Deuteronomy 4:32 For ask now of the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created man on the earth… An imperial philosopher, having divided time into the past, the present, and the future, says, we should give the past to oblivion, the present to duty, and the future to Providence. Now, we admire two of these admonitions. We readily give the future to Providence, and we ought to give the present to duty, so that "whatsoever our hands find to do, we may do it with our might." But we can never consent to give the past to oblivion. "God requires that which is past," and He requires us to remember it. I. THE PAST DAYS OF OTHERS, THOSE WHO HAVE LIVED BEFORE US. 1. See that your aim in this be not only, or principally, mere amusement; but endeavour to derive lessons mental and moral, and religious instruction, from the characters and the events recorded. 2. Secondly, beware how you place implicit confidence in history. Endeavour to distinguish between fiction and truth. 3. Relinquish the prejudice which Solomon assails when he says, "Ask not why the former days were better than these, for thou dost not wisely concerning this matter." No, the thing is not true; we ought to be wiser than the ancients, for we are much more ancient than they. Certainly, the world is older now than it was ages ago. Surely mankind are not incapable of intellectual or moral progression and improvement. II. THOSE OF YOURSELVES: THOSE WHICH YOU HAVE PASSED THROUGH IN YOUR OWN HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE. These come nearer home, and are more easily reviewed and compared. There is something very solemn in the thought of days that are past; past, never to return, while their moral results remain forever as subjects of future responsibility. And who has not to reckon upon days that are past? for time, like tide, stays for no man. 1. Let us ask, then, what they have to say concerning the world. Mr. Savage has strikingly remarked, "I never knew any of the people of the world praise it at parting." Nor need we wonder at this: we should wonder if they did. They have been too much in it, they have seen too much of it, they have been too much deceived by it, to recommend it to others, when dying, from their own history and experience. 2. "Ask the days that are past" what they have to say concerning yourselves. Have they not shown you many things with which you were formerly unacquainted, and filled you with surprise and regret? Ah! how many convictions have you violated, how many resolutions have you broken? Instead of the paradise you promised yourself, you have found yourselves in a wilderness. Have not your dependencies often proved broken reeds — not only unable to sustain your hopes, but which have "pierced you through with many sorrows"? And yet will not these "days that are past" also tell you something else? Will they not tell you that life has been at least a chequered scene If you have been in the wilderness, have you not found grace in the sanctuary Have you not had there the fiery, cloudy pillar to guide you? Have you not had the manna to sustain you? Have you not had the waters from the rock to refresh you? Have you not had some of the grapes of Eshcol? 3. "Ask of the days that are past" what they have to say concerning the Scriptures. (1) Have they not tended to confirm them? (2) Have they not tended to explain them? (3) Have they not tended to endear them? 4. "Ask the days that are past" what they have to say concerning our Lord and Saviour. Ask them whether He has not been a good Master; whether you cannot say at the end of ten, or twenty, or thirty, or forty, or sixty years, "Thou hast dealt well with Thy servant, O Lord." Ask them whether He has not been a good Master; whether you cannot say at the end of ten, or twenty, or thirty, or forty, or sixty years, "Thou has dealt well with Thy servant, O Lord." Ask them whether He has not been your powerful Helper and your kindest Friend. Three conclusions are derivable from this: — (1) The first is, that you commit yourselves to God by prayer, that you may be prepared for all your future days, whatever may be their complexion. (2) Secondly, that you should beware of presumption; that you should leave off devising, and say, "The Lord shall choose my inheritance for me."(3) Thirdly, you should equally guard against despondency; for though you know not what your future days may be, you know that nothing they contain in them will happen by chance. One thing you know, that "all the way of the Lord" towards you will be "mercy and truth." One thing you know, that "all things work together for good to them that love God." (W. Jay.) Parallel Verses KJV: For ask now of the days that are past, which were before thee, since the day that God created man upon the earth, and ask from the one side of heaven unto the other, whether there hath been any such thing as this great thing is, or hath been heard like it? |
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