For I proclaim the name of the Lord;
Ascribe greatness to our God!
The Rock! His work is perfect,
For all His ways are just;
A God of faithfulness and without injustice
Righteous and upright is He.
Deuteronomy 32: 3-4
There is no comfort like the fact of God's infinite, unchanging and eternal love for us. If we can but get this truth into our individual consciousness, it will sustain us in every trial. All the universe is under His personal sway, and He is our tenderest and dearest Friend carrying each of us close in His heart.
Providence is not merely the outworking of a mechanical system or the beneficent operation of wise and good laws. It is rather the thoughtful, sleepless, loving care of our Father. We put God too far off. There are laws of Nature, but He is the Law-maker, and these laws are but the methods of His kindness. They do not make any gulf between Him and His children. In every well-ordered household there are regulations, rules, habits, laws, but these do not make the home-providence any less due to the love and kindness of the parents. No more do Nature's established and uniform laws cut us off from the personal care of God.
He comes near to us perpetually in these methods of His providence. His own fingers touch the tints in the flower. With His own hand He feeds the birds, and in all second causes it is still His hand that works. The beautiful things we see are the pictures our Father has hung up in our chamber to give us pleasure. The good things we receive are the ever-fresh tokens of His thoughtful love for us.
And the same is true of the evil and painful things. Our Father sent them. They seem to mean harm. But He loves us with a love deep, tender and eternal. We cannot see how these things consist with love's plan, but we know that they must; and in this faith we may rest, not understanding, but yet undoubting, unquestioning and unfearing.
If we could push ajar the gates of life,
And stand within and all God's workings see,
We could interpret all this doubt and strife,
And for each mystery could find a key.
But this we cannot do. Hereafter we shall know. Yet even now, knowing what we do of God's wise and eternal love for us, we can believe and trust and be at peace. This is the truest comfort. It is the clasp of the tree's roots upon the immutable rock. It is the soul's clinging to God in the storm.
Dr J. R. Miller, Pennsylvania, 1897
1 comment:
Amen! From the airport in Mumbai...
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