Mark 12:8

Note, If men's prejudices be not conquered by the evidence of truth, they are but confirmed; and if the corruptions of the heart be not subdued by faithful reproofs, they are but enraged and exasperated. If the gospel be not a savour of life unto life, it will be a savour of death unto death.

The verses before us contain a historical parable. The history of the Jewish nation, from the day that Israel left Egypt down to the time of the destruction of Jerusalem, is here set before us as in a mirror. Under the figure of the vineyard and the husbandmen, the Lord Jesus tells the story of God's dealings with His people for fifteen hundred years. Let us study it attentively, and apply it to ourselves. Let us observe, in the first place, God's special kindness to the Jewish Church and nation . He gave to them peculiar privileges.

The verses before us contain a historical parable. The history of the Jewish nation, from the day that Israel left Egypt down to the time of the destruction of Jerusalem, is here set before us as in a mirror. Under the figure of the vineyard and the husbandmen, the Lord Jesus tells the story of God's dealings with His people for fifteen hundred years. Let us study it attentively, and apply it to ourselves. Let us observe, in the first place, God's special kindness to the Jewish Church and nation . He gave to them peculiar privileges. He dealt with them as a man deals with a piece of land which he separates and hedges in for "a vineyard." He gave them good laws and ordinances. He planted them in a goodly land, and cast out seven nations before them. He passed by greater and mightier nations to show them favor. He let alone Egypt, and Assyria, and Greece, and Rome, and showered down mercies on a few million people in Palestine. The vineyard of the Lord was the house of Israel. No family under heaven ever received so many signal and distinguishing privileges as the family of Abraham. And we too, who live in Great Britain, can we say that we have received no special mercies from God? We cannot say so. Why are we not a heathen country, like China? Why are we not a land of idolaters, like Hindostan? We owe it all to the distinguishing favor of God. It is not for our goodness and worthiness, but of God's free grace, that England is what England is among the nations of the earth. Let us be thankful for our mercies, and know the hand from which they come. Let us not be high-minded, but humble, lest we provoke God to take our mercies away. If Israel had peculiar national privileges, so also has England. Let Englishmen mark this well, and take heed lest that which happened to Israel should happen also to them.

BROTHERS AND SISTERS, you know the story of God's dealing with Israel and Israel's dealing with God. The Lord chose their fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He made them a race separated unto Himself; He brought them out of Egypt from under the iron yoke; He led them through the Red Sea; He fed them for 40 years in the wilderness. He led them about and tutored them, even as a man teaches His son.

BROTHERS AND SISTERS, you know the story of God's dealing with Israel and Israel's dealing with God. The Lord chose their fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He made them a race separated unto Himself; He brought them out of Egypt from under the iron yoke; He led them through the Red Sea; He fed them for 40 years in the wilderness. He led them about and tutored them, even as a man teaches His son. In due time He brought them into the land which flows with milk and honey and He put them under a dispensation eminently gentle and full of tenderness where, as a nation, they might enjoy unbroken prosperity, "sitting every man under his vine and under his fig tree, none making them afraid." All that He required of them was that He should be their God and that they should put no idols in His place, but should obey His statutes. Alas, from the first, they copied the nations among whom they dwelt—they set up the gods of Egypt when they were in the wilderness and, in Canaan, they went astray after the polluted deities of the nations. They worshipped defiled gods with obscene rites—they even passed their children through the fire to Moloch—and did horrible things which angered the Most High. In His long-suffering, He sent them Prophets one after another—Prophets who received unworthy treatment at their hands whenever they rebuked their sins. The Prophets were derided, persecuted and even slain with the sword. God, in great patience, sent them more of His messengers, some of them grandly eloquent, like Isaiah and Ezekiel; others of them full of tears, like Jeremiah, or clothed with dignity, like Daniel. They warned the people and ceased not to plead with them, whether they would hear or whether they would forbear. Cruel treatment awaited many of the servants of the Lord—they were stoned, they were sawn asunder.