Morning
Time: 7:39 AM PST
"For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all
nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall
upon the earth." --Amos 9:9
Every sifting comes by divine command and permission. Satan must ask
leave before he can lay a finger upon Job. Nay, more, in some sense our siftings
are directly the work of heaven, for the text says, "I will sift the
house of Israel." Satan, like a drudge, may hold the sieve, hoping to destroy
the corn; but the overruling hand of the Master is accomplishing the purity of
the grain by the very process which the enemy intended to be destructive.
Precious, but much sifted corn of the Lord's floor, be comforted by the blessed
fact that the Lord directeth both flail and sieve to His own glory, and to thine
eternal profit.
The Lord Jesus will surely use the fan which is in His hand, and will
divide the precious from the vile. All are not Israel that are of Israel;
the heap on the barn floor is not clean provender, and hence the winnowing
process must be performed. In the sieve true weight alone has power. Husks and
chaff being devoid of substance must fly before the wind, and only solid corn
will remain.
Observe the complete safety of the Lord's wheat; even the least grain
has a promise of preservation. God Himself sifts, and therefore it is stern and
terrible work; He sifts them in all places, "among all nations"; He sifts them
in the most effectual manner, "like as corn is sifted in a sieve"; and yet for
all this, not the smallest, lightest, or most shrivelled grain, is permitted to
fall to the ground. Every individual believer is precious in the sight of the
Lord, a shepherd would not lose one sheep, nor a jeweller one diamond, nor a
mother one child, nor a man one limb of his body, nor will the Lord lose one of
His redeemed people. However little we may be, if we are the Lord's, we may
rejoice that we are preserved in Christ Jesus.