Streams in the Desert
November 1 to 24
(1) Praying
"Elias was a man subject to like passions as we
are" (James 5:17).
Thank God for that! He got under a juniper tree,
as you and I have often done; he complained and
murmured, as we have often done; was unbelieving,
as we have often been. But that was not the case
when he really got into touch with God. Though "a
man subject to like passions as we are," "he
prayed praying." It is sublime in the
original--not "earnestly," but "he prayed in
prayer." He kept on praying. What is the lesson
here? You must keep praying.
Come up on the top of Carmel, and see that
remarkable parable of Faith and Sight. It was not
the descent of the fire that now was necessary,
but the descent of the flood; and the man that
can command the fire can command the flood by the
same means and methods. We are told that he bowed
himself to the ground with his face between his
knees; that is, shutting out all sights and
sounds. He was putting himself in a position
where, beneath his mantle, he could neither see
nor hear what was going forward.
He said to his servant, "Go and take an
observation." He went and came back, and
said--how sublimely brief! one word--"Nothing!"
What do we do under such circumstances?
We say, "It is just as I expected!" and we give
up praying. Did Elijah? No, he said, "Go again."
His servant again came back and said, "Nothing!"
"Go again." "Nothing!"
By and by he came back, and said, "There is a
little cloud like a man's hand." A man's hand had
been raised in supplication, and presently down
came the rain; and Ahab had not time to get back
to the gate of Samaria with all his fast steeds.
This is a parable of Faith and Sight--faith
shutting itself up with God; sight taking
observations and seeing nothing; faith going
right on, and "praying in prayer," with utterly
hopeless reports from sight.
Do you know how to pray that way, how to pray
prevailingly? Let sight give as discouraging
reports as it may, but pay no attention to these.
The living God is still in the heavens and even
to delay is part of His goodness. --Arthur T.
Pierson
Each of three boys gave a definition of faith
which is an illustration of the tenacity of
faith. The first boy said, "It is taking hold of
Christ"; the second, "Keeping hold"; and the
third, "Not letting go."
(2) Fresh Touch with God
"And the ill favored and lean-fleshed kine did
eat up the seven well favored and fat kin…and the
thin, ears swallowed up the seven rank and full
ears" (Gen. 41:4, 7).
There is a warning for us in that dream, just as
it stands: It is possible for the best years of
our life, the best experiences, the best
victories won, the best service rendered, to be
swallowed up by times of failure, defeat,
dishonor, uselessness in the kingdom. Some men's
lives of rare promise and rare achievement have
ended so. It is awful to think of, but it is
true. Yet it is never necessary.
S. D. Gordon has said that the only assurance of
safety against this tragedy is "fresh touch with
God," daily, hourly. The blessed, fruitful,
victorious experiences of yesterday are not only
of no value to me today, but they will actually
be eaten up or reversed by today's failures,
unless they serve as incentives to still better,
richer experiences today.
"Fresh touch with God," by abiding in Christ,
alone will keep the lean kine and the ill favored
grain out of my life. --Messages for the Morning
Watch
(3) The Prayer of Faith
"God that cannot lie promised" (Titus 1:2).
Faith is not working up by will power a sort of
certainty that something is coming to pass, but
it is seeing as an actual fact that God has said
that this thing shall come to pass, and that it
is true, and then rejoicing to know that it is
true, and just resting because God has said it.
Faith turns the promise into a prophecy. While it
is merely a promise it is contingent upon our
cooperation. But when faith claims it, it becomes
a prophecy, and we go forth feeling that it is
something that must be done because God cannot
lie. --Days of Heaven upon Earth
I hear men praying everywhere for more faith, but
when I listen to them carefully, and get at the
real heart of their prayer, very often it is not
more faith at all that they are wanting, but a
change from faith to sight.
Faith says not, "I see that it is good for me, so
God must have sent it," but, "God sent it, and so
it must be good for me."
Faith, walking in the dark with God, only prays
Him to clasp its hand more closely. --Phillips
Brooks
"The Shepherd does not ask of thee
Faith in thy faith, but only faith in Him;
And this He meant in saying, 'Come to me.'
In light or darkness seek to do His will,
And leave the. work of faith to Jesus still."
(4) The Key to the Wind
"The Lord hath prepared his throne in the
heavens; and his kingdom ruleth over all" (Ps.
103:19).
Some time since, in the early spring, I was going
out at my door when round the corner came a blast
of east wind--defiant and pitiless, fierce and
withering--sending a cloud of dust before it.
I was just taking the latchkey from the door as I
said, half impatiently, "I wish the wind
would"--I was going to say change; but the word
was checked, and the sentence was never finished.
As I went on my way, the incident became a
parable to me. There came an angel holding out a
key; and he said:
"My Master sends thee His love, and bids me give
you this."
"What is it?" I asked, wondering. "The key of the
winds," said the angel, and disappeared.
Now indeed should I be happy. I hurried away up
into the heights whence the winds came, and stood
amongst the caves. "I will have done with the
east wind at any rate--and that shall plague us
no more," I cried; and calling in that friendless
wind, I closed the door, and heard the echoes
ringing in the hollow places. I turned the key
triumphantly. "There," I said, now we have done
with that."
"What shall I choose in its place?" I asked
myself, looking about me. "The south wind is
pleasant"; and I thought of the lambs, and the
young life on every hand, and the flowers that
had begun to deck the hedgerows. But as I set the
key within the door, it began to burn my hand.
"What am I doing?" I cried; "who knows what
mischief I may bring about? How do I know what
the fields want! Ten thousand things of ill may
come of this foolish wish of mine."
Bewildered and ashamed, I looked up and prayed
that the Lord would send His angel yet again to
take the key; and for my part I promised that I
would never want to have it any more.
But lo, the Lord Himself stood by me. He reached
His hand to take the key; and as I laid it down,
I saw that it rested against the sacred
wound-print.
It hurt me indeed that I could ever have murmured
against anything wrought by Him who bare such
sacred tokens of His love. Then He took the key
and hung it on His girdle.
"Dost THOU keep the key of the winds?" I asked.
"I do, my child," He answered graciously.
And lo, I looked again and there hung all the
keys of all my life. He saw my look of amazement,
and asked, "Didst thou not know, my child, that
my kingdom ruleth over all?"
"Over all, my Lord!" I answered; "then it is not
safe for me to murmur at anything?" Then did He
lay His hand upon me tenderly. "My child," He
said, "thy only safety is, in everything, to love
and trust and praise." --Mark Guy Pearse
(5) Call Upon the Lord
"And it shall come to pass that whosoever shall
call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered"
(Joel 2:32).
Why do not I call on His name? Why do I run to
this neighbor and that when God is so near and
will hear my faintest call? Why do I sit down and
devise schemes and invent plans? Why not at once
roll myself and my burden upon the Lord?
Straightforward is the best runner--why do not I
run at once to the living God? In vain shall I
look for "deliverance anywhere else; but with God
I shall find it; for here I have His royal shall
to make it sure.
I need not ask whether I may call on Him or not,
for that word "Whosoever" is a very wide and
comprehensive one. Whosoever means me, for it
means anybody and everybody who calls upon God. I
will therefore follow the leading of the text,
and at once call upon the glorious Lord who has
made so large a promise.
My case is urgent, and I do not see how I am to
be delivered; but this is no business of mine. He
who makes the promise will find ways and means of
keeping it. It is mine to obey His commands; it
is not mine to direct His counsels. I am His
servant, not His solicitor. I call upon Him, and
He will deliver. --C. H. Spurgeon
(6) The Mountain After the Quake
"He maketh sore, and bindeth up: he woundeth and
his hands make whole" (Job 5:18).
The ministry of a great sorrow.
As we pass beneath the hills which have been
shaken by the earthquake and torn by convulsion,
we find that periods of perfect repose succeed
those of destruction. The pools of calm water lie
clear beneath their fallen rocks, the water
lilies gleam, and the reeds whisper among the
shadows; the village rises again over the
forgotten graves, and its church tower, white
through the storm twilight, proclaims a renewed
appeal to His protection "in whose hand are all
the corners of the earth, and the strength of the
hills is his also." --Ruskin
God ploughed one day with an earthquake,
And drove His furrows deep!
The huddling plains upstarted,
The hills were all aleap!
But that is the mountains' secret,
Age-hidden in their breast;
"God's peace is everlasting,"
Are the dream-words of their rest.
He made them the haunts of beauty,
The home elect of His grace;
He spreadeth His mornings upon them,
His sunsets light their face.
His winds bring messages to them
Wild storm-news from the main;
They sing it down the valleys
In the love-song of the rain.
They are nurseries for young rivers,
Nests for His flying cloud,
Homesteads for new-born races,
Masterful, free, and proud.
The people of tired cities
Come up to their shrines and pray;
God freshens again within them,
As He passes by all day.
And lo, I have caught their secret!
The beauty deeper than all!
This faith--that life's hard moments,
When the jarring sorrows befall,
Are but God ploughing His mountains;
And those mountains yet shall be
The source of His grace and freshness,
And His peace everlasting to me.
--William C. Gannett
(7) Sing Praise to the Lord!
"When they began to sing and praise, the Lord set
ambushments...and they were smitten" (2 Chron.
20:22).
Oh, that we could reason less about our troubles,
and sing and praise more! There are thousands of
things that we wear as shackles which we might
use as instruments with music in them, if we only
knew how.
Those men that ponder, and meditate, and weigh
the affairs of life, and study the mysterious
developments of God's providence, and wonder why
they should be burdened and thwarted and
hampered--how different and how much more joyful
would be their lives, if, instead of forever
indulging in self-revolving and inward thinking,
they would take their experiences, day by day,
and lift them up, and praise God for them.
We can sing our cares away easier than we can
reason them away. Sing in the morning. The birds
are the earliest to sing, and birds are more
without care than anything else that I know of.
Sing at evening. Singing is the last thing that
robins do. When they have done their daily work;
when they have flown their last flight, and
picked up their last morsel of food, then on a
topmost twig, they sing one song of praise.
Oh, that we might sing morning and evening, and
let song touch song all the way through.
--Selected
"Don't let the song go out of your life
Though it chance sometimes to flow
In a minor strain; it will blend again
With the major tone you know.
"What though shadows rise to obscure life's
skies,
And hide for a time the sun,
The sooner they'll lift and reveal the rift,
If you let the melody run.
"Don't let the song go out of your life;
Though the voice may have lost its trill,
Though the tremulous note may die in your throat,
Let it sing in your spirit still.
"Don't let the song go out of your life;
Let it ring in the soul while here;
And when you go hence, 'twill follow you thence,
And live on in another sphere."
(8) The Secrets of Providence
"The secret of the Lord is with them that fear
him" (Ps. 25:14).
There are secrets of Providence which God's dear
children may learn. His dealings with them often
seem, to the outward eye, dark and terrible.
Faith looks deeper and says, "This is God's
secret. You look only on the outside; I can look
deeper and see the hidden meaning."
Sometimes diamonds are done up in rough packages,
so that their value cannot be seen. When the
Tabernacle was built in the wilderness there was
nothing rich in its outside appearance. The
costly things were all within, and its outward
covering of rough badger skin gave no hint of the
valuable things which it contained.
God may send you, dear friends, some costly
packages. Do not worry if they are done up in
rough wrappings. You may be sure there are
treasures of love, and kindness, and wisdom
hidden within. If we take what He sends, and
trust Him for the goodness in it, even in the
dark, we shall learn the meaning of the secrets
of Providence. --A. B. Simpson
"Not until each loom is silent,
And the shuttles cease to fly,
Will God unroll the pattern
And explain the reason why
The dark threads are as needful
In the Weaver's skillful hand,
As the threads of gold and silver
For the pattern which He planned."
He that is mastered by Christ is the master of
every circumstance. Does the circumstance press
hard against you? Do not push it away. It is the
Potter's hand. Your mastery will come, not by
arresting its progress, but by enduring its
discipline, for it is not only shaping you into a
vessel of beauty and honor, but it is making your
resources available.
(9) Beginning Without Finishing
"He spoke a parable unto them…that men ought
always to pray, and not to faint" (Luke 18:1).
No temptation in the life of intercession is more
common than this of failure to persevere. We
begin to pray for a certain thing; we put up our
petitions for a day, a week, a month; and then,
receiving as yet no definite answer, straightway
we faint, and cease altogether from prayer
concerning it.
This is a deadly fault. It is simply the snare of
many beginnings with no completions. It is
ruinous in all spheres of life.
The man who forms the habit of beginning without
finishing has simply formed the habit of failure.
The man who begins to pray about a thing and does
not pray it through to a successful issue of
answer has formed the same habit in prayer.
To faint is to fail; then defeat begets
disheartenment, and unfaith in the reality of
prayer, which is fatal to all success.
But someone says, "How long shall we pray? Do we
not come to a place where we may cease from our
petitions and rest the matter in God's hands?"
There is but one answer. Pray until the thing you
pray for has actually been granted, or until you
have the assurance in your heart that it will be.
Only at one of these two places dare we stay our
importunity, for prayer is not only a calling
upon God, but also a conflict with Satan. And
inasmuch as God is using our intercession as a
mighty factor of victory in that conflict, He
alone, and not we, must decide when we dare cease
from our petitioning. So we dare not stay our
prayer until the answer itself has come, or until
we receive the assurance that it will come.
In the first case we stop because we see. In the
other, we stop because we believe, and the faith
of our heart is just as sure as the sight of our
eyes; for it is faith from, yes, the faith of
God, within us.
More and more, as we live the prayer life, shall
we come to experience and recognize this
God-given assurance, and know when to rest
quietly in it, or when to continue our
petitioning until we receive it. --The Practice
of Prayer
Tarry at the promise till God meets you there. He
always returns by way of His promises.
--Selected
(10) The Road Uphill
"Walking in the midst of the fire" (Daniel 3:25).
The fire did not arrest their motion; they walked
in the midst of it. It was one of the streets
through which they moved to their destiny. The
comfort of Christ's revelation is not that it
teaches emancipation from sorrow, but
emancipation through sorrow.
O my God, teach me, when the shadows have
gathered, that I am only in a tunnel. It is
enough for me to know that it will be all right
some day.
They tell me that I shall stand upon the peaks of
Olivet, the heights of resurrection glory. But I
want more, O my Father; I want Calvary to lead up
to it. I want to know that the shadows of this
world are the shades of an avenue the avenue to
the house of my Father. Tell me I am only forced
to climb because Thy house is on the hill! I
shall receive no hurt from sorrow if I shall walk
in the midst of the fire. --George Matheson
"'The road is too rough,' I said;
'It is uphill all the way;
No flowers, but thorns instead;
And the skies over head are grey.'
But One took my hand at the entrance dim,
And sweet is the road that I walk with Him.
"The cross is too great,' I cried--
'More than the back can bear,
So rough and heavy and wide,
And nobody by to care.'
And One stooped softly and touched my hand:
'I know. I care. And I understand.'
"Then why do we fret and sigh;
Cross-bearers all we go:
But the road ends by-and-by
In the dearest place we know,
And every step in the journey we
May take in the Lord's own company."
(11) The Friend of God
"Abraham stood yet before the Lord" (Gen. 18:22).
The friend of God can plead with Him for others.
Perhaps Abraham's height of faith and friendship
seems beyond our little possibilities. Do not be
discouraged, Abraham grew; so may we. He went
step by step, not by great leaps.
The man whose faith has been deeply tested and
who has come off victorious, is the man to whom
supreme tests must come.
The finest jewels are most carefully cut and
polished; the hottest fires try the most precious
metal. Abraham would never have been called the
Father of the Faithful if he had not been proved
to the uttermost. Read Genesis, twenty-second
chapter:
"Take thy son, thine only son, whom thou lovest."
See him going with a chastened, wistful, yet
humbly obedient heart up Moriah's height, with
the idol of his heart beside him about to be
sacrificed at the command of God whom he had
faithfully loved and served!
What a rebuke to our questionings of God's
dealings with us! Away with all doubting
explanations of this stupendous scene! It was an
object lesson for the ages. Angels were looking.
Shall this man's faith stand forever for the
strength and help of all God's people? Shall it
be known through him that unfaltering faith will
always prove the faithfulness of God?
Yes; and when faith has borne victoriously its
uttermost test, the angel of the Lord--who? The
Lord Jesus, Jehovah, He in whom "all the promises
of God are yea and amen"--spoke to him, saying,
"Now I know that thou fearest God." Thou hast
trusted me to the uttermost. I will also trust
thee; thou shalt ever be My friend, and I will
bless thee, and make thee a blessing.
It is always so, and always will be. "They that
are of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham."
--Selected
It is no small thing to be on terms of friendship
with God.
(12) Lie Still and Trust
"I had fainted unless…!(Ps. 27:13).
"FAINT NOT!"
How great is the temptation at this point! How
the soul sinks, the heart grows sick, and the
faith staggers under the keen trials and testings
which come into our lives in times of special
bereavement and suffering.
"I cannot bear up any longer, I am fainting under
this providence. What shall I do? God tells me
not to faint. But what can one do when he is
fainting?"
What do you do when you are about to faint
physically? You cannot do anything. You cease
from your own doings. In your faintness, you fall
upon the shoulder of some strong loved one. You
lean hard. You rest. You lie still and trust.
It is so when we are tempted to faint under
affliction. God's message to us is not, "Be
strong and of good courage," for He knows our
strength and courage have fled away. But it is
that sweet word, "Be still, and know that I am
God."
Hudson Taylor was so feeble in the closing months
of his life that he wrote a dear friend: "I am so
weak I cannot write; I cannot read my Bible; I
cannot even pray. I can only lie still in God's
arms like a little child, and trust."
This wondrous man of God with all his spiritual
power came to a place of physical suffering and
weakness where he could only lie still and trust.
And that is all God asks of you, His dear child,
when you grow faint in the fierce fires of
affliction. Do not try to be strong. Just be
still and know that He is God, and will sustain
you, and bring you through.
"God keeps His choicest cordials for our deepest
faintings."
"Stay firm and let thine heart take courage"
(Psa. 27:14, --After Osterwald).
Stay firm, He has not failed thee
In all the past,
And will He go and leave thee
To sink at last?
Nay, He said He will hide thee
Beneath His wing;
And sweetly there in safety
Thou mayest sing.
–Selected
(13) Sailing Through the Tempest
"We went through fire and through water: but thou
broughtest us out into a wealthy place" (Ps.
66:12).
Paradoxical though it be, only that man is at
rest who attains it through conflict. This peace,
born of conflict, is not like the deadly hush
preceding the tempest, but the serene and
pure-aired quiet that follows it.
It is not generally the prosperous one, who has
never sorrowed, who is strong and at rest. His
quality has never been tried, and he knows not
how he can stand even a gentle shock. He is not
the safest sailor who never saw a tempest; he
will do for fair-weather service, but when the
storm is rising, place at the important post the
man who has fought out a gale, who has tested the
ship, who knows her hulk sound, her rigging
strong, and her anchor-flukes able to grasp and
hold by the ribs of the world.
When first affliction comes upon us, how
everything gives way! Our clinging, tendril hopes
are snapped, and our heart lies prostrate like a
vine that the storm has torn from its trellis;
but when the first shock is past, and we are able
to look up, and say, "It is the Lord," faith
lifts the shattered hopes once more, and binds
them fast to the feet of God. Thus the end is
confidence, safety, and peace. --Selected
The adverse winds blew against my life;
My little ship with grief was tossed;
My plans were gone--heart full of strife,
And all my hope seemed to be lost--
"Then He arose"--one word of peace.
"There was a calm"--a sweet release.
A tempest great of doubt and fear
Possessed my mind; no light was there
To guide, or make my vision clear.
Dark night! 'twas more than I could bear--
"Then He arose," I saw His face--
"There was a calm" filled with His grace.
My heart was sinking 'neath the wave
Of deepening test and raging grief;
All seemed as lost, and none could save,
And nothing could bring me relief--
"Then He arose"--and spoke one word,
"There was a calm!" IT IS THE LORD..
--L. S. P.
(14) The Discipline of Faith
"All things are possible to him that believeth"
(Mark 9:23).
The "all things" do not always come simply for
the asking, for the reason that God is ever
seeking to teach us the way of faith, and in our
training in the faith life there must be room for
the trial of faith, the discipline of faith, the
patience of faith, the courage of faith, and
often many stages are passed before we really
realize what is the end of faith, namely, the
victory of faith.
Real moral fibre is developed through discipline
of faith. You have made your request of God, but
the answer does not come. What are you to do?
Keep on believing God's Word; never be moved away
from it by what you see or feel, and thus as you
stand steady, enlarged power and experience is
being developed. The fact of looking at the
apparent contradiction as to God's Word and being
unmoved from your position of faith make you
stronger on every other line.
Often God delays purposely, and the delay is just
as much an answer to your prayer as is the
fulfillment when it comes.
In the lives of all the great Bible characters,
God worked thus. Abraham, Moses and Elijah were
not great in the beginning, but were made great
through the discipline of their faith, and only
thus were they fitted for the positions to which
God had called them.
For example, in the case of Joseph whom the Lord
was training for the throne of Egypt, we read in
the Psalms:
"The word of the Lord tried him." It was not the
prison life with its hard beds or poor food that
tried him, but it was the word God had spoken
into his heart in the early years concerning
elevation and honor which were greater than his
brethren were to receive; it was this which was
ever before him, when every step in his career
made it seem more and more impossible of
fulfillment, until he was there imprisoned, and
all in innocency, while others who were perhaps
justly incarcerated, were released, and he was
left to languish alone.
These were hours that tried his soul, but hours
of spiritual growth and development, that, "when
his word came" (the word of release), found him
fitted for the delicate task of dealing with his
wayward brethren, with a love and patience only
surpassed by God Himself.
No amount of persecution tries like such
experiences as these. When God has spoken of His
purpose to do, and yet the days go on and He does
not do it, that is truly hard; but it is a
discipline of faith that will bring us into a
knowledge of God which would otherwise be
impossible.
(15) Can Thine Heart Endure?
"We know not what we should pray for as we ought"
(Rom. 8:26).
Much that perplexes us in our Christian
experience is but the answer to our prayers. We
pray for patience, and our Father sends those who
tax us to the utmost; for "tribulation worketh
patience."
We pray for submission, and God sends sufferings;
for "we learn obedience by the things we suffer."
We pray for unselfishness, and God gives us
opportunities to sacrifice ourselves by thinking
on the things of others, and by laying down our
lives for the brethren.
We pray for strength and humility, and some
messenger of Satan torments us until we lie in
the dust crying for its removal.
We pray, "Lord, increase our faith," and money
takes wings; or the children are alarmingly ill;
or a servant comes who is careless, extravagant,
untidy or slow, or some hitherto unknown trial
calls for an increase of faith along a line where
we have not needed to exercise much faith before.
We pray for the Lamb-life, and are given a
portion of lowly service, or we are injured and
must seek no redress; for "he was led as a lamb
to the slaughter and…opened not his mouth."
We pray for gentleness, and there comes a perfect
storm of temptation to harshness and
irritability. We pray for quietness, and every
nerve is strung to the utmost tension, so that
looking to Him we may learn that when He giveth
quietness, no one can make trouble.
We pray for love, and God sends peculiar
suffering and puts us with apparently unlovely
people, and lets them say things which rasp the
nerves and lacerate the heart; for love suffereth
long and is kind, love is not impolite, love is
not provoked. LOVE BEARETH ALL THINGS, believeth,
hopeth and endureth, love never faileth. We pray
for likeness to Jesus, and the answer is, "I have
chosen thee in the furnace of affliction." "Can
thine heart endure, or can thine hands be
strong?" "Are ye able?"
The way to peace and victory is to accept every
circumstance, every trial, straight from the hand
of a loving Father; and to live up in the
heavenly places, above the clouds, in the very
presence of the Throne, and to look down from the
Glory upon our environment as lovingly and
divinely appointed. --Selected
I prayed for strength, and then I lost awhile
All sense of nearness, human and divine;
The love I leaned on failed and pierced my heart,
The hands I clung to loosed themselves from mine;
But while I swayed, weak, trembling, and alone,
The everlasting arms upheld my own.
I prayed for light; the sun went down in clouds,
The moon was darkened by a misty doubt,
The stars of heaven were dimmed by earthly fears,
And all my little candle flames burned out;
But while I sat in shadow, wrapped in night,
The face of Christ made all the darkness bright.
I prayed for peace, and dreamed of restful ease,
A slumber drugged from pain, a hushed repose;
Above my head the skies were black with storm,
And fiercer grew the onslaught of my foes;
But while the battle raged, and wild winds blew,
I heard His voice and Perfect peace I knew.
I thank Thee, Lord, Thou wert too wise to heed
My feeble prayers, and answer as I sought,
Since these rich gifts Thy bounty has bestowed
Have brought me more than all I asked or thought;
Giver of good, so answer each request
With Thine own giving, better than my best.
--Annie Johnson Flint
(16) Instant Obedience
"In the selfsame day, as God had said unto him"
(Gen. 17:23).
Instant obedience is the only kind of obedience
there is; delayed obedience is disobedience.
Every time God calls us to any duty, He is
offering to make a covenant with us; doing the
duty is our part, and He will do His part in
special blessing.
The only way we can obey is to obey "in the
selfsame day," as Abraham did. To be sure, we
often postpone a duty and then later on do it as
fully as we can. It is better to do this than not
to do it at all. But it is then, at the best,
only a crippled, disfigured, half-way sort of
duty-doing; and a postponed duty never can bring
the full blessing that God intended, and that it
would have brought if done at the earliest
possible moment.
It is a pity to rob ourselves, along with robbing
God and others, by procrastination. "In the
selfsame day" is the Genesis way of saying, "Do
it now." --Messages for the Morning Watch
Luther says that "a true believer will crucify
the question, 'Why?' He will obey without
questioning." I will not be one of those who,
except they see signs and wonders, will in no
wise believe. I will obey without questioning.
"Ours not to make reply,
Ours not to reason why,
Ours but to do and die."
Obedience is the fruit of faith; patience, the
bloom on the fruit. --Christina Rossetti
We Wrestle Not Against Flesh and Blood
"Fear not, Daniel: for from the first day that
thou didst set thine heart to understand, and to
chasten thyself before thy God, thy words were
heard, and I am come for thy words. But the
prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me one
and twenty days" (Dan. 10:12, 13).
We have wonderful teaching here on prayer, and we
are shown the direct hindrance from Satan.
Daniel had fasted and prayed twenty-one days, and
had a very hard time in prayer. As far as we read
the narrative, it was not because Daniel was not
a good man, nor because his prayer was not right;
but it was because of a special attack of Satan.
The Lord started a messenger to tell Daniel that
his prayer was answered the moment Daniel began
to pray; but an evil angel met the good angel and
wrestled with him, hindering him. There was a
conflict in the heavens; and Daniel seemed to go
through an agony on earth the same as that which
was going on in the heavens.
"We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but
against principalities, against powers… against
wicked spirits in high places" (Eph. 6:12,
margin).
Satan delayed the answer three full weeks. Daniel
nearly succumbed, and Satan would have been glad
to kill him; but God will not suffer anything to
come above that we "are able to bear."
Many a Christian's prayer is hindered by Satan;
but you need not fear when your prayers and faith
pile up; for after a while they will be like a
flood, and will not only sweep the answer
through, but will also bring some new
accompanying blessing. --Sermon
Hell does its worst with the saints. The rarest
souls have been tested with high pressures and
temperatures, but Heaven will not desert them.
--W. L. Watkinson
(17) Season of Waiting
"And when forty years were expired, there
appeared to him in the wilderness…an angel of the
Lord...saying....now come, I will send thee into
Egypt" (Acts 7:30-34).
Often the Lord calls us aside from our work for a
season, and bids us be still and learn ere we go
forth again to minister. There is no time lost in
such waiting hours.
Fleeing from his enemies, the ancient knight
found that his horse needed to be re-shod.
Prudence seemed to urge him on without delay, but
higher wisdom taught him to halt a few minutes at
the blacksmith's forge by the way, to have the
shoe replaced; and although he heard the feet of
his pursuers galloping hard behind, yet he waited
those minutes until his charger was refitted for
his flight. And then, leaping into his saddle
just as they appeared a hundred yards away, he
dashed away from them with the fleetness of the
wind, and knew that his halting had hastened his
escape.
So often God bids us tarry ere we go, and fully
recover ourselves for the next stage of the
journey and work. --Days of Heaven upon Earth
Waiting! Yes, patiently waiting!
Till next steps made plain shall be;
To hear, with the inner hearing,
The Voice that will call for me.
Waiting! Yes, hopefully waiting!
With hope that need not grow dim;
The Master is pledged to guide me,
And my eyes are unto Him.
Waiting! Expectantly waiting!
Perhaps it may be today
The Master will quickly open
The gate to my future way.
Waiting! Yes, waiting! still waiting!
I know, though I've waited long,
That, while He withholds His purpose,
His waiting cannot be wrong.
Waiting! Yes, waiting! still waiting!
The Master will not be late:
He knoweth that I am waiting
For Him to unlatch the gate.
--J. D. Smith
(18) Pressing Forward
"I was crushed...so much so that I despaired even
of life, but that was to make me rely not on
myself, but on the God who raises the dead" (2
Cor. 1:8, 9).
"Pressed out of measure and pressed to all
length;
Pressed so intensely it seems, beyond strength;
Pressed in the body and pressed in the soul,
Pressed in the mind till the dark surges roll.
Pressure by foes, and a pressure from friends.
Pressure on pressure, till life nearly ends.
"Pressed into knowing no helper but God;
Pressed into loving the staff and the rod.
Pressed into liberty where nothing clings;
Pressed into faith for impossible things.
Pressed into living a life in the Lord,
Pressed into living a Christ-life outpoured."
The pressure of hard places makes us value life.
Every time our life is given back to us from such
a trial, it is like a new beginning, and we learn
better how much it is worth, and make more of it
for God and man. The pressure helps us to
understand the trials of others, and fits us to
help and sympathize with them.
There is a shallow, superficial nature, that gets
hold of a theory or a promise lightly, and talks
very glibly about the distrust of those who
shrink from every trial; but the man or woman who
has suffered much never does this, but is very
tender and gentle, and knows what suffering
really means. This is what Paul meant when he
said, "Death worketh in you."
Trials and hard places are needed to press us
forward, even as the furnace fires in the hold of
that mighty ship give force that moves the
piston, drives the engine, and propels that great
vessel across the sea in the face of the winds
and waves. --A. B. Simpson
"Out of the presses of pain,
Cometh the soul's best wine;
And the eyes that have shed no rain,
Can shed but little shine."
(19) Attitude of Trust
"And it came to pass, before he had done
speaking...and he said, Blessed be Jehovah…who
hath not forsaken his lovingkindness and his
truth" (Gen. 24:15, 27).
Every right prayer is answered before the prayer
itself is finished--before we have "done
speaking." This is because God has pledged His
Word to us that whatsoever we ask in Christ's
name (that is, in oneness with Christ and His
will) and in faith, shall be done.
As God's Word cannot fail, whenever we meet those
simple conditions in prayer, the answer to our
prayer has been granted and completed in Heaven
as we pray, even though its showing forth on
earth may not occur until long afterward.
So it is well to close every prayer with praise
to God for the answer that He has already
granted; He who never forsakes His
loving-kindness and His truth. (See Daniel
9:20-27 and 10:12.) --Messages for the Morning
Watch
When we believe for a blessing, we must take the
attitude of faith, and begin to act and pray as
if we had the blessing. We must treat God as if
He had given us our request. We must lean our
weight over upon Him for the thing that we have
claimed, and just take it for granted that He
gives it, and is going to continue to give it.
This is the attitude of trust.
When the wife is married, she at once falls into
a new attitude, and acts in accordance with the
fact; and so when we take Christ as our Savior,
as our Sanctifier, as our Healer, or as our
Deliverer, He expects us to fall into the
attitude of recognizing Him in the capacity that
we have claimed, and expect Him to be to us all
that we have trusted Him for. --Selected
"The thing I ask when God doth bid me pray,
Begins in that same act to come my way."
(20) Receive the Cup of Sorrow
"Shall I refuse to drink the cup of sorrow which
the Father has given me to drink?" (John 18:11,
Weymouth).
God takes a thousand times more pains with us
than the artist with his picture, by many touches
of sorrow, and by many colors of circumstance, to
bring us into the form which is the highest and
noblest in His sight, if only we receive His
gifts of myrrh in the right spirit.
But when the cup is put away, and these feelings
are stifled or unheeded, a greater injury is done
to the soul that can ever be amended. For no
heart can conceive in what surpassing love God
giveth us this myrrh; yet this which we ought to
receive to our souls' good we suffer to pass by
us in our sleepy indifference, and nothing comes
of it.
Then we come and complain: "Alas, Lord! I am so
dry, and it is so dark within me!" I tell thee,
dear child, open thy heart to the pain, and it
will do thee more good than if thou wert full of
feeling and devoutness. --Tauler
"The cry of man's anguish went up to God,
'Lord take away pain:
The shadow that darkens the world Thou hast made,
The close-coiling chain
That strangles the heart, the burden that weighs
On the wings that would soar,
Lord, take away pain from the world Thou hast
made,
That it love Thee the more.'
"Then answered the Lord to the cry of His world:
'Shall I take away pain,
And with it the power of the soul to endure,
Made strong by the strain?
Shall I take away pity, that knits heart to heart
And sacrifice high?
Will ye lose all your heroes that lift from the
fire
White brows to the sky?
Shall I take away love that redeems with a price
And smiles at its loss?
Can ye spare from your lives that would climb
unto Me
The Christ on His cross?"
(21) Remember My Song in the Night
"I call to remembrance my song in the night"
(Psalm 77:6).
I have read somewhere of a little bird that will
never sing the melody his master wishes while his
cage is full of light. He learns a snatch of
this, a bar of that, but never an entire song of
its own until the cage is covered and the morning
beams shut out.
A good many people never learn to sing until the
darkling shadows fall. The fabled nightingale
carols with his breast against a thorn. It was in
the night that the song of the angels was heard.
It was at midnight that the cry came, "Behold,
the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him."
Indeed it is extremely doubtful if a soul can
really know the love of God in its richness and
in its comforting, satisfying completeness until
the skies are black and lowering.
Light comes out of darkness, morning out of the
womb of the night.
James Creelman, in one of his letters, describes
his trip through the Balkan States in search of
Natalie, the exiled Queen of Serbia.
"In that memorable journey," he says, "I learned
for the first time that the world's supply of
attar of roses comes from the Balkan Mountains.
And the thing that interested me most," he goes
on, "is that the roses must be gathered in the
darkest hours. The pickers start out at one
o'clock and finish picking them at two.
"At first it seemed to me a relic of
superstition; but I investigated the picturesque
mystery, and learned that actual scientific tests
had proven that fully forty per cent of the
fragrance of roses disappeared in the light of
day."
And in human life and human culture that is not a
playful, fanciful conceit; it is a real veritable
fact. -Malcolm J. McLeod
(22) He Worketh
"He
worketh" (Ps. 37:5).
The
translation that we find in Young of "Commit
thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him; and he
shall bring it to pass," reads: "Roll
upon
Jehovah
thy way; trust upon him: and he worketh."
It
calls our attention to the immediate action of
God
when we truly commit, or roll out of our
hands into His, the burden of whatever kind it
may be; a way of sorrow, of difficulty, of
physical need, or of anxiety for the conversion
of some dear one.
"He
worketh." When? Now. We
are so in danger of
postponing our expectation of His
acceptance of
the trust, and His undertaking to accomplish
what
we ask Him to do, instead of saying as we
commit,
"He
worketh." "He worketh"
even now; and praise
Him that it is so.
The
very expectancy enables the Holy Spirit to do
the very thing we have rolled upon Him. It is
out
of our reach. We are not trying to do it any
more. "He worketh!"
Let
us take the comfort out of it and not put our
hands on it again. Oh, what a relief it brings!
He
is really working on the difficulty.
But
someone may say, "I see no results." Never
mind. "He worketh,"
if you have rolled it over
and are looking to Jesus to do it. Faith may be
tested, but "He worketh";
the Word is sure! --V.
H.
F.
"I
will cry unto God most high; unto God that
performeth
all things for me" (Ps. 57:2).
The
beautiful old translation says, "He shall
perform the cause which I have in hand." Does
not
that make it very real to us today? Just the very
thing that "I have in hand"--my own
particular
bit of work today, this cause that I cannot
manage, this thing that I undertook in
miscalculation of my own powers--this is
what I
may ask Him to do "for me," and rest
assured that
He
will perform it. "The wise and their works are
in the hands of God." --Havergal
The
Lord will go through with His covenant
engagements. Whatever He takes in
hand He will
accomplish; hence past mercies are
guarantees for
the future and admirable reasons for continuing
to cry unto Him. --C. H. Spurgeon
(23) At Wit's End
"At their wit's end, they cry unto the Lord in
their trouble, and he bringeth them out" (Ps.
107:27, 28).
Are you standing at "Wit's End Corner,"
Christian, with troubled brow?
Are you thinking of what is before you,
And all you are bearing now?
Does all the world seem against you,
And you in the battle alone?
Remember--at "Wit's End Corner"
Is just where God's power is shown.
Are you standing at "Wit's End Corner,"
Blinded with wearying pain,
Feeling you cannot endure it,
You cannot bear the strain,
Bruised through the constant suffering,
Dizzy, and dazed, and numb?
Remember--at "Wit's End Corner"
Is where Jesus loves to come.
Are you standing at "Wit's End Corner"?
Your work before you spread,
All lying begun, unfinished,
And pressing on heart and head,
Longing for strength to do it,
Stretching out trembling hands?
Remember--at. "Wit's End Corner"
The Burden-bearer stands.
Are you standing at "Wit's End Corner"?
Then you're just in the very spot
To learn the wondrous resources
Of Him who faileth not:
No doubt to a brighter pathway
Your footsteps will soon be moved,
But only at "Wit's End Corner"
Is the "God who is able" proved.
--Antoinette Wilson
Do not get discouraged; it may be the last key in
the bunch that opens the door. Stansifer
(24) Wait on God's Time
"Sarah bare Abraham a son in his old age, at the
set time of which God had spoken to him" (Gen.
21:2).
The counsel of the Lord standeth forever, the
thoughts of His heart to all generations" (Psalm
33:11). But we must be prepared to wait God's
time. God has His set times. It is not for us to
know them; indeed, we cannot know them; we must
wait for them.
If God had told Abraham in Haran that he must
wait for thirty years until he pressed the
promised child to his bosom, his heart would have
failed him. So, in gracious love, the length of
the weary years was hidden, and only as they were
nearly spent, and there were only a few more
months to wait, God told him that "according to
the time of life, Sarah shall have a son." (Gen.
18:14.)
The set time came at last; and then the laughter
that filled the patriarch's home made the aged
pair forget the long and weary vigil.
Take heart, waiting one, thou waitest for One who
cannot disappoint thee; and who will not be five
minutes behind the appointed moment: ere long
"your sorrow shall be turned into joy."
Ah, happy soul, when God makes thee laugh! Then
sorrow and crying shall flee away forever, as
darkness before the dawn. --Selected
It is not for us who are passengers, to meddle
with the chart and with the compass. Let that
all-skilled Pilot alone with His own work.
--Hall
"Some things cannot be done in a day. God does
not make a sunset glory in a moment, but for days
may be massing the mist out of which He builds
His palaces beautiful in the west."
"Some glorious morn--but when? Ah, who shall say?
The steepest mountain will become a plain,
And the parched land be satisfied with rain.
The gates of brass all broken; iron bars,
Transfigured, form a ladder to the stars.
Rough places plain, and crooked ways all
straight,
For him who with a patient heart can wait.
These things shall be on God's appointed day:
It may not be tomorrow--yet it may."