1 Chronicles 5:2 For Judah prevailed above his brothers, and of him came the chief ruler; but the birthright was Joseph's:) A significant fact of the early history of the patriarchs is here brought to remembrance. It is one so curious as to carry suggestions and lessons for all the ages, and so is recorded for our instruction. By providential arrangement the tribal birthright was Reuben's; he, however, lost it through his wrongdoing, and his father shifted it from the eldest son of his first with to the eldest son of his second but really his own chosen wife - from Reuben to Joseph. Man's adjustments of the Divine order are not always sealed by God. Jacob's were not in this case. As the years passed on, Judah came to the front, ultimately gained the sovereignty, and from this tribe came the permanent Davidic dynasty. Joseph, represented by the tribe of Ephraim, struggled, age after age, to keep the birthright place, but in vain; and in the conflict of the two tribes we may find illustration of the hopelessness of pressing mere human adjustments against the providential order. Neither the individual nor the community may ever hope to "resist God and prosper." It is ever ill work "running upon the bosses of Jehovah's buckler." I. MAN CANNOT READJUST THE DIVINE ORDER. Yet that is exactly what we, in our self-will, are ever striving to do. Even when we know what is God's will, we try to get it twisted about so that it may at least seem to conform to our will. This is a very common but very subtle form of Christian error and sin. We know what we wish or want, so we deceive ourselves into the idea that this is what God wishes or wants for us, and fail in that simple openness to Divine lead which is the right spirit to cherish. Scripture illustrations may be found in Rebekah, whose will was to gain the birthright and blessing for her favourite son, so she took the Divine order into her own adjustment, and won those things for him by deceptions which, very properly, brought heavy penalties on her and on him. Or in Balaam, who professed to do exactly what God wished him to do, and yet evidently did what he himself planned to do, forcing from God that fatal "Go." Or in Saul, who could not simply wait God's time and the arrival of his prophet, but, arranging the Divine order according to his own self-will, must himself offer the sacrifice. The forms in which nowadays men take the ordering of their lives into their own hands may be illustrated, and, as a contrast, mention may be made of David, who, though tempted to slay King Saul, would not interfere with the Divine order, though he might easily have seemed to himself to have been only fulfilling the Divine promise. We must wait for God as well as on him. II. MAN FINDS HIS TRUE GOOD IN FOLLOWING THE DIVINE ORDER. Not in the helplessly passive way of poor aged Eli, but in an active and loyal way, we may say, "It is the Lord; let him do what seemeth him good." Keble expresses the right state of mind for the child of God, in his picture of the man sanctified by affliction, "wishing, no longer struggling, to be free." The Divine order for our life may differ wholly from the order of our own plannings. It may even seem to flesh and blood painful and humiliating. Still let life unfold, and it proves the way of best blessing for us and for others through us. Let eternity unfold, and we sing through all the ages of the "good way wherein the Lord our God led us." David shows us the attitude to which the Divine order is revealed. "The meek will he guide in judgment, and the meek will he teach his way." III. FOLLOWING THE DIVINE ORDER MAY LEAD A MAN TO HIGHER THINGS THAN HIS BIRTH PROMISED. Illustrate from Judah, and from cases of men born in the disabilities of poverty, or of the weakness of hereditary disease, who have been led in God's providence to high place, powers, and usefulness. Let us find our faculty and endowment. It is the key to God's purpose in our life; let us develop it. Life will then bring to us its best. Let us but follow on along the line of our Divine endowment, and even the "least may become the first." - R.T. Parallel Verses KJV: For Judah prevailed above his brethren, and of him came the chief ruler; but the birthright was Joseph's:) |
    |