Evening
Time: 7:49 PM PST
"I will sing of mercy and judgment." --Psalm 101:1
Faith triumphs in trial. When reason is thrust into the inner prison, with
her feet made fast in the stocks, faith makes the dungeon walls ring with her
merry notes as she I cries, "I will sing of mercy and of judgment. Unto thee, O
Lord, will I sing." Faith pulls the black mask from the face of trouble, and
discovers the angel beneath. Faith looks up at the cloud, and sees that
'Tis big with mercy and shall break In blessings on her head."
There is a subject for song even in the judgments of God towards us. For,
first, the trial is not so heavy as it might have been; next, the trouble
is not so severe as we deserved to have borne; and our affliction is
not so crushing as the burden which others have to carry. Faith sees that
in her worst sorrow there is nothing penal; there is not a drop of God's wrath
in it; it is all sent in love. Faith discerns love gleaming like a jewel on the
breast of an angry God. Faith says of her grief, "This is a badge of honour, for
the child must feel the rod"; and then she sings of the sweet result of her
sorrows, because they work her spiritual good. Nay, more, says Faith, "These
light afflictions, which are but for a moment, work out for me a far more
exceeding and eternal weight of glory." So Faith rides forth on the black horse,
conquering and to conquer, trampling down carnal reason and fleshly sense, and
chanting notes of victory amid the thickest of the fray.
"All I meet I find assists me
In my path to heavenly joy:
Where, though trials now attend me,
Trials never more annoy.
"Blest there with a weight of glory,
Still the path I'll ne'er forget,
But, exulting, cry, it led me
To my blessed Saviour's seat."