May 28

Rich unto all that call upon him. — ROMANS x. 12.

O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. — MATT. xv. 28.

WHAT a wonderful concession this, of the grace of Jesus Christ! It suggests the omnipotence of de- termined faith. It illustrates what we may regard as a law in the higher realm of spiritual relations and results. In it there would seem to be not only no conflict between sov- ereignty and free agency, but the sovereignty of God would seem, by his gracious permission, to have passed over into the agency of his child, — the child a sovereign of grace. We may call it one of the great moral equations of the Bible, the "Be it unto thee" of the Master being in exact equipoise with the "As thou wilt" of the believer. The woman's faith was "great" in kind, — by virtue of the vital energy, the courage to face discouraging conditions, the skill in pleading, which it embodied. Such a faith as this, though seeming "as a grain of mustard seed," shall avail great things. That faith is always great which admits no element of unbelief, and so, great in degree.

In particular, why should we not believe that Christ is as willing to save men from their sins as he was to heal the Sy- rophœnician woman's daughter? And why may we not sup- pose it a certainty that when we present our appeal for the salvation of sinners with as much earnestness and dexterity as this woman used, — their grievous condition resting with equal heaviness on the heart, — the blessing will in his own time be granted?

George A. Dewsbury.

Thou art coming to a king, Large petitions with thee bring; For his grace and power are such, None can ever ask too much.

JOHN NEWTON.