Promise to the Fathers

"THE heaven, even the heavens, are the Lord's, but the earth hath he given to the children of men." Ps. 115:16.

It is written that "faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." Therefore, that which is not based on the word of God is not faith; it may be opinion or conjecture, but it is not faith. Even so that is not hope—Bible hope—which is not based on the promise of God. Men may claim to hope for many things, but if there is no promise to sustain the claim, it is clearly invalid. In order to have clear ideas of the Christian's hope, it is necessary to understand God's revealed purposes of grace toward us.

There is no doctrine of the Bible which stands alone or has its place disconnected from other doctrines. They are all related, so that each one casts light upon all the others; and, therefore, all are important, and none are "non-essential."

It is the purpose of this writing to examine some of the promises of God, and thus endeavor to determine what is, truly, our hope.

There is no subject of greater interest to man than that of the future destiny of this earth and our relation to it. We find ourselves, not only placed upon the earth, but so strongly identified with it that we may be said to be a part of it. It is no mere figure of speech which says that God "knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust." Ps. 103:14. Vain philosophy and false science, prompted by human pride, have denied, as far as they possibly can, every statement of the Scriptures which shows man to be a frail, perishable creature. But the declaration of Bible history that "God made man of the dust of the earth," Gen. 2:7, cannot be denied; for continuous observation convinces us that we are of the dust, and return to dust again.

But so great is the obduracy of the human heart that it will pervert what it cannot deny. Thus it has been claimed that Prov. 11:31, which in its teaching is related to our text, proves that there is no future punishment. But such a claim is seriously defective in several respects. The passage reads: "Behold, the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth: much more the wicked and the sinner." 1. This text does not relate to this life, but to the future. 2. If it denies a future punishment to the wicked, it also denies a future reward to the righteous. But 3. The claim is based upon the material error of confounding consequences with penalties. Two men may be burned in the same house; one of them set fire to the house to destroy his neighbor's life and property, but by some mishap perished in the flames. The other perished also, but he was trying to rescue his neighbor from destruction. Did either of them receive the desert of his action? If the one justly perished, what shall we say of the other? We might multiply illustrations to any extent to show that men are not rewarded in this life; every consideration of justice accepts the declaration that God "hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world." Acts 17:31. The question arises whether the reference to THE GIFT OF THE EARTH in our text is historic or prophetic. We will first consider it in the light of history.

Turning to Gen. 1:26, we find that it was God's purpose in the creation of man to give him dominion "over all the earth." And in verse 28 we learn that this dominion was given to Adam; that he was authorized to bear rule over the earth, and over everything upon the earth.

In consistency with man's nature he was placed upon probation for the development of his character; and while the tree and the herb of the field were given him for food, one tree was excepted. Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he was not permitted to eat under the severest penalty; the Lord said to him: "In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Gen. 2:17.

But man did eat of that forbidden fruit; God arraigned him as a transgressor, and cursed both him and his dominion. "Cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;" plainly intimating that his life should end. "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." Gen. 3:17, 19. And this was no idle threat. Its execution is on record. "And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he died." Gen. 5:5.

A few points of interest and importance are here to be noticed:—

1. Had not man sinned he would not have died; God would have established him in immortality that he would have continued to live forever.

2. But, of course, he would have lived forever on the earth; here he was created; this was his "dominion;" and there is no intimation that any other dominion was to be his, or that he was to be transferred to any other locality.

3. The loss of life is the greatest of all losses; it includes all other losses; for when a man loses his life he has nothing more to lose. It was a knowledge of this truth, and of human nature, that led Satan to say, "All that a man hath will he give for his life;" Job 2:4; "for we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out." 1 Tim. 6:7. By transgression Adam lost everything.

4. Adam could bequeath to his posterity no more than he possessed. He forfeited his dominion and his inheritance, and possessed it but a little while. And, accordingly, the Scriptures never point us to what was given to Adam as the ground of our hope. Our inheritance from Adam is of death as well as of life; a brief possession of a little of this world, with sorrow and pain, ending in the darkness of the grave. Therefore, if the gift of the earth, referred to in our text, is that granted to Adam, it is a matter in which we have no deep, abiding interest. Historically, it has no hope for us. But the passage quoted from Proverbs, "The righteous shall be recompensed in the earth," assures us that another view is to be taken of our text; that it has a prophetic bearing to which the "children of men" may look with hope and confidence.

That our minds may be guided in the proper channel of investigation, we will examine a few texts in the New Testament which speak of our hope and of its foundation. Says Paul to the Hebrews 6:12-19:—

"That ye be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises. For when God made promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, he sware by himself, Saying, Surely blessing I will bless thee, and multiplying I will multiply thee. And so, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise. For men verily swear by the greater: and an oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife. Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath: That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast."

Several interesting points are here introduced which are well worthy of notice.

1. We are pointed to God's promise to Abraham as the source of our hope, and of strong consolation.

2. Notice the certainty of the promises: God's immutable word confirmed by his oath.

3. This hope is "set before us." Some people outlive their hope; it was a hope of last year, and they think they would be pleased to recover it after it is lost. A hope that is grounded upon our own works, our own experience or feelings, may be outgrown. But when the promises of God are the basis, it is indeed a hope set before us; for we cannot outlive the promises of God. No change of feeling, no vicissitudes of experience, can invalidate the promises of God. Like the polar star, which in all weather and at all times points out the course of the mariner, they stand as the beacon of hope and of safety.

4. This hope is an anchor to the soul, sure and steadfast. It is the only hope that never fails, because it alone has an immovable foundation. "The hope of the hypocrite shall perish;" and "his trust shall be as the spider's web" (Job 8:13, 14), because it does not take hold of God's unfailing word. When Paul says "there is one hope," Eph. 4 4, or speaks of those who are "without hope," Eph. 2:12; 1 Thess. 4:13, he does not mean to say that others are absolutely hopeless and despairing; but their confidence is vain; they have no firm foundation; no hope worthy of the name. This will be readily understood by the figures used; compare the spider's web with an anchor! or imagine a navigator collecting a quantity of spider's web, and taking it on board his vessel for an anchor! so foolish is he who rests on anything but the promise of God for the foundation of his hope.

But it may be objected that Paul does not mean that we are to look for consolation and hope to the promise made to Abraham, but only that that promise is set forth as an illustration of the faithfulness of God, who will as sorely perform the promises given to us as he did those given to Abraham. This objection, however, is fully met by the following considerations:—

1. In all the Scriptures, God's people are referred to Abraham as their father in the faith; as the one with whom the covenant was made in which is contained our hope. This is a well-known and acknowledged truth.

2. Paul says: "If ye be Christ's then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." Gal. 3:29. Here our heirship is directly referred to the promise made to Abraham, and our inheritance is conditioned upon our being his seed, or children. This is very explicit and decisive.

3. When Paul answered his accusers before Agrippa, he said: "And now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made of God, unto our fathers; unto which promise our twelve tribes, instantly serving God day and night, hope to come." Paul's hope was not a new one; it was the hope held by the "twelve tribes;" the promise made to their fathers. And we can be at no loss to whom to refer the term, "the fathers." What has been quoted from Paul refers us to Abraham, to whom, and to Isaac and Jacob, "the heirs with him of the same promise," Heb. 11:9, it must apply.

The interesting point of inquiry now is, What is the promise to which he refers? Some have answered this in one way; some, in another; but in this all must agree that the safest way—the way to find out to a certainty what God did promise to Abraham—is to turn to the record and read for ourselves. And now I must ask the indulgence of the reader while quoting at some length from the Old Testament. To some it may be tedious, but all who wish to have settled to a certainty, and by undisputed authority, the important question raised, will doubtless follow, with interest, the chain of testimony which places it beyond a doubt.

In entering upon this field, we must bear in mind the position occupied by the race at the time to which the record relates. We have seen that man was created to dwell upon, and rule over, the earth; and that, by transgression, he lost his dominion, and sunk into the grave, to molder back to dust. The promise made to the woman that her seed should bruise the head of the serpent, doubtless looked to the restoration of that which man lost; but in what manner this should be effected was not revealed. We know also that this "seed of the woman," referred to, is Christ. But it is likewise true that the covenant, under which Christ works the great "restitution," was made with Abraham; that we are "Abraham's seed" if we are Christ's. Gal. 3:29. Therefore, whether we follow the condition of man as he stood after the loss of his inheritance, or look at the gospel means of restoration, we shall find that the promises to Abraham contain the substance of the plan of restitution, and offer a solution to the difficulty in the way of carrying out God's original purpose in the creation of man. Gen. 1:26, 28. After man was driven from Paradise, there is no chain of promises given to him until we come down to Abraham. Here are given promises—here is made a covenant which reaches to the latest hour of human probation, and links our hope to the revealed purpose of God in creation, presenting a unity of design and execution in the work of God, and in his purposes of grace toward man, which fills the soul with admiration and joy.