Bible Heaven/Bible Heaven.iso/online/topics27/t29350

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29351
 September 16                                             Evening

 \\"Am I a sea, or a whale, that thou settest a watch over me?"\\
                                                       --Job 7:12

    This was a strange question for Job to ask of the Lord. He
 felt himself to be too insignificant to be so strictly watched
 and chastened, and he hoped that he was not so unruly as to need
 to be so restrained. The enquiry was natural from one surrounded
 with such insupportable miseries, but after all, it is capable
 of a very humbling answer. It is true man is not the sea, but he
 is even more troublesome and unruly. The sea obediently respects
 its boundary, and though it be but a belt of sand, it does not
 overleap the limit. Mighty as it is, it hears the divine
 \\hitherto\\, and when most raging with tempest it respects the
 word; but self-willed man defies heaven and oppresses earth,
 neither is there any end to this rebellious rage. The sea,
 obedient to the moon, ebbs and flows with ceaseless regularity,
 and thus renders an active as well as a passive obedience; but
 man, restless beyond his sphere, sleeps within the lines of
 duty, indolent where he should be active. He will neither come
 nor go at the divine command, but sullenly prefers to do what he
 should not, and to leave undone that which is required of him.
 Every drop in the ocean, every beaded bubble, and every yeasty
 foam-flake, every shell and pebble, feel the power of law, and
 yield or move at once. O that our nature were but one thousandth
 part as much conformed to the will of God! We call the sea
 fickle and false, but how constant it is! Since our fathers'
 days, and the old time before them, the sea is where it was,
 beating on the same cliffs to the same tune; we know where to
 find it, it forsakes not its bed, and changes not in its
 ceaseless boom; but where is man-vain, fickle man? Can the wise
 man guess by what folly he will next be seduced from his
 obedience? We need more watching than the billowy sea, and are
 far more rebellious. Lord, rule us for thine own glory. Amen.

29352
 September 17                                             Evening

 \\"Encourage him."\\
                                               --Deuteronomy 1:38

    God employs his people to encourage one another. He did not
 say to an angel, "Gabriel, my servant Joshua is about to lead my
 people into Canaan--go, encourage him." God never works needless
 miracles; if his purposes can be accomplished by ordinary means,
 he will not use miraculous agency. Gabriel would not have been
 half so well fitted for the work as Moses. A brother's sympathy
 is more precious than an angel's embassy. The angel, swift of
 wing, had better known the Master's bidding than the people's
 temper. An angel had never experienced the hardness of the road,
 nor seen the fiery serpents, nor had he led the stiff-necked
 multitude in the wilderness as Moses had done. We should be glad
 that God usually works for man by man. It forms a bond of
 brotherhood, and being mutually dependent on one another, we are
 fused more completely into one family. Brethren, take the text
 as God's message to you. Labour to help others, and especially
 strive to \\encourage\\ them. Talk cheerily to the young and
 anxious enquirer, lovingly try to remove stumblingblocks out of
 his way. When you find a spark of grace in the heart, kneel down
 and blow it into a flame. Leave the young believer to discover
 the roughness of the road by degrees, but tell him of the
 strength which dwells in God, of the sureness of the promise,
 and of the charms of communion with Christ. Aim to comfort the
 sorrowful, and to animate the desponding. Speak a word in season
 to him that is weary, and encourage those who are fearful to go
 on their way with gladness. God encourages you by his promises;
 Christ encourages you as he points to the heaven he has won for
 you, and the spirit encourages \\you\\ as he works in you to
 will and to do of his own will and pleasure. Imitate divine
 wisdom, and encourage others, according to the word of this
 evening.

29353
 September 18                                             Evening

 \\"And they follow me."\\
                                                     --John 10:27

    We should follow our Lord as unhesitatingly as sheep follow
 their shepherd, for \\he has a right to lead us wherever he\\
 \\pleases\\. We are not our own, we are bought with a price--let
 us recognize the rights of the redeeming blood. The soldier
 follows his captain, the servant obeys his master, much more
 must we follow our Redeemer, to whom we are a purchased
 possession. We are not true to our profession of being
 Christians, if we question the bidding of our Leader and
 Commander. Submission is our duty, cavilling is our folly. Often
 might our Lord say to us as to Peter, "What is that to thee?
 Follow thou me." Wherever Jesus may lead us, \\he goes before\\
 \\us\\. If we know not where we go, we know with whom we go.
 With such a companion, who will dread the perils of the road?
 The journey may be long, but his everlasting arms will carry us
 to the end. The presence of Jesus is the assurance of eternal
 salvation, because he lives, we shall live also. We should
 follow Christ in simplicity and faith, because \\the paths in\\
 \\which he leads us all end in glory and immortality\\. It is
 true they may not be smooth paths--they may be covered with
 sharp flinty trials, but they lead to the "city which hath
 foundations, whose builder and maker is God." "All the paths of
 the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant."
 Let us put full trust in our Leader, since we know that, come
 prosperity or adversity, sickness or health, popularity or
 contempt, his purpose shall be worked out, and that purpose
 shall be pure, unmingled good to every heir of mercy. We shall
 find it sweet to go up the bleak side of the hill with Christ;
 and when rain and snow blow into our faces, his dear love will
 make us far more blest than those who sit at home and warm their
 hands at the world's fire. To the top of Amana, to the dens of
 lions, or to the hills of leopards, we will follow our Beloved.
 Precious Jesus, draw us, and we will run after thee.

29354
 September 19                                             Evening

 \\"For this child I prayed."\\
                                                  --1 Samuel 1:27

    Devout souls delight to look upon those mercies which they
 have obtained in answer to supplication, for they can see God's
 especial love in them. When we can name our blessings Samuel,
 that is, "asked of God," they will be as dear to us as her child
 was to Hannah. Peninnah had many children, but they came as
 common blessings unsought in prayer: Hannah's one heaven-given
 child was dearer far, because he was the fruit of earnest
 pleadings. How sweet was that water to Samson which he found at
 "the well of him that prayed!" Quassia cups turn all waters
 bitter, but the cup of prayer puts a sweetness into the draughts
 it brings. Did we pray for the conversion of our children? How
 doubly sweet, when they are saved, to see in them our own
 petitions fulfilled! Better to rejoice over them as the fruit of
 our pleadings than as the fruit of our bodies. Have we sought of
 the Lord some choice spiritual gift? When it comes to us it will
 be wrapped up in the gold cloth of God's faithfulness and truth,
 and so be doubly precious. Have we petitioned for success in the
 Lord's work? How joyful is the prosperity which comes flying
 upon the wings of prayer! It is always best to get blessings
 into our house in the legitimate way, by the door of prayer;
 then they are blessings indeed, and not temptations. Even when
 prayer speeds not, the blessings grow all the richer for the
 delay; the child Jesus was all the more lovely in the eyes of
 Mary when she found him after having sought him sorrowing. That
 which we win by prayer we should dedicate to God, as Hannah
 dedicated Samuel. The gift came from heaven, let it go to
 heaven. Prayer brought it, gratitude sang over it, let devotion
 consecrate it. Here will be a special occasion for saying, "Of
 thine own have I given unto thee." Reader, is prayer your
 element or your weariness? Which?

29355
 September 20                                             Evening

 \\"In the evening withhold not thy hand."\\
                                              --Ecclesiastes 11:6

    In \\the evening of the day\\ opportunities are plentiful:
 men return from their labour, and the zealous soul-winner finds
 time to tell abroad the love of Jesus. Have I no evening work
 for Jesus? If I have not, let me no longer withhold my hand from
 a service which requires abundant labour. Sinners are perishing
 for lack of knowledge; he who loiters may find his skirts
 crimson with the blood of souls. Jesus gave both his hands to
 the nails, how can I keep back one of mine from his blessed
 work? Night and day he toiled and prayed for me, how can I give
 a single hour to the pampering of my flesh with luxurious ease?
 Up, idle heart; stretch out thy hand to work, or uplift it to
 pray; heaven and hell are in earnest, let me be so, and this
 evening sow good seed for the Lord my God.

    \\The evening of life\\ has also its calls. Life is so short
 that a morning of manhood's vigour, and an evening of decay,
 make the whole of it. To some it seems long, but a four-pence is
 a great sum of money to a poor man. Life is so brief that no man
 can afford to lose a day. It has been well said that if a great
 king should bring us a great heap of gold, and bid us take as
 much as we could count in a day, we should make a long day of
 it; we should begin early in the morning, and in the evening we
 should not withhold our hand; but to win souls is far nobler
 work, how is it that we so soon withdraw from it? Some are
 spared to a long evening of green old age; if such be my case,
 let me use such talents as I still retain, and to the last hour
 serve my blessed and faithful Lord. By his grace I will die in
 harness, and lay down my charge only when I lay down my body.
 Age may instruct the young, cheer the faint, and encourage the
 desponding; if eventide has less of vigorous heat, it should
 have more of calm wisdom, therefore in the evening I will not
 withhold my hand.

29356
 September 21                                             Evening

 \\"Gather not my soul with sinners."\\
                                                     --Psalm 26:9

    Fear made David pray thus, for something whispered, "Perhaps,
 after all, thou mayst be gathered with the wicked." That fear,
 although marred by unbelief, springs, in the main, from holy
 anxiety, arising from the recollection of past sin. Even the
 pardoned man will enquire, "What if at the end my sins should be
 remembered, and I should be left out of the catalogue of the
 saved?" He recollects his present unfruitfulness--so little
 grace, so little love, so little holiness, and looking forward
 to the future, he considers his weakness and the many
 temptations which beset him, and he fears that he may fall, and
 become a prey to the enemy. A sense of sin and present evil, and
 his prevailing corruptions, compel him to pray, in fear and
 trembling, "Gather not my soul with sinners." Reader, if you
 have prayed this prayer, and if your character be rightly
 described in the Psalm from which it is taken, you need not be
 afraid that you shall be gathered with sinners. Have you the two
 virtues which David had--the outward walking in integrity, and
 the inward trusting in the Lord? Are you resting upon Christ's
 sacrifice, and can you compass the altar of God with humble
 hope? If so, rest assured, with the wicked you never shall be
 gathered, for that calamity is impossible. The gathering at the
 judgment is like to like. "Gather ye together first the tares,
 and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into
 my barn." If, then, thou art \\like\\ God's people, thou shalt
 be \\with\\ God's people. You cannot be gathered with the
 wicked, for you are too dearly bought. Redeemed by the blood of
 Christ, you are his for ever, and where he is, there must his
 people be. You are loved too much to be cast away with
 reprobates. Shall one dear to Christ perish? Impossible! Hell
 cannot hold thee! Heaven claims thee! Trust in thy Surety and
 fear not!

29357
 September 22                                             Evening

 \\"When my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the Rock that is\\
 \\higher than I."\\
                                                     --Psalm 61:2

    Most of us know what it is to be overwhelmed in heart;
 emptied as when a man wipeth a dish and turneth it upside down;
 submerged and thrown on our beam ends like a vessel mastered by
 the storm. Discoveries of inward corruption will do this, if the
 Lord permits the great deep of our depravity to become troubled
 and cast up mire and dirt. Disappointments and heart-breaks will
 do this when billow after billow rolls over us, and we are like
 a broken shell hurled to and fro by the surf. Blessed be God, at
 such seasons we are not without an all-sufficient solace, our
 God is the harbour of weather-beaten sails, the hospice of
 forlorn pilgrims. Higher than we are is he, his mercy higher
 than our sins, his love higher than our thoughts. It is pitiful
 to see men putting their trust in something lower than
 themselves; but our confidence is fixed upon an exceeding high
 and glorious Lord. A Rock he is since he changes not, and a high
 Rock, because the tempests which overwhelm us roll far beneath
 at his feet; he is not disturbed by them, but rules them at his
 will. If we get under the shelter of this lofty Rock we may
 defy the hurricane; all is calm under the lee of that towering
 cliff. Alas! such is the confusion in which the troubled mind is
 often cast, that we need piloting to this divine shelter. Hence
 the prayer of the text. O Lord, our God, by thy Holy Spirit,
 teach us the way of faith, lead us into thy rest. The wind blows
 us out to sea, the helm answers not to our puny hand; thou, thou
 alone canst steer us over the bar between yon sunken rocks, safe
 into the fair haven. How dependent we are upon thee--we need
 thee to bring us to thee. To be wisely directed and steered into
 safety and peace is thy gift, and thine alone. This night be
 pleased to deal well with thy servants.

29358
 September 23                                             Evening

 \\"Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe."\\
                                                      --Mark 9:23

    A certain man had a demoniac son, who was afflicted with a
 dumb spirit. The father, having seen the futility of the
 endeavours of the disciples to heal his child, had little or no
 faith in Christ, and therefore, when he was bidden to bring his
 son to him, he said to Jesus, "If thou canst do anything, have
 compassion on us, and help us." Now there was an "if" in the
 question, but the poor trembling father had put the "if" in the
 wrong place: Jesus Christ, therefore, without commanding him to
 retract the "if," kindly puts it in its legitimate position.
 "Nay, verily," he seemed to say, "there should be no 'if' about
 my power, nor concerning my willingness, the 'if' lies somewhere
 else." "\\If thou canst believe\\, all things are possible to
 him that believeth." The man's trust was strengthened, he
 offered a humble prayer for an increase of faith, and instantly
 Jesus spoke the word, and the devil was cast out, with an
 injunction never to return. There is a lesson here which we need
 to learn. We, like this man, often see that there is an "if"
 somewhere, but we are perpetually blundering by putting it in
 the wrong place. "\\If\\" Jesus can help me--"\\if\\" he can
 give me grace to overcome temptation--"\\if\\" he can give me
 pardon--"\\if\\" he can make me successful? Nay, "\\if\\" you
 can believe, he both can and will. You have misplaced your "if."
 If you can confidently trust, even as all things are possible to
 Christ, so shall all things be possible to you. Faith standeth
 in God's power, and is robed in God's majesty; it weareth the
 royal apparel, and rideth on the King's horse, for it is the
 grace which the King delighteth to honour. Girding itself with
 the glorious might of the all-working Spirit, it becomes, in the
 omnipotence of God, mighty to do, to dare, and to suffer. All
 things, without limit, are possible to him that believeth. My
 soul, canst thou believe thy Lord to-night?
29359
 September 24                                             Evening

 \\"I sleep, but my heart waketh."\\
                                            --Song of Solomon 5:2

    Paradoxes abound in Christian experience, and here is
 one--the spouse was asleep, and yet she was awake. He only can
 read the believer's riddle who has ploughed with the heifer of
 his experience. The two points in this evening's text are--a
 mournful sleepiness and a hopeful wakefulness. I \\sleep\\.
 Through sin that dwelleth in us we may become lax in holy
 duties, slothful in religious exercises, dull in spiritual joys,
 and altogether supine and careless. This is a shameful state for
 one in whom the quickening Spirit dwells; and it is dangerous to
 the highest degree. Even wise virgins sometimes slumber, but it
 is high time for all to shake off the bands of sloth. It is to
 be feared that many believers lose their strength as Samson lost
 his locks, while sleeping on the lap of carnal security. With a
 perishing world around us, to sleep is cruel; with eternity so
 near at hand, it is madness. Yet we are none of us so much awake
 as we should be; a few thunder-claps would do us all good, and
 it may be, unless we soon bestir ourselves, we shall have them
 in the form of war, or pestilence, or personal bereavements and
 losses. O that we may leave for ever the couch of fleshly ease,
 and go forth with flaming torches to meet the coming Bridegroom!
 \\My heart waketh\\. This is a happy sign. Life is not extinct,
 though sadly smothered. When our renewed heart struggles against
 our natural heaviness, we should be grateful to sovereign grace
 for keeping a little vitality within the body of this death.
 Jesus will hear our hearts, will help our hearts, will visit our
 hearts; for the voice of the wakeful heart is really the voice
 of our Beloved, saying, "Open to me." Holy zeal will surely
 unbar the door.

               "Oh lovely attitude! He stands
               With melting heart and laden hands;
               My soul forsakes her every sin;
               And lets the heavenly stranger in."

29360
 September 25                                             Evening

 \\"Who of God is made unto us wisdom."\\
                                             --1 Corinthians 1:30

    Man's intellect seeks after rest, and by nature seeks it
 apart from the Lord Jesus Christ. Men of education are apt,
 even when converted, to look upon the simplicities of the cross
 of Christ with an eye too little reverent and loving. They are
 snared in the old net in which the Grecians were taken, and have
 a hankering to mix philosophy with revelation. The temptation
 with a man of refined thought and high education is to depart
 from the simple truth of Christ crucified, and to invent, as the
 term is, a more \\intellectual\\ doctrine. This led the early
 Christian churches into Gnosticism, and bewitched them with all
 sorts of heresies. This is the root of Neology, and the other
 fine things which in days gone by were so fashionable in
 Germany, and are now so ensnaring to certain classes of divines.
 Whoever you are, good reader, and whatever your education may
 be, if you be the Lord's, be assured you will find no rest in
 philosophizing divinity. You may receive this dogma of one great
 thinker, or that dream of another profound reasoner, but what
 the chaff is to the wheat, that will these be to the pure word
 of God. All that reason, when best guided, can find out is but
 the A B C of truth, and even that lacks certainty, while in
 Christ Jesus there is treasured up all the fulness of wisdom and
 knowledge. All attempts on the part of Christians to be content
 with systems such as Unitarian and Broad-church thinkers would
 approve of, must fail; true heirs of heaven must come back to
 the grandly simple reality which makes the ploughboy's eye flash
 with joy, and gladens the pious pauper's heart--"Jesus Christ came
 into the world to save sinners." Jesus satisfies the most
 elevated intellect when he is believingly received, but apart
 from him the mind of the regenerate discovers no rest. "The fear
 of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge." "A good
 understanding have all they that do his commandments."
29361
 September 26                                             Evening

 \\"Howl, fir tree, for the cedar is fallen."\\
                                                 --Zechariah 11:2

    When in the forest there is heard the crash of a falling oak,
 it is a sign that the woodman is abroad, and every tree in the
 whole company may tremble lest to-morrow the sharp edge of the
 axe should find it out. We are all like trees marked for the
 axe, and the fall of one should remind us that for every one,
 whether great as the cedar, or humble as the fir, the appointed
 hour is stealing on apace. I trust we do not, by often hearing
 of death, become callous to it. May we never be like the birds
 in the steeple, which build their nests when the bells are
 tolling, and sleep quietly when the solemn funeral peals are
 startling the air. May we regard death as the most weighty of
 all events, and be sobered by its approach. It ill behoves us to
 sport while our eternal destiny hangs on a thread. The sword is
 out of its scabbard--let us not trifle; it is furbished, and the
 edge is sharp--let us not play with it. He who does not prepare
 for death is more than an ordinary fool, he is a madman. When
 the voice of God is heard among the trees of the garden, let fig
 tree and sycamore, and elm and cedar, alike hear the sound
 thereof.

    Be ready, servant of Christ, for thy Master comes on a
 sudden, when an ungodly world least expects him. See to it that
 thou be faithful in his work, for the grave shall soon be digged
 for thee. Be ready, parents, see that your children are brought
 up in the fear of God, for they must soon be orphans; be ready,
 men of business, take care that your affairs are correct, and
 that you serve God with all your hearts, for the days of your
 terrestrial service will soon be ended, and you will be called
 to give account for the deeds done in the body, whether they be
 good or whether they be evil. May we all prepare for the
 tribunal of the great King with a care which shall be rewarded
 with the gracious commendation, "Well done, good and faithful
 servant"
29362
 September 27                                             Evening

 \\"My Beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my\\
 \\bowels were moved for him."\\
                                            --Song of Solomon 5:4

    Knocking was not enough, for my heart was too full of sleep,
 too cold and ungrateful to arise and open the door, but the
 touch of his effectual grace has made my soul bestir itself.
 Oh, the longsuffering of my Beloved, to tarry when he found
 himself shut out, and me asleep upon the bed of sloth! Oh, the
 greatness of his patience, to knock and knock again, and to add
 his voice to his knockings, beseeching me to open to him! How
 could I have refused him! Base heart, blush and be confounded!
 But what greatest kindness of all is this, that he becomes his
 own porter and unbars the door himself. Thrice blessed is the
 hand which condescends to lift the latch and turn the key. Now I
 see that nothing but my Lord's own power can save such a naughty
 mass of wickedness as I am; ordinances fail, even the gospel has
 no effect upon me, till his hand is stretched out. Now, also, I
 perceive that his hand is good where all else is unsuccessful,
 he can open when nothing else will. Blessed be his name, I feel
 his gracious presence even now. Well may my bowels move for him,
 when I think of all that he has suffered for me, and of my
 ungenerous return. I have allowed my affections to wander. I
 have set up rivals. I have grieved him. Sweetest and dearest of
 all beloveds, I have treated thee as an unfaithful wife treats
 her husband. Oh, my cruel sins, my cruel self. What can I do?
 Tears are a poor show of my repentance, my whole heart boils
 with indignation at myself. Wretch that I am, to treat my Lord,
 my All in All, my exceeding great joy, as though he were a
 stranger. Jesus, thou forgivest freely, but this is not enough,
 prevent my unfaithfulness in the future. Kiss away these tears,
 and then purge my heart and bind it with sevenfold cords to
 thyself, never to wander more.

29363
 September 28                                             Evening

 \\"Go again seven times."\\
                                                  --1 Kings 18:43

    Success is certain when the Lord has promised it. Although
 you may have pleaded month after month without evidence of
 answer, it is not possible that the Lord should be deaf when his
 people are earnest in a matter which concerns his glory. The
 prophet on the top of Carmel continued to wrestle with God, and
 never for a moment gave way to a fear that he should be
 non-suited in Jehovah's courts. Six times the servant returned,
 but on each occasion no word was spoken but "Go again." We must
 not dream of unbelief, but hold to our faith even to seventy
 times seven. Faith sends expectant hope to look from Carmel's
 brow, and if nothing is beheld, she sends again and again. So
 far from being crushed by repeated disappointment, faith is
 animated to plead more fervently with her God. She is humbled,
 but not abashed: her groans are deeper, and her sighings more
 vehement, but she never relaxes her hold or stays her hand. It
 would be more agreeable to flesh and blood to have a speedy
 answer, but believing souls have learned to be submissive, and
 to find it good to wait \\for\\ as well as \\upon\\ the Lord.
 Delayed answers often set the heart searching itself, and so
 lead to contrition and spiritual reformation: deadly blows are
 thus struck at our corruption, and the chambers of imagery are
 cleansed. The great danger is lest men should faint, and miss
 the blessing. Reader, do not fall into that sin, but continue in
 prayer and watching. At last the little cloud was seen, the sure
 forerunner of torrents of rain, and even so with you, the token
 for good shall surely be given, and you shall rise as a
 prevailing prince to enjoy the mercy you have sought. Elijah was
 a man of like passions with us: his power with God did not lie
 in his own merits. If his believing prayer availed so much, why
 not yours? Plead the precious blood with unceasing importunity,
 and it shall be with you according to your desire.

29364
 September 29                                             Evening

 \\"I found him whom my soul loveth: I held him, and would not\\
 \\let him go."\\
                                            --Song of Solomon 3:4

    Does Christ receive us when we come to him, notwithstanding
 all our past sinfulness? Does he never chide us for having tried
 all other refuges first? And is there none on earth like him? Is
 he the best of all the good, the fairest of all the fair? Oh,
 then let us praise him! Daughters of Jerusalem, extol him with
 timbrel and harp! Down with your idols, up with the Lord Jesus.
 Now let the standards of pomp and pride be trampled under foot,
 but let the cross of Jesus, which the world frowns and scoffs
 at, be lifted on high. O for a throne of ivory for our King
 Solomon! Let him be set on high for ever, and let my soul sit at
 his footstool, and kiss his feet, and wash them with my tears.
 Oh, how precious is Christ! How can it be that I have thought so
 little of him? How is it I can go abroad for joy or comfort when
 he is so full, so rich, so satisfying. Fellow believer, make a
 covenant with thine heart that thou wilt never depart from him,
 and ask thy Lord to ratify it. Bid him set thee as a signet upon
 his finger, and as a bracelet upon his arm. Ask him to bind thee
 about him, as the bride decketh herself with ornaments, and as
 the bridegroom putteth on his jewels. I would live in Christ's
 heart; in the clefts of that rock my soul would eternally abide.
 The sparrow hath made a house, and the swallow a nest for
 herself where she may lay her young, even thine altars, O Lord
 of hosts, my King and my God; and so too would I make my nest,
 my home, in thee, and never from thee may the soul of thy turtle
 dove go forth again, but may I nestle close to thee, O Jesus, my
 true and only rest.

                  "When my precious Lord I find,
                  All my ardent passions glow;
                  Him with cords of love I bind,
                  Hold and will not let him go."
29365
 September 30                                             Evening

 \\"A living dog is better than a dead lion."\\
                                               --Ecclesiastes 9:4

    Life is a precious thing, and in its humblest form it is
 superior to death. This truth is eminently certain in spiritual
 things. It is better to be the least in the kingdom of heaven
 than the greatest out of it. The lowest degree of grace is
 superior to the noblest development of unregenerate nature.
 Where the Holy Ghost implants divine life in the soul, there is
 a precious deposit which none of the refinements of education
 can equal. The thief on the cross excels Caesar on his throne;
 Lazarus among the dogs is better than Cicero among the senators;
 and the most unlettered Christian is in the sight of God
 superior to Plato. Life is the badge of nobility in the realm of
 spiritual things, and men without it are only coarser or finer
 specimens of the same lifeless material, needing to be
 quickened, for they are dead in trespasses and sins.

    A living, loving, gospel sermon, however unlearned in matter
 and uncouth in style, is better than the finest discourse devoid
 of unction and power. A living dog keeps better watch than a
 dead lion, and is of more service to his master; and so the
 poorest spiritual preacher is infinitely to be preferred to the
 exquisite orator who has no wisdom but that of words, no energy
 but that of sound. The like holds good of our prayers and other
 religious exercises; if we are quickened in them by the Holy
 Spirit, they are acceptable to God through Jesus Christ, though
 we may think them to be worthless things; while our grand
 performances in which our hearts were absent, like dead lions,
 are mere carrion in the sight of the living God. O for living
 groans, living sighs, living despondencies, rather than lifeless
 songs and dead calms. Better anything than death. The snarlings
 of the dog of hell will at least keep us awake, but dead faith
 and dead profession, what greater curses can a man have? Quicken
 us, quicken us, O Lord!

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