The grievousness of war.
The grievousness of war is especially felt in defeat. Kedar was the most turbulent of the sons of Ishmael (Genesis 25:13). "His hand" like that of his father, "was against every man, and every man's hand against him" (Genesis 16:12). So long as his "mighty men," armed with their formidable bows, could ravage and plunder the inhabitants of more peaceable districts at their pleasure, and carry off plenty of spoil to their fastnesses in the rocky parts of the desert (Isaiah 42:11), the "grievousness of war" was not felt. Rather, "the inhabitants of the rock sang, and shouted from the top of the mountain" (Isaiah 42:11). But at length the tide of battle had turned. Kedar was itself attacked, invaded, plundered. The "drawn sword" and the "bent bow" of the men of Asshur were seen in the recesses of Arabia itself, and the assailants, becoming the assailed, discovered, apparently to their surprise, that war was a "grievous" thing. Does not history "repeat itself?" Have we not heard in our own day aggressive nations, that have carried the flames of war over half Europe or half Asia, complain bitterly, when their turn to be attacked came, of the "grievousness" of invasion? The Greeks said, "To suffer that which one has done, is strictest, straitest right;" but this is not often distinctly perceived by the sufferers. It is only "God's ways" that are "equal;" man's are apt always to be "unequal" (Ezekiel 18:25).
HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON