III.  The worshipper will resemble his god in fate.

We may observe that it is only of God’s people that Micah in our text applies the words ‘for ever and ever.’  ‘The peoples’’ worship perishes.  They walk for a time in the name of their god, but what comes of it at last is veiled in silence.  It is Jehovah’s worshippers who walk in His name for ever and ever, and of whom the great words are true, ’Because I live ye shall live also.’  We may be sure of this that all the divine attributes are pledged for our immortality; we may be sure, too, that a soul which here follows in the footsteps of Jesus, which in its earthly life walked in the name of the Lord its God, will continue across the narrow bridge, and go onward ‘for ever and ever’ in direct progress in the same direction in which it began on earth.  The imitation, which is the practical religion of every Christian, has for its only possible result the climax of likeness.  The partial likeness is attained on earth by contemplation, by aspiration, and by effort; but it is perfected in the heavens by the perfect vision of His perfect face.  ’We shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.’  Not till it has reached its goal can the Christian life begun here be conceived as ended.  It shall never be said of any one who tried by God’s help to walk ’in the name of the Lord’ that he was lost in the desert, and never reached his journey’s end.  The peoples who walked in the name of any false god will find their path ending as on the edge of a precipice, or in an unfathomable bog; loss, and woe, and shame will be their portion.  But ’the name of the Lord is a strong tower,’ into which whoever will may run and be safe, and to walk in the name of the Lord is to walk on a way ’that shall be called the Way of Holiness, whereon no ravenous beast shall go up, but the redeemed shall walk there,’ and all that are on it ’shall come with singing to Zion, and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads.’

‘A DEW FROM THE LORD’

     ’The remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many people as a dew
     from the Lord, that tarrieth not for man, nor waiteth for the sons
     of men.’—­MICAH v. 7.

The simple natural science of the Hebrews saw a mystery in the production of the dew on a clear night, and their poetic imagination found in it a fit symbol for all silent and gentle influences from heaven that refreshed and quickened parched and dusty souls.  Created by an inscrutable process in silence and darkness, the dewdrops lay innumerable on the dry plains and hung from every leaf and thorn, each little globule a perfect sphere that reflected the sun, and twinkled back the beams in its own little rainbow.  Where they fell the scorched vegetation lifted its drooping head.  That is what Israel is to be in the world, says Micah.  He saw very deep into God’s mind and into the function of the nation.