THE UNKNOWN SUFFERINGS OF CHRIST.
I consider that prayer, “By all thy sufferings, known and unknown, good Lord deliver us,” to be one of the most touching ever uttered. The unknown sufferings of Christ! All His described sufferings were slight in comparison with what infinite holiness must have felt in the midst of sinners; the light, the glory of heaven, in the darkness and impurity of the world, yet spotless, and without sin! O my Saviour, no tongue can describe, no angel can fathom the abyss of thy suffering for me, a sinner! As I cannot reach the infinite height of thy love and thy glory in heaven, so I cannot descend into the depth of thy sorrows when here on earth. I only wonder and adore.—Rowland Hill.
THE THINGS GOD HAS PREPARED FOR HIS PEOPLE.
Who can speak aright of the blessings included in the unsearchable riches of Christ? That is a fine passage, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things that God hath prepared for them that love Him.” The eye hath seen great things; on a fine night, for instance, how much and to what an immense distance, can the eye behold!—and, with those wonderful helps, telescopes, how much further it can penetrate!—and my thoughts can penetrate further than my eyes can see, or my ears hear. But the eye cannot see all, nor the ear hear all, nor the heart conceive all; neither can we hear, or even conceive aright of the unsearchable riches of Christ. O let us meditate more on the great things which God has laid up for them that love Him.—Rowland Hill.
ALL WELL IN GOD’S WILL.
The saintly Bernard Gilpin who lived in Queen Mary’s reign was seized in his Northumbrian vicarage for his Protestant convictions, and carried off towards London to be tried. Unquestionably his trial would have issued in death by fire for heresy. But somewhere on the long journey southward, the horse stumbled and Bernard Gilpin’s leg was badly broken. Now he was used to give glory to God for everything, and one of his keepers turned sarcastically upon him and asked if he would give glory to God for this. “Yes,” he said, “all things are well in the will of God.” It was impossible to move him as he was, that day or the next, and in the interval the persecuting Queen was called to her account, and presently Gilpin was set free to return to his flock at Houghton-le-Spring.—Selected.
KEEP OUT OF DEBT.
“Owe no man anything” (Rom. xiii. 8) is certainly a binding precept of the gospel—one perhaps often neglected, but not the less enjoined than that bounden duty “to love one another.” Indeed, these two moral obligations are linked together by the great apostle of the Gentiles, as if he would say, “He that oweth you aught, does not love you as he ought; for if he loved you he would not do you ill in depriving you of your rightful own.” The text alluded to has always been engraven on my mind, as with the point of a diamond, by the remembrance of a man of God. As a young person, I felt the deepest respect for the venerable man who uttered the words, “Owe no man anything.” He was a white-haired sailor, a retired captain of Her Majesty’s navy. He was what the world would call a poor man; but he was “rich in faith” and high in honour. He wanted to place his young daughter, a girl of seventeen, in a first-class school, in order to give her a year or two more education, to fit her to instruct others, if need be. The terms were higher than he could afford. “Madam,” he said to the head of the establishment, “the Bible says, ‘owe no man anything.’ I could stand with composure before a cannon’s mouth, but I cannot stand before a debt that I cannot pay.” How much less misery would be in the world if others felt the same! The lady thought it an honour to come to his terms, I am glad to say.—Hooks and Eyes.