Such, then, are the victories of faith.
But we have more still; and in the next scene, in chapter xv. we see faith's boldness.
And let me ask, for our common comfort, what more precious with God Himself than this? The intelligence of faith is bright, and its victories glorious; but in the accounting of the God of all grace, its boldness surpasses all.
After Abraham's victory over the world, or over the offers of the king of Sodom, the Lord comes to him with some great pledges and promises. After these things the word of the Lord came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward. xv. 1. After the heat of the preceding day, it was meet, in the ways of grace, that Abraham should be owned again, and encouraged again. But faith is bold, very bold, apparently aiming higher than the purposes and undertakings of grace. And this is a wonderful moment to contemplate. Abraham seems to throw back the words of the Lord. "I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward," says the Lord. "What wilt thou give me?" Abraham replies--"What wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus?"
This was bold; but, blessed to say it, not too bold for the ear of the Lord who finds His richest joy in the language of faith like this.
Good it is to have a portion; but Abraham sought an object, an object for the heart; something far more important to us. Adam found it so. Eden was not to him what Eve was. The garden with all its tributes did not do for him what the helpmeet did. Eve opened his mouth; she alone did that, because she alone had filled his heart. Christ finds it so. The Church is more to Him than all the glory of the kingdom--as the pearl and the treasure were more to the men who found them, than all their possessions, for they sold all to get them. The strayed sheep, the lost piece of silver, the prodigal son, are more to heaven--to the Father, to the Shepherd, to the Spirit, and to angels--as occasions of joy, than all else; just because the heart has got its object--love has found its answer. This is the mind of Christ. Affection puts the heart on a journey; and it cannot rest, in the midst of all beside, without its object; and it says even to the Lord and His pledges, "What wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless?"
But bold faith this was indeed, appearing thus to throw back the words of God. But it was precious to Him. Yea, it was precious to Him on the highest kind of title; for faith, acting thus and craving after this manner, spoke the way and the taste of the divine mind itself. For God Himself looks for children, as Abraham did. It is not the spirit of bondage that is to fill His house, but that of adoption; it is not servants but children He will have round Him. He has "predestinated us unto the adoption of children, by Jesus Christ, to Himself." He has found in His children an object for Himself; and Abraham was, therefore, but telling out the common secret of his own heart, and of the bosom of God. And at once his desire is answered; and the sight of the starry heavens is made to pledge to the patriarch something better than all portions and all conditions; for the Lord says to him, "So shall thy seed be."
How truly may we say, never does faith aim more justly than when it aims high, and draws with a bold hand. Never is the mark it sets before it more God's own purpose. "Ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God," says the prophet to the king, "ask it either in the depth, or in the height above;" range through the divine resources, and use them. What king Ahaz would not do, wearying the Lord by his reserve, and unbelief, and slowness of heart, Abraham does and continues to do. His soul continues in the same power of faith to the end of this action. He holds on in the same track. "I'll give thee this land to inherit it," says the Lord to him shortly afterwards. "Whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?" is his reply to the Lord. This is of the same fine character; and being so--bespeaking the boldness of faith--it is still infinitely acceptable with the Lord. Abraham seeks something beyond a promise. Not that he doubted the promise. He was sure of it. It could never fail. Heaven and earth would pass away, ere it could pass away. But "oath and blood" to seal it were desired by Abraham. He loved covenant title, and his faith sought it; but sought no more than grace and purpose and sovereign good-pleasure had already designed to give him.
And there lies the richest, fullest consolation. Faith is never too bold to please the Lord. In the days of His flesh, He often rebuked the reserves and suspicions of little faith, but never the strength and decision of a faith that aimed as at everything, and would not go without a blessing. So, the very style in which, in this fine chapter (xv.), He answers the faith of His servant, tells us of the delight with which He had entertained His servant's boldness. The very style of the answer speaks this in our ears; as afterwards in the case of the palsied man in Luke v.; for there the words, "Man, thy sins be forgiven thee," tell how the heart of the same Lord, the God of Abraham, had been refreshed by the faith which broke up the roof of the house without apology, in order to reach Him. And it is the same here. When a fine, bold, unquestioning faith sought for a child, the Lord God took Abraham forth that very night, and, showing him the starry heavens, said to him, "So shall thy seed be." When like faith would have the land secured by something more than a word of promise, the same Lord pledges the covenant by the passage of a burning lamp between the pieces of the sacrifice.
This style, as I said, is full of meaning. It eloquently (may I say?) bespeaks the divine mind. The Lord does not content Himself by merely promising a child, as by word of mouth, or by merely giving some other assurances to Abraham that the land shall be the inheritance of his seed; but, in each case, He enters on certain actions, and conducts them with such august and striking solemnities, as lets us know instinctively, the delight with which He had listened to these demands of faith.