But we have not yet done with those barren hills; for we have not yet
exhausted their evidence. Some may enquire how it is that a country
which was once so fertile is now become so desolate; and the answer may
be given that the villages have been burned, the terraces neglected, the
cisterns broken, and the water-courses choked, which is all perfectly
true. But that is not enough to satisfy a real enquirer. “How was it,”
the thoughtful man will ask, “that the villages were burned and the
terraces neglected?” In the answer of this question the rocks can give
us no assistance, and we must depend entirely on the Book; but there we
find the whole mystery solved. The fact is, that the whole country bears
witness to the truth of prophecy. The present state of things is exactly
what God foretold in His Word. It is perfectly true that the mountains
are dreary, barren, and desolate; perfectly true that it is no longer
“the land flowing with milk and honey, the glory of all lands;” but it is
equally true that the change which has taken place is exactly that which
God foretold in the Scriptures.
What did Moses write three thousand three hundred years ago? Turn to
Leviticus xxvi. 33: “And I will scatter you among the heathen, and will
draw out a sword after you; and your land shall be desolate, and your
cities waste.”
What did Isaiah say, writing about two thousand five hundred years ago?
Turn to Isaiah vi. 11: “Then said I, Lord, how long? And He answered,
Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without
man, and the land be utterly desolate.” Turn to chap. xxiv. 3: “The land
shall be utterly emptied, and utterly spoiled; for the Lord hath spoken
this word.” Or to chap. xxxii. 12, 13: “They shall lament for the teats,
for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine. Upon the land of my
people shall come up thorns and briers; yea, upon all the houses of joy
in the joyous city.”
What did Jeremiah say, writing about two thousand three hundred years
ago? Turn to Jeremiah iv. 26, 27: “I beheld, and, lo, the fruitful place
was a wilderness, and all the cities thereof were broken down at the
presence of the Lord, and by His fierce anger. For thus hath the Lord
said, The whole land shall be desolate; yet will I not make a full end.”
“The spoilers are come upon all high places through the wilderness: for
the sword of the Lord shall devour from the one end of the land even to
the other end of the land: no flesh shall have peace.” (Chap. xii. 12.)
And what did Ezekiel, writing about the same time, predict of the
condition of Palestine during the dispersion, and until the restoration
of the people? Turn to his address to those hills of which we have been
speaking, in Ezekiel xxxvi. 3, 4: “Therefore prophesy and say, Thus saith
the Lord God; Because they have made you desolate, and swallowed you up
on every side, that ye might be a possession unto the residue of the
heathen, and ye are taken up in the lips of talkers, and are an infamy of
the people: therefore, ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord
God; Thus saith the Lord God to the mountains, and to the hills, to the
rivers, and to the valleys, to the desolate wastes, and to the cities
that are forsaken, which became a prey and derision to the residue of the
heathen that are round about.”
Here then we have the whole mystery solved, and the whole thing
explained. In His sure Word of prophecy our heavenly Father told us what
He would do, and the desolate hills of Palestine bear witness that He has
done it. We may long to see them clothed once more with the vine and the
olive, and we may profoundly pity their lawful proprietors, who look on
their lawful home—once so beautiful, but now so desolate! But yet we
cannot look even on that desolation without thanksgiving, for it is an
evidence to all thinking men of the certain truth of God’s inspired Word.
Those who refer to those desolate hills as an argument against the truth
forget that the desolation to which they refer is a conclusive proof of
the truth of the _prophetic_ Word of God. Thus we are carried by this
third proof far beyond either geographical accuracy or historical truth.
A book may be geographically accurate, or historically true, and yet not
be inspired. But no _man_ can foretell the future. No man can look
forward 3,000 years. No man, therefore, could span over all those
centuries and tell us ages ago what would be the condition of Palestine
in this nineteenth century. But God has done it. We thank God,
therefore, for His Word, and we thank Him also for the testimony of the
rocks. Nay, more, we may thank Him even for the sneers of such a man as
Voltaire, for the very sneers are a proof to the students of the
Scriptures that God’s prophecy is being fulfilled, and that God’s Holy
Word may be trusted as divine.
But we must not leave the subject there, for we are taught a most solemn
lesson as to the desolating power of a righteous God. He who has reduced
those fertile hills to desolation, cannot He equally desolate the soul,
and reduce the poor ruined heart to a similar condition of barren
hopelessness? And will He not do it if His great salvation be neglected?
I know that it is the fashion to believe that He is too merciful to
punish; but for my own part I find it much more easy to believe that he
is too true to declare that which he has no intention of performing. If
the Word of God be true, “Verily there is a God that judgeth the earth,”
and we cannot doubt that to the guilty sinner He must prove “a consuming
fire.” But, thanks be to His Holy Name, if the warnings be true, so also
are the promises. If the judgment be certain, so also is the salvation.
If the minister of wrath be sure to fulfil the Word of judgment, so also
is the blessed Saviour perfectly sure to fulfil the promises of life. If
the law condemn with infallible certainty, so also does the Gospel
proclaim that the claim of the law is satisfied in the great propitiation
by the Son of God; so that any one, even the least and most unworthy of
His people, may peacefully rest in the certainty of His never-failing
Word, and abide in perfect peace, and perfect safety, in the perfect
truth, and never-failing covenant of God.