MY
TIMES IN GOD'S HAND
"My times are in Your hand."--Psalm 31:15
What confirmation would the precious truth contained in
these words derive, from the personal experience of the man of God who
penned them! Reviewing the past of his eventful history, he would trace the
guiding and overshadowing hand of his Heavenly Father in all the
circumstances of the chequered and diversified scene; and as memory thus
recalled the strange and momentous events of his life, with what
overpowering solemnity would the conviction force itself upon his mind--that
for the form and complexion of that life how little was it indebted to
himself! Circumstances which chance could not originate, events which human
sagacity could not foresee, and results which finite experience could not
determine, would at once lift his grateful and adoring thoughts to that God
of infinite foreknowledge and love, whose over-ruling providence had
guarded with a sleepless eye each circumstance, and whose infinite
goodness had guided with a skillful hand each step. With this retrospect
before him, with what intensity of feeling would the aged king exclaim, "MY
TIMES ARE IN YOUR HAND."
But if David felt this truth--that all his interests were
in God's keeping and under His supreme direction--so consolatory, as life
drew near its close, how much more cheering may it be to us just entering
upon a new year of human life, all whose history is, to our view, wisely and
beneficently enshrouded in obscurity, and all whose events, from the least
to the greatest, are happily beyond our control. "My times are in Your
hand." Who can give us the heartfelt, soothing influence of this precious
truth, but the Holy Spirit, by whose Divine inspiration it was uttered? May
He now unfold, and apply with his sanctifying, comforting power this portion
of his own holy word to the reader's heart!
The declaration, that "our times are in the Lord's hand,"
implies, that the FUTURE of our history is impenetrably and mysteriously
veiled from our sight. We live in a world of mysteries. They meet our eye,
awaken our inquiry, and baffle our investigation at every step. Nature is a
vast arcade of mysteries. Science is a mystery--truth is a mystery--religion
is a mystery--our existence is a mystery--the future of our being is a
mystery. And God, who alone can explain all mysteries, is the greatest
mystery of all. How little do we understand of the inexplicable wonders of a
wonder-working God, "whose thoughts are a great deep," and "whose ways are
past finding out." But to God nothing is mysterious. In His purpose, nothing
is unfixed; in His forethought, nothing is unknown; in His providence,
nothing is contingent. His glance pierces the future, as vividly as it
beholds the past. "He knows the end from the beginning." All His doings are
parts of a divine, eternal, and harmonious plan. He may make "darkness His
secret place; His pavilion round about Him dark waters, and thick clouds of
the skies," and to human vision His dispensations may appear gloomy,
discrepant, and confused; yet is He "working all things after the counsel of
His own will," and "at the brightness that is before Him, His thick clouds
pass," and all is transparent and harmonious to His eye.
And why this obscurity thus investing all our future?
Would it not make for our present well-being--would it not be a satisfaction
and a blessing, could we loop back the mystic veil, and gaze with a
far-seeing and undimmed eye upon "our times," yet awaiting us on this side
the grave? Remembering the past, you are perhaps ready to say, "Could I but
have foreseen, I would have fore-arranged. Had I anticipated the result of
such a step, or have known the outcome of such a movement, or have safely
calculated the consequences of such a measure, I might have pursued an
opposite course, and have averted the evil I now deplore, and have spared
myself the misery I now feel."
But hush this vain reasoning! God, your God, O believer,
had in wisdom, faithfulness, and love, hidden all the future from your view.
"You shall remember all the ways which the Lord your God led you these forty
years." How has He guided, counseled, and upheld you. He has led you by a
right way. In perplexity, He has directed you--in need, He has supplied
you--in sorrow, He has comforted you--in slippery paths, His mercy has held
you up, and when fallen He has raised you again. From seeming evil He has
educed positive good. The mistakes you have made, and the follies you have
committed--in the blindness of your path, and in the sinfulness of your
heart--have but led you to a closer acquaintance with, and to a stronger
confidence in, God. They have opened up to you new and more glorious views
of His character and His government; while, in leading you closer to the
feet of Jesus in self-knowledge and self-abhorrence, they have unlocked to
you springs of spiritual blessings--fresh, sanctifying, and unspeakable.
Beloved, God has placed us in a school in which He is
teaching us to lay our blind reason at His feet, to cease from our own
wisdom and guidance, and lean upon and confide in Him, as children with a
parent. The goodness of God to us, combined with a jealous regard to His own
glory, constrains Him to conceal the path along which He conducts us. His
promise is, "I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will
lead them in paths that they have not known: I will make darkness light
before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them,
and not forsake them."--Isaiah 42:16.
Could the scenes of this year's history rise in their
shadowy outline before us--or were an angel permitted to divulge a single
page in the momentous volume of events just opened, how might we shrink from
the revelation, and closing the book again, calmly wait until He should
unfold its leaves, "in whose hand our times are." How unfitted would we be
to discharge our duties--to sustain our responsibilities --to meet our
trials--cope with our difficulties, and bear our sorrows, were they all to
confront us at this moment! Oh, how kindly, wisely, and tenderly does our
Father deal with us! And in no part of His providential dealings is His
goodness more clearly seen than in veiling all our future from our view. Let
us sit down at Jesus' feet, thanking Him that the "life which we now live in
the flesh," we live not by sight, but by "faith in the Son of
God, who loved us, and gave Himself for us."
But our "times," all wrapped in impenetrable mystery, are
yet in the Lord's hand. The words are emphatic. Our times are not in the
hands of angels or of men, still less in our own--they are in the Lord's
hand. It is an individual truth. "My times." We deal too timidly with
our individuality--with the truth of God as individuals--with Jesus as
individuals--with the covenant of grace as individuals--with our
responsibilities as individuals. "What," you exclaim, "I, a poor worm of the
dust, not worthy of His regard, too insignificant for His notice--I, who
have a heart so cold, a nature so depraved, a will so perverse--"my
times?" Yes, dear reader, you may humbly adopt these words as your own, and
exultingly exclaim, "My times are in His hand."
How comprehensive, too, is this truth, "My times
are in His hand." Diversified as they may be--whatever the shape in which
they are developed, or the complexion which they assume--attractive or
repulsive, bathed with light or draped in gloom--all are there,
exclusively and safely lodged in the Lord's hand. Let us specify a few of
these "times."
Our time of prosperity is in the Lord's hand.
There are no circumstances of life in which we are more sadly prone to
indulge in self-complaisance than those of earthly prosperity. Industry is
enriched and perseverance is rewarded, wealth increases and blessings
accumulate, and the "heart grows fat, and kicks against God." The merchant
ship returns freighted with treasure--the acres of the tiller are fruitful,
and his barns are filled with plenty; or prosperity in some other form
smiles upon our path, and then, alas, God is forgotten. We arrogate to
ourselves the praise of our success. "My hand, and the might of my
power has gotten me this." But what is the language of God's Word?
"Beware that you do not forget the Lord your God, lest when you have eaten
and are full, and have built goodly houses and dwelt therein; and when your
herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and your gold is multiplied,
and all that you have is multiplied, then your heart be lifted up, and you
forget the Lord your God."--Deut. 8:11, 14.
But oh, let us remember all our past, and all our coming
prosperity--if indeed He shall so appoint it--is in the hand of God. It is
His wisdom that suggests our plans--it is His power that guides, and it is
His goodness that causes them to succeed. Every flower that blooms in our
path, every smile that gladdens it, every mercy that bedews it, yes, "every
good and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of
lights." Oh, for grace to recognize God in our mercies, for a heart lifted
up in holy returns of love, gratitude, and praise! How much sweeter will be
our sweets, how much more blessed our blessings, and endeared our
endearments, seeing them all dropping from the outstretched, munificent hand
of a loving, gracious, and bountiful Father.
But there are times of adversity, and they,
also, are in the Lord's hand. As every sunbeam that brightens, so every
cloud that darkens, comes from God. We are subject to great and sudden
reverses in our earthly condition. Joy is often followed by grief,
prosperity by adversity. We are on the pinnacle today--tomorrow at its base.
Oh, what a change may one event, and in one moment, create! A storm--a
conflagration--a slight oscillation of the funds--the morning's post--the
casual meeting of a friend, may clothe our life in mourning. But, beloved,
all is from the Lord. "Affliction comes not forth of the dust,
neither does trouble spring out of the ground."--Job 5:6.
Sorrow cannot come until God bids it. Health cannot
fade--wealth cannot vanish--comfort cannot decay--friendship cannot
chill--loved ones cannot die until He, in His sovereignty permits. Your time
of sorrow is His appointment. The bitter cup which it may please the Lord
you shall drink this year, will not be mixed by human hands. In the hand of
the Lord is that cup. The cloud that may lower on your path, will not gather
at a creature's bidding. "He makes the cloud His chariot." Some treasure you
are now pressing to your heart, He may ask you to resign--some blessing you
now possess, He may bid you relinquish--some fond expectation you now
cherish, He may will you should forego--some lonely path He may design you
should tread--yes, He may even bereave you of all, and yet all, all
is in His hand. His hand--a Father's hand--moving in the thick darkness, is
shaping every event, and arranging every dispensation of your life.
Has sickness laid you on a bed of suffering? has
bereavement darkened your home? has adversity impoverished
your resources? has change lessened your comforts? has sorrow
in one of its many forms crushed your spirit to the earth? The Lord has
done it! In all that has been sent, in all that has been recalled, and
in all that has been withheld, His hand, noiseless and unseen, has moved.
Ah! yes! that hand of changeless love blends a sweet with every bitter,
pencils a bright rainbow on each dark cloud--upholds each faltering
step--shelters within its hollow, and guides with unerring skill His chosen
people safely to eternal glory.
Dear child of God, your afflictions, your trials, your
crosses, your losses, your sorrows, all, all are in your heavenly
Father's hand, and they cannot come until sent by Him. Bow that stricken
heart, yield that tempest-tossed soul to His sovereign disposal, to His
calm, righteous sway, in the submissive spirit and language of your
suffering Savior, "Your will, O my Father, not mine, be done! My times of
sadness and of grief are in Your hand."
Times of soul-distress, spiritual darkness, and
conflict are in His hand. Many such are there in the experience of
the true saints of God. Many the hard-fought battle, the fiery dart, the
desperate wound, the momentary defeat in the Christian's life. Taking
advantage of the spiritual mist which may hover around the mind in the time
of perplexing care, and of gloomy providences; the foe, with stealthy tread,
may rush in upon the soul like a flood. And when to this surprisal is added
the suspension of the Lord's manifested presence, the veiling of His smile,
the silence of His responsive voice, Oh, that is a time of
soul-distress indeed!
But it is in the Lord's hand. No spiritual cloud shades,
no mental distress depresses, no fiery dart is launched, that is not by Him
permitted, and for which there is not a provision by Him arranged. There is
nothing which the Lord has taken more entirely and exclusively into His
keeping than the redeemed, sanctified souls of His people. All their
interests for eternity are exclusively in His hand. In the infinite fullness
of Jesus, in the inexhaustible supply of the covenant, in the exceeding
great and precious promises of His word, He has anticipated every spiritual
exigence of the believer. How precious is your soul to Him who bore all its
sins, who exhausted all its curse--who travailed for it in ignominy and
suffering, and who ransomed it with His own most precious blood. Guarded,
also, by His indwelling Spirit is His kingdom of righteousness, joy, and
peace within you. Oh, endeavor to realize that, whatever be your mental
exercises, spiritual conflicts, doubts and fears, your "times" of soul
despondency are in the Lord's hand.
Lodged there, safe are your spiritual interests. "All His
saints are in His hand." And He to whose care you have confided your
redeemed soul, has pledged Himself for its eternal security. Of His own
sheep He says, "I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish,
neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My Father, who gave them to
me, is greater than all: and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's
hand." With like precious faith and humble assurance you are privileged to
exclaim with Paul, "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is
able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day."
Ah! as soon shall Christ Himself perish, as one bought
with His blood. No member of His body, insignificant though it may be, shall
be dissevered. No temple of the Holy Spirit, frail and imperfect though it
is, shall be destroyed. Not a soul to whom the divine image has been
restored, and the divine nature has been imparted, upon whose heart the name
of Jesus has been carved, shall be involved in the final and eternal
destruction of the wicked. Nothing shall perish but the earthly and the
sensual. Not one grain of precious faith shall be lost--not one spark of
divine light shall be extinguished--not one pulsation of spiritual life
shall die!
Oh, think of this, you who have fled all sinful and
trembling to Jesus--you who cling to Him, as the limpet to the rock, as the
ivy to the oak, never shall you lose that hold of faith you have on Christ,
and never will Christ lose that hold of love He has on you. You and Jesus
are one, indivisibly and eternally one. Nothing shall separate you
from His love, nor sever you from His care, nor exclude you from His
sympathy, nor banish you from His heaven of eternal blessedness. You are in
Christ, the subject of His grace; and Christ is in you, the hope of
glory. All your cares are Christ's care--all your sorrows are
Christ's sorrow--all your need is Christ's supply--all your sicknesses are
Christ's cure--all your crosses are Christ's burden. Your life, temporal,
spiritual, eternal, is "hidden with Christ in God." Oh, the unutterable
blessings that spring from a vital union with the Lord Jesus! The believer
can exultingly say, "Christ and I are one! One in nature--one in
affection--one in sympathy--one in fellowship, and one through the countless
ages of eternity.
The life I live is a life of faith in Him. I fly to Him
in the confidence of a loving friend, in the simplicity of a little child,
and I reveal to Him my secret sorrow. I confess to Him my hidden sin. I
acknowledge my heart-backsliding. I make known to Him my needs, my
sufferings, my fears. I tell Him how chilled is my affection, how reserved
is my obedience, how imperfect is my service, and yet how I long to love Him
more ardently, to follow Him more closely, to serve Him more devotedly, to
be more wholly and holily His. And how does He meet me? With a hearkening
ear--with a beaming eye--with a gracious word--with an out-stretched
hand--with a benignity and a gentleness all like Himself." Confide,
then, dear reader, your spiritual and deathless interests in the Lord's
hand. Careful only to "work out" in a holy life the grace He has
wrought in your soul--thus manifestly a "living epistle of Christ, known and
read of all men."
To those who, depressed with a painful foreboding at
their final dissolution, are all their lifetime subject to bondage, how
consolatory is the reflection that the time of the believer's death
is peculiarly in the Lord's hand. It is solemnly true that there is a
"time to die." Ah! affecting thought--"a time to die!" A time
when this mortal conflict will be over--when this heart will cease to feel,
alike insensible to joy or sorrow--when this head will ache and these eyes
will weep no more--best and holiest of all--a time "when this corruptible
shall put on incorruption, and this mortal shall put on immortality," and we
shall "see Christ as He is, and be like Him." The world we have left will
move on then as now: life's lights and shadows will gather in blended hues
around our grave; but wrapped in death's deep, dreamless sleep, we shall be
unconscious of all that once distressed or charmed us--the frown of anger,
and the smile of love--"forever with the Lord."
If this be so, then, O Christian, why this anxious,
trembling fear? Your time of death, with all its attendant circumstances, is
in the Lord's hand. All is appointed and arranged by Him who loves you and
who redeemed you--infinite goodness, wisdom and faithfulness consulting your
highest happiness in each circumstance of your departure. The final sickness
cannot come, the "last enemy" cannot strike until He bids it. All is in His
hand--then calmly, confidingly leave life's closing scene with Him. You
cannot die away from Jesus. Whether your spirit wings its flight at home or
abroad, amid strangers or friends, by a lingering process, or by a sudden
stroke, in brightness or in gloom, Jesus will be with you; and, upheld by
His grace and cheered with His presence, you shall triumphantly exclaim,
"Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear
no evil; for You are with me; your rod and your staff they comfort
me," bearing your dying testimony to the faithfulness of God and the
preciousness of His promises. My time to die is in your hand, O Lord,
and there I calmly leave it.
There is a peculiar emphasis in a truth contained in the
beautiful words upon which we have been commenting worthy of a more
particular notice. In whose hand are the believer's times? In
a Father's hand. Be those times what they may--times of trial--times
of temptation--times of suffering--times of peril--times of sunshine or of
gloom--of life or death--they are in a Parent's hand. Is your present path
lonely and dreary? Has the Lord seen fit to recall some fond blessing, to
deny some earnest request, or painfully to discipline your heart? All this
springs from a Father's love as fully as though He had unlocked His
treasury, and poured its costliest gifts at your feet.
Can you enter upon the unknown history of this
year--troubles, it may be, looming in the shadowy distance, uncertainty
hanging over your future path, not able to forecast a single probability of
what may be your future lot--with a firmer, sweeter truth for faith to lean
upon than this?--"My times are in a Father's hand, and all will, all
must be well."
In a Redeemer's hand, also, are our times. That
same Redeemer who carried our sorrows in His heart, our curse and
transgressions on His soul, our cross on His shoulder, who died, who rose
again, and who lives and intercedes for us, and who will gather all His
ransomed around Him in glory, is your guardian and your guide. Can you not
cheerfully confide all your earthly concerns, all your spiritual interests
to His keeping and control?--"casting all your care upon Him who
cares for you?" "Oh, yes!" faith replies, "in that hand that still bears in
its palm the print of the nail, are all my times; and I will trust and not
be afraid."
Unconverted reader--do you ask, "In whose hand are my
times?" I answer, in that Infinite Sovereign's, "in whose hand your life is,
and whose are all your ways." I confront you, standing upon the threshold of
the new year, with this solemn truth--Your times are in God's hand. "In Him
you live, and move, and have your being." You cannot be independent of God
for a single breath, a single thought or a single step. From His government
you cannot break, from His eye you cannot hide, from His power you cannot
flee. He holds you responsible for all your endowments, acquirements, and
doings, and before long will say to you, "Give an account of your
stewardship." Oh, that this may be a year of new life to your soul--of
living to the Lord. A new year it then, indeed, will be in your
history, such as you have never lived before. Oh, that this year your
stubborn will, after so long a resistance--your rebellious heart, after its
years of closing and hardening against a beseeching, pleading Savior, may be
sweetly constrained to bow to the despised gospel of Christ--born of the
Spirit a child of God, an heir of happiness which the revolution of time and
the ages of eternity shall never terminate.
Ah! of how many who read these pages may the decree have
already gone forth, "Thus says the Lord, This year you shall die!"
Oh, dismal sentence to those who have no union with the Lord Jesus! Dear
reader, are you preparing and resolving to spend this year as all the
previous years of your life have been spent? What! in hating God, in abusing
His mercies, in despising His Son, in neglecting His salvation, in hardening
your heart in sin, in living for the world and to yourself, and in
treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath? Is such a life worthy
of your being? Can you bend the knee upon the confines of this year and
pray--"Great Author of my being! Father of all my mercies! Righteous Judge
of the world! grant me another year of rebellion and impiety; more time to
waste; more mercies to abuse; more means of grace to neglect; more property
to squander; more influence to oppose and fight against You?"
You shudder at the thought! You could not, for your life,
breathe such a prayer. And yet, entering upon this year in an unconverted
state, are not your thoughts, temper, and resolves--always far more
expressive than words--insulting God with the spirit of a petition
the language of which you dare not utter. Oh, that, gently, persuasively
drawn by the Holy Spirit, you may now betake yourself to the Lord Jesus as a
self-destroyed yet humble, repentant sinner. Oh, that this may be the happy
hour of your spiritual espousals--of your covenant, unreserved surrender to
the Lord to be His child, His servant forever. True happiness, joy, and
peace will ever be strangers to your heart until it tastes the love of the
Savior. Nor will you be able to give yourself to the high and noble duties
of real life, or to contemplate death with calmness, and the eternity that
stretches beyond it with hope, until you are reconciled to God, through the
"one Mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus."
In pressing these thoughts upon your attention, with
equal earnestness and affection would I exhort you to come to Christ without
demurring at your sinfulness, or hesitating on the ground of having no
fitness or worthiness to plead. Jesus saves none but sinners.
Approach with a price in your hand with which to purchase your
salvation, and you will be indignantly rejected! But approach the
life-giving waters "without money and without price," and receive salvation
as a free gift, and you will be cordially received! The
atoning work is finished, the great salvation is purchased, the mighty debt
is paid--all perfected and secured by the blood of God's incarnate Son. And
now it is His good pleasure and delight to confer this priceless, precious
boon upon every one who is of a "contrite and humble spirit," as an act of
most free favor, however vile, undeserving, and poor the recipient might be.
"By grace are you saved." "Therefore it is of faith that it might be
by grace." Before the majesty and splendor of this precious truth all
human glory must fade, all human pride must fall.
Were a crown to encircle your brow--or had you lived the
life of the most rigid moralist--or were you possessed of all the spoils of
ancient and modern lore--yet, if saved, you must be saved as was the humble
tax-collector, approaching in his spirit and breathing his petition, "God be
merciful to me a sinner." That proud, rebellious, self-righteous
heart of yours must be laid low in the dust. Oh, descend from the Babel
of your own works, from the towering summit of which you have profanely
hoped to build your way into heaven, tear from off you the fig-leaf
righteousness with the covering of which you have vainly sought to veil the
moral deformity of your soul, and come and base your hope of heaven upon the
"only name given under heaven whereby a sinner might be saved," and enfold
yourself believingly in the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ, and you
shall be accepted. "Being justified freely by His grace through the
redemption that is in Christ Jesus." It is written, "By the deeds of the law
there shall no flesh be justified in His sight." And by the same inspiration
it is also written, "But to him that works not, but believes
in Him that justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness."
And then, from this act of most free justification follows this precious,
holy result, "Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with GOD
through our Lord Jesus Christ."--Rom. 5:1. Oh, then, by all the
deathless interests that are at stake, by the desire for a holy life, a
happy death, and a glorious immortality, cease from yourself; relinquish all
reliance upon sacraments, religious duties, and charitable works, and under
a spiritual, deep conviction of the desperate sinfulness of your fallen and
corrupt nature, the "plague of your own heart," your condemnation by the
law, your entire inability to save yourself and your utter unpreparedness to
stand before the holy Lord God, flee to Christ, and avail yourself of the
great salvation which He has effectually wrought and most freely bestows.
And what will be your reception by the Savior?
Does it admit of a doubt? Oh, no! not one. He came into the world to save
sinners--and He will save you. His compassion inclines Him to
save sinners--His power enables Him to save sinners--His promise
binds Him to save sinners. "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all
acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners." And Oh,
how easy it is to be saved when the Holy Spirit draws the heart to Christ!
It is not great faith, nor deep experience, nor extensive knowledge that are
required. The dimmest eye that ever looked to Christ--the feeblest hand that
ever took hold of Christ--the most trembling step that ever traveled to
Christ, has in it present salvation--has in it life eternal. The smallest
measure of real faith will take the soul to heaven. Yes! there is hope
for the trembling penitent. Jesus suffered to the uttermost,
therefore He is able to "save to the uttermost all that come unto God
by Him."
Let us, in conclusion, trace the practical influence
which this truth should exert upon our minds. The present aspect of our
"times," as a nation, is gloomy and depressive to a degree. It is "a time of
WAR!" The scourge which our hearts fondly hoped would be stayed, and which a
patient diplomacy strenuously strove to avert, has fallen upon us with more
than expected terror and destruction. The nation is clad in mourning.
Scarcely is there a family, from the highest to the lowest, that has not
felt some vibration of the terrible shock. "Abroad the sword bereaves, at
home there is as death." Who can paint the anguish or describe the
desolateness at the present moment of many an English home--whose brave
husband, father, brother, lover, friend, reposes, all alone and gory, on
Alma's bleak heights, or in Inkerman's low valley?
Bereaved ones! GOD IS LOVE. With what more consoling
truth can we meet your case? There is kindness in God--there is sympathy in
Jesus--there is consolation in the Bible--there is soothing in prayer--there
is the hope of a reunion in a holier and brighter world with all those who
have died in the Lord. Such a hope may you not cherish? The tear of
penitence--the cry for pardon--the look of faith--the appeal to mercy from
the battle-field while life was fast ebbing, was it in vain? Infinite power!
Divine compassion! Sovereign grace! forbid the thought! He who met the last
look, and caught the last sigh, and "heard the last prayer of the dying
malefactor and saved him, as life passed away, was near the expiring
warrior--and who will dare say that He who can save at the "eleventh hour,"
and the chief of sinners, heard not that cry for help, answered not that
prayer for mercy? In one moment the Spirit of God can breathe divine
life into the soul, and fit it for heaven. He who said, "Let there be
light," and light was, can by a word say, "I am your salvation," and the
expiring sinner is instantly and eternally saved.
But we turn to you who are thus suddenly and deeply
bereaved. Your present time of calamity is in the Lord's hand. He has made
you a widow that He might be your God--a fatherless one that in Him you
might find mercy. "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" "I wound
and I heal." Oh, that this the time of your deep, inconsolable grief may be
the time of prayer, of seeking unto Him who has smitten and who alone binds
up. "Acquaint now yourself with Him, and be at peace;" and then, in
deep unmurmuring submission to the Divine disposal, you will exclaim, "The
cup which my Father has given me shall I not drink it? He has done all
things well."
Let this precious truth, "My times are in your hand,"
divest your mind of all needless, anxious care for the present or the
future. Exercising simple faith in God, "be anxious for nothing." "Be
content with such things as you have, for He has said, I will never leave
you nor forsake you." Learn to be content with your present lot, with God's
dealings with, and His disposal of, you. You are just where His providence
has, in its inscrutable, but all-wise and righteous decision, placed you. It
may be a painful, irksome, trying position, but it is right. Oh, yes! it is
right! Only aim to glorify Him in it. Wherever you are placed, God
has a work for you to do, a purpose through you to be accomplished, in which
He blends your happiness with His glory. And when you have learned the
lessons of His love, He will transfer you to another and a wider sphere, for
whose nobler duties and higher responsibilities the present is, perhaps, but
disciplining and preparing you.
Strive, then, to live a life of daily dependence upon
God. Oh, it is a sweet and holy life! It saves from many a desponding
feeling, from many a corroding care, from many an anxious thought, from many
a sleepless night, from many a tearful eye, and from many an imprudent and
sinful scheme. Repairing to the "covenant ordered in all things and sure,"
you may confide children, friends, calling, yourself, to the Lord's care, in
the fullest assurance that all their "times" and yours are in His hand.
In a letter addressed by Luther to Melancthon, at
Augsburg, there occur these striking remarks, which from their relevancy to
the present subject, I venture to interweave with my own, "Grace and peace
in Christ! in Christ I say, and not in the world, amen. I hate, with
exceeding hatred, those extreme cares which consume you. If the cause is
unjust, abandon it; if the cause is just, why should we belie the promises
of Him who commands us to sleep without fear? Can the devil do more than
kill us? Christ will not be lacking to the work of justice and of truth. He
lives! He reigns! What fear, then, can we have? God is powerful to upraise
His cause, if it is overthrown; to make it proceed, if it remains
motionless; and if we are not worthy of it, He will do it by others. For our
cause is in the very hands of Him who can say, 'No one shall pluck it out of
my hands.' I would not have it in our hands, and it would not be desirable
that it were so. I have had many things in my hands, and I have lost them
all; but whatever I have been able to place in God's, I still possess." (D'Aubigny's
Reformation.)
Oh, yes! beloved reader, thank God that your times, your
interests, your salvation, are all out of your hands, and out of the hands
of all creatures, supremely and safely in His. Forward in the path of duty,
of labor, and of suffering. Aim to resemble Christ more closely in your
disposition, your spirit, your whole life. Soon will it be said, "The Master
has come, and calls for you." He is coming. "Prepare to meet your
God."
Let your motto for this year be--FORWARD! Patient in
endurance--submissive in suffering--content with God's allotment--zealous,
prayerful, and watchful, be found "standing in your lot at the end of the
days." Trust God implicitly for the future. No sorrow comes but shall
open some sweet spring of comfort--no necessity transpires but shall
endear a Father's care--no affliction befalls but shall be attended
with the Savior's tenderest sympathy. In Him meets all confluence of grace
for your hourly, momentary need. Let your constant prayer be--"Hold
me up, and I shall be safe." Let your daily precept be--"Casting all
your care upon Him, for He cares for you." And then leave God to fulfill, as
most faithfully He will, "His own gracious, precious promise"--"AS
YOUR DAYS, SO SHALL YOUR STRENGTH BE." Thus walking with God through this
valley of tears, until you exchange sorrow for joy, suffering for ease, sin
for purity, labor for rest, conflict for victory, and all earth's chequered,
gloomy scenes, for the changeless, cloudless happiness and glory of heaven.
"Go to, then! Henceforth it shall no longer vex me,
Because as I wish the world goes not always;
The turmoils of life shall no longer perplex me,
Nor my heart be worn out with grief of today.
Woe is Time's blight;
The seed of delight
Shall spring up and bloom in heaven's islands of light.
"Then pain shall inherit a rich o'er-payment;
Then tears shall be wiped from all sorrowing eyes;
The poor be clothed then in the fairest of clothing,
And the sick with the vigor of health shall arise;
Hatred shall cease;
All shall be peace;
For in heaven alone does good ever increase.
"Oh, let, then, my lot and my life be appointed,
Just as my God and my Lord sees meet;
Hopes laid in heaven are never disappointed,
Let the world have its way until the end is complete;
Time's tree will cast
Its leaves on the blast,
And heaven make everything right at the last."
--Thomas Kingo, 1634