He will order all things for you. What can cross your will, when it is one
with His will, on which all creation hangs, round which all things revolve?
Keep your hearts clear of evil thoughts; for as evil choices estrange the
will from His will, so evil thoughts cloud the soul, and hide Him from
us. Whatever sets us in opposition to Him makes our will an intolerable
torment. So long as we will one thing and He another, we go on piercing
ourselves through and through with a perpetual wound; and His will advances
moving on in sanctity and majesty, crushing ours into the dust.
H. E. MANNING.
October 23
_Teach me to do Thy will; for Thou art my God: Thy spirit is good; lead me
into the land of uprightness_.--PS. cxliii. 10.
The battle of our life is won,
And heaven begun,
When we can say, "Thy will be done!"
But, Lord, until
These restless hearts in Thy deep love are still,
We pray Thee, "Teach us how to do Thy will!"
LUCY LARCOM.
"You are seeking your own will, my daughter. You are seeking some good
other than the law you are bound to obey. But how will you find good? It
is not a thing of choice; it is a river that flows from the foot of the
Invisible Throne, and flows by the path of obedience. I say again, man
cannot choose his duties. You may choose to forsake your duties, and
choose not to have the sorrow they bring. But you will go forth, and what
will you find, my daughter? Sorrow without duty--bitter herbs, and no
bread with them."
GEORGE ELIOT.
However dark and profitless, however painful and weary, existence may have
become, life is not done, and our Christian character is not won, so long
as God has anything left for us to suffer, or anything left for us to do.
F. W. ROBERTSON.
October 24
_The Lord is my strength, and my shield; my heart trusted in Him, and I
am helped: therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; and with my song will I
praise Him_.--PS. xxviii. 7.
Well may Thy happy children cease
From restless wishes, prone to sin,
And, in Thy own exceeding peace,
Yield to Thy daily discipline.
A. L. WARING.
Talk of hair-cloth shirts, and scourgings, and sleeping on ashes, as means
of saintship! There is no need of them in our country. Let a woman
once look at her domestic trials as her hair-cloth, her ashes, her
scourges,--accept them,--rejoice in them,--smile and be quiet, silent,
patient, and loving under them,--and the convent can teach her no more; she
is a victorious saint.
H. B. STOWE.
Perhaps it is a greater energy of Divine Providence, which keeps the
Christian from day to day, from year to year--praying, hoping, running,
believing--against all hindrances--which maintains him as a _living
martyr_, than that which bears him up for an hour in sacrificing himself at
the stake.
R. CECIL.
October 25
_For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor
principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor
height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us
from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord_.--ROM. viii. 38,
39.
I know not what the future hath
Of marvel or surprise,
Assured alone that life and death
His mercy underlies.
J. G. WHITTIER.
Be of good faith, my dear Friends, look not out at any thing; fear none of
those things ye may be exposed to suffer, either outwardly or inwardly; but
trust the Lord over all, and your life will spring, and grow, and refresh
you, and ye will learn obedience and faithfulness daily more and more, even
by your exercises and sufferings; yea, the Lord will teach you the very
mystery of faith and obedience; the wisdom, power, love, and goodness of
the Lord ordering _every_ thing for you, and ordering _your_ hearts in
every thing.
I. PENINGTON.
October 26
_Turn you to the strong hold, ye prisoners of hope_.--ZECH. ix. 12.
O power to do; O baffled will!
O prayer and action! ye are one.
Who may not strive, may yet fulfil
The harder task of standing still,
And good but wished with God is done.
J. G. WHITTIER.
That God has circumscribed our life may add a peculiar element of trial,
but often it defines our way and cuts off many tempting possibilities that
perplex the free and the strong; whilst it leaves intact the whole body
of spiritual reality, with the Beatitude thereon, "that if we know these
things, happy are we if we do them." We know that God orders the lot; and
to meet it with the energies it requires and permits, neither more nor
less,--to fill it at every available point with the light and action of an
earnest and spiritually inventive mind, though its scene be no wider than
a sick chamber, and its action narrowed to patient suffering, and gentle,
cheerful words, and all the light it can emit the thankful quiet of a
trustful eye,--without chafing as though God had misjudged our sphere, and
placed us wrong, and did not know where we could best serve Him,--this is
what, in that condition, we _have to do_.
J. H. THOM.
October 27
_Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities,
in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then
am I strong_.--2 COR. xii. 10.
Whatever God does is well!
In patience let us wait;
He doth Himself our burdens bear,
He doth for us take care,
And He, our God, knows all our weary days.
Come, give Him praise.
B. SCHMOLCK.
Nothing else but this seeing God in everything will make us loving and
patient with those who annoy and trouble us. They will be to us then only
the instruments for accomplishing His tender and wise purposes towards us,
and we shall even find ourselves at last inwardly thanking them for the
blessings they bring us. Nothing else will completely put an end to all
murmuring or rebelling thoughts.
H. W. SMITH.
The subjection of the will is accomplished by calmly resigning thyself in
everything that internally or externally vexes thee; for it is thus only
that the soul is prepared for the reception of divine influences. Prepare
the, heart like clean paper, and the Divine Wisdom will imprint on it
characters to His own liking.
M. DE MOLINOS.
October 28
_I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of
peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end_.--JER. xxix. 11.
Thy thoughts are good, and Thou art kind,
E'en when we think it not;
How many an anxious, faithless mind
Sits grieving o'er its lot,
And frets, and pines by day and night,
As God had lost it out of sight,
And all its wants forgot.
P. GERHARDT.
You are never to complain of your birth, your training, your employments,
your hardships; never to fancy that you could be something if only you had
a different lot and sphere assigned you. God understands His own plan, and
He knows what you want a great deal better than you do. The very things
that you most deprecate, as fatal limitations or obstructions, are probably
what you most want. What you call hindrances, obstacles, discouragements,
are probably God's opportunities. Bring down your soul, or, rather, bring
it up to receive God's will and do His work, in your lot, in your sphere,
under your cloud of obscurity, against your temptations, and then you
shall find that your condition is never opposed to your good, but really
consistent with it.
H. BUSHNELL.
October 29
_Behold, I have refined thee, but not with silver; I have chosen thee in
the furnace of affliction_--ISA. xlviii. 10.
Be patient, suffering soul! I hear thy cry.
The trial fires may glow, but I am nigh.
I see the silver, and I will refine
Until My image shall upon it shine.
Fear not, for I am near, thy help to be;
Greater than all thy pain, My love for thee.
H. W. C.
God takes a thousand times more pains with us than the artist with his
picture, by many touches of sorrow, and by many colors of circumstance, to
bring man into the form which is the highest and noblest in His sight, if
only we received His gifts and myrrh in the right spirit. But when the cup
is put away, and these feelings are stifled or unheeded, a greater injury
is done to the soul than can ever be amended. For no heart can conceive in
what surpassing love God giveth us this myrrh; yet this which we ought
to receive to our soul's good, we suffer to pass by us in our sleepy
indifference, and nothing comes, of it. Then we come and complain: "Alas,
Lord! I am so dry, and it is so dark within me!" I tell thee, dear child,
open thy heart to the pain, and it will do thee more good than if thou wert
full of feeling and devoutness.
J. TAULER.
October 30
_That good thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy Ghost which
dwelleth in us_.--2 TIM. i. 14.
Oh that the Comforter would come!
Nor visit as a transient guest,
But fix in me His constant home,
And keep possession of my breast:
And make my soul His loved abode,
The temple of indwelling God!
C. WESLEY.
Thy spirit should become, while yet on earth, the peaceful throne of the
Divine Being; think, then, how quiet, how gentle and pure, how reverent,
thou shouldst be.
GERHARD TERSTEEGEN.
I cannot tell you how much I love you. But that which of all things I have
most at heart, with regard to you, is the real progress of your soul in the
divine life. Heaven seems to be awakened in you. It is a tender plant. It
requires stillness, meekness, and the unity of the heart, totally given up
to the unknown workings of the Spirit of God, which will do all its work in
the calm soul, that has no hunger or desire but to escape out of the mire
of its earthly life into its lost union and life in God. I mention this,
out of a fear of your giving in to an eagerness about many things, which,
though seemingly innocent, yet divide and weaken the workings of the divine
life within you.
WM. LAW.
October 31
_And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him_.--GEN. v. 24.
Oh for a closer walk with God,
A calm and heavenly frame;
A light to shine upon the road
That leads me to the Lamb!
W. COWPER.
Is it possible for any of us in these modern days to so live that we may
walk with God? Can we walk with God in the shop, in the office, in the
household, and on the street? When men exasperate us, and work wearies us,
and the children fret, and the servants annoy, and our best-laid plans fall
to pieces, and our castles in the air are dissipated like bubbles that
break at a breath, then can we walk with God? That religion which fails us
in the every-day trials and experiences of life has somewhere in it a flaw.
It should be more than a plank to sustain us in the rushing tide, and land
us exhausted and dripping on the other side. It ought, if it come from
above, to be always, day by day, to our souls as the wings of a bird,
bearing us away from and beyond the impediments which seek to hold us down.
If the Divine Love be a conscious presence, an indwelling force with us, it
will do this.
CHRISTIAN UNION.
November 1
_Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named_.--EPH. iii. 15.
One family, we dwell in Him;
One church above, beneath;
Though now divided by the stream,--
The narrow stream of death.
One army of the living God,
To His command we bow:
Part of His host has crossed the flood,
And part is crossing now.
C. WESLEY.
Let us, then, learn that we can never be lonely or forsaken in this life.
Shall they forget us because they are "made perfect"? Shall they love us
the less because they now have power to love us more? If we forget them
not, shall they not remember us with God? No trial, then, can isolate us,
no sorrow can cut us off from the Communion of Saints. Kneel down, and you
are with them; lift up your eyes, and the heavenly world, high above all
perturbation, hangs serenely overhead; only a thin veil, it may be, floats
between. All whom we loved, and all who loved us, whom we still love no
less, while they love us yet more, are ever near, because ever in His
presence in whom we live and dwell.
H. E. MANNING.
November 2
_Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of
witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so
easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before
us_.--HEB. xii. i.
When the powers of hell prevail
O'er our weakness and unfitness,
Could we lift the fleshly veil,
Could we for a moment witness
Those unnumbered hosts that stand
Calm and bright on either hand;
Oh, what joyful hope would cheer,
Oh, what faith serene would guide us!
Great may be the danger near,
Greater are the friends beside us.
ANON.
We are compassed about by a cloud of witnesses, whose hearts throb in
sympathy with every effort and struggle, and who thrill with joy at every
success. How should this thought check and rebuke every worldly feeling
and unworthy purpose, and enshrine us, in the midst of a forgetful and
un-spiritual world, with an atmosphere of heavenly peace! They have
overcome--have risen--are crowned, glorified; but still they remain to us,
our assistants, our comforters, and in every hour of darkness their voice
speaks to us: "So we grieved, so we struggled, so we fainted, so we
doubted; but we have overcome, we have obtained, we have seen, we have
found,--and in our victory behold the certainty of thy own."
H. B. STOWE.
November 3
_Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor: for
we are members one of another_.--EPH. iv. 25.
In conversation be sincere;
Keep conscience as the noontide clear;
Think how All-seeing God thy ways
And all thy secret thoughts surveys.
THOMAS KEN.
The essence of lying is in deception, not in words; a lie may be told by
silence, by equivocation, by the accent on a syllable, by a glance of the
eye attaching a peculiar significance to a sentence; and all these kinds of
lies are worse and baser by many degrees than a lie plainly worded; so that
no form of blinded conscience is so far sunk as that which comforts itself
for having deceived because the deception was by gesture or silence,
instead of utterance.
J. RUSKIN.
He that is habituated to deceptions and artificialities in trifles, will
try in vain to be true in matters of importance; for truth is a thing of
habit rather than of will. You cannot in any given case by any sudden
and single effort will to be true, if the habit of your life has been
insincerity.
F. W. ROBERTSON.
November 4
_A soft answer turneth away wrath: but grievous words stir up
anger_.--PROV. xv. i,
_Doest thou well to be angry_?--JONAH iv. 4.
Renew Thine image, Lord, in me,
Lowly and gentle may I be;
No charms but these to Thee are dear;
No anger mayst Thou ever find,
No pride in my unruffled mind,
But faith, and heaven-born peace be there.
P. GERHARDT.
Neither say nor do aught displeasing to thy neighbor; and if thou hast been
wanting in charity, seek his forgiveness, or speak to him with gentleness.
Speak always with mildness and in a low tone of voice.
L. SCUPOLI.
Injuries hurt not more in the receiving than in the remembrance. A small
injury shall go as it comes; a great injury may dine or sup with me; but
none at all shall lodge with me. Why should I vex myself because another
hath vexed me? Grief for things past that cannot be remedied, and care for
things to come that cannot be prevented, may easily hurt, can never benefit
me. I will therefore commit myself to God in both, and enjoy the present.
JOSEPH HALL.
November 5
_The temple of God is holy, which temple ye are_.--I COR. iii. 17.
Now shed Thy mighty influence abroad
On souls that would their Father's image bear;
Make us as holy temples of our God,
Where dwells forever calm, adoring prayer.
C. J. P. SPITTA.
This pearl of eternity is the church or temple of God within thee, the
consecrated place of divine worship, where alone thou canst worship God
in spirit and in truth. When once thou art well grounded in this inward
worship, thou wilt have learned to live unto God above time and place. For
every day will be Sunday to thee, and, wherever thou goest, thou wilt have
a priest, a church, and an altar along with thee. For when God has all that
He should have of thy heart, when thou art wholly given up to the obedience
of the light and spirit of God within thee, to will only in His will, to
love only in His love, to be wise only in His wisdom, then it is that
everything thou dost is as a song of praise, and the common business of thy
life is a conforming to God's will on earth as angels do in heaven.
WM. LAW.
November 6
_He will fulfil the desire of them that fear Him: He also will hear their
cry, and will save them_;--PS. cxlv. 19.
_Delight thyself also in the Lord; and He shall give thee the desires of
thine heart_.--PS. xxxvii. 4.
Though to-day may not fulfil
All thy hopes, have patience still;
For perchance to-morrow's sun
Sees thy happier days begun.
P. GERHARDT.
His great desire and delight is God; and by desiring and delighting, he
hath Him. _Delight thou in the Lord, and He shall give thee thy heart's
desire,_--HIMSELF; and then surely thou shall have all. Any other thing
_commit it to Him_, and He shall bring it to pass.
R. LEIGHTON.
All who call on God in true faith, earnestly from the heart, will certainly
be heard, and will receive what they have asked and desired, although not
in the hour or in the measure, or the very thing which they ask; yet they
will obtain something greater and more glorious than they had dared to ask.
MARTIN LUTHER.
November 7
_I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision_.--ACTS xxvi. 19.
_The Lord our God will we serve, and His voice will we obey_.--JOSH. xxiv.
24.
I will shun no toil or woe,
Where Thou leadest I will go,
Be my pathway plain or rough;
If but every hour may be
Spent in work that pleases Thee,
Ah, dear Lord, it is enough!
G. TERSTEEGEN.
All these longings and doubts, and this inward distress, are the voice of
the Good Shepherd in your heart, seeking to call you out of all that is
contrary to His will. Oh, let me entreat of you not to turn away from His
gentle pleadings.
H. W. SMITH.
The fear of man brings a snare. By halting in our duty and giving back in
the time of trial, our hands grow weaker, our ears grow dull as to hearing
the language of the true Shepherd; so that when we look at the way of the
righteous, it seems as though it was not for us to follow them.
J. WOOLMAN.
November 8
_Lo, I come to do Thy will, O God_.--HEB. x. 9.
_Teach me to do Thy will, for Thou art my God_.--PS. cxliii. 10.
Lo! I come with joy to do
The Father's blessed will;
Him in outward works pursue,
And serve His pleasure still.
Faithful to my Lord's commands,
I still would choose the better part;
Serve with careful Martha's hands,
And loving Mary's heart.
C. WESLEY.
A soul cannot be regarded as truly subdued and consecrated in its will,
and as having passed into union with the Divine will, until it has a
disposition to do promptly and faithfully all that God requires, as well as
to endure patiently and thankfully all that He imposes.
T. C. UPHAM.
When we have learned to offer up every duty connected with our situation
in life as a sacrifice to God, a settled employment becomes just a settled
habit of prayer.
THOMAS ERSKINE.
"_Do the duty which lies nearest thee_," which thou knowest to be a duty.
Thy second duty will already have become clearer.
T. CARLYLE.
November 9
_Say not thou, I will hide myself from the Lord: shall any remember me from
above? I shall not be remembered among so many people: for what is my soul
among such an infinite number of creatures_?--ECCLESIASTICUS xvi. 17.
Among so many, can He care?
Can special love be everywhere?
A myriad homes,--a myriad ways,--
And God's eye over every place?
I asked: my soul bethought of this;--
In just that very place of His
Where He hath put and keepeth you,
God hath no other thing to do!
A. D. T. WHITNEY.
Give free and bold play to those instincts of the heart which believe that
the Creator must care for the creatures He has made, and that the only real
effective care for them must be that which takes each of them into His
love, and knowing it separately surrounds it with His separate sympathy.
There is not one life which the Life-giver ever loses out of His sight; not
one which sins so that He casts it away; not one which is not so near to
Him that whatever touches it touches Him with sorrow or with joy.
PHILLIPS BROOKS.
November 10
_In Him we live, and move, and have our being_.--ACTS xvii. 28.
_Whither shall I go from Thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from Thy
presence_?--PS. cxxxix. 7.
Yea! In Thy life our little lives are ended,
Into Thy depths our trembling spirits fall;
In Thee enfolded, gathered, comprehended,
As holds the sea her waves--Thou hold'st us all.
E. SCUDDER.
Where then is _our_ God? You say, He is _everywhere:_ then show me
_anywhere_ that you have met Him. You declare Him _everlasting:_ then tell
me _any moment_ that He has been with you. You believe Him ready to succor
them that are tempted, and to lift those that are bowed down: then in what
passionate hour did you subside into His calm grace? in what sorrow lose
yourself in His "more exceeding" joy? These are the testing questions by
which we may learn whether we too have raised our altar to an "unknown God"
and pay the worship of the blind; or whether we commune with Him "in whom
we live, and move, and have our being."
J. MARTINEAU.
November 11
_Walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good
work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all might,
according to His glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with
joyfulness_.--COL. i. 10, ii.
To be the thing we seem,
To do the thing we deem
Enjoined by duty;
To walk in faith, nor dream
Of questioning God's scheme
Of truth and beauty.
ANON.
To shape the whole Future is not our problem; but only to shape faithfully
a small part of it, according to rules already known. It is perhaps
possible for each of us, who will with due earnestness inquire, to
ascertain clearly what he, for his own part, ought to do; this let him,
with true heart, do, and continue doing. The general issue will, as it has
always done, rest well with a Higher Intelligence than ours. This day thou
knowest ten commanded duties, seest in thy mind ten things which should be
done for one that thou doest! _Do_ one of them; this of itself will show
thee ten others which can and shall be done.
T. CARLYLE.
November 12
_I must work the works of Him that sent me, while it is day: the night
cometh, when no man can work_.--JOHN ix. 4.
_Wherefore have ye not fulfilled your task_?--EX. v. 14.
He who intermits
The appointed task and duties of the day
Untunes full oft the pleasures of the day;
Checking the finer spirits that refuse
To flow, when purposes are lightly changed.
W. WORDSWORTH.
By putting off things beyond their proper times, one duty treads upon the
heels of another, and all duties are felt as irksome obligations,--a yoke
beneath which we fret and lose our peace. In most cases the consequence of
this is, that we have no time to do the work as it ought to be done. It is
therefore done precipitately, with eagerness, with a greater desire simply
to get it done, than to do it well, and with very little thought of God
throughout.
F. W. FABER.
Sufficient for each day is the _good_ thereof, equally as the evil. We must
do at once, and with our might, the merciful deed that our hand findeth to
do,--else it will never be done, for the hand will find other tasks, and
the arrears fall through. And every unconsummated good feeling, every
unfulfilled purpose that His spirit has prompted, shall one day charge us
as faithless and recreant before God.
J. H. THOM.
November 13
_Blessed is the man whom Thou chastenest, O Lord, and teachest him out of
Thy law_.--PS. xciv
_Truly this is a grief, and I must bear it_.--JER. x. 19.
Hold in thy murmurs, heaven arraigning!
The patient see God's loving face;
Who bear their burdens uncomplaining,
'Tis they that win the Father's grace.
ANON.
Do not run to this and that for comfort when you are in trouble, but bear
it. Be uncomfortably quiet--be uneasily silent--be patiently unhappy.
J.P. GREAVES.
Hard words _will_ vex, unkindness _will_ pierce; neglect _will_ wound;
threatened evils _will_ make the soul quiver; sharp pain or weariness
_will_ rack the body, or make it restless. But what says the Psalmist?
"When my heart is vexed, I will complain." To whom? Not _of_ God, but _to_
God.
E.B. PUSEY.
Surely, I have thought, I do not want to have a grief which would not be
a grief. I feel that I shall be able to take up my cross in a religious
spirit soon, and then it will be all right.
JAMES HINTON.
November 14
_Thou art my servant: I have formed thee; thou art my servant: O Israel,
thou shalt not be forgotten of me_.--ISA. xliv. 21.
Oh, give Thy servant patience to be still,
And bear Thy will;
Courage to venture wholly on the arm
That will not harm;
The wisdom that will never let me stray
Out of my way;
The love, that, now afflicting, knoweth best
When I should rest.
J. M. NEALE.