Spurgeon: May AM
* 05/22/AM
"He led them forth by the right way."
--Psalm 107:7
Changeful experience often leads the anxious believer to
enquire "Why is it thus with me?" I looked for light, but lo,
darkness came; for peace, but behold trouble. I said in my
heart, my mountain standeth firm, I shall never be moved. Lord,
thou dost hide Thy face, and I am troubled. It was but yesterday
that I could read my title clear; to-day my evidences are
bedimmed, and my hopes are clouded. Yesterday I could climb to
Pisgah's top, and view the landscape o'er, and rejoice with
confidence in my future inheritance; to-day, my spirit has no
hopes, but many fears; no joys, but much distress. Is this part
of God's plan with me? Can this be the way in which God would
bring me to heaven? Yes, it is even so. The eclipse of your
faith, the darkness of your mind, the fainting of your hope, all
these things are but parts of God's method of making you ripe
for the great inheritance upon which you shall soon enter. These
trials are for the testing and strengthening of your faith--they
are waves that wash you further upon the rock--they are winds
which waft your ship the more swiftly towards the desired haven.
According to David's words, so it might be said of you, "so He
bringeth them to their desired haven." By honour and dishonour,
by evil report and by good report, by plenty and by poverty, by
joy and by distress, by persecution and by peace, by all these
things is the life of your souls maintained, and by each of
these are you helped on your way. Oh, think not, believer, that
your sorrows are out of God's plan; they are necessary parts of
it. "We must, through much tribulation, enter the kingdom."
Learn, then, even to "count it all joy when ye fall into divers
temptations."
"O let my trembling soul be still,
And wait Thy wise, Thy holy will!
I cannot, Lord, Thy purpose see,
Yet all is well since ruled by Thee."