11. SOVEREIGNTY

"How precious also are Your thoughts unto me, O God!"

I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things. Isaiah 45:7

What a sad world this would be, were it governed by Fate. Were its blended lights and shadows, its joys and sorrows, the result of capricious accident—blind and wayward chance! How blessed to think that each separate occurrence that befalls me is "a thought of God"—the fulfillment of His own immutable purpose.

Is it the outer material world? It is He who "forms the light and creates darkness"—who appoints the sun and moon for their seasons—who gives to the sea its decree—who watches the sparrow in its fall—who tends the lily in the field—and who paints the tiniest flower that blossoms in the meadow.

Is it the moral world? All events are predetermined and prearranged by Him. It is He who makes peace and creates evil. Prosperity and adversity are His appointment. The Lord who of old prepared Jonah's shade-plant, prepared also the worm. He gives and He takes away. He molds every tear. He "puts them into His bottle." He knows them all, counts them all, treasures them all. Not one of them falls unbidden—unnoted.

"The lot is cast into the lap, but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord." Over every occurrence in nature and in providence He writes, "I the Lord do all these things."

True, His thoughts are often mysterious, His ways past finding out. We are led at times, amid the bewildering mazes of His providential dealings, to exclaim, "O Lord, how great are Your works, and Your thoughts are very deep!" Be it ours to defer our verdict until their full development. We cannot envision the thoughts and intents of the architect or engineer in the first clearing of the ground for the foundation of some gigantic structure. The uninitiated eye can discover nothing but deep unsightly scars, or piles of unshapely rubbish—a chaos of confusion. But gradually, as week by week passes, we see his thoughts molding themselves into visible and substantial shapes of order and beauty; and when the edifice at last stands before us complete, we discern that all which was mystery and confusion at first, was a necessary part and portion of the undertaking.

So is it, at present, regarding "the thoughts of God." Often, in vain, do we try to comprehend the purposes of the Almighty Architect amid the dust and debris of the earthly foundations. Let us wait patiently until we gaze on the finished structure of eternity.

Oh, blessed assurance—'precious thought' of God—that the loom of life is in the hands of the Great Designer—that it is He who is interweaving the threads of existence, the light and the dark, the acknowledged good and the apparent evil. The chain of what is erroneously called "destiny," is in His keeping. He knows its every connecting link—He has forged these on His own anvil. Man's purposes have failed, and are ever liable to fail—his brightest anticipations may be thwarted; his best-laid schemes may be frustrated.

Life is often a retrospect of crushed hopes—the bright rainbow-hues of morning, passing in its afternoon into damp mist and drizzling rain. "Many are the thoughts in a man's heart," (which know no fulfillment nor fruition,) "but the counsel of the Lord, that shall stand."

"From eternity to eternity I am God. No one can oppose what I do. No one can reverse My actions." Isaiah 43:13