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The verse suggests three thoughts concerning our human life -

I. THE EXCELLENCY OF OUR ESTATE. "A land that floweth with milk and honey." God gave the Israelites an excellent inheritance when he led them into the land. of promise. For beauty, variety of scenery, fertility, etc., it was all that could be desired. Our present estate as citizens of time is one rich and full, a "land flowing," etc. We have:

1. The beauty and grandeur of the world.

2. Human love in its manifold forms, conjugal, parental, filial, fraternal, etc.

3. Sufficiency of all kinds of palatable food.

4. Intellectual gratifications.

5. Spiritual relationships and the sacred, enduring joys which belong to these.

II. THE TENURE UNDER WHICH WE HOLD POSSESSION. "I will give it unto you to possess it." We reckon that we "possess" many things. We call them "ours." We endeavour to secure them to ourselves by carefully drawn documents and witnesses. But what, when all has been done that can be done, is the tenure under which we hold everything? It is not the consent of man, but the will of God. God said to Israel concerning the country of the Canaanites, "Ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto you to possess it." He thought well to take it away from its former occupants and give it to them. There were, no doubt, the best reasons for this exchange; but Jehovah evidently assumed his perfect right to dispose as seemed well to him of his own. God always has the best grounds on which to deal with us, raising up or laying low; he never acts capriciously; but he often acts without assigning reasons to us, and in such wise that we cannot make any conjecture thereupon that is even probably true. We must recognize the fact that we hold everything at his will, and be perfectly ready to lay it down or to hand it on to another at the bidding of the Supreme. This is true of

(1) our property and position,

(2) our mental powers,

(3) our health, and

(4) our life on earth.

III. THE PAINFUL NEED TO SEPARATE OURSELVES FROM OTHERS. "I am the Lord your God, which have separated you flora other people." By their daily habits and social customs (verse 25), the Jews were cut off from intercourse with other people: intermarriages were strictly prohibited (Deuteronomy 7:3, 4); they were to maintain a studied separateness from all surrounding nations. The conscientious service of God our Saviour involves some separateness on our part.

1. We have to form ourselves into separate societies, Christian Churches. From these we are bound, in faithfulness, to exclude those who do not profess to love our Lord Jesus Christ. This will produce resentment on their part, and cause them to ascribe to pride that which is due to simple loyalty to the Master.

2. We have to separate ourselves from those persons and things whose association would be injurious to the cause of Christ; from

(1) unholy friendships,

(2) institutions and customs which have evil features or evil tendencies,

(3) the abounding spirit of worldliness and selfishness.

We are bound to make it clear and plain to all that we are "on the Lord's side," and on the side of all those righteous and holy principles which he commends to us. - C.

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KJV: But I have said unto you, Ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto you to possess it, a land that floweth with milk and honey: I am the LORD your God, which have separated you from other people.

WEB: But I have said to you, "You shall inherit their land, and I will give it to you to possess it, a land flowing with milk and honey." I am Yahweh your God, who has separated you from the peoples.