Post by Lee on Jan 4, 2014 20:16:03 GMT
Psa 10:1 "Silence of God"
But the judgments occasioning the new song were to succeed a long time of divine silence. “I have long time holden my peace; I have been still and refrained myself; now will I cry like a travailing woman; I will destroy and devour at once” (5:14). This foreordained silence of God, which has now endured for so long a time since the apostolic age, has been considered in very different ways by different classes of men. God’s people, on the one hand, have endured in faith and patience; the blood of thousands crying from the earth for vengeance; and the prayer of all being expressed in the yearnings of the Psalms of David: “Why standest thou far off, O Lord, why hidest thou thyself in times of trouble?” (Ps. 10:1). “Arise, O God, plead thine own cause; remember how the foolish man reproacheth thee daily” (Ps. 84:22). The adversary, on the other hand, has misinterpreted the silence of God altogether, even to the extent of construing it as evidence of His non-existence! There is trouble, say they in effect, and He doth not deliver us; there is wickedness untold, and He doth not arise to judgment. Therefore He is not. Therefore, we must steer the course of our own troubled lives without regard to Him, or the more or less mythical documents that the Jews wish to foist upon us as the revelation of His will that claims our obedience.
From all such deadly fallacies the word delivers us, “The silence of God” is as much a part of His purpose as the thunders of Sinai, and as plainly announced beforehand. It is not alone here that it has been foretold. Micah about the same time foretold a night of darkness for Israel, wherein should be no “vision,” “no answer of God” (Mic. 3:6). Amos foretold a “famine, not of bread, but of hearing the words of the Lord” (Amos 8:11–12). There was a break in this famine when Jesus was manifested in Israel as “the bread of Life”; but when he ascended into heaven, and the apostolic age passed, famine again supervened; and so far as the voice of divine authority is concerned, endures to the present day. The written Word is all that is left us; and is the most direct approach that can now be made to the mind of God. Seeing this was pre-determined, we are reconciled to it, and cleave to the Word in the assurance that the “silence of God” will presently be broken as He declared.
Robert Roberts, & Walker, C. C. (1907). The Ministry of the Prophets: Isaiah (550–551). The Publishing Commitee, Christadelphian Old Paths Ecclesia.
But the judgments occasioning the new song were to succeed a long time of divine silence. “I have long time holden my peace; I have been still and refrained myself; now will I cry like a travailing woman; I will destroy and devour at once” (5:14). This foreordained silence of God, which has now endured for so long a time since the apostolic age, has been considered in very different ways by different classes of men. God’s people, on the one hand, have endured in faith and patience; the blood of thousands crying from the earth for vengeance; and the prayer of all being expressed in the yearnings of the Psalms of David: “Why standest thou far off, O Lord, why hidest thou thyself in times of trouble?” (Ps. 10:1). “Arise, O God, plead thine own cause; remember how the foolish man reproacheth thee daily” (Ps. 84:22). The adversary, on the other hand, has misinterpreted the silence of God altogether, even to the extent of construing it as evidence of His non-existence! There is trouble, say they in effect, and He doth not deliver us; there is wickedness untold, and He doth not arise to judgment. Therefore He is not. Therefore, we must steer the course of our own troubled lives without regard to Him, or the more or less mythical documents that the Jews wish to foist upon us as the revelation of His will that claims our obedience.
From all such deadly fallacies the word delivers us, “The silence of God” is as much a part of His purpose as the thunders of Sinai, and as plainly announced beforehand. It is not alone here that it has been foretold. Micah about the same time foretold a night of darkness for Israel, wherein should be no “vision,” “no answer of God” (Mic. 3:6). Amos foretold a “famine, not of bread, but of hearing the words of the Lord” (Amos 8:11–12). There was a break in this famine when Jesus was manifested in Israel as “the bread of Life”; but when he ascended into heaven, and the apostolic age passed, famine again supervened; and so far as the voice of divine authority is concerned, endures to the present day. The written Word is all that is left us; and is the most direct approach that can now be made to the mind of God. Seeing this was pre-determined, we are reconciled to it, and cleave to the Word in the assurance that the “silence of God” will presently be broken as He declared.
Robert Roberts, & Walker, C. C. (1907). The Ministry of the Prophets: Isaiah (550–551). The Publishing Commitee, Christadelphian Old Paths Ecclesia.
