Numbers 13:23. They came unto the brook of Eshcol, and cut down from thence a branch with one cluster of grapes.
Taken with editing from Law’s Christ Is All: Numbers and Deuteronomy.
We reach the brook of Eshcol through a humbling path. Before we touch its clustering grapes, let the dark steps be traced. The story shows how vile man is, how gracious our God is! It proves our proneness to transgress. It then presents an emblem of the heavenly bliss.
When Sinai has been left, the march of Israel advances prosperously. There is nothing in the way. No enemy annoys. No difficulties hinder. Each day the intervening wilderness decreases; and the desired land is neared. And now the very borders are in view. A few more steps will plant the pilgrim-host in Canaan. Surely courage will now brace each nerve; joy will beat high in every heart; and with triumphant praise they will plant conquering banners. But is it so? Alas they pause; they hesitate. Jehovah’s ancient covenant fades from their view. The pledged support, the daily help and the experienced favour are forgotten, as an unsubstantial dream. The unworthy thought creeps in: perhaps the nations are too strong for us: their walled cities and their iron gates may beat back our assault. Such are the workings of vile unbelief. And that dark monster is not dead. It yet lives. It lurks in corners of each heart. It ever watches to bring its veil to every eye, its poison-draught to every lip. It is crafty to whisper that perhaps God’s many promises may fail, that faith may be pursuing a vain shadow and may lie down at last misled, deceived, undone.
Reader, beware. Look inward. If you discern the slightest trace of this beguiling serpent, do not spare it. Seize it and slay it on the altar of revealed truth. Take for the solid pavement of your steps, “It is written”. Then advance manfully. Grasp tight the promises, and boldly march toward your pledged inheritance. Let nothing tempt you to try heaven’s counsels at the bar of human sense. He is the fool of fools who tests divine assurances in the scales of mortal vision.
But this timid policy befools Israel’s camp. The spies are named. They are sent forth to ascertain whether their God is true. They pass from place to place. They view the mountains and the vales. Then in their progress they reach Eshcol’s brook. Here fruit before unknown for size, for beauty and for luxuriant juice meets their admiring gaze. They pluck one cluster from the vine. This treasure needs two men to bear it. Upon a staff they prop it up. And thus they seek the camp, laden with a trophy of the country’s wealth. Here let the spies be left. Here let a curtain fall on their sad errand and their sin. Their sin – for they bring back a false report. And while they show the fruit, they largely dwell upon the walled towns and monster-forms and other formidable sights. But from such conduct let us turn. It is more comforting to contemplate the cluster which they bear – that earnest of rich fields.
The Spirit teaching, we may draw hence a foretaste of the full riches of the celestial land. These grapes are proof of Canaan’s vast fertility. The giant produce testifies abundance. So too there is a heavenly Eshcol before faith’s eye. It shows delicious clusters. And should we not delight to walk in this delightful ground and cheer our spirits with the glowing prospect? Surely Eshcol’s luxuriance portrays a glorious Canaan. It pictures heaven, the believer’s looked-for rest, the mark to which they press, the haven of their storm-tossed voyage, the end of weary pilgrimage, the soul’s eternal home, the land of every delight. This Eshcol should be ever in their view. The joy ahead of Christ cheered His heart. The joy before believers should gird up their loins. The runner bounds, when he discerns the goal just won. The seaman is alert when land is seen. The soul spreads swifter wings when heaven seems to open.
Reader, come and read faith’s amazing prize, in Eshcol’s grapes.
But here thought flags, mind fails, all words seem emptiness, all images fall short. No angel’s tongue can adequately paint the brightness of those realms. Mortal powers shrink into nothingness. None can describe, but they who believe. And they who believe find their delight an ever-swelling flood, an ever-brightening day, an ever-opening flower, a volume which eternity cannot read through. Heaven! It is the palace of the great Eternal One. Salvation is its walls; its gates are praise; its pavement is purity’s most golden lustre; its atmosphere is perfect love. Heaven! It is the home prepared by God before the worlds were made, for His redeemed children. It is the mansion which the ascended Jesus still labours to make fit. Heaven! It is so fair that all Jehovah’s skill cannot increase the beauty, so full that nothing can be added, so rich that it can hold no more.
Eshcol’s luxuriance allures to closer examination.
Let us draw nearer. This cluster was the vine’s perfection. So too is perfection the essence of heaven. Nothing can enter there to stain, to soil, to vex, to humble. What a contrast to our present state! We would be holy – but stay; a treacherous adversary rolls us in the mire. Our hearts are daily pierced. We loathe ourselves. But the believer’s high home is barricaded against sin. Never, never, never can iniquity again intrude. The soul for ever joys – righteous as God is righteous; pure as God is pure.
Reader, seek heaven. But heaven is more than this.
Here the foul tempter all day long is spreading nets. There is no saint too saintly for his vile approach. In Eden he approached the innocent. To Jesus he said, Worship me. His whispers, his bold lies, as keenest anguish, haunt the regenerate heart. And while life lasts, there is no respite. He watches every dying bed. But in heaven this misery has ceased. No serpent crawls along that pavement. Satan is outside – far off – the bottomless pit has shut its mouth upon him.
Reader, seek heaven. But heaven is more than this.
Here fears rush in. The ground is slippery. A precipice is near. We tremble on the brink. Fiery darts fly around. We shudder lest some poison penetrate our veins. The torturing thought breaks in. Will my frail soul hold out? Will even God’s own grace endure my daily provocations? May I not, after all, fail of salvation? May my end be with the lost? But fear dies at heaven’s gate. The happy company realise that they are lofty above injury. Their throne is safety in the highest. They know it; what then can they fear?
Reader, seek heaven. But heaven is more than this.
Earth is affliction’s home. A troop of sorrows compass us about. Tears stream. The bosom sighs. The brow is furrowed by the lines of care. Death tears away the much-loved friend. Sickness invades the frame. The home is desolate. The table is empty. We look to the right hand, and there is trouble; on the left, and still fresh troubles frown. But heaven is a wide sea of bliss without a ripple. All tears are wiped away. All faces beam with one enraptured smile. All lips confess that the cup of happiness overflows. We bathe in oceans of delight.
Reader, seek heaven. But heaven is more than this.
Here unbelief oft gathers as a chilly cloud. It mantles the soul in darkness. It suggests apprehension, that His love has ceased, and that desertion is, or may be, our lot. This is a miserable case. When God is felt to be a God at hand, woe ceases to be woe, and burdens are all light. But in heaven a present God is always everywhere. We cannot move beyond the sunshine of His love. His countenance is universal brightness.
Reader, seek heaven. But heaven is more than this.
Here ignorance leads us in a floundering path. We thirst for knowledge, but we reach it not. How much about God is utterly beyond our grasp! Blindness curtails our prospect. Clouds narrow what we can see. But heaven is a realm without horizon. Believers will know God as they are known. They love intelligently. They understand whom they adore.
Reader, seek heaven. But heaven is more than this.
Sin is shut out, temptations banished, fears buried in an unfathomable grave, sorrow and unbelief have fled away, knowledge is perfect, their souls are purity, their bodies are imperishable beauty, they completely share the glory of their all-glorious Lord. How much is this! Yet this is not all.
In the true Eshcol’s cluster, there is this richer fruit: Jesus is seen. This is the crown of heaven. This is the pinnacle of bliss. The rising of the sun makes day. The presence of the king constitutes the court. The revelation of the Lord, without one intervening cloud, is the grand glory of the endless kingdom. Heaven is fully heaven because Christ shines there exactly as He is: seen and admired by every eye.
Faith searches for Him now in types and shadows and prophetic forms, and sacraments and holy emblems. This sight is precious – gratefully to be enjoyed, devoutly to be used. But these are faint outlines of the eternal vision. These are often obscured. But in heaven Christ ever stands conspicuous in one undiminishable blaze.
Believer, what will it be to gaze on the manifested beauty of Him who is so altogether lovely! What? To read clearly all the deep mysteries of His redeeming will! What? To dive down to the vast depths of His unfathomable heart! What? To fly upward to the very summit of His boundless love! What? To trace clearly all His dealings in providence and grace! What? To comprehend all that Jesus is! What? Never to lose sight of Him – no, not for a moment! What? To be for ever receiving fresh raptures from His present smile! What? To feel that this joy is mine for ever! What? To shout, Come on, you ages of eternity, you will never part me from my Lord! This, this is heaven. This, this is Eshcol’s full cluster.
Are you a traveller towards this heaven?
Reader, are you a traveller towards this heaven? Do you know that when you behold the grapes of Eshcol, the vineyard is your sure heritage? The question may be solved. This kingdom is for the subjects of the King; this palace is for His sons. Are you then His by faith? They who are in Him now will dwell with Him for ever. They who live for Christ on earth go to Him in the upper world. Then say, Is your soul knit to Him? Are you a branch engrafted into the heavenly stem? Are you the bride espoused to the Lamb? The link which thus connects the sinner and the Lamb is faith. This is that precious grace which sees His worth, flees to Him, embraces Him and holds Him tight. This is that heaven-given power, which receives the title deeds of heaven with a glad hand. This is that Spirit-implanted confidence which looks to Eshcol, and claims all Canaan as a promised home. Reader, never rest till, standing on firm gospel ground, you can look up and cry, “Lord, I believe”. Then feed daily on Eshcol’s grapes. Then move daily toward Canaan. You will soon hear, “Come, ye blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world” (Mt 25:34).