My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year Part 49

of the Lord we advance against the foe. We "ride abroad, redressing human wrongs." We "tread upon the lion and the adder, the young lion and the dragon we trample under foot." We meet our enemy on the open field, and we slay him in his pride!

And so our G.o.d is our resource in the double warfare of active and pa.s.sive crusade. In Him we can take refuge, and the enemy withers. In Him we can find fighting strength, and the enemy is overthrown.

OCTOBER The Eleventh

_THE OLD COMPANION ON THE NEW ROAD_

"_Get thee out ... and I will show thee."

"So Abram departed ... and the Lord appeared._"

--GENESIS xii. 1-9.

We must bring these separated pa.s.sages together if we would appreciate the graciousness of the Lord's call. They are like the two sides of the same shield. They answer each other as voice and echo. When I move in obedience the Lord moves in inspiration. He never lets me go on my own charges. "All things are now ready." Before He makes me hunger the bread is prepared.

Before I thirst the water is at hand. Before He calls me He has opened springs in difficult places and arbours of rest along the road. When Abram set out from his own country the Lord went before him.

And so I need not fear the arduous call. The very measure of its difficulty is also the measure of the riches of the divine provisions. "As thy day so shall thy strength be." At every turning of the winding way the Lord will appear unto us. At every new demand we shall discover new bounty, and everywhere in the unfamiliar road we shall gaze upon the familiar and friendly face of the Lord.

OCTOBER The Twelfth

_ROUND-ABOUT WAYS_

ACTS vii. 1-7.

"Unto a land that I will show thee." But what mysterious windings there often are before that land is reached! But G.o.d's windings are never wasteful and purposeless. The apparent deviations are always gracious preparations. We are taken out of the way in order that we may the more richly reach our end. George Pilkington yearned to go to the foreign field, and G.o.d sent him to a dairy farm in Ireland. But the Irish dairy farm proved to be on the way to Uganda; and all the experience and knowledge which Pilkington picked up in this strange business proved invaluable when he reached his appointed field. "He bringeth the blind by a way that they know not."

So I will remember that the "short cut" is not always the finest road.

G.o.d's round-about ways are filled with heavenly treasure. Every winding is purposed for the discovery of new wealth. What riches we gather on the way to G.o.d's goal!

"The hill of Zion yields A thousand sacred sweets Before we reach the heavenly fields Or walk the golden streets."

OCTOBER The Thirteenth

_THE ROYAL AIR_

GALATIANS iii. 6-14.

Emerson says somewhere that he has noticed that men whose duties are performed beneath great domes acquire a stately and appropriate manner.

The vergers in our great cathedrals have a dignified stride. It is not otherwise with men who consciously live under the power of vast relationships. Princes of royal blood have a certain great "air" about them. The consciousness of n.o.ble kinships has an expansive influence upon the soul. The Jews felt its influence when they called to mind "our Father Abraham."

So is it with men and women of glorious kinships in the realm of faith.

Their souls expand in the vast and exalted relations. "The children of faith" have vital communion with all the spiritual princes and princesses of countless years. They have blood-relationship with the patriarchs, and psalmists, and prophets, and they dwell "in heavenly places" with Paul, and Augustine, and Luther, and Wesley.

Surely, such exalted kinship should influence our very stride, and set its mark upon our "daily walk and conversation." It ought to make us so big that we can never speak a mean word, or do a petty and peevish thing.

OCTOBER The Fourteenth

_COMMONPLACE PEOPLE_

JOHN i. 35-47.

Our Lord delights to glorify the commonplace. He loves to fill the common water-pots with His mysterious wine. He chooses the earthen vessels into which to put His treasure. He calls obscure fishermen to be the amba.s.sadors of His grace. He proclaims His great Gospel through provincial dialects, and He fills uncultured mouths with mighty arguments. He turns common meals into sacraments, and while He breaks ordinary bread He relates it to the blessing of heaven.

And "this same Jesus" is among us to-day, with the same choices and delights. He will make a humdrum duty shine like the wayside bush that burned with fire and was not consumed. He will make our daily business the channel of His grace. He will take our disappointments, and, just as we sometimes put banknotes into black-edged envelopes, He will fill them with treasures of unspeakable consolation. He will use our poor, broken, stammering speech to convey the wonders of His grace to the weary sinful souls of men.

OCTOBER The Fifteenth

_THE CALL AND THE EQUIPMENT_

LUKE v. 27-32.

Matthew was very weary, and the all-seeing Lord read the signs of his spiritual dissatisfaction and unrest. As Jesus "pa.s.sed by" nothing escaped His watchful eye. He saw a look in Matthew's eye as of some caged creature longing for freedom. Matthew's office, the contempt of his fellows, and perhaps his own self-contempt held him in imprisoning disquietude. The Lord knew it all, and one word from Him and the iron gate was open, and the prisoner was free! "Follow Me! And he left all, rose up, and followed Him." With the Lord's command was conveyed the ability to obey, and Matthew stepped into "the glorious liberty of the children of G.o.d."

And this is the Master's way. His calls are always equipments. Every received commandment is also the vehicle of requisite grace. G.o.d's decrees are also promises, nay, they are immediate endowments. If we reverently open one of His callings we shall find it a store-house of needed strength.

And therefore we need not fear the calls of the Lord. They are not the harsh commandments of a tyrant, they are the loving invitations of a friend. If we obey them we shall taste the grace of them, and "His statutes will become our songs."

OCTOBER The Sixteenth

_THE INSPIRATIONS OF THE PAST_

ISAIAH li. 1-6.

Here is a sentence from Lord Morley: "If a man is despondent about his work the best remedy I can prescribe for him is to turn to a good biography." He counsels him to go into the yesterdays to find inspiration for the life of to-day. Other men's attainments are bugle-calls to me.

"Look unto Abraham, your father." Look unto the blessings which waited upon his obedience! See how springs of refreshment broke out in the troubled way! G.o.d "called him and blessed him." Rekindle your hope at his radiant triumph. Strengthen your will in his glorious persistence.

Here do I see G.o.d's mercy in the gift of memory and in the witness of history. I can turn to the yesterdays for light and quickening. "Do ye not remember the miracle of the loaves?" Yes, I can recall the grace that met me in my need, the power that made the crooked straight and the rough places plain. And I am privileged to turn the pages of other men's testimonies and read the record of the Lord's dealings with them. And so do memory and history come as helpful angel-presences to my soul.