stay the plague, and arrest divine vengeance in its career. He approached unto God in our behalf, not with the trembling diffidence of a sinful mortal, who is conscious of his own danger and demerits, but with the holy, becoming boldness of a son to a father. He interposed with precious blood; and, on the ground of the stipulations which intervene between him and the Father, claims his church as his purchase, and asserts his authority to save them "with an everlasting salvation;" "Deliver him

Ezra vi. 22. ↑ Zech. iv. 14.

Zech. iv. 7-9.

Zech. vi. 12, 13. || Isaiah vii. 14.

from going down to the pit; I have found a ransom.”* He made his approach to God by a vicarious sacrifice and spotless obedience, by enduring the awful penalty denounced on transgressors; and by magnifying the law made it honourable.

His heart was also ineffably engaged in this work. None ever exhibited such a concern for the divine honour, such a zeal for the divine interests, as was exemplified by our blessed Lord. "Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire: in burnt-offering and sin-offering thou hadst no pleasure. Then I said, To do thy will, O God, I come; thy law is in my heart."t

Nor was he deterred by the greatest discouragements, nor dismayed by the greatest opposition, nor by the certain prospect of the most dismal sufferings, so as to desist from persevering in his undertaking till it was completed. He did not "fail, nor was discouraged, till he had set judgment in the earth."

Animated by the joy that was set before him, "he endured the cross, despising the shame."

If we look through all the scenes and passages of his life, we shall find him incessantly engaged in his Father's business, with an utter contempt of the world, and a perfect absorption of mind in the great and holy objects he came to accomplish. He never for a moment lost sight of the ends of his mission, nor ever suffered his attention to be diverted from them by the love of ease, the fascination of pleasure, or the terrors of death. His disciples, who were the daily witnesses of his actions, were compelled to apply to him a remarkable expression in the prophetic part of the Psalms "The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up."‡

III. We may consider the passage before us as highly expressive of the true manner in which the service of God must be undertaken, if we would render it acceptable to him, or useful to ourselves.

Among the heathen, it was usual to form a conjecture of the good or the ill success of application to their deities from the state in which the entrails of the victim were found; and nothing was considered as a more fatal omen than its wanting a heart. Their worship, we are well aware, was folly and delusion; but in this instance it may serve to illustrate the subject before us, which is, the absolute necessity of the heart being engaged in religion.

By the heart the Scriptures generally intend the innermost and the noblest powers of the mind, in opposition to external actions of the body. It denotes deliberate choice, understanding, and feeling, as distinguished from the semblance of devotion, consisting in a compliance with its visible forms and regulations. As the heart has usually (whether justly or not it is not necessary to inquire) been looked upon as the seat of feeling,—in like manner as the brain has been supposed to be the chief organ of thought,-it has been, by an easy metaphor, employed to denote that faculty of the soul by which we perceive what appears desirable, and cleave to what affords us satisfaction, and

*Job xxxiii. 24.

† Psalm xl. 6-8.

+ Psalm Ixix. 9.

taste the delight which certain objects are adapted to afford. a most essential part of religion; here is its proper seat.

This is

Ezra

1. It implies a preparation of heart for religious duties. "prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord and to do it," to disengage his mind from vain imaginations, from worldly thoughts, from every thing, in short, foreign to the spirit of religion. By a diligent perusal of a portion of the word of God, we are prepared to approach him; by hearing him when he speaks to us, we are fitted to speak to him.

He who rushes into the presence of the Most High without solemn deliberation, without reflecting on the weighty and serious nature of such an undertaking, can with little propriety be said to have "engaged his heart."

2. It includes the exercise of suitable affections in the services of religion, the being susceptible of such sentiments and dispositions as are correspondent to the universal object of worship, as well as to the diversified circumstances in which [we are placed.] Love, reverence, and trust, a profound sense of our own meanness and pollution, belong universally to every approach to God. While these dispositions, in truly pious souls, will receive a colour and complexion from their peculiar condition,—according as it is a condition of joy or sorrow, of sensible consolation or of desertion, is depressed with a consciousness of guilt or exhilarated with a sense of pardon,—the soul sometimes, with little reflection on its own state, will be taken up with adoring views of the Divine glory, delightfully losing itself in the vivid contemplation of the great All in All. At other times it will be occupied with an affecting view of the conduct of God towards it in providence and grace. "We thought of thy loving-kindness in the midst of thy temple." There are seasons again, when, under burdens of guilt and distress, it will be incessantly stirring itself up to take hold upon God. "Have mercy upon me, O Lord: my soul is bowed down within me ; my wounds stink and are corrupt because of my foolishness."†

In such circumstances the pious soul will resemble Jacob, who wrestled with the angel, wept, and made supplication. In all these various exercises the heart will be engaged, in approaching to God: the heart will be mingled with it, as the expression signifies.

3. It includes constancy and unshaken firmness, steadfastness of resolution to cleave to God. "I have sworn," says David," and I will perform it, that I will keep thy righteous judgments. I have inclined my heart to perform thy statutes always, even unto the end." Contrast this with the conduct of the children of Israel at the Red Sea, and with Saul.

*Psalm xlviii. 9.

VOL. III.-I

Psalm vi. 2; xxxviii. 5, 6.