=June 13th.=
_Come out from among them, and be ye separate. 2 Cor.
vi. 17._
With all the world in his choice, God placed His ancient people in a
very remarkable situation. On the north they were walled in by the snowy
ranges of Lebanon; a barren desert formed their eastern boundary; far to
the south stretched a sterile region, called the howling wilderness;
while the sea--not then, as now, the highway of the nations,
facilitating rather than impeding intercourse--lay on their west,
breaking on a shore that had few harbors and no navigable rivers to
invite the steps of commerce.
May we not find a great truth in the very position in which God placed
His chosen people? It certainly teaches us that to be holy, or
sanctified, we must be a separate people--living in the world, but not
of it--as oil, that may be mixed, but cannot be combined with
water.--_Guthrie._
=June 14th.=
_I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places
whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into
this land. Gen. xxviii. 15._
"With thee," companionship; "Keep thee," guardianship; "Bring thee,"
guidance.
=June 15th.=
_I have set thee . . . that thou shouldst be for
salvation unto the ends of the earth. Acts xiii. 47._
_Ye shall be witnesses unto me . . . unto the uttermost
parts of the earth. Acts i. 8._
Men are questioning now, as they never have questioned before, whether
Christianity is, indeed, the true religion which is to be the salvation
of the world. Christian men, it is for us to give our bit of answer to
that question. It is for us, in whom the Christian church is at this
moment partially embodied, to declare that Christianity, that the
Christian faith, the Christian manhood can do that for the world which
the world needs.