The preciousness of one human life in the sight of God.
The value of this paragraph can be duly appreciated only as the indifference with which pagan nations of old regarded human life is studied and understood. As a piece of civil legislation, it is far superior to anything in the code of the nations around at that time. Dr. Jameson remarks that in it we have undoubtedly the origin or the germ of modern coroners' inquests. The following points in it are worthy of note.
1. It is a rule to be observed when they should be settled in the land of Canaan.
2. It indicates that from the first, each human life should be regarded as an object of common interest to the whole people, and that it was to be one of their prime points of honor, that no human life could be tampered with without arousing national indignation and concern.
3. God would teach them, that if it should be found that any one's life had been trifled with, it was a sin against Heaven as well as a crime against earth.
4. That this sin could be laid at the door of all the people if they were indifferent to the fact of its commission, and if they did not make full inquiry respecting it, and solemnly put it away from among them. At the back of this piece of civil legislation, yea, as the fount from which it sprang, we get this beautiful, sublime, and comforting truth—"Each human life an object of Divine concern."
I. IN WHAT WAY HAS GOD MANIFESTED HIS CARE FOR THE INDIVIDUAL?
1. This passage is pregnant with blessed teaching thereon. We have:
2. The Lord Jesus Christ taught it in terms more beautiful, more clear (Luke 12:1-59.; Matthew 18:1-35.; Luke 15:1-32.). How often does Christ lay stress on "one!"
3. The death of the Lord Jesus Christ for every man, is a standing proof of every man's worth before God; so the apostle argues (2 Corinthians 5:16).
4. The Spirit of God stirreth in every man to move his sluggish nature that it may rise toward heaven. Materialism merges the man in his accidents. Pantheism drowns him in the All. Deism hides him in vastness. Ultramontanism smothers him in the Church. Caesarism makes the State all, the individual nothing. Christ rescues the one from being lost in the many, and cries aloud, "It is not the will of your Father in heaven that one of these little ones should perish."
II. WHAT SHOULD BE THE EFFECT ON US OF GOD'S CARE FOR THE INDIVIDUAL?
1. It should fill us with intense thankfulness that we are not lost in the crowd (see Isaiah 40:27). We are so apt to say, "God has too much to do to think of us," that we need to meditate often on the words, "He careth for you."
2. It should impress us with the dignity of man. When God fences every man round with such a guard against ill treatment from others, it may well lead us to "honor all men."
3. It should teach us the solidarity of the race. The weal of one is a concern to all.
4. It should teach us to cultivate the spirit of a universal brotherhood. "Have we not all one Father?"
5. It should lead us to aim at saving man. If God cares for all, well may we.
6. It should make us very indignant at any doctrines concerning the constitution and destiny of man, that would put him, or even seem to put him, on a level with the brute creation.
7. We should take every opportunity of warning men that, if ever they trifle with the interests and destinies of their brother man, God will call them to account at his bar. The voice of Abel's blood cried unto God from the ground. If a neglected, mutilated, slain body of any one, however obscure, was found in Israel's fields, they were responsible to the God of nations for inquiry and for expiation. No one is at liberty to cry, "Am I my brother's keeper?" When he maketh inquisition for blood, he forgetteth not the cry of the humble (see Psalms 94:1-23.). And terrible beyond all power of expression, will be the shame and dismay, at the bar of God, of those who have trifled with human interests, and who go into eternity laden with the guilt of their brothers' blood!