Deuteronomy 16:16-17 Three times in a year shall all your males appear before the LORD your God in the place which he shall choose… Empty in one sense, empty of blessing, none of us can appear before the Lord, or our prayer has mocked Him, and our praise. Crowned with His goodness, you have come up hither; crown His goodness in return with praise. I. A leading feature, the leading feature of the Old Testament revelation is, THAT LIFE AND ALL THAT CROWNS IT — its crown of blessings — IS THE GIFT OF A LIVING INTELLIGENT BEING, AND COMES TO US BEARING THE SEAL OF HIS LOVE, The Jews were separated to this end, that God's methods and purposes with all men might be laid bare; that for once the Hand might be clearly manifest which is busy about every life. II. THE MOTIVE WHICH IS PLEADED FOR ALL THE NOBLEST HUMAN EFFORT IS GOD'S EXAMPLE. God has done thus and thus for you: "Go ye and do likewise" for your fellow men. It is the plea which is constantly urged in the Old Testament, which we accuse of low and material views, both of man and of God. It is the highest witness to man's essential God-likeness which can be conceived. Man's nature only finds free, that is joyful play, when it is doing God-like things, when it is striving to think, will, and act like God. The only complete form of man's life is the life which is also Divine. III. THE EXHORTATIONS OF THE SCRIPTURE ARE AMPLY SUSTAINED BY OUR OWN EXPERIENCE OF LIFE. There is no joy that fills man's heart which is comparable with that which he shares with God. He who does a deed purely unselfish, who yields free play to the most generous, heavenly impulses. IV. Part of this God-like duty finds expression in the text. "NONE SHALL APPEAR BEFORE THE LORD EMPTY." The Lord has filled you with good; you are "fearfully and wonderfully made," and in fearful and wonderful harmony with the world. Your organs, exquisitely fashioned, and all the beauty and splendour of the creation, form a concord which at once expresses God's loving kindness, and is to you a fountain of intense delight. And there is an inner harmony which He is striving to develop by uniting your heart to fear His name, which will make this great universe a Father's house, and the awful future all eternal home. Help God, for His great mercy's sake, to help the world. V. Another great thought of the Old Testament is THE HELP WHICH IT IS IN MAN'S POWER TO RENDER TO GOD. His ends can never be reached without us, in the way in which His wisdom has ordered the world. He might have ruled as a despot; He has chosen to seek rather to rule — as the Bishop of Argyll has happily phrased it as a constitutional king. (J. B. Brown, B. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: Three times in a year shall all thy males appear before the LORD thy God in the place which he shall choose; in the feast of unleavened bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles: and they shall not appear before the LORD empty: |
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