Deuteronomy 32:31 For their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges. Modern infidelity has many tones and many voices. Some of these are insolent and arrogant, — they drive us at once to a distance. There is just one which is deeply pathetic. It is that which confesses that its rock is not as our Rock; that its reasonings and its discoveries have not enriched but impoverished. "Our Rock" is the God of the Christian revelation. Our enemy's rock is a divinity of man's construction, however many or however few it may admit of the characteristics of the other. Let me name one or two of the attributes of our Rock. I. THE DIVINE PERSONALITY. Man wants, and must have, someone above himself to worship, trust, love. II. THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS. It is very well to say that sin is not sinful; or to say, on the other hand, that sin must be left as it is, to bear its fruit in consequence, and to know no other cure but forgetfulness: this does not meet the case, does not heal the remorse, does not repair the mischief, does not set the sinner free to work, because it sets him not free to hope. Forgiveness is a name not yet named: till it is named, I am helpless still. But forgiveness of sins is named in revelation. It is the keystone of the Gospel. III. THE LAWFULNESS, REALITY, AND EFFICACY OF PRAYER. How ready to hand are the old cavils! How shall man stay or guide the hand of God? IV. LIFE AND IMMORTALITY BROUGHT TO LIGHT BY THE GOSPEL. What has "their rock" to tell of a world beyond death? A guess, a peradventure — at best, a recognition of angel faces loved and lost — at best, a resumption, in some spoilt and damaged form, of relationships formed here and broken — at best, an absorption into the great ocean or fountain of being, impassive, impersonal, unconscious, irresponsive. (Dean Vaughan.) Parallel Verses KJV: For their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges.WEB: For their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges. |
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