II. This was to be, you will remember, THE CAUSE OF THE GREAT CHANGE.
The first cause of this change is the grace received. In the previous part of the chapter, we find the Lord saying, “I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from him.” Then our text naturally follows, “Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols?” We cannot get you to give up sin, however earnestly we may exhort you to forsake it; but if, by God’s grace, you receive Christ as your Saviour, then you will abandon sin as a natural consequence. What is the best way to keep chaff out of a bushel measure? Fill it full of wheat; and when the heart of a man is full of Christ, there will be no room for the world, the flesh, and the devil. These things cannot find an entrance where Christ has full possession. When God is as the dew of our soul, and we receive freely of his grace, then we do not need telling, and urging, and driving but we at once say, “What have I to do any more with idols?”
Another cause of this great change lies in our perception of the beauties of the Lord. I do not quite know whether what I am going to say is the exact teaching of the text, but I think it is. It is very difficult, sometimes, in these prophecies to know who is speaking. There are often dialogues, and the dialogues are not always so clearly marked that we can tell who is the speaker. I have always thought, when I have read this chapter that it was the Lord who said, “I have heard him, and observed him;” but on thinking the passage over very carefully, I am not quite sure that it is so. Let me give you another version, which I met with in two verses by an unknown poet; and then see whether this is not the, meaning of the passage:—
“I have heard him, and observed him,
Seen his beauty rich and rare,
Seen his majesty and glory,
And his grace beyond compare.
“What have I to do with idols,
When such visions fill my eye?
How be occupied with shadows
When the substance passes by?”
Does the text mean, then, “I will have nothing more to do with idols, for I have heard my God, and I have observed him; I have heard Christ speak, and I have observed the excellence of his character”? This much I know,—whether that be the teaching of this passage, or not,—nothing weans the heart from idols like a sight of Christ. O you worldly Christians, who are getting to be so fond of this world, I am sure that you have not seen your Master lately! If you had, the world would sink in your esteem. O you who are beginning to be fond of human wisdom, you cannot have heard him speak of late, or else he would be made of God unto you wisdom, and everything else would be folly! O you who are seeking to live for self and for earthly gain, your heads have not been lately pillowed on the Saviour’s bosom, you have not recently looked into those dear eyes which are more radiant than the glories of the morning! You cannot have known the fragrance of those garments which smell of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia, or you would never be enamoured of this poor, foul, unsavoury world. “I have heard him, and observed him: what have I to do any more with idols?” “I have heard him say, ‘I have loved thee with an everlasting love.’ I have observed him go up to the cross, and lay down his life for me; ‘what have I to do any more with idols?’” When thou, as the bride of Christ, lovest thy first Husband as thou shouldst love him, then thy wanderings will be at an end. When all thy heart goes after the Well-beloved, and he enraptures thee with manifestations of his love and of his grace, then wilt thou say, “What have I to do with idols,—I so favoured, I so enriched with divine blessings, I who am on the road to heaven, I who am so soon to see the face of him I love,—what have I to do with idols?”
That seems to me to be a grand meaning perfectly consistent with earnest Christian experience, so I leave it with you. This great change, then, is wrought in us by the grace of God, and by a sight of the true beauties of our Lord.
But now, taking the text as it is generally understood, you will get another meaning. One cause for this great change is the sense of answered prayer: Ephraim shall say, “What have I to do any more with idols?” And God says of Ephraim, “I have heard him.” I recollect, even as a child, God hearing my prayer; I cannot tell you what it was about, it may have been concerning a mere trifle, but to me as a child it was as important as the greatest prayer that Solomon ever offered for himself, and God heard that prayer, and it was thus early established in my mind that the Lord was God. And afterwards, when I came really to know him,—afterwards, when I came to cry to him intelligently, I had this prayer answered, and that petition granted, and many a time since then,—I am only speaking what any of you who know the Lord could also say,—many a time since then he has answered my requests. I cannot tell you all about this matter; there is many a secret between me and my dear Lord. This very week, I have had a love-token from him which, if I could tell you about it, would make your eyes wonder and fill with tears. I asked, and I received, as manifestly as if I had spoken to my brother in the flesh, and he had said, “Yes, there, take all you need.” Well now, I always find that, in proportion as I am conscious that God is answering my prayers, my heart says, “What have I to do any more with idols?” If I can have from my God whatever I ask for, why need I cringe and bow my knees to men? If I have but to go to God, and wait upon him, and he will give me the desires of my heart, what have I to do with the fretting, and fuming, and being anxious? What have I to do with idols? If there is everything in Christ, and that everything is to be had for the asking, what have I to do with idols? It is wonderful how you are weaned from the dry breasts of the world when you can drink in all that your soul desires from the living God. If God, the Jehovah of hosts, be no more to you than the gods of the heathen, or the gods of the men of the world, why then you will have to do with idols; but if your God is the God that heareth prayer, and if you live in his presence, and you speak to him, and he speaks to you, if you keep up perpetual intercourse with him, so that God can say to you, “I have heard him, and observed him,” then I am sure that you will also say, “What have I to do any more with idols?”
If I am addressing any poor soul that has been craving mercy from God, one who has been crying for months to God to give him forgiveness through Jesus Christ, why, dear heart, if you will only believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you shall get all that you are asking, you shall receive peace, and pardon, and joy, and rest; and then you will say, “What have I to do any more with idols?”
“Oh!” says one, “my dear sir, I have been trying to overcome sin, and I cannot.” I know you cannot; but if you begin by receiving Christ, by praying to God, and getting the answer, then you will be able to say, “What have I to do any more with idols?” You want to wash yourself first, and then to come to the fountain. That will not do; you must come, black as you are, and wash, and be cleansed. You want to get rich spiritually, and then to come to God to enrich you. No; you must come to him poor, come without anything of your own, just as you are, and trust the boundless mercy of God in Christ Jesus, he will give you all you need, and then you will say, “What have I to do any more with idols, for God has heard me, and he doth observe my soul?”
You see, then, some of the ways in which this very great and wonderful change is wrought. I had to omit many other points on which I meant to speak, but I do pray that this change may be wrought in every one of you. Do not wait to have the change wrought, and then come to God, but come to God for it. If you have a broken heart, come to Christ with it; but if you do not feel your sin, come to Christ that you may be made to feel it. If there is any good thing in you, thank God for it, and come to him for more; but if there is no good thing whatever in you, come without any good thing, and let Christ begin at the very beginning with you, in all your emptiness, and need, and spiritual beggary and loathsomeness. Come to him just as you are, for he still says, “Him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out.” May his sweet Spirit graciously attract every one of you till you shall be drawn to him, and so drawn from your idols, and to him shall be glory, for ever and ever! Amen.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
