Rejoice with Trembling

"And the LORD said, I have pardoned according to thy word. But as truly as 1 live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the LORD." -Numbers 14:20, 21 [KJV]

My soul! ponder over this solemn scripture, and observe how truly awful Jehovah is, even in His mercies. Well may it be said to the people of God, "rejoice with trembling." This was a memorable moment in the history of Israel, when the spies returned from searching the promised land. The evil report which the greater number brought back, in denying God's faithfulness, is most solemnly recorded; and the falling carcases in the wilderness, most awfully set forth the divine judgment. And what is unbelief now but the same, aggravated, if possible, to a ten thousand times greater degree of guilt, in denying and disbelieving the record which God hath given of His Son? The apostle saith, "it is making God a liar," see 1 John 5: 10. And John the Baptist confirms the same; and adds a dreadful event, which must inevitably follow: "He that believeth not, shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth upon him," -John 3:36.  

And do observe, my soul, how Jehovah engageth to manifest and fulfil His glory. He confirms it with the most solemn asseveration: "As truly as I live, saith the LORD, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the LORD." And what is the glory of the Lord, but God manifested in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ? Here all the glory of Jehovah centers. In Jesus all is proclaimed; and in the dispensation of the fulness of times, the one great object of all things in the kingdom of nature, providence, grace, and glory, is "to gather together in one all things in Christ."  

What sayest thou, my soul, to these things? Art thou now gathered to Christ, to Whom, as to the glorious Shiloh, the gathering of the people shall be? Is He that is the Father's glory, thy glory: is the Father's beloved, thy beloved; the Father's chosen, thy chosen? Surely, if so, it must undeniably follow, that God is already glorified in thy view, and in thine heart? the glory of the Lord Jehovah, which is to fill the earth, hath, in the person of His dear Son filled thy soul and affections, and is formed in thine heart "the hope of glory." Oh! for increasing evidences of this love of God, and glory of the Lord, to be shed abroad in my heart, "to give me the light and knowledge of God in the face of Jesus Christ!" 

-Robert Hawker (1753-1827 A.D.) 

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