THE GOSPEL MAGAZINE. "COMFORT YE, COMFORT YE MY PEOPLE, SAITH YOUR GOD." "ENDEAVOURING TO KEEP THE UNITY OF THE SPIRIT IN THE BOND OF PEACE" "JESUS CHRIST, THE SAME YESTERDAY, AND TO-DAY, AND FOR EVER." "WHOM TO KNOW IS LIFE ETERNAL." No. 89, NEW SERIES. } AUGUST 1, 1872. The Family Portion; OR, WORDS OF SPIRITUAL CAUTION, COUNSEL, AND COMFORT. No. 1,280, OLD SERIES. Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God."-2 COR. i. 4. SATURDAY-TRAVAIL; OR, MEETINGS AND GREETINGS; BEING LESSONS BY THE WAY.-" MY FATHER." "Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another: and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon IIis name. And they shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him."-MAL. iii. 16, 17. Ir was Saturday morning, and we had, as usual, carefully read the Lessons and Psalms, the Epistle and Gospel, for the coming day, in hope of finding a text. We had gone to the pulpit the previous Thursday evening with much sinking of heart, feeling used up, and as though we had nothing left to say, when the Lord, notwithstanding, vouchsafed to us a most privileged season, so that, according to feeling, we should like to have stood talking till midnight upon that precious portion, "I will cry unto God Most High; unto God that performeth all things for me" (Psalm lvii. 2). Still, as we have numberless times found before, after the sweetest seasons in the pulpit, there comes the greatest blank. No sooner has one ceased to speak-sat down in the pulpit, or retired to the vestry-than the load of trial, or care, or anxiety, re-appears, and is taken up afresh, so that the poor flesh cringes under the burden. On this particular Saturday morning, the aforenamed state of mind very greatly prevailed. Bowed down-much oppressed-feeling the weight of the coming day-it was in very deed the "burden of the Word of the Lord." The remembrance of such recent mercies would not suffice. It must be a fresh communication. Moreover, the ensuing day was both the seventh and the thirty-first anniversary of two of life's dearest companions and earthly props being taken away. Hence there was additional material for thought and care, and, in a certain sense, sadness. G G Under these circumstances we can rarely sit; we must walk; and, whilst we are walking, we love, if possible, to muse; and, strange as it may appear, we can generally best do so in the crowded thoroughfare. We have no idea of shut-up, monastic retirement. We have too commonly found that, in thus attempting to shut out man, we have shut in Satan and our own base hearts; and these, getting together, have made sad havoc. We do not say that this is always the case. No (blessed be God!), we have known, personally, so much of the sweets of retirement, as to love it at times and seasons. Nevertheless, we must, as it were, revel in real life; we must come in contact with our fellow-men, in order to sympathize, to weep with them, and to rejoice with them; and, in so doing, we very frequently get a crumb for our own poor hungry soul; and there is such virtue and fulness and strengthening sustaining power in the bread of life, that even a crumb satisfies! It serves for the soul to masticate and feed upon, and from which to derive nourishment for hours or days together. But, before we walk, we are glad, if we can, to get this crumb from the word of life, so that we may masticate as we walk; or, in other words, we are thankful to get a portion from the Word, upon which to meditate as we walk. Hence the reading of the various portions for the coming day just now referred to; but, although one sweet passage touching the Fatherhood of God occurred in these readings, yet we could not decide upon it as a text. It lacked as yet present power-actual life-spirit and soul-heart and home application. Ah, this is what we love in regard to a text. Well, in this state of indecision we went forth, with, as we said, the "burden of the Word of the Lord" on our heart, not in the leastwise presuming upon the morrow. No, we never dare do that. Indulged us, as the Lord has done hundreds, if not thousands, of times, we can never be reckless, or carelessly exclaim, "Well, we always have had something to say, and no doubt we shall again; hence we need not be anxious." No, that is a kind of spirit, and that is language, in which, we repeat, we dare not indulge. Notwithstanding the numberless times in which the Lord has appeared, we want afresh the seal, the power, of which we just now spake; the loved "Fear not "the heart-whisper, "I am with thee." Then, as dear Hart says "Confirm'd by one soft secret word, As we walked we met two in particular whom we knew to be deeply tried. Both had been recently bereaved of their earthly companions, and both had had the most significant of lessons set before them, in various ways. To each of these we sought to speak words in season, and to give the results of test and experience. We hope that in neither instance they were lost words. Meanwhile, however, we had no seal for the morrow-no crumb for ourselves-naught as yet to carry to and break up among the people. This, however thanks to our God!), was in reserve; and a little incident led to it. We called at a house of business, one of the principals of which kindly asked us to accompany him home for the afternoon. We respectfully declined, saying, we had the morrow before us. "And arn't you prepared for it ?" was the reply. "No," said we, "but are obliged to come out in this way, to seek for something. It is in contact with my fellow-men, or with real life, I obtain what I want." The subject, then, of "father" came up, and he told a touching fact about his "father." Within a few minutes, another gentleman having entered, he busied himself in packing up a small parcel, which, having done, he said, to one of the principals aforenamed, "I was about to ask you kindly to take this to my child." We never remember the words, "my child," ever to have fallen upon the ear and into the heart with greater force or power; so that we could not help giving utterance to the thought which was instantly suggested: "How often our Father above says to one of His celestial attendants, Take this or that to my child!"" Oh, what a field of thought immediately opened-what a host of ideas burst in upon the mind-in connexion with this near and dear relationship, "Father" and "child!" The line of thought became the more real and vivid, because we happened to know that "the child" alluded to had been long and painfully afflicted. Hence the tender sympathies and the more intense solicitude of the father were the more ardently awakened. How beautifully, therefore, stood out, in lively and blessed prominence, the gracious sympathies, boundless love, and divine compassion of the "Everlasting Father," the Brother born for adversity, that kind and tender and loving Sympathizer who, as our Great High Priest, can in very deed be "touched with the feeling of our infirmities, He having been in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin!" An occurrence, ten to eleven years gone by, directly came to our recollection. Our dear son (then a student at college) was most reluctant from time to time to draw upon our already over-taxed limited means. Knowing this reluctance, we were most anxious to save him the unpleasant ordeal of asking further help, by anticipating his wishes in regard to that help; but, by some means, we were prevented. Hence, ere we were aware, as we were walking upon a certain spot-ever since identified in our mind with the circumstance-he modestly said," he should want some money to take him through the course that awaited him." We shall never forget the selfreproach of which we instantly became the subject, through not having acted more promptly, and saved our dear one the pain of asking for further help. But, oh, the light that this simple circumstance threw upon certain passages of the Word was unspeakably precious: "And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear;" "Your Heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things before ye ask Him;" "If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him?" And, if the reader be one taught of God, and familiar with the chequered course of the wilderness, has he not again and again proved how the Lord has repeatedly been beforehand with him, in His kind and gracious provision? Many times, ere he was aware that such and such thing would presently be necessary-yea, absolutely indispensable the Lord has had them in waiting. So that, when the need has really come, he has been compelled to see and acknowledge the Lord's hand in the provision; and, in that so timely provision, had so sweet a proof of the Lord's Fatherly care and tender, loving interest. Yes, such merciful anticipation of our needs have so sweetly illustrated the Saviour's precious assurance just now quoted, "Your Heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things, before ye ask Him." Dear reader, the incident aforenamed may seem trifling and insignificant in your estimation, but it taught us a lesson we shall never forget. It gave us an insight into the loving, tender, considerate heart of our Father-God, that has stood by us to the present moment. "Oh," thought we, "if this be our feelings, poor, sinful, and polluted as we are-yea, virtually all sin and abominationwhat must be the tenderness, the compassion, the boundless love of Him who was the Author and Infuser of these tender emotions?" Who can conceive of the depth and height, the length and breadth of His love, of whom it is declared, "that, like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pities them who fear Him; He knoweth our frame; He remembereth that we are dust ?" "Is Ephraim my dear son? is he a pleasant child? for, since I spake against him, I do earnestly remember him still. My bowels are troubled for him. I will surely have mercy upon him, saith the Lord.” Ah, reader, there are circumstances and positions in which those who are parents are placed, which serve to illustrate, and to open up in a wonderful way, both the character and the dealings of our God, which it seems to us none but parents can fully understand In other respects or in other persons, it appears to us to be speculation or mere guess-work-not absolute feeling, not positive realization, not actual experience. Hence the insight which these parental feelings and emotions afford us as to the love, the tenderness, the gracious dealings of our God, may well help to reconcile us to the responsibilities and the weight and the care more or less inseparable from our position as parents. What a key, we repeat, does it again and again give us to the very heart of our God! How readily does it furnish us, in these repeated lessons of every-day and all-the-day life, with thoughts and feelings-views and convictions-of divine leadings and teachings, guardianship and guidance, which naught of anything else, of an earthly kind, could afford! The foregoing had been pencilled down in our memorandum-book for some weeks, when the recollection that it was again Saturday morning led us to take it up, and we did so with very similar feelings to those already expressed: dark, fearful, perplexed, and harassed. Sunday before us, but no word to light upon us with mellowness, dew, unction. This text had already been spoken from, and that, an 1 the other. Where was there something fresh, new, of interest to the people? Surely they would weary with "the old, old story." Thirty years ago, when immersed in a large and anxious business, we were bowed down beneath the weight of this and that monetary engagement which had to be met. Money's worth in stock or on the ledger is one thing; but money at the bank or in the cash-box quite another. Hence there would be specially the Saturday's travail for the means wherewith to wind up the anxious week, and that one might have a little cessation of business-care, and a measure of relaxation from trading life and perplexity, during the sacred hours of the Sabbath. Ah, where there is a tender conscience, and where a becoming sense of right and wrong, what dear child of God placed in the midst of a godless world, but feels the difficulty of his position? He knows full well that he is not a match for those whose sole end and aim are the attainment of their own selfish objects, at any price, and with an utter disregard to principle or truth; those who have "no fear of God before their eyes," and of whom Solomon speaks, when he says, "It is naught, it is naught, saith the buyer, but when he has gone his way he boasteth." We repeat, that the daily contact with such wounds the child of God to the quick, and causes him to cry mightily to the Lord for succour and deliverance. Oh, the anguish of his heart, the sinking of his soul, as, during the Sabbath-hours, or ronsed from his restless slumbers, he in the night-watches anticipates the renewal of his commercial conflict and trade turmoil and travail. Moreover, there is a far greater amount of this anguish of heart and burden of business-care and responsibility in these times, than formerly, because of the departure from the plainness and simplicity which characterized bygone days. It is because there is so little real "coming out from the world," in its habits and observances, pursuits and practices, "and being separate, and touching not the unclean thing," upon the part of the people of God, that additional weight and care and anxiety fall to their portion. If they seek to shun the cross by the avoidance of what would seem to be marked or special, or, as some would term it, "straight-laced," they are only called to meet it in another way-that is, in the opinions of men. Oh, if I were to fail-should I come short-if circumstances went against me, then what would So and So, and So and So say? Hence, if we seek to please man in one way, we become the subjects of the fear of man in another way. So that it would be far better, had we grace to come out boldly and fearlessly and truthfully, utterly regardless of what men might think or say: at the same time, taking 66 |