1 Kings 21:2-16 And Ahab spoke to Naboth, saying, Give me your vineyard, that I may have it for a garden of herbs, because it is near to my house… There are many voices addressed to us from:Naboth's vineyard. I. BEWARE OF COVETOUSNESS. That vineyard has its counterpart in the case and conduct of many still. Covetousness may assume a thousand camelon hues and phases, but these all resolve themselves into a sinful craving after something other than what we have. Covetousness of means — a grasping after more material wealth; the race for riches. Covetousness of place — aspiring after other positions in life than those which Providence has assigned us; — not because they are better — but because they are other than our present God-appointed lot — invested with an imaginary superiority. And the singular and sad thing is, that such inordinate longings are most frequently manifested, as with Ahab, in the case of those who have least cause to indulge them. The covetous eye cast on the neighbour's vineyard is, strange to say, more the sin of the affluent than of the needy, — of the owner of the lordly mansion than of the humble cottage. The man with his clay floor, and thatched roof, and rude wooden rafters, though standing far more in need of increase to his comfort, is often (is generally) more contented and satisfied by far than he whose cup is full. The old story, which every schoolboy knows, is a faithful picture of human nature. It was Alexander, not defeated, but victorious — Alexander, not the lord of one kingdom, but the sovereign of the world, who wept unsatisfied tears. How many there are, surrounded with all possible affluence and comfort, who put a life-thorn in their side by some similar chase after a denied good, some similar fretting about a denied trifle. They have abundance; the horn of plenty has poured its contents into their lap. But a neighbour possesses something which they fancy they might have also. Like Haman, though their history has been a golden dream of prosperity; — advancement and honour such as the brightest visions of youth could never have pictured, — yet all this avails them nothing, so long as they see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate! Seek to suppress these unworthy envious longings. "For which things' sake," says the apostle (and among "these things" is covetousness), "the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience." Covetousness, God makes a synonym for idolatry. He classes the covetous in the same category with the worshippers of stocks and stones. "Be content with such things as ye have." II. KEEP OUT OF THE WAY OF TEMPTATION. If Ahab, knowing his own weakness and besetting sin, had put a restraint on his covetous eye, and not allowed .it to stray on his neighbour's forbidden property, it would have saved a black page in his history, and the responsibilities of a heinous crime. Let us beware of tampering with evil. "If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee." "Avoid it," says the wise man, speaking of this path of temptation, "pass not by it, turn from it, and pass away." Each has his own strong temptation, — the fragile part of his nature, — his besetting sin.. That sin should be specially watched, muzzled, curbed; — that gate of temptation specially padlocked and sentinelled. One guilty dereliction of duty, — one unhappy abandonment of principle, — one inconsistent, thoughtless word or deed, — may be the progenitor of unnumbered evils. How many have bartered their peace of conscience for veriest trifles: — sold a richer inheritance than Esau's birthright for a mess of earthly pottage! And once the first fatal step is taken, it cannot be so easily undone. Once the blot on fair character is made, the stain is not so easily erased. III. BE SURE YOUR SIN WILL FIND YOU OUT. Ahab and Jezebel, as we have seen, had managed to a wish their accursed plot. The wheels of crime had moved softly along without one rut or impediment in the way. The two murderers paced their blood-stained inheritance without fear of challenge or discovery.:Naboth was in that silent land where no voice of protest can be heard against high-handed inquity. But there was a God in heaven who maketh inquisition for blood, and who "remembered them." Their time for retribution did come at last, although years of gracious forbearance were suffered to intervene. And are the principles of God's moral government different now? It is true, indeed, that the present economy deals not so exclusively as the old in temporal retribution. Sinners now have before them the surer and more terrible recompense and vengeance of a world to come. But not unfrequently here also, retribution still follows, and sooner or later overtakes, the defiant transgressor. Conscience, like another stern Elijah in the vineyard of Naboth, will confront the transgressor and utter a withering doom. How many such an Elijah stands a rebuker within the gates of modern vineyards, purchased by the reward of iniquity! How many such an Elijah stands a ghostly sentinel by the door of that house whose stones have been hewn and polished and piled by illicit gain! How many an Elijah mounts on the back of the modern chariot, horsed and harnessed, pillowed and cushioned and liveried with the amassings of successful roguery! How many an Elijah stands in the midst of banquet-hall and drawing-room scowling down on some murderer of domestic peace and innocence, who has intruded into vineyards more sacred than Naboth's, — trampled virtue under foot, and left the broken, bleeding vine, to trail its shattered tendrils unpitied on the ground! And even should conscience itself, in this world be defied and overborne; at all events in the world to come, sin must be discovered; retribution (long evaded here) will at last exact its uttermost farthing. The most awful picture of a state of eternal punishment is that of sinners surrendered to the mastery of their own special transgression; these sins, like the fabled furies, following them, in unrelenting pursuit, from hall to hall and from cavern to cavern in the regions of unending woe; — and they, at last, hunted down, wearied, breathless, with the unavailing effort to escape the tormentors, crouching in wild despair, and exclaiming, like Ahab to Elijah, "Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?" (J. R. Macduff, D. D.). Parallel Verses KJV: And Ahab spake unto Naboth, saying, Give me thy vineyard, that I may have it for a garden of herbs, because it is near unto my house: and I will give thee for it a better vineyard than it; or, if it seem good to thee, I will give thee the worth of it in money. |
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