One day in the year 520 B. C., Zechariah was preaching in Jerusalem. He
had been in Babylon during the great captivity, and had returned with
some other Jews in the hope of rebuilding the ruined capital and
beginning anew their broken national life. He asked the younger people
to avoid the sins which in their fathers had wrought all this ruin. He
meant that in successively better generations is the road uphill for
the race.
One day I met a father who was some twelve inches shorter than his
accompanying son. The difference was the more conspicuous in that they
were close companions. Some one referred to it, and the father replied
that he considered it was as it should be—each generation a little taller
than the preceding one. I knew what he meant. He had seen where lies the
road uphill.
In 1714, in a little English tavern, a boy was born who was destined to
affect the history of religion. George Whitefield was brought up cleaning
floors and selling drink to the rough frequenters of his father’s tavern.
He worked his way through Oxford since his parents were little concerned
with such matters. He lived to make hearts tremble with his prophetic
voice and to plant undying works of Christian service and benevolence. He
pushed a little ahead of what his parents were. That is the road uphill.
During the presidency of General Grant, an old sailor went to the White
House to object that the naval department had promoted his son to a place
of authority above him, saying that it would not look right to be taking
orders from his own son. The President replied that he had just appointed
his father, Jesse Grant, postmaster in a little town in a distant state,
and that he did not seem to mind taking orders from his own son.
Jesse Grant had seen the road uphill.
One day in a Nazarene synagogue, Mary’s Son stood up and read from the
Book of Isaiah His own commission to proclaim the kingdom of God. His
human heritage was a long line of choice ancestors, but He had surpassed
all those behind Him in the line. He was traveling and leading His race
along the road uphill.