Daily Strength for Daily Needs Part 58

Lo! I come with joy to do The Father's blessed will; Him in outward works pursue, And serve His pleasure still.

Faithful to my Lord's commands, I still would choose the better part; Serve with careful Martha's hands, And loving Mary's heart.

C. WESLEY.

A soul cannot be regarded as truly subdued and consecrated in its will, and as having pa.s.sed into union with the Divine will, until it has a disposition to do promptly and faithfully all that G.o.d requires, as well as to endure patiently and thankfully all that He imposes.

T. C. UPHAM.

When we have learned to offer up every duty connected with our situation in life as a sacrifice to G.o.d, a settled employment becomes just a settled habit of prayer.

THOMAS ERSKINE.

"_Do the duty which lies nearest thee_," which thou knowest to be a duty.

Thy second duty will already have become clearer.

T. CARLYLE.

November 9

_Say not thou, I will hide myself from the Lord: shall any remember me from above? I shall not be remembered among so many people: for what is my soul among such an infinite number of creatures_?--ECCLESIASTICUS xvi. 17.

Among so many, can He care?

Can special love be everywhere?

A myriad homes,--a myriad ways,-- And G.o.d's eye over every place?

I asked: my soul bethought of this;-- In just that very place of His Where He hath put and keepeth you, G.o.d hath no other thing to do!

A. D. T. WHITNEY.

Give free and bold play to those instincts of the heart which believe that the Creator must care for the creatures He has made, and that the only real effective care for them must be that which takes each of them into His love, and knowing it separately surrounds it with His separate sympathy.

There is not one life which the Life-giver ever loses out of His sight; not one which sins so that He casts it away; not one which is not so near to Him that whatever touches it touches Him with sorrow or with joy.

PHILLIPS BROOKS.

November 10

_In Him we live, and move, and have our being_.--ACTS xvii. 28.

_Whither shall I go from Thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from Thy presence_?--PS. cx.x.xix. 7.

Yea! In Thy life our little lives are ended, Into Thy depths our trembling spirits fall; In Thee enfolded, gathered, comprehended, As holds the sea her waves--Thou hold'st us all.

E. SCUDDER.

Where then is _our_ G.o.d? You say, He is _everywhere:_ then show me _anywhere_ that you have met Him. You declare Him _everlasting:_ then tell me _any moment_ that He has been with you. You believe Him ready to succor them that are tempted, and to lift those that are bowed down: then in what pa.s.sionate hour did you subside into His calm grace? in what sorrow lose yourself in His "more exceeding" joy? These are the testing questions by which we may learn whether we too have raised our altar to an "unknown G.o.d"

and pay the wors.h.i.+p of the blind; or whether we commune with Him "in whom we live, and move, and have our being."

J. MARTINEAU.

November 11

_Walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of G.o.d; strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness_.--COL. i. 10, ii.

To be the thing we seem, To do the thing we deem Enjoined by duty; To walk in faith, nor dream Of questioning G.o.d's scheme Of truth and beauty.

ANON.

To shape the whole Future is not our problem; but only to shape faithfully a small part of it, according to rules already known. It is perhaps possible for each of us, who will with due earnestness inquire, to ascertain clearly what he, for his own part, ought to do; this let him, with true heart, do, and continue doing. The general issue will, as it has always done, rest well with a Higher Intelligence than ours. This day thou knowest ten commanded duties, seest in thy mind ten things which should be done for one that thou doest! _Do_ one of them; this of itself will show thee ten others which can and shall be done.

T. CARLYLE.

November 12

_I must work the works of Him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work_.--JOHN ix. 4.

_Wherefore have ye not fulfilled your task_?--EX. v. 14.

He who intermits The appointed task and duties of the day Untunes full oft the pleasures of the day; Checking the finer spirits that refuse To flow, when purposes are lightly changed.

W. WORDSWORTH.

By putting off things beyond their proper times, one duty treads upon the heels of another, and all duties are felt as irksome obligations,--a yoke beneath which we fret and lose our peace. In most cases the consequence of this is, that we have no time to do the work as it ought to be done. It is therefore done precipitately, with eagerness, with a greater desire simply to get it done, than to do it well, and with very little thought of G.o.d throughout.

F. W. FABER.

Sufficient for each day is the _good_ thereof, equally as the evil. We must do at once, and with our might, the merciful deed that our hand findeth to do,--else it will never be done, for the hand will find other tasks, and the arrears fall through. And every unconsummated good feeling, every unfulfilled purpose that His spirit has prompted, shall one day charge us as faithless and recreant before G.o.d.

J. H. THOM.

November 13

_Blessed is the man whom Thou chastenest, O Lord, and teachest him out of Thy law_.--PS. xciv

_Truly this is a grief, and I must bear it_.--JER. x. 19.