Deuteronomy 29:29 The secret things belong to the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children for ever… It is one material consideration, amongst many, in favour of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, that they preserve throughout so due a medium in the discoveries which they make of Divine truths, as to direct the faith and practice of men without indulging their curiosity. I. THAT WE SHOULD NEVER PRY INTO MATTERS WHICH INFINITE WISDOM HATH CONCEALED. For we shall seldom, if at all, he wiser for such inquiries: we shall never be happier or better; and we shall usually be more wretched, and less innocent. II. THAT WE SHOULD RECEIVE WITH ATTENTIVE HUMILITY WHATEVER INFINITE WISDOM COMMUNICATES TO US. For that God is able to communicate many important truths to us, which we have no means of knowing otherwise, concerning His own nature, His designs and dispensations concerning the inhabitants of the invisible world, and our future state in it, can no more be doubted than whether we ourselves, according to our various knowledge of men and things, are able to give unexpected and serviceable notices one to another. And that we should understand nothing further of His secrets than is unfolded to us, nor be capable of answering many questions that may be asked about them, otherwise than by confessing our ignorance, is so far from being a plea against their being really His, that it is a necessary consequence of it: so far from being strange in supernatural things, that it is common in natural ones. III. THAT WE SHOULD ALLOW EVERY DIVINE TRUTH ITS DUE INFLUENCE ON OUR BEHAVIOUR. In proportion as we know God, we are to glorify Him as God: according to every particular which the Scripture hath manifested concerning Him. And the several obligations incumbent on us towards Him, ought not to be estimated, however commonly they are, by their influence on the affairs of our present life, but by the stress which He, who alone knows the proper one, hath laid upon them. Our performance of these obligations, as it was the true motive to the delivery of each article, is the just measure of our belief in it. If we know enough of the mysterious doctrines in religion to fulfil those duties, of which they are each respectively the foundation, our knowledge, however imperfect, is sufficient. And if those duties remain unfulfilled, the completest knowledge will not avail us. (Archbishop Seeker.) Parallel Verses KJV: The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law. |
    |