'... Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my
last end be like his!'--NUM. xxiii. 10.
'... Balaam also the son of Beor they slew with the
sword.'--NUM. xiii. 8.
Ponder these two pictures. Take the first scene. A prophet, who knows
God and His will, is standing on the mountain top, and as he looks down
over the valley beneath him, with its acacia-trees and swift river,
there spread the tents of Israel. He sees them, and knows that they are
'a people whom the Lord hath blessed.' Brought there to curse, 'he
blesses them altogether'; and as he gazes upon their ordered ranks and
sees somewhat of the wondrous future that lay before them, his mind is
filled with the thought of all the blessedness of that righteous
nation, and the sigh of longing comes to his lips, 'May I be with them
in life and death; may I have no higher honour, no calmer end, than to
lie down and die as one of the chosen people, with memories of a divine
hand that has protected me all through the past, and quiet hopes of the
same hand holding me up in the great darkness!' A devout aspiration, a
worthy desire!
Look at the other picture. Midian has seduced Israel to idolatry and
its constant companion, sensual sin. The old lawgiver has for his last
achievement to punish the idolater. 'Avenge the children of Israel of
the Midianites, afterwards thou shalt be gathered to thy people.' So
each tribe gives its contingent to the fight, and under the fierce and
prompt Phinehas, whose javelin had already smitten one of the chief
offenders, they go forth. Fire and sword, devastation and victory, mark
their track. The princes of Midian fall before the swift rush of the
desert-born invaders. And--sad, strange company!--among them is the
'man who saw the vision of the Almighty, and knew the knowledge of the
Most High'! he who had taught Moab the purest lessons of morality, and
Midian, alas! the practice of the vilest profligacy; he who saw from
afar 'the sceptre arise out of Israel and the Star from Jacob'; he who
longed to 'die the death of the righteous'! The onset of the avenging
host, with the 'shout of a king' in their midst; the terror of the
flight, the riot of havoc and bloodshed, and, finally, the quick thrust
of the sharp Israelite sword in some strong hand, and the grey hairs
all dabbled with his blood--these were what the man came to who had
once breathed the honest desire, 'Let me die the death of the
righteous, and let my last end be like his'!
I. There is surely a solemn lesson for us all here--as touching the
danger of mere vague religious desires and convictions which we do not
allow to determine our conduct.