this fight of the divine glory to the multitude, and to fet all down to the facred feaft on the mount; but, fince it was covenant-entertainment, the feventy were brought to it, as the reprefentatives of the people. Thus alfo the New-Teftament church is represented by twenty-four elders about the throne, Rev. iv. 4.-From this you may learn, that fafe communion and fellowship with God is the privilege of the church of believers, the If raelites indeed. That all the people of God have not alike nearness of accefs to God; fome come farther forward than others. Peter, James, and John, were taken up to the mount of transfiguration, and not the rest of the apoftles.-That it is a mercy to have an intereft in, and relation to, these who are brought near to God, especially fuch as will act for us in the mount with God. There may be fome young ones here, whofe fathers or mothers are to approach the table of the Lord. I would advise them to tell them to mind them there. Say, I cannot go, but, O! give up my name to Christ, confent you in my name to the covenant, and tell your covenanted God, I am alfo content to be his.' Or, if you have not father or mother, tell any other godly perfon ye know. And fo may one diftreffed Chriftian do with another: Song, v. 8. "I charge you, O daughters of Jerufalem! if ye find my Beloved, that ye tell him that I am fick of love.". We may obferve, 2. How their fafety is expreffed: He laid not his hand upon them, that is, did not hurt or deftroy them, Gen. xxxvii. 22. Though they faw God, (ver. 10.), yet they died not, their lives were preferved. This imports, that he might in point of justice have laid his hand on them. They were finful creatures; and though they were on the mount mount of God, yet they had a finful nature with them, which did leave the marks of it even upon what they did there. But he overlooked their weakness, and in mercy fpared them. This inftructs us, that when we are at our beft, if God fhould mark our iniquity, we could not stand before him. We are ever in mercy's debt, and cannot be one moment fafe without being under the covert of blood. Even in heaven, it is under that canopy the faints will feast for ever, Heb. vii. 25. --It alfo imports, that the weight of his hand would have crushed them. If he had but laid it on them, it would have done their bufinefs. If he had but put forth his hand and touched them in wrath, they would have gone like a moth with a touch of the hand.--From this we may learn the utter weakness and nothingness of the creature before the Lord. He can touch it to destruction, and can frown it back, when he will, into the womb of nothing. Why, then, fhould we ftrive with our Maker?-More particularly, that the greatest of men are nothing before the great God: Upon the nobles he laid not his hand. Though they caused terror to their inferior fellow-creatures, they were as unable to bear the terror of God as the meaneft in the camp of Ifrael. All flesh is alike before God. You will obferve, 3. How they came to be fafe. The word nobles · fignifies felect, feparate ones, who had been fet apart. They were felected out of the covenanted body of the people, to come up into the mount to the Lord, at his call. Mofes gets an order for fo many to come up with him, ver. 1. Having that order, he first proposes a covenant to the people, and they declare their acceptance, ver. 3.; then he writes the words of the covenant, and the covenant is most folemnly entered into, ratified, and fealed; fealed; there is an altar built to reprefent God in Christ, ver. 4. and twelve pillars to represent the twelve tribes. Thus thefe were the parties. Sacrifices were offered, ver. 5. fhewing the covenant to be founded on the blood of a Mediator. The half of the blood was fprinkled on the altar, ver. 6. fhewing it was not an abfolute God with whom they were to covenant, but a God atoned by the blood of a crucified Saviour.. Then he read the book of the covenant; thus propofing it to the people; and their fecond thoughts are as their first, they folemnly confent to it, ver. 7.; and he fprinkles the rest of the blood on them, and fo it was fealed and ratified. Then, after all this, he and these selected elders go up to the mount, in obedience to the call formerly given; and there they faw God, and were fafe notwithstanding. Thus, their feparation was their fecurity.--From which you may obferve, That there is fafety in following God's call, be the calling never so high. Had any of the people attempted to have gone whither they went, they had fmarted for it; but being called, they were fafe. Some, who measure reverence of God more by their own carnal wifdom than by God's word, cry out on us for not kneeling, but fitting, at the Lord's table. But though fitting be a gesture of more familiarity than kneeling, yet, seeing it is instituted, we may expect more fafety in it, than in their kneeling, which, at the Lord's table, wants both precept and example. We now come to the Second part of the verfe. They were kindly entertained in their approach: Alfo (or but) they faw God, and did eat and drink.-Here observe, 1. A glorious fight which they got.-Where confider, (1.) The object, God, more largely expreffed, ver. ver. 10. "The God of Ifrael." Not any vifible resemblance of the divine nature, but fome glorious appearance and token of God's fpecial prefence. Our Lord Jefus Chrift was known to the Old-Teftament church by this name, the God of Ifrael. And that this was the Son of God, feems very plain from that word, ver. 1. "He faid, Come up unto the Lord." Compare ch. xxiii. 20.-23. with Exod. iii. 2.-8. Now, he who fends is the Father, and it is the fame who fpeaks here; and he speaks of another perfon, who alfo is the Lord. And, seeing we read of his feet, ver. 10. he seems to have appeared in a glorious human shape, as a pledge of his future incarnation. This, then, was a moft glorious fight of Jefus Chrift. Nothing is here defcribed but what was under his feet; though the text seems to intimate they saw more, an inconceivable glory which mortals cannot make words of.. -Confider, (2.) The act, they faw. This seeing imports fomething more than that in ver. 10. for it is evident the first part of the verse relates to that fee. ing, ver. 10. And fo the fenfe requires fomething more to be in this. Accordingly, they are different words in the original; this here fignifies to contemplate and fixedly behold; from it our word gaze feems to be derived. It might be read, They beheld God; importing, not a tranfient glance, but a fixed view: John, i. 14. "And the word was made flesh, and dwelt among us; and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth;" which is ftill more admirable condefcenfion, and accordingly it is emphatically expreffed. Now, confider this as following upon the folemn tranfaction of the covenant made by facrifice.It holds out to us, (1.) That the great end of the covenant, covenant, next to the divine glory, is the happiness of the covenanters in seeing and enjoying of God. There it is completed. And beyond this the creature cannot go.-(2.). That not the fight of an abfolute God, but of a God in Chrift, is the covenanters happiness. None can fee God in mercy but they, for there is no other way but that of the covenant; and their happy fight is nothing other than a fight of God in Chrift. In Christ, all the lines of our hope meet for time and eternity.-Obferve, 2. A blessed feast of which they were partakers: They did eat and drink.-Here confider, (1.) What they did, they did eat and drink upon the mount. They feafted upon the remains of the facrifices of the peace-offerings, ver. 5. And this in token of their hearty fatisfaction with the covenant now made, their ready acceptance of the benefits of it, and their communion with God in pursuance of it. Thus believers their feeding on Chrift and gofpel-dainties is expreffed in fcripture: Pfal. xxii. 25. 26. "My praife fhall be of thee in the great congregation: I will pay my vows before them that fear him: The meek fhall eat, and be fatisfied." Thus they were admitted to a holy familiarity with God, to eat and drink in his prefence: They saw him, and they did eat and drink. Confider, (2.) How they did it, with holy joy and comfort.. This is implied in the connection, or oppofition betwixt the parts of the text. They were fo far from being flain with the fight, that they were not faithlessly frightened at it; but, with a holy compofure of fpirit, they did cat and drink. What they faw was not like a cloudy sky to damp them, but as a clear one to refresh them. Holy reverence is neceffary, but faithlefs fears in folemn approaches Gg 2 |