Exodus 12:37-39 And the children of Israel journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand on foot that were men, beside children.… People looking on will judge everything according to their own quality. You cannot get bad people to form good judgments. You cannot persuade good people to form mean and contemptible judgments. Let us suppose Moses and Aaron at the head of this great throng. Criticism would thus speak respecting the multitude: They must be better than they seem, or they would not follow the leadership of such men as Moses and Aaron; it is a very motley crowd, but it must be substantially good at heart, because look at the leadership which it has chosen. Or criticism might speak thus: Moses and Aaron cannot be much after all, or they would not allow this rag-tag-and-bob-tail following. Thus criticism, I repeat, is determined by quality. In the one case the multitudes get the benefit of the moral elevation of their leaders; in the other case the leaders come in for depreciation because of the motley character of their followers. Blessed be heaven, the Judge is just who shall judge us all. We shall not be left at the disposal of imperfect and selfish criticism. A crowd, even in church, is not to be judged indiscriminately or pronounced upon in some rough generalization. The crowd is "mixed." Men are not all in church for the same reason. Men are not all in church through the same motives. Some are in church who do not want to be there; they have a purpose to serve: some are there on account of mere curiosity. Others are in church to pray, to confess their life-sins, and seek the pity of God as expressed in pardon at the foot of the saving Cross. Outside criticism would thus judge us differently. Whilst we say this about the outward church, the great surging crowd that may be within the hallowed walls, we could say practically the same thing about the inner church. Even the inner church, gathered around the sacramental board, is a mixed multitude. For example, look at the difference of spiritual attainment. There is the veteran who knows his Bible almost by heart, and here is the little learner spelling out its earliest words. Have they a right to be in the same church? Their right is not in their attainments, but in their desire. But this makes church life very difficult to conduct: very difficult for the pastor and teacher, very difficult for the constituent members themselves. One can go at a great pace; another can only crawl. What is to be done when there is such a diversity of power? Then look at what a mixture of disposition there is even in the inner church. We are not all of one quality. Some men are born generous; other men are born misers. It is easy for some men to pray; other men have to scourge themselves to their knees. Look at the difference of faculty for work you find in the church. One man will do anything for you in the way of music. He likes it; it would be a burden to him not to do it. Thank God for such service! Another man will work in the Sunday school. He loves children; their presence makes him young; he can never be old so long as he sees the light of little faces. Every man is himself a mixed multitude. That is the philosophy. Have you ever gone far enough in the task of self-analysis to find out how many men you, the individual man, really are? You are self-inconsistent; you are not the same man at night you were in the morning; whatever you do, you do in a mixed way. It is human nature that is the mixed multitude. We know that we have motives; we have never seen them, but we have felt them; we know of a verity that we never do anything with a pure, simple, direct, frank motive. Sometimes the motive is as a whole good, with just one tittle taint in the middle of it. Sometimes the motive is predominantly bad, with just one little speck of white on the outside or on the left hand. So are we. It is the same way with our thoughts. We are not always impious. Sometimes even the unbeliever feels as though he could believe if one beam could be added to the light which already showers its glory upon his life. Sometimes the believer feels as if he had been misled, as if he were following some aerial sprite, some shadowy spectral nothing. At what point is he to be judged? God will judge him at his best. God accepts our prayers in their bloom. Do not, therefore, condemn yourselves because some. times you are in moods that really distress the very soul; on the other hand, do not flatter yourselves and commit yourselves to the seduction that ends in utterest failure of life. What is the great work which the gospel has to do in the soul in relation to all this mixture of motive and thought? It has to take out all the bad and throw it away. Come, thou Holy Ghost, and take out of our hearts the selfish motive, the miser's greed, the debasing thought, the little, mean, contemptible purpose; tear it up, burn it in unquenchable fire. When a man can so pray he has a seed hope that one day he shall be self-unanimous. Blessed will be the realization of self-unanimity. (J. Parker, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And the children of Israel journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand on foot that were men, beside children. |
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