July 23

I will wait upon the Lord that hideth his face from the house of Jacob. - Isaiah 8:17.

THE providence of God is oftentimes very mysterious. Thus it was here with the ancient Church. And Jacob their progenitor also said, “All these things are against me;” but he judged prematurely, and partially, and after the flesh; for while he said this, at the very time “all these things” were working for his good and subserving his real welfare. How perplexed and embarrassed Joseph must have been to reconcile his being thrown into a pit, and sold to the Ishmaelites, and imprisoned as a criminal; how difficult he found it to reconcile all this to those dreams which assured him of his future elevation.

Yet we see at length it was made perfectly plain. “Yes,” said he, “you sold me, but God sent me.” You “meant it for evil, but God meant it for good.” Thus will it be with all Christians by-and-by, when in his light they shall see light; for “when Messias, who is called Christ, is come, he will tell us all things.” And we can gain this confidence with regard to distressing providences even now. Let us seek after it, and keep this thought in our minds under all these dark and painful dispensations, that “though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion;” that though he afflicts, “he does not afflict willingly;” that though “no chastisement for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous, yet nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peace- able fruits of righteousness to them that are exercised thereby.”

Thus shall we be able to “walk by faith” until we shall “walk by sight,” and be able to see that all the paths of the Lord have been mercy and truth. However perplexed we may now be by the dealings of Providence, we shall then find that all things have been working for our good, the darkness as well as the light, afflictions and pain as well as health and comfort, the opposition of foes as well as the kindness of friends, losses as well as gains. “Behold, we count them happy which endure; ye have heard of the patience,” as well as the perplexities, “of Job,” “and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy.”

“Yet a season, and we know,

Happy entrance shall be given,

All our sorrows left below,

And earth exchanged for heaven.”