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Leading into Canaan

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Oct 4, 1906

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 83, No. 40.

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Leading into Canaan

By C. M. S.

THE law of God led the way into the land of Canaan. In the ark of God, representing the throne of God, the law went forward, and the people followed.
Between the people and the promised land lay a river that barred their way; but at the presence of the ark and the law the waters of that river were driven back and banked up that the people might go through unimpeded. The reason for that manner of leading, Joshua declares thus: “For ye have not passed this way heretofore.”
During forty years God had been preparing them for this. Doubtless every path of that wilderness had been trodden by them again and again; but there came a time when they must make a straight course, without regard to intervening obstacles. That last journey is over a path that is new to them, and as never before they will need careful leading. The directions for this entrance journey are very explicit. The law of God was to them the key that opened the promised land.
Is there no lesson in this for us, so near the border of the eternal inheritance? The last admonition of the Old Testament is this: “Remember ye the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, even statutes and ordinances.” That this admonition is for the people of the last generation is shown by the words preceding and following this text. It is the time just previous to the day that shall “burn as an oven,” consuming the wicked. It is the day when the message of Elijah the prophet is due “before the great and terrible day of Jehovah come.” Is it not significant that the last admonition of the last Old Testament prophet is in regard to the law of God, and that it accompanies prophecies relating to the very close of God’s work in the earth?
At the time when all the world will be confederating together in opposition to the truth of God and his remnant people, the admonition of the prophet to the people of God is, “Bind thou up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples.” Isa. 8:16. Is there no significance in this admonition given to a people who are to live at that time? In the days of ancient Israel the nations confederated together to hinder the plainly expressed purpose of God. Just so is it to be in our generation; and that confederating process is already under way. The law of God led the way then; it must lead the way now. The confederated nations could not prevent that law-led people from entering that promised possession; neither can they in the closing of God’s work in this earth prevent God’s law-led people from entering their promised home.
When the agents of Satan, through spiritism, are blinding the minds of the people to the truth of God, and gathering souls into the great nets of perdition, while they claim to be the very ministers of God, the instruction of the Word rings out clear and plain, “To the law and to the testimony! if they speak not according to this word, surely there is no morning for them.” Isa. 8:20. That is, if they are not led by the law, there is no light for them or for those who follow them.
Of that mighty company that is to “follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth” the Word declares, “They are without blemish.” They are righteous. “Harken unto me, ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law.” Isa. 51:7. The psalmist says, “O how love I thy law! It is my meditation all the day.” Ps. 119:97. Again: “Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.” Ps. 119:11. That attitude toward the law of God will transform the desires of the natural man, and build up a strong bulwark against sin; and at no time in the history of the world do men need such a bulwark so much as now in the time of sin’s culmination and the close of the gospel work. God says of that company which triumphs in that day, “Here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.”
As truly as the law went before Israel of old into the promised land, it will go before spiritual Israel into the eternal inheritance, the kingdom of perpetual peace. From every side that law and that people will be attacked, as was Israel of old, by the confederated powers of sin; but that company, obedient to that law, are finally seen standing before the throne of God, and this is what is said of them: “These are they that come out of the great tribulation, and they washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the throne of God. . . . . The Lamb that is in the midst of the throne shall be their shepherd, and shall guide them unto fountains of waters of life: and God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes.” Rev. 7:14-17.
But let not man think to accomplish the keeping of that holy law in human strength. One who is “our Righteousness” has kept it; but his keeping it does not absolve us from loyalty to its every precept. Grace abounds, but there is no place in God’s everlasting kingdom for the willingly disobedient. Let us hide the law in our hearts, that it may work out in our lives and illuminate the way and lead the way into the enduring Canaan.
C. M. S.