August 29

"Thus saith the Lord, Thou shalt not build Me an house. Furthermore I tell thee that the Lord will build thee an house."—1 Chronicles 17:4, 10.

HE who gives to God receives from God immeasurably more than he gives. David would fain have built for his Lord a house of cedar; and in response his Lord builds for him an everlasting house. Full measure pressed down and running over, the heavenly King returns to the earthly servant. For that which is temporary, that which is age-long and everlasting. For that which is local and national, that which is world-wide. For that which is tainted and marred, that which is as it were a paved work of sapphire stone, and as it were the very heaven for clearness. For the Temple in Jerusalem, the better Temple of Christ's body.

Have I not felt it too?

I give God my heart, the nest of many a hateful bird, unfitted to be His shrine. I receive it back, washed and justified and sanctified, in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of omnipotent grace.

I give God my life, cramped and meagre at the best, weakened still further by my sin, an example to others of evil. He restores it dignified, gladdened, with opportunities opening before it on every side.

I give God my means, no more perhaps than the widow's two mites, or than the Galilean boy's bread and fish. And He multiplies my offering, transmutes it, uses it for the most marvellous and glorious ends.

Thus the more I cast away, at His feet, in His service, the more I have. I yield Him my wood and hay and stubble, and He repays me with His gold and silver and precious stones.