Eternal Glory Struggles

(1) Eternal Glory Struggles

"I endure all things for the sake of God's own people; so that they also may obtain salvation...and with it eternal glory" (2 Tim. 2:10, Weymouth).

If Job could have known as he sat there in the ashes, bruising his heart on this problem of Providence--that in the trouble that had come upon him he was doing what one man may do to work out the problem for the world, he might again have taken courage. No man lives to himself. Job's life is but your life and mine written in larger text....So, then, though we may not know what trials wait on any of us, we can believe that, as the days in which Job wrestled with his dark maladies are the only days that make him worth remembrance, and but for which his name had never been written in the book of life, so the days through which we struggle, finding no way, but never losing the light, will be the most significant we are called to live. --Robert Collyer

Who does not know that our most sorrowful days have been amongst our best? When the face is wreathed in smiles and we trip lightly over meadows bespangled with spring flowers, the heart is often running to waste.

The soul which is always blithe and gay misses the deepest life. It has its reward, and it is satisfied to its measure, though that measure is a very scanty one. But the heart is dwarfed; and the nature, which is capable of the highest heights, the deepest depths, is undeveloped; and life presently burns down to its socket without having known the resonance of the deepest chords of joy.

"Blessed are they that mourn." Stars shine brightest in the long dark night of winter. The gentians show their fairest bloom amid almost inaccessible heights of snow and ice.

God's promises seem to wait for the pressure of pain to trample out their richest juice as in a wine-press. Only those who have sorrowed know how tender is the "Man of Sorrows." --Selected

Thou hast but little sunshine, but thy long glooms are wisely appointed thee; for perhaps a stretch of summer weather would have made thee as a parched land and barren wilderness. Thy Lord knows best, and He has the clouds and the sun at His disposal. --Selected

"It is a gray day." "Yes, but dinna ye see the patch of blue?" --Scotch Shoemaker
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(2) Praise in Advance

"Spring up, O well; sing ye unto it" (Num.
21:17).

This was a strange song and a strange well. They had been traveling over the desert's barren sands, no water was in sight and they were famishing with thirst. Then God spake to Moses and said:

"Gather the people together, and I will give them water," and this is how it came.

They gathered in circles on the sands. They took their staves and dug deep down into the burning earth and as they dug, they sang,

"Spring up, O well, sing ye unto it," and lo, there came a gurgling sound, a rush of water and a flowing stream which filled the well and ran along the ground.

When they dug this well in the desert, they touched the stream that was running beneath, and reached the flowing tides that had long been out of sight.

How beautiful the picture given, telling us of the river of blessing that flows all through our lives, and we have only to reach by faith and praise to find our wants supplied in the most barren desert.

How did they reach the waters of this well? It was by praise. They sang upon the sand their song of faith, while with their staff of promise they dug the well.

Our praise will still open fountains in the desert, when murmuring will only bring us judgment, and even prayer may fail to reach the fountains of blessing.

There is nothing that pleases the Lord so much as praise. There is no test of faith so true as the grace of thanksgiving. Are you praising God enough? Are you thanking Him for your actual blessings that are more than can be numbered, and are you daring to praise Him even for those trials which are but blessings in disguise? Have you learned to praise Him in advance for the things that have not yet come? --Selected

"Thou waitest for deliverance!
O soul, thou waitest long!
Believe that now deliverance
Doth wait for thee in song!

"Sigh not until deliverance
Thy fettered feet doth free:
With songs of glad deliverance
God now doth compass thee."
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(3) He Satisfies Our Soul

"Bring them hither to me" (Matt. 14:18.).

Are you encompassed with needs at this very moment, and almost overwhelmed with difficulties, trials, and emergencies? These are all divinely provided vessels for the Holy Spirit to fill, and if you but rightly understood their meaning, they would become opportunities for receiving new blessings and deliverances which you can get in no other way.

Bring these vessels to God. Hold them steadily before Him in faith and prayer. Keep still, and stop your own restless working until He begins to work. Do nothing that He does not Himself command you to do. Give Him a chance to work, and He will surely do so; and the very trials that threatened to overcome you with discouragement and disaster, will become God's opportunity for the revelation of His grace and glory in your life, as you have never known Him before. "Bring them (all needs) to me." --A. B. Simpson

"My God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus" (Phil.
4:19).

What a source--"God!" What a supply--"His riches in glory!" What a channel--"Christ Jesus!" It is your sweet privilege to place all your need over against His riches, and lose sight of the former in the presence of the latter. His exhaustless treasury is thrown open to you, in all the love of His heart; go and draw upon it, in the artless simplicity of faith, and you will never have occasion to look to a creature-stream, or lean on a creature-prop. --C. H. M.

"MY CUP RUNNETH OVER"

There is always something over, When we trust our gracious Lord; Every cup He fills o'erfloweth, His great rivers all are broad. Nothing narrow, nothing stinted, Ever issues from His store; To His own He gives full measure, Running over, evermore.

There is always something over, When we, from the Father's hand, Take our portion with thanksgiving, Praising for the path He planned. Satisfaction, full and deepening, Fills the soul, and lights the eye, When the heart has trusted Jesus All its need to satisfy.

There is always something over, When we tell of all His love; Unplumbed depths still lie beneath us, Unsealed heights rise far above: Human lips can never utter All His wondrous tenderness, We can only praise and wonder, And His name forever bless. --Margaret E. Barber

"How can He but, in giving Him, lavish on us all things" (Rom. 8:32).
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(4) Cling to God in Faith

"I will not let thee go, except thou bless me ... and he blessed him there." (Gen. 32:26, 29.)

Jacob got the victory and the blessing not by wrestling, but by clinging. His limb was out of joint and he could struggle no longer, but he would not let go. Unable to wrestle, he wound his arms around the neck of his mysterious antagonist and hung all his helpless weight upon him, until at last he conquered.

We will not get victory in prayer until we too cease our struggling, giving up our own will and throw our arms about our Father's neck in clinging faith.

What can puny human strength take by force out of the hand of Omnipotence? Can we wrest blessing by force from God? It is never the violence of wilfulness that prevails with God. It is the might of clinging faith, that gets the blessing and the victories. It is not when we press and urge our own will, but when humility and trust unite in saying, "Not my will, but Thine." We are strong with God only in the degree that self is conquered and is dead. Not by wrestling, but by clinging can we get the blessing. --J. R. Miller

An incident from the prayer life of Charles H. Usher (illustrating "soul-cling" as a hindrance to prevailing prayer): "My little boy was very ill. The doctors held out little hope of his recovery. I had used all the knowledge of prayer which I possessed on his behalf, but he got worse and worse. This went on for several weeks.

"One day I stood watching him as he lay in his cot, and I saw that he could not live long unless he had a turn for the better. I said to God, 'O God, I have given much time in prayer for my boy and he gets no better; I must now leave him to Thee, and I will give myself to prayer for others. If it is Thy will to take him, I choose Thy will--I surrender him entirely to Thee.'

"I called in my dear wife, and told her what I had done. She shed some tears, but handed him over to God. Two days afterwards a man of God came to see us. He had been very interested in our boy Frank, and had been much in prayer for him.

"He said, 'God has given me faith to believe that he will recover--have you faith?'

"I said, 'I have surrendered him to God, but I will go again to God regarding him.' I did; and in prayer I discovered that I had faith for his recovery. From that time he began to get better. It was the 'soul-cling' in my prayers which had hindered God answering; and if I had continued to cling and had been unwilling to surrender him, I doubt if my boy would be with me today.

"Child of God! If you want God to answer your prayers, you must be prepared to follow the footsteps of 'our father Abraham,' even to the Mount of Sacrifice." (See Rom. 4:12.)
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(5) Secret Prayer

"I have called you friends" (John 15:15).

Years ago there was an old German professor whose beautiful life was a marvel to his students. Some of them resolved to know the secret of it; so one of their number hid in the study where the old professor spent his evenings.

It was late when the teacher came in. He was very tired, but he sat down and spent an hour with his Bible. Then he bowed his head in secret prayer; and finally closing the Book of books, he said,

"Well, Lord Jesus, we're on the same old terms."

To know Him is life's highest attainment; and at all costs, every Christian should strive to be "on the same old terms with Him."

The reality of Jesus comes as a result of secret prayer, and a personal study of the Bible that is devotional and sympathetic. Christ becomes more real to the one who persists in the cultivation of His presence.

Speak thou to Him for He heareth, And spirit with spirit will meet! Nearer is He than breathing, Nearer than hands and feet. --Maltbie D. Babcock
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(6) School of Sorrow

"And no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth" (Rev. 14:3).

There are songs which can only be learned in the valley. No art can teach them; no rules of voice can make them perfectly sung. Their music is in the heart. They are songs of memory, of personal experience. They bring out their burden from the shadow of the past; they mount on the wings of yesterday.

St. John says that even in Heaven there will be a song that can only be fully sung by the sons of earth--the strain of redemption. Doubtless it is a song of triumph, a hymn of victory to the Christ who made us free. But the sense of triumph must come from the memory of the chain.

No angel, no archangel can sing it so sweetly as I can. To sing it as I sing it, they must pass through my exile, and this they cannot do. None can learn it but the children of the Cross.

And so, my soul, thou art receiving a music lesson from thy Father. Thou art being educated for the choir invisible. There are parts of the symphony that none can take but thee.

There are chords too minor for the angels. There may be heights in the symphony which are beyond the scale--heights which angels alone can reach; but there are depths which belong to thee, and can only be touched by thee.

Thy Father is training thee for the part the angels cannot sing; and the school is sorrow. I have heard many say that He sends sorrow to prove thee; nay, He sends sorrow to educate thee, to train thee for the choir invisible.

In the night He is preparing thy song. In the valley He is tuning thy voice. In the cloud He is deepening thy chords. In the rain He is sweetening thy melody. In the cold He is moulding thy expression. In the transition from hope to fear He is perfecting thy lights.

Despise not thy school of sorrow, O my soul; it will give thee a unique part in the universal song. --George Matheson

"Is the midnight closing round you? Are the shadows dark and long? Ask Him to come close beside you, And He'll give you a new, sweet song. He'll give it and sing it with you; And when weakness lets it down, He'll take up the broken cadence, And blend it with His own.

"And many a rapturous minstrel
Among those sons of light,
Will say of His sweetest music
'I learned it in the night.'
And many a rolling anthem,
That fills the Father's home,
Sobbed out its first rehearsal, In the shade of a darkened room."

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(7) Character with Age

"Like a shock of corn fully ripe" (Job 5:26).

A gentleman, writing about the breaking up of old ships, recently said that it is not the age alone which improves the quality of the fiber in the wood of an old vessel, but the straining and wrenching of the vessel by the sea, the chemical action of the bilge water, and of many kinds of cargoes.

Some planks and veneers made from an oak beam which had been part of a ship eighty years old were exhibited a few years ago at a fashionable furniture store on Broadway, New York, and attracted general notice for the exquisite coloring and beautiful grain.

Equally striking were some beams of mahogany taken from a bark which sailed the seas sixty years ago. The years and the traffic had contracted the pores and deepened the color, until it looked as superb in its chromatic intensity as an antique Chinese vase. It was made into a cabinet, and has today a place of honor in the drawing-room of a wealthy New York family.

So there is a vast difference between the quality of old people who have lived flabby, self-indulgent, useless lives, and the fiber of those who have sailed all seas and carried all cargoes as the servants of God and the helpers of their fellow men.

Not only the wrenching and straining of life, but also something of the sweetness of the cargoes carried get into the very pores and fiber of character. --Louis Albert Banks

When the sun goes below the horizon he is not set; the heavens glow for a full hour after his departure. And when a great and good man sets, the sky of this world is luminous long after he is out of sight. Such a man cannot die out of this world. When he goes he leaves behind him much of himself. Being dead, he speaks. --Beecher

When Victor Hugo was past eighty years of age he gave expression to his religious faith in these sublime sentences: "I feel in myself the future life. I am like a forest which has been more than once cut down. The new shoots are livelier than ever. I am rising toward the sky. The sunshine is on my head. The earth gives me its generous sap, but Heaven lights me with its unknown worlds.

"You say the soul is nothing but the resultant of the bodily powers. Why, then, is my soul more luminous when my bodily powers begin to fail? Winter is on my head, but eternal spring is in my heart. I breathe at this hour the fragrance of the lilacs, the violets, and the roses as at twenty years. The nearer I approach the end the plainer I hear around me the immortal symphonies of the worlds which invite me. It is marvelous, yet simple."

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(8) Why Dost Thou Worry Thyself?

"This is the rest wherewith ye may cause the weary to rest; and this is the refreshing" (Isa.
28:12).

Why dost thou worry thyself? What use can thy fretting serve? Thou art on board a vessel which thou couldst not steer even if the great Captain put thee at the helm, of which thou couldst not so much as reef a sail, yet thou worriest as if thou wert captain and helmsman. Oh, be quiet; God is Master!

Dost thou think that all this din and hurly-burly that is abroad betokens that God has left His throne?

No, man, His coursers rush furiously on, and His chariot is the storm; but there is a bit between their jaws, and He holds the reins, and guides them as He wills! Jehovah is Master yet; believe it; peace be unto thee! be not afraid. --C. H. Spurgeon

"Tonight, my soul, be still and sleep; The storms are raging on God's deep-- God's deep, not thine; be still and sleep.

"Tonight, my soul, be still and sleep; God's hands shall still the tempter's sweep-- God's hands, not thine; be still and sleep.

"Tonight, my soul, be still and sleep; God's love is strong while night hours creep-- God's love, not thine; be still and sleep.

"Tonight, my soul, be still and sleep; God's heaven will comfort those who weep-- God's heaven, not thine; be still and sleep."

I entreat you, give no place to despondency. This is a dangerous temptation--a refined, not a gross temptation of the adversary. Melancholy contracts and withers the heart, and renders it unfit to receive the impressions of grace. It magnifies and gives a false coloring to objects, and thus renders your burdens too heavy to bear. God's designs regarding you, and His methods of bringing about these designs, are infinitely wise. --Madame Guyon
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(9) Greatest Gifts Come Through Travail

"For Abraham, when hope was gone, hoped on in faith. His faith never quailed" (Rom. 4:18-19).

We shall never forget a remark that George Mueller once made to a gentleman who had asked him the best way to have strong faith.

"The only way," replied the patriarch of faith, "to learn strong faith is to endure great trials. I have learned my faith by standing firm amid severe testings." This is very true. The time to trust is when all else fails.

Dear one, you scarcely realize the value of your present opportunity; if you are passing through great afflictions you are in the very soul of the strongest faith, and if you will only let go, He will teach you in these hours the mightiest hold upon His throne which you can ever know.

"Be not afraid, only believe." And if you are afraid, just look up and say, "What time I am afraid I will trust in thee," and you will yet thank God for the school of sorrow which was to you the school of faith. --A. B. Simpson

"Great faith must have great trials."

"God's greatest gifts come through travail. Whether we look into the spiritual or temporal sphere, can we discover anything, any great reform, any beneficent discovery, any soul-awakening revival, which did not come through the toils and tears, the vigils and blood-shedding of men and women whose sufferings were the pangs of its birth? If the temple of God is raised, David must bear sore afflictions; if the Gospel of the grace of God is to be disentangled from Jewish tradition, Paul's life must be one long agony."

"Take heart, O weary, burdened one, bowed down Beneath thy cross; Remember that thy greatest gain may come Through greatest loss. Thy life is nobler for a sacrifice, And more divine. Acres of bloom are crushed to make a drop Of perfume fine.

"Because of storms that lash the ocean waves, The waters there Keep purer than if the heavens o'erhead Were always fair. The brightest banner of the skies floats not At noonday warm; The rainbow traileth after thunder-clouds, And after storm."
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(10) God Works in the Dark

"The Lord caused the sea to go back…all that night" (Exod. 14:21).

In this verse there is a comforting message showing how God works in the dark. The real work of God for the children of Israel, was not when they awakened and found that they could get over the Red Sea; but it was "all that night."

So there may be a great working in your life when it all seems dark and you cannot see or trace, but yet God is working. Just as truly did He work "all that night," as all the next day. The next day simply manifested what God had done during the night. Is there anyone reading these lines who may have gotten to a place where it seems dark? You believe to see, but you are not seeing. In your life-progress there is not constant victory; the daily, undisturbed communion is not there, and all seems dark.

"The Lord caused the sea to go back…all that night." Do not forget that it was "all that night." God works all the night, until the light comes. You may not see it, but all that "night" in your life, as you believe God, He works. --C.
H. P.

"All that night" the Lord was working, Working in the tempest blast, Working with the swelling current, Flooding, flowing, free and fast.

"All that night" God's children waited-- Hearts, perhaps in agony With the enemy behind them, And, in front, the cruel sea.

"All that night" seemed blacker darkness Than they ever saw before, Though the light of God's own presence Near them was, and sheltered o'er.

"All that night" that weary vigil Passed; the day at last did break, And they saw that God was working "All that night" a path to make.

"All that night," O child of sorrow, Canst thou not thy heartbreak stay? Know thy God in darkest midnight Works, as well as in the day.
--L. S. P.

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(11) Potent Prayers

"Make thy petition deep" (Isa. 7:11, margin).

Make thy petition deep, O heart of mine, Thy God can do much more Than thou canst ask; Launch out on the Divine, Draw from His love-filled store. Trust Him with everything; Begin today, And find the joy that comes When Jesus has His way! --Selected

We must keep on praying and waiting upon the Lord, until the sound of a mighty rain is heard. There is no reason why we should not ask for large things; and without doubt we shall get large things if we ask in faith, and have the courage to wait with patient perservance upon Him, meantime doing those things which lie within our power to do.

We cannot create the wind or set it in motion, but we can set our sails to catch it when it comes; we cannot make the electricity, but we can stretch the wire along upon which it is to run and do its work; we cannot, in a word, control the Spirit, but we can so place ourselves before the Lord, and so do the things He has bidden us do, that we will come under the influence and power of His mighty breath. --Selected

"Cannot the same wonders be done now as of old? Where is the God of Elijah. He is waiting for Elijah to call on Him."

The greatest saints who ever lived, whether under the Old or New Dispensation, are on a level which is quite within our reach. The same forces of the spiritual world which were at their command, and the exertion of which made them such spiritual heroes, are open to us also. If we had the same faith, the same hope, the same love which they exhibited, we would achieve marvels as great as those which they achieved. A word of prayer in our mouths would be as potent to call down the gracious dews and melting fires of God's Spirit, as it was in Elijah's mouth to call down literal rain and fire, if we could only speak the word with that full assurance of faith wherewith he said it. --Dr. Goulburn, Dean of Norwich
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(12) Go Not Without Prayer

"Watch unto prayer" (1 Peter 4:7).

Go not, my friend, into the dangerous world without prayer. You kneel down at night to pray, drowsiness weighs down your eyelids; a hard day's work is a kind of excuse, and you shorten your prayer, and resign yourself softly to repose. The morning breaks; and it may be you rise late, and so your early devotions are not done, or are done with irregular haste.

No watching unto prayer! Wakefulness once more omitted; and now is that reparable? We solemnly believe not.

There has been that done which cannot be undone. You have given up your prayer, and you will suffer for it.

Temptation is before you, and you are not ready to meet it. There is a guilty feeling on the soul, and you linger at a distance from God. It is no marvel if that day in which you suffer drowsiness to interfere with prayer be a day in which you shrink from duty.

Moments of prayer intruded on by sloth cannot be made up. We may get experience, but we cannot get back the rich freshness and strength which were wrapped up in those moments. --Frederick W. Robertson.

If Jesus, the strong Son of God, felt it necessary to rise before the breaking of the day to pour out His heart to God in prayer, how much more ought you to pray unto Him who is the Giver of every good and perfect gift, and who has promised all things necessary for our good.

What Jesus gathered into His life from His prayers we can never know; but this we do know, that the prayerless life is a powerless life. A prayerless life may be a noisy life, and fuss around a great deal; but such a life is far removed from Him who, by day and night, prayed to God. --Selected
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(13) Fill the Night With Song

"Where is God my maker, who giveth songs in the night" (Job 35:10).

Do you have sleepless nights, tossing on the hot pillow, and watching for the first glint of dawn? Ask the Divine Spirit to enable you to fix your thoughts on God your Maker, and believe that He can fill those lonely, dreary hours with song.

Is yours the night of bereavement? Is it not often at such a time that God draws near, and assures the mourner that the Lord has need of the departed loved one, and called "the eager, earnest spirit to stand in the bright throng of the invisible, liberated, radiant, active, intent on some high mission"; and as the thought enters, is there not the beginning of a song?

Is yours the night of discouragement and fancied or actual failure? No one understands you, your friends reproach; but your Maker draws nigh, and gives you a song--a song of hope, the song which is harmonious with the strong, deep music of His providence. Be ready to sing the songs that your Maker gives. --Selected

"What then? Shall we sit idly down and say The night hath come; it is no longer day? Yet as the evening twilight fades away, The sky is filled with stars, invisible to day."

The strength of the vessel can be demonstrated only by the hurricane, and the power of the Gospel can be fully shown only when the Christian is subjected to some fiery trial. If God would make manifest the fact that "He giveth songs in the night," He must first make it night. --William Taylor
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(14) Faith Can Change Any Situation

"For every child of God overcomes the world: and the victorious principle which has overcome the world is our faith" (1 John 5:4, Weymouth).

At every turn in the road one can find something that will rob him of his victory and peace of mind, if he permits it. Satan is a long way from having retired from the business of deluding and ruining God's children if he can. At every milestone it is well to look carefully to the thermometer of one's experience, to see whether the temperature is well up.

Sometimes a person can, if he will, actually snatch victory from the very jaws of defeat, if he will resolutely put his faith up at just the right moment.

Faith can change any situation. No matter how dark it is, no matter what the trouble may be, a quick lifting of the heart to God in a moment of real, actual faith in Him, will alter the situation in a moment.

God is still on His throne, and He can turn defeat into victory in a second of time, if we really trust Him.

"God is mighty! He is able to deliver; Faith can victor be in every trying hour; Fear and care and sin and sorrow be defeated By our faith in God's almighty, conquering power.

"Have faith in God, the sun will shine, Though dark the clouds may be today; His heart has planned your path and mine, Have faith in God, have faith alway."

"When one has faith, one does not retire; one stops the enemy where he finds him." --Marshal Foch
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(15) The Eagle That Soars

"Feed on his faithfulness" (Ps. 37:3, RV).

I once met a poor colored woman, who earned a precarious living by hard daily labor; but who was a joyous triumphant Christian. "Ah, Nancy," said a gloomy Christian lady to her one day, "it is well enough to be happy now; but I should think the thoughts of your future would sober you.

"Only suppose, for instance, you should have a spell of sickness, and be unable to work; or suppose your present employers should move away, and no one else should give you anything to do; or suppose--"

"Stop!" cried Nancy, "I never supposes. De Lord is my Shepherd, and I knows I shall not want. And, Honey," she added, to her gloomy friend, "it's all dem supposes as is makin' you so mis'able. You'd better give dem all up, and just trust de Lord."

There is one text that will take all the "supposes" out of a believer's life, if it be received and acted on in childlike faith; it is Hebrews 13:5, 6: "Be content with such things as ye have: for He hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me." --H. W. S.

"There's a stream of trouble across my path; It is black and deep and wide. Bitter the hour the future hath When I cross its swelling tide. But I smile and sing and say: 'I will hope and trust alway; I'll bear the sorrow that comes tomorrow, But I'll borrow none today.'

"Tomorrow's bridge is a dangerous thing; I dare not cross it now. I can see its timbers sway and swing, And its arches reel and bow. O heart, you must hope alway; You must sing and trust and say: 'I'll bear the sorrow that comes tomorrow, But I'll borrow none today."'

The eagle that soars in the upper air does not worry itself as to how it is to cross rivers. --Selected
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(16) God Meant It Unto Good

"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God" (Rom. 8:28).

How wide is this assertion of the Apostle Paul! He does not say, "We know that some things," or "most things," or "joyous things," but "ALL things." From the minutest to the most momentous; from the humblest event in daily providence to the great crisis hours in grace.

And all things "work'--they are working; not all things have worked, or shall work; but it is a present operation.

At this very moment, when some voice may be saying, "Thy judgments are a great deep," the angels above, who are watching the development of the great plan, are with folded wings exclaiming, "The Lord is righteous in all his ways, and holy in all his works." (Ps. 145:17)

And then all things "work together." It is a beautiful blending. Many different colors, in themselves raw and unsightly, are required in order to weave the harmonious pattern.

Many separate tones and notes of music, even discords and dissonances, are required to make up the harmonious anthem.

Many separate wheels and joints are required to make the piece of machinery. Take a thread separately, or a note separately, or a wheel or a tooth of a wheel separately, and there may be neither use nor beauty discernible.

But complete the web, combine the notes, put together the separate parts of steel and iron, and you see how perfect and symmetrical is the result. Here is the lesson for faith: "What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter." --Macduff

In one thousand trials it is not five hundred of them that work for the believer's good, but nine hundred and ninety-nine of them, and one beside. --George Mueller

"GOD MEANT IT UNTO GOOD" (Gen. 50:20).

"God meant it unto good"--O blest assurance, Falling like sunshine all across life's way, Touching with Heaven's gold earth's darkest storm clouds, Bringing fresh peace and comfort day by day.

'Twas not by chance the hands of faithless brethren Sold Joseph captive to a foreign land; Nor was it chance which, after years of suffering, Brought him before the monarch's throne to stand.

One Eye all-seeing saw the need of thousands, And planned to meet it through that one lone soul; And through the weary days of prison bondage Was working towards the great and glorious goal.

As yet the end was hidden from the captive, The iron entered even to his soul; His eye could scan the present path of sorrow, Not yet his gaze might rest upon the whole.

Faith failed not through those long, dark days of waiting, His trust in God was recompensed at last, The moment came when God led forth his servant To succour many, all his sufferings past.

"It was not you but God, that sent me hither," Witnessed triumphant faith in after days; "God meant it unto good," no "second causes" Mingled their discord with his song of praise.

"God means it unto good" for thee, beloved, The God of Joseph is the same today; His love permits afflictions strange and bitter, His hand is guiding through the unknown way.

Thy Lord, who sees the end from the beginning, Hath purposes for thee of love untold. Then place thy hand in His and follow fearless, Till thou the riches of His grace behold.

There, when thou standest in the Home of Glory, And all life's path ties open to thy gaze, Thine eyes shall see the hand which now thou trustest, And magnify His love through endless days. --Freda Hanbury Allen

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(17) Gentleness of Spirit

"The servant of the Lord must be gentle" (2 Tim.
2:24).

When God conquers us and takes all the flint out of our nature, and we get deep visions into the Spirit of Jesus, we then see as never before the great rarity of gentleness of spirit in this dark and unheavenly world.

The graces of the Spirit do not settle themselves down upon us by chance, and if we do not discern certain states of grace, and choose them, and in our thoughts nourish them, they never become fastened in our nature or behavior.

Every advance step in grace must be preceded by first apprehending it, and then a prayerful resolve to have it.

So few are willing to undergo the suffering out of which thorough gentleness comes. We must die before we are turned into gentleness, and crucifixion involves suffering; it is a real breaking and crushing of self, which wrings the heart and conquers the mind.

There is a good deal of mere mental and logical sanctification nowadays, which is only a religious fiction. It consists of mentally putting one's self on the altar, and then mentally saying the altar sanctifies the gift, and then logically concluding therefore one is sanctified; and such an one goes forth with a gay, flippant, theological prattle about the deep things of God.

But the natural heartstrings have not been snapped, and the Adamic flint has not been ground to powder, and the bosom has not throbbed with the lonely, surging sighs of Gethsemane; and not having the real death marks of Calvary, there cannot be that soft, sweet, gentle, floating, victorious, overflowing, triumphant life that flows like a spring morning from an empty tomb.
--G. D. W.

"And great grace was upon them all" (Acts 4:33).

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(18) Sweetness of the Storm

"In everything ye are enriched by him" (1 Cor.
1:5).

Have you ever seen men and women whom some disaster drove to a great act of prayer, and by and by the disaster was forgotten, but the sweetness of religion remained and warmed their souls?

So have I seen a storm in later spring; and all was black, save where the lightning tore the cloud with thundering rent.

The winds blew and the rains fell, as though heaven had opened its windows. What a devastation there was! Not a spider's web that was out of doors escaped the storm, which tore up even the strong-branched oak.

But ere long the lightning had gone by, the thunder was spent and silent, the rain was over, the western wind came up with its sweet breath, the clouds were chased away, and the retreating storm threw a scarf of rainbows over her fair shoulders and resplendent neck, and looked back and smiled, and so withdrew and passed out of sight.

But for weeks long the fields held up their bands full of ambrosial flowers, and all the summer through the grass was greener, the brooks were fuller, and the trees cast a more umbrageous shade, because the storm passed by--though all the rest of the earth had long ago forgotten the storm, its rainbows and its rain. --Theodore Parker

God may not give us an easy journey to the Promised Land, but He will give us a safe one. --Bonar

It was a storm that occasioned the discovery of the gold mines of India. Hath not a storm driven some to the discovery of the richer mines of the love of God in Christ?

Is it raining, little flower?
Be glad of rain;
Too much sun would wither thee; 'Twill shine again. The clouds are very black, 'tis true; But just behind them shines the blue.

Art thou weary, tender heart?
Be glad of pain:
In sorrow sweetest virtues grow, As flowers in rain. God watches, and thou wilt have sun, When clouds their perfect work have done. --Lucy Larcom

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(19) It's Raining Blessing

"For God hath made me fruitful in the land of my affliction" (Gen. 41:52).

The summer showers are falling. The poet stands by the window watching them. They are beating and buffeting the earth with their fierce downpour. But the poet sees in his imaginings more than the showers which are falling before his eyes. He sees myriads of lovely flowers which shall be soon breaking forth from the watered earth, filling it with matchless beauty and fragrance. And so he sings:

"It isn't raining rain for me, it's raining daffodils; In every dimpling drop I see wild flowers upon the hills. A cloud of gray engulfs the day, and overwhelms the town; It isn't raining rain for me: it's raining roses down."

Perchance some one of God's chastened children is even now saying, "O God, it is raining hard for me tonight.

"Testings are raining upon me which seem beyond my power to endure. Disappointments are raining fast, to the utter defeat of all my chosen plans. Bereavements are raining into my life which are making my shrinking heart quiver in its intensity of suffering. The rain of affliction is surely beating down upon my soul these days."

Withal, friend, you are mistaken. It isn't raining rain for you. It's raining blessing. For, if you will but believe your Father's Word, under that beating rain are springing up spiritual flowers of such fragrance and beauty as never before grew in that stormless, unchastened life of yours.

You indeed see the rain. But do you see also the flowers? You are pained by the testings. But God sees the sweet flower of faith which is upspringing in your life under those very trials.

You shrink from the suffering. But God sees the tender compassion for other sufferers which is finding birth in your soul.

Your heart winces under the sore bereavement. But God sees the deepening and enriching which that sorrow has brought to you.

It isn't raining afflictions for you. It is raining tenderness, love, compassion, patience, and a thousand other flowers and fruits of the blessed Spirit, which are bringing into your life such a spiritual enrichment as all the fullness of worldly prosperity and ease was never able to beget in your innermost soul. --J. M. McC.

SONGS ACROSS THE STORM

"A harp stood in the moveless air, Where showers of sunshine washed a thousand fragrant blooms; A traveler bowed with loads of care Essayed from morning till the dusk of evening glooms To thrum sweet sounds from the songless strings; The pilgrim strives in vain with each unanswering chord, Until the tempest's thunder sings, And, moving on the storm, the fingers of the Lord

A wondrous melody awakes;
And though the battling winds their soldier deeds perform, Their trumpet-sound brave music makes While God's assuring voice sings love across the storm"

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(20) Prayer Will Be Answered

"My expectation is from him" (Ps. 62:5).

Our too general neglect of looking for answers to what we ask, shows how little we are in earnest in our petitions. A husbandman is not content without the harvest; a marksman will observe whether the ball hits the target; a physician watches the effect of the medicine which he gives; and shall the Christian be careless about the effect of his labor?

Every prayer of the Christian, made in faith, according to the will of God, for which God has promised, offered up in the name of Jesus Christ, and under the influence of the Spirit, whether for temporal or for spiritual blessings, is, or will be, fully answered.

God always answers the general design and intention of His people's prayers, in doing that which, all things considered, is most for His own glory and their spiritual and eternal welfare. As we never find that Jesus Christ rejected a single supplicant who came to Him for mercy, so we believe that no prayer made in His name will be in vain.

The answer to prayer may be approaching, though we discern not its coming. The seed that lies under ground in winter is taking root in order to a spring and harvest, though it appears not above ground, but seems dead and lost. --Bickersteth

Delayed answers to prayer are not only trials of faith, but they give us opportunities of honoring God by our steadfast confidence in Him under apparent repulses. --C. H. Spurgeon

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(21) Fluttering Spirit

"And there was a voice from the firmament that was over their heads, when they stood, and had let down their wings" (Ezek. 1:25).

That is the letting down of the wings? People so often say, "How do you get the voice of the Lord?" Here is the secret. They heard the voice when they stood and let down their wings.

We have seen a bird with fluttering wings; though standing still, its wings are fluttering. But here we are told they heard the voice when they stood and had let down their wings.

Do we not sometimes kneel or sit before the Lord and yet feel conscious of a fluttering of our spirits? Not a real stillness in His presence.

A dear one told me several days ago of a certain thing she prayed about, "But," said she, "I did not wait until the answer came."

She did not get still enough to hear Him speak, but went away and followed her own thought in the matter. And the result proved disastrous and she had to retrace her steps.

Oh, how much energy is wasted! How much time is lost by not letting down the wings of our spirit and getting very quiet before Him! Oh, the calm, the rest, the peace which come as we wait In His presence until we hear from Him!

Then, ah then, we can go like lightning, and turn not as we go but go straight forward whithersoever the Spirit goes. (Ezek. 1:1, 20)

"Be still! Just now be still!
Something thy soul hath never heard, Something unknown to any song of bird, Something unknown to any wind, or wave, or star,

A message from the Fatherland afar, That with sweet joy the homesick soul shall thrill, Cometh to thee if thou canst but be still.

"Be still! Just now be still!
There comes a presence very mild and sweet; White are the sandals of His noiseless feet. It is the Comforter whom Jesus sent To teach thee what the words He uttered meant. The willing, waiting spirit, He doth fill. If thou would'st hear His message, Dear soul, be still!"

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(22) Limp Hands and Feeble Knees

Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees; and make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way; but let it rather be healed" (Heb.
12:12-13).

This is God's word of encouragement to us to lift up the hands of faith, and confirm the knees of prayer. Often our faith grows tired, languid, and relaxed, and our prayers lose their force and effectiveness.

The figure used here is a very striking one. The idea seems to be that we become discouraged and so timid that a little obstacle depresses and frightens us, and we are tempted to walk around it, and not face it: to take the easier way.

Perhaps it is some physical trouble that God is ready to heal, but the exertion is hard, or it is easier to secure some human help, or walk around in some other way.

There are many ways of walking around emergencies instead of going straight through them. How often we come up against something that appalls us, and we want to evade the issue with the excuse:

"I am not quite ready for that now." Some sacrifice is to be made, some obedience demanded, some Jericho to be taken, some soul that we have not the courage to claim and carry through, some prayer that is hanging fire, or perhaps some physical trouble that is half healed and we are walking around it.

God says, "Lift up the hands that hang down." March straight through the flood, and lo, the waters will divide, the Red Sea will open, the Jordan will part, and the Lord will lead you through to victory.

Don't let your feet "be turned out of the way," but let your body "be healed," your faith strengthened. Go right ahead and leave no Jericho behind you unconquered and no place where Satan can say that he was too much for you. This is a profitable lesson and an intensely practical one. How often have we been in that place. Perhaps you are there today. --A. B. Simpson

Pay as little attention to discouragement as possible. Plough ahead as a steamer does, rough or smooth--rain or shine. To carry your cargo and make your port is the point. --Maltbie D. Babcock

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(23) Gentleness of Spirit

"The servant of the Lord must be gentle" (2 Tim.
2:24).

When God conquers us and takes all the flint out of our nature, and we get deep visions into the Spirit of Jesus, we then see as never before the great rarity of gentleness of spirit in this dark and unheavenly world.

The graces of the Spirit do not settle themselves down upon us by chance, and if we do not discern certain states of grace, and choose them, and in our thoughts nourish them, they never become fastened in our nature or behavior.

Every advance step in grace must be preceded by first apprehending it, and then a prayerful resolve to have it.

So few are willing to undergo the suffering out of which thorough gentleness comes. We must die before we are turned into gentleness, and crucifixion involves suffering; it is a real breaking and crushing of self, which wrings the heart and conquers the mind.

There is a good deal of mere mental and logical sanctification nowadays, which is only a religious fiction. It consists of mentally putting one's self on the altar, and then mentally saying the altar sanctifies the gift, and then logically concluding therefore one is sanctified; and such an one goes forth with a gay, flippant, theological prattle about the deep things of God.

But the natural heartstrings have not been snapped, and the Adamic flint has not been ground to powder, and the bosom has not throbbed with the lonely, surging sighs of Gethsemane; and not having the real death marks of Calvary, there cannot be that soft, sweet, gentle, floating, victorious, overflowing, triumphant life that flows like a spring morning from an empty tomb.
--G. D. W.

"And great grace was upon them all" (Acts 4:33).