Divine judgments upon others, to ensure obedience in us.
Moses wishes to bring all possible motive to bear upon the people to secure their obedience in Canaan. He has just been speaking of their national development from a family of seventy to a multitude as numerous as the stars. Such a blessing should encourage them to love the Lord their God, and to "keep his charge, and his statutes, and his judgments; and his commandments, always." Obedience is thus founded upon gratitude, which is God's invariable plan. But in these verses before us, Moses takes what we may call the converse method. He calls up in succession the judgments with which God visited both the Egyptians and their own forefathers on account of disobedience. He calls upon them to recognize ( וִידַעְתֶּם) the "chastisement" ( מוּסַר) with which God had signalized the disobedience of the Egyptians and of the Israelites. The following lessons are in these verses suggested.
I. GRATITUDE IS THE FOUNDATION OF NEW OBEDIENCE. This is God's plan. He does not say, "Obey, and I will save you for your obedience," but "Take salvation as a free gift, and then obey me as a matter of gratitude." "If ye love me, keep my commandments." He secures the love by sovereign mercy, and receives obedience as his return upon his investment. Obedience is God's dividend upon his investment of love. Those who would make "good works" the root of salvation instead of the fruit of salvation, are reversing the whole procedure of God.
II. GRATITUDE MAY BE REINFORCED BY A STUDY OF THE CONSEQUENCES OF INGRATITUDE IN OTHERS. For what God strikes at is ingratitude. The Egyptians were ungrateful. They should have recognized God's mercy in their fertile land, in their civilization and advancement, in the mission of Moses, and in the character of the earlier plagues. God had visited Egypt with his love—love which was undeserved, love which remained unrequited. When he revealed "his greatness, his mighty hand, and his stretched out arm," it was against Egypt's ingratitude and consequent disobedience. The denouement at the Red Sea was judgment upon ingratitude and persevering impiety.
Now, the study of all this, here recommended by Moses, was well fitted to foster gratitude in the hearts of the Israelites. Here was unrequited love receiving its vindication in the series of disasters which culminated in the Red Sea. "We must be thankful," they might well say, "that our ingratitude in past years has not been similarly treated, and for the coming time we must cultivate gratitude and the obedience it secures."
III. GRATITUDE MAY ALSO BE REINFORCED BY A STUDY OF THE CONSEQUENCES OF SELF-CONFIDENCE. For this seems to be the idea of Moses in bringing forward the case of Dathan and Abiram. As descendants of Reuben, the firstborn of Jacob, they imagined that they had the right to the primacy in Israel. Hence they disputed the rights of Moses and of the priestly line of Aaron. They insisted on their right of primogeniture as valid in the government of God.
But God recognizes no such personal claims, and he visited the presumption with swift destruction. The study of this "chastisement" would deliver Israel from all confidence in themselves. They would recognize that personal claims are not accepted by a sovereign God; that in consequence they must in humility approach him, thankful for spared lives and continued mercy, and anxious to testify by obedience to their genuine thankfulness.
IV. OBEDIENCE WILL BE FOUND TO BE THE SECRET OF STRENGTH AND SUCCESS IN THE INVASION. For while obedience rests on gratitude, it elicits gratitude from God. If God expects us to be grateful for his love, he shows us the example in being grateful for ours. "I love them that love me," he says (Proverbs 8:17); and again, "He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him" (John 14:21; see also John 14:23). Now, this is what we do not hesitate to call Divine gratitude.
Hence Israel found that obedience rendered thankfully to God received a grateful reward from him in strength to invade and conquer the land of Canaan, and, secondly, in strength to prolong their days in it. A similar experience is realized by God's servants still. Obedience is rewarded graciously and gratefully. Strength is found equal to our day, as we make our pilgrimage to God. How important, then, to obey from a proper motive, and at the same time to receive with proper delight the gracious return which a grateful God bestows!—R.M.E.