January 16

Arise ye, and depart. Micah 2:10.

SOMETIMES the believer is drawn and weaned from the earth. But if not disposed to leave the world, the Lord knows how to drive as well as to draw him. He can put a thorn in our nest, and cause us to flutter out to the edge of it, and there to sit like a bird ready to fly towards heaven when he shall have sent the command. If we become careless and high-minded, and, like David, saying, “In my prosperity I shall never be moved,” then we shall be made to say, also with him, “Thou didst hide thy face, and I was troubled.” We are liable to become slothful, and to fall asleep at our post, and it is no little thing sometimes that will wake us; but God can strike very hard, and will do so if necessary; and instead of our complaining of this, we should rather be grateful that he is determined we shall not take up with anything here as our portion, and that he should say by his providence as well as by his word, “arise and depart, for this is not your rest;” look towards heaven, go and take hold of the everlasting covenant.

And the trials and disappointments of earth will never do us good till they have produced this result. If we only dispute, cavil, and fret, our afflictions have as yet done nothing effectually for us. But when they cause us to turn from earth to heaven, from time to eternity, from the creature to God, they are working together for our good, and made to yield unto us “the peaceable fruits of righteousness”-

“From every earthly pleasure,

From every transient joy,

From every mortal treasure,

That soon will fade and die;

No longer these desiring,

Upwards our wishes tend,

To nobler bliss aspiring,

And joys that never end.”