 |  |
The typical Principle tested.
B.--If by a "straight answer" you mean some cut and dried theory of my own, then I
gladly confess that I cannot give you one. Without the wonderful teaching and perfect
parallel of the scripture type I suppose I should be obliged to accept one of the many
systems of theology that attempt to account for the problems of the age-purpose,
choosing according to my temperament and upbringing one of the explanations offered,
from Higher Calvinism with its decrees of election and reprobation on the one hand, to
Universalism on the other. May I once again suggest that we turn to Gen. 15:?
A.--We have already seen what that passage teaches, but I am anxious to test your
theory, so I suppose I must comply. (Turns to Gen. 15:).
B.--That's good. Now we rest once more on solid truth. Will you read verse 16?
A.--
"But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: FOR THE INIQUITY OF
THE AMORITE IS NOT YET FULL."
I see it! What a revelation! What a relief from that awful doctrine that I felt obliged
to accept, which, in order to explain this interval of death and sin, makes God Himself
responsible. Yet as I say this I remember the claim that
"Of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things" (Rom. 11: 36).
Israel's Bondage and the Amorite.
B.--Let us go one step at a time. Before us is a definite statement. Israel's bondage was
not primarily connected with Israel's sin, but with God's forbearance and longsuffering
with a sinful race that had started its course before an Israelite had been born. You will
find the same principle in operation just before Israel are redeemed out of Egypt. Before
one of the plagues fell God warned Pharaoh that if he did not let Israel go, it would result
in the loss of his firstborn. Yet plague after plague fell in the longsuffering of God before
that dreadful night overtook Egypt. After that you will remember Pharaoh and his host
made one more desperate attempt against the Lord with the result that the Lord said:--
"The Egyptians whom ye have seen to-day, ye shall see them again no more for the
age" (Exod. 14: 13).
and when the waters returned and covered the Egyptians we read:--
"There remained not so much as one of them" (Exod. 14: 28).
This utter destruction coming upon the second revolt finds its parallel in Rev. 20:,
where, when Satan gathers the nations that are in the four quarters of the earth against the
beloved city after the millennium, we read:--
"Fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them" (verse 9).