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SERMON XLVII.

FIFTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY.

JEREMIAH, Xxxv. 18, 19.

Because ye have obeyed the command of Jonadab, the son of Rechab, your father, and kept all his precepts, and done according unto all that he hath commanded you, Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand before me for ever.

THE family of the sons of Rechab, to whom this singular promise was made, and of whose peculiar customs an account has been given you in the First Lesson for this morning, were originally an Ethiopian or black tribe, dwelling in the north of Arabia, known by the name of Kenites, and a branch of the more numerous nation of Midian.' Moses, during his banishment from Egypt, found in Jethro, or Reuel, their priest and governor, a protector and father-in-law; and, though the complexion or family of his wife Zipporah occasioned very unreasonable murmurs, on the part of his own brothers and sisters2, yet was the marriage approved by God; and Moses himself, and the whole nation of Israel appear 1 Judges, i. 16; 1 Chron. ii. 55. 2 Numbers, xii. 1.

to have drawn much advantage from the wise counsels of good old Jethro, and from the perfect knowledge of the country, through which they were to pass, as displayed by his son Hobab. Attached to Moses by a near and dear connexion, and agreeing with the Israelites in their worship of the one true God, the Kenites followed their powerful allies into the land which God had appointed for their inheritance; and continued, during many ages of peaceful obscurity, to pitch their tents, and feed their cattle, amid the cities and cultivated lands of Israel. In the wars and revolutions of the neighbouring people, they seem to have seldom, if ever, interfered. They were at peace, at once, with the army of Barak, and with that of Jabin king of Canaan; and Sisera, though his confidence was, as it happened, horribly betrayed, considered himself as safe in a Kenite tent from the fury of a pursuing enemy. In somewhat later times, when Saul was sent by God on a warlike expedition against the Amalekites, we find him sending a message to the scattered families of the Kenites, who dwelt in his enemy's country, to remove from their present abode, lest they should be unintentionally involved in the general slaughter'; and, many hundred years after, we find them, in the present chapter, remaining as a distinct and

1 1 Samuel, xv. 6.

numerous race, held up by God as an example to the Jews, for their attachment to the customs of their ancestors; and honoured by Him with a gracious and remarkable promise, that their family should endure so long as the world itself.

Of Jonadab, the son of Rechab, in honour of whom they changed their name from Kenites to Rechabites, we are told but little; and that little is contained in the present chapter, and in the 10th chapter of the 2nd Book of Kings. When Jehu, son of Nimshi, had seized the gevernment of Israel, and when he was on his way to execute a severe justice on the idolatrous worshippers of Baal, he met, we are told, this Jonadab, or Jehonadab, and paid him, before all the people, a very extraordinary and respectful attention; being the first to salute him, expressing great anxiety for his approbation and good-will, and taking him up into his own chariot, to go with him, and to witness his zeal for the Lord. Such a degree of deference, shown by this cruel and daring adventurer, [for such Jehu, doubtless, was, though he were an appointed instrument in the hands of God to execute a particular purpose,] such deference shown by such a person, in the moment of his triumph, may reasonably lead us to suppose, that Jonadab, the son of Rechab, was a man of high character and popularity; and we may also guess from the manner, in which Jehu commends his own

zeal to his companion, that he had been remarkable, in those evil times of persecution and temptation, for faithfully adhering to the worship of the one true God, against all the threats and enticements of Ahab and Jezebel, and the bad example of the great body of the Israelitish nation. Certain it is, however, that, with his own clan, Jonadab was possessed of a very great degree of influence; since we find, in the present chapter, that, two hundred years after his death, the Rechabites continued to observe, with unvarying strictness, the customs, which he had enjoined them. "Jonadab," said they to Jeremiah, "Jonadab, the son of Rechab our father, commanded us, saying, ye shall drink no wine, neither ye, nor your sons for ever; neither shall ye build houses, nor sow seed, nor plant vineyards, nor have any; but all your days ye shall dwell in tents, that ye may live many days in the land in which ye are strangers. Thus," they continued, "have we obeyed the voice of Jonadab the son of Rechab our father, in all that he hath charged us, to drink no wine all our days, we, and our sons, and our daughters; nor to build houses for us to dwell in, neither have we vineyard, nor field, nor seed. But we have dwelt in tents; and have done according to all that Jonadab our father commanded us.”

This obedience of the Rechabites to the tradition of their ancestors is then contrasted by

the prophet, in a strain of bitter expostulation, with the indifference shown by the Jews to ordinances, which had God Himself for their author: and he concludes, by the assurance on God's part, which is contained in the words of my text; "Thus saith the Lord God of Hosts, the God of Israel, Because ye have obeyed the commandment of Jonadab the son of Rechab your father, and kept all his precepts, and done according to all that he hath commanded you, therefore thus saith the Lord, Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand before Me for ever."

That this promise has been exactly performed, no reasonable doubt can be entertained, by those who believe it to have been given by command of God: though, from the little knowledge, which we possess, of those wildernesses, where the Rechabites dwelt, and of the tribes and families, which at present, inhabit them, we cannot possibly fix on any particular clan, as descended from the ancient Kenites. Many thousand families there are, however, and always have been, in those countries, who dwell in tents, neither ploughing nor sowing, but rambling from place to place, with their cattle over the whole country, which is like one great common; and religiously refraining from wine, and from all other spirituous or fermented liquors. And

1 See Heber's Sermons in England, p. 277.

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