The glory of redemption.
Under the similitude of a wretched child cast off by its mother and picked up by a passer by, Israel is shown to have been found by God in a miserable condition and cared for and blessed by him. Tins idea may be carried further as a symbol of the redemption of the Church by Christ.
I. THE FIRST CONDITION IS ONE OF POLLUTION AND NEGLECT. Israel was in a miserable condition in Egypt when God had pity on his people. But the spiritual state of souls in sin is more wretched and forlorn.
1. It is a condition of pollution. Sinners lie in the defilement of their own sinfulness, and their wretched plight is the direct consequence of their own moral corruption.
2. It is a condition of neglect. Until God interfered, Israel in Egypt was friendless. No kindred Semitic tribe cared or dared to rescue the nation of slaves. No being came to save the world before God made bare his arm.
II. THE FIRST STEP TO RECOVERY SPRINGS FROM THE PITY OF GOD. The good Samaritan is a type of our great Father. There is no beauty in sinful man to attract the attention of God. It is not our claim, but his pity, that moves God to save the world. The love of Christ, not the worth of man, brought our redemption. Pity—commiseration for the wretched—lies at the root of the gospel. God is love, and therefore he comes to the miserable in supreme compassion.
III. THE REDEMPTION BEGINS IN CLEANSING. Sin must be washed away before the soul can be received into the privileges of the family of God. Even this early process is preceded by God's adoption of the wretched castaway, and the cleansing is done by God himself. It is as when a miserable child of the street has been taken by a charitable person into his own home. The child cannot make itself clean. But the first act of the kind rescuer is to wash it. Christ cleanses from sin with his own blood.
IV. THE REDEMPTION IS CROWNED WITH SPLENDOUR. The poor wastling is not treated as a workhouse child or put to low drudgery. She is clothed in purest apparel and decked with rarest ornaments. So the prodigal is to wear the best robe and to have a ring on his hand. God does not save grudgingly or by halves. He does not content himself with plucking the brand from the burning. He gives royally of his best to the miserable sinners whom he has redeemed. The gospel promises glory as well as grace.
V. THE RESCUE AND REDEMPTION ESTABLISH A NEW RELATION WITH GOD. According to the richly illustrative picture of Ezekiel, when the poor abandoned infant is grown up, her rescuer makes her his bride. God is often regarded as the Husband of his people. But here the picture is not of God marrying any human soul, but of his marrying the most abandoned. This illustrates his marvellous condescension. At the same time, it shows the supreme duty of fidelity to God on the part of the Church that has been rescued from so dire a fate and then raised to so great an honors.