Inspiration from the least likely of places...

"Let me ask you something. If someone prays for patience, you think God gives them patience? Or does he give them the opportunity to be patient? If he prayed for courage, does God give him courage, or does he give him opportunities to be courageous?" --from the movie, Evan Almighty

Never afterwards waver

"He hath acquainted himself with my beaten path. When he hath searched me out, I shall come out shining." (Job 23:10, free translation.)

"Faith grows amid storms"--just four words, but oh, how full of import to the soul who has been in the storms!

Faith is that God-given faculty which, when exercised, brings the unseen into plain view, and by which the impossible things are made possible. It deals with supernaturals.

But it "grows amid storms"; that is, where there are disturbances in the spiritual atmosphere. Storms are caused by the conflicts of the elements; and the storms of the spiritual world are conflicts with hostile elements.

In such an atmosphere faith finds its most productive soil; in such an element it comes more quickly to full fruition.

..."Amid storms." Right in the midst where it is fiercest. You may shrink back from the ordeal of a fierce storm of trial . . . but go in! God is there to meet you in the center of all your trials, and to whisper His secrets which will make you come forth with a shining face and an indomitable faith that all the demons of hell shall never afterwards cause to waver.--E. A. Kilbourne.

"He didn't come..."

"I called upon him, but he gave me no answer." (S. of Sol. 5:6.)

The Lord, when He hat given great faith, hath been known to try it by long delayings. He has suffered His servants' voices to echo in their ears as from a brazen sky. They have knocked at the golden gate, but it has remained unmovable, as though it were rusted upon its hinges. Like Jeremiah, they have cried, "Thou has covered thyself with a cloud, that our prayer should not pass through." Thus have true saints continued long in patient waiting without reply, not because their prayers were not vehement, nor because they were unaccepted, but because it so pleased Him who is a Sovereign, and who gives according to His own pleasure. If it pleases Him to bid our patience exercise itself, shall He not do as He will with His own!

No prayer is lost. Praying breath was never spent in vain. There is no such thing as prayer unanswered or unnoticed by God, and some things that we count refusals or denials are simply delays.--H. Bonar.

Christ sometimes delays His help that He may try our faith and quicken our prayers. The boat may be covered with the waves, and He sleeps on; but He will wake up before it sinks. He sleeps, but He never oversleeps; and there are no "too lates" with Him.--Alexander Maclaren.

The pit of despair

"I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction." (Isa. 48:10.)

Does not the Word come like a soft shower, assuaging the fury of the flame? Yes, is it not an asbestos armor, against which the heat has no power? Let the affliction come--God has chosen me. Poverty, thou mayest stride in at my door; but God is in the house already, and He has chosen me. Sickness, thou mayest intrude; but I have a balsam ready--God has chosen me. Whatever befall me in this vale of tears, I know that He has chosen me.

Fear not, Christian; Jesus is with thee. In all thy fiery trials, His presence is both thy comfort and safety. He will never leave one whom He has chosen for His own. "Fear not, for I am with thee," is His sure word of promise to His chosen ones in "the furnace of affliction."--C. H. Spurgeon

"Hang me in your bathroom?"

"He hath made me a polished shaft." (Isa. 49:2.)

There is a very famous "Pebble Beach" at Pescadero, on the California coast. The long line of white surf comes up with its everlasting roar, and rattles and thunders among the stones on the shore. They are caught in the arms of the pitiless waves, and tossed and rolled, and rubbed together, and ground against the sharp-grained cliffs. Day and night forever the ceaseless attrition goes on--never any rest. And the result?

Tourists from all the world flock thither to gather the round and beautiful stones. They are laid up in cabinets; they ornament the parlor mantels. But go yonder, around the point of the cliff that breaks off the force of the sea; and up in that quiet cove, sheltered from the storms, and lying ever in the sun, you shall find abundance of pebbles that have never been chosen by the traveler.

Why are these left all the years through unsought? For the simple reason that they have escaped all the turmoil and attrition of the waves, and the quiet and peace have left them as they found them, rough and angular and devoid of beauty. Polish comes through trouble.

Since God knows what niche we are to fill, let us trust Him to shape us to do it. Since He knows what work we are to do, let us trust Him to drill us to the proper preparation.

"O blows that smite! O hurts that pierce
This shrinking heart of mine!
What are ye but the Master's tools
Forming a work divine?"

--from Streams in the Desert

Let's hope to endure

What is to give light must endure burning. --Viktor Frankl

The dark night of the soul

Luke 10. 19: I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.

Our Lord Jesus said this to the seventy: and yet we know that all down the ages His servants have been hurt in a thousand ways. So the words must mean, and we know they do mean, something that goes far deeper than bodily hurt, deeper even than disappointment--that hardest hurt the mind can be asked to bear.

It must mean that our spirits shall tread on serpents and scorpions, and have power over all the enemy. Nothing shall be able to sting our spirit, poison it, or paralyse it. It is one of the magnificent promises of the Bible. We cannot take it too literally. There is no need to be overcome, whatever happens. "O my soul, thou hast trodden down strength." (Judges 5. 21)

Sometimes we do not feel in the least like treading down scorpions and serpents and all the power of the enemy. Perhaps we are allowed to feel our nothingness, so that we may in the depths of our heart understand those other words "Without Me ye can do nothing." (John 15. 5) I think there was something of this in our Lord Jesus' mind, when He told the story of one who had nothing to set before his friend--not a crumb--and it was midnight. (Luke 11. 5-8) When we do not feel victorious and have nothing to give others, it is in truth "midnight" in our soul, "the dark night of the soul", old writers called it.

But we have a God to Whom we can go at any minute, the weakest minute, the darkest minute, "at midnight". "Be Thou my strong habitation, whereunto I may continually resort: Thou hast given commandment to save me; for Thou art my Rock and my Fortress." (Psa. 71. 3) --Edges of His Ways, Amy Carmichael

We're not worthy! We're not worthy!

Rom. 8. 18: Not worthy to be compared.

Settle this in your minds so that you will not have to settle it again; there is no promise of ease for any soldier on any field. Search the New Testament; you will not find one such promise. It is made quite clear that things are not going to be made easy. So to be surprised and troubled when they are difficult is foolish and unreasonable too. Why is there so much inward stress, sometimes sharp trial, or what the New Testament calls Tribulation? We are not told; but we are told that there will be this sort of thing, and that it is "not worthy to be compared with the glory"--not worthy to be compared. --Edges, Amy Carmichael

The price to pay for the privilege

Many of us cannot be used to become food for the world's hunger until we are broken in Christ's hands. "Bread corn is bruised." Christ's blessing ofttimes means sorrow, but even sorrow is not too great a price to pay for the privilege of touching other lives with benediction. The sweetest things in this world today have come to us through tears and pain.--J. R. Miller

God has made me bread for His elect, and if it be needful that the bread must be ground in the teeth of the lion to feed His children, blessed be the name of the Lord.--Ignatius

Are we willing?

Exod. 27. 20: Pure olive oil beaten for the light, to cause the lamp to burn always.

If the oil is to feed a lamp so that it burns continually, it must be pure. In how many ways the question is brought home to us! Are we willing for whatever is required for purification? Have we any mental reserve?

"Try me, O God, and seek the ground of my heart: prove me, and examine my thoughts." (Psa. 139. 23 P.B.V.)
--Edges of His Ways, Amy Carmichael

Faith is the steel of the soul

Unexpected answers

God counts on us to accept whatever answer to our prayers He gives us, whether or not it be the answer that we wished and expected (See Rom. 15. 30-32). When Paul wrote to the Christians of Rome, he asked for the kind of prayer that is like wrestling with a strong (though unseen) enemy. He asked for prayer for three things, that his service (the offering of alms) might be acceptable to the Jewish Christians; that he might be delivered from the Jews who did not believe; that he might come to them--the Christians of Rome--with joy. The answer to the second of these three prayers was two years in a prison in Caesarea; the answer to the third was two years' imprisonment in Rome. In both cases his was the kind of imprisonment which required the prisoner's right hand to be chained to a soldier's left.

Not many of us love to be under a roof between walls, without being able to go out into the open air. Think what it must have meant to Paul to be not only indoors but never once alone. Think of being chained to a Roman soldier at all hours of the day and night. "That I may come unto you with joy by the will of God, and may with you be refreshed" (Rom. 15. 32). There was not much natural joy and refreshment in coming as a chained prisoner.

Nothing was explained. Paul and the men and women of Rome were trusted to accept the unexplained and, like John the Baptist, not to be offended in their Lord.

Do you not think that a great deal of what we call faith is not worth the name? It is too flimsy to be called by so strong a word. Faith is the steel of the soul.--Edges of His Ways, Amy Carmichael

Blessing unthought of

“The hand of the Lord hath wrought this.” (Job 12:9).

Several years ago there was found in an African mine the most magnificent diamond in the world’s history. It was presented to the King of England to blaze in his crown of state. The King sent it to Amsterdam to be cut. It was put into the hands of an expert lapidary. And what do you suppose he did with it?

He took the gem of priceless value, and cut a notch in it. Then he struck it a hard blow with his instrument, and lo! the superb jewel lay in his hand cleft in twain. What recklessness! what wastefulness! what criminal carelessness!

Not so. For days and weeks that blow had been studied and planned. Drawings and models had been made of the gem. Its quality, its defects, its lines of cleavage had all been studied with minutest care. The man to whom it was committed was one of the most skillful lapidaries in the world.

Do you say that blow was a mistake? Nay. It was the climax of the lapidary’s skill. When he struck that blow, he did the one thing which would bring that gem to its most perfect shapeliness, radiance, and jewelled splendor. That blow which seemed to ruin the superb precious stone was, in fact, its perfect redemption. For, from those two halves were wrought the two magnificent gems which the skilled eye of the lapidary saw hidden in the rough, uncut stone as it came from the mine.

So, sometimes, God lets a stinging blow fall upon your life. The blood spurts. The nerves twine. The soul cries out in agony. The blow seems to you an appalling mistake. But it is not, for you are the most priceless jewel in the world to God. And He is the most skilled lapidary in the universe.

Some day you are to blaze in the diadem of the King. As you lie in His hand now He knows just how to deal with you. Not a blow will be permitted to fall upon your shrinking soul but that the love of God permits it, and works out from its depths, blessing and spiritual enrichment unseen, and unthought of by you.—J.H. McC

What an honor to suffer like Jesus; what an honor to be like Jesus

"When God conquers us and takes all the flint out of our nature, and we get deep visions into the Spirit of Jesus, we then see as never before the great rarity of gentleness of spirit in this dark and unheavenly world.

. . . So few are willing to undergo the suffering out of which thorough gentleness comes. We must die before we are turned into gentleness, and crucifixion involves suffering; it is a real breaking and crushing of self, which wrings the heart and conquers the mind.

There is a good deal of mere mental and logical sanctification nowadays, which is only a religious fiction. It consists of mentally putting one's self on the altar, and then mentally saying the altar sanctifies the gift, and then logically concluding therefore one is sanctified; and such an one goes forth with a gay, flippant, theological prattle about the deep things of God.

But the natural heartstrings have not been snapped, and the Adamic flint has not been ground to powder, and the bosom has not throbbed with the lonely, surging sighs of Gethsemane; and not having the real death marks of Calvary, there cannot be that soft, sweet, gentle, floating, victorious, overflowing, triumphant life that flows like a spring morning from an empty tomb.--G. D. W.

Come what may

1 Tim. 6.11: (Conybeare) But thou, O man of God, follow . . . steadfastness (and the note to the word steadfastness is "steadfast endurance under persecution").

I have been thinking of the persecution of circumstances. The body can be persecuted by pain, weariness, lack of strength to do, and so on. The spirit can be persecuted by disappointment, rending of many kinds, such as the particular kind our Lord described in Matt. 7.6. ["Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces."] Those who have given their pearls--pearls of love, every kind of pearl they had to give--and have then met ingratitude and perhaps untruth, know what these words mean. But come what may, "O man of God [O woman of God], follow steadfastness". No persecution, whether it be of body or of spirit, need ever conquer us. We are called to fight the good fight of faith. If we saw the victorious issue of the fight, it would not be a fight of faith. If we saw the end of the road clearly and the reason why we are being led along this particular road, we would not walk by faith, but by sight. Again and again the emphasis is on faith.

Lord, increase our faith that we may follow steadfastness--even unto the end. --Edges of His Ways, Amy Carmichael

"To the death? I accept."

He said, " I will forget the dying faces;

The empty places,

They shall be filled again.

O voices moaning deep with me, cease."

But vain the word; vain, vain:

Not in forgetting lieth peace.

He said, "I will crowd action upon action,

The strife of faction

Shall stir me and sustain;

O tears that drown the fire of manhood cease."

But vain the word; vain, vain:

Not in endeavor lieth peace.

He said, "I will withdraw me and be quiet,

Why meddle in life's riot?

Shut be my door to pain,

Desire, thou dost befool me, thou shalt cease."

But vain the word; vain, vain:

Not in aloofness lieth peace.

He said, "I will submit; I am defeated.

God hath depleted

My life of its rich gain.

O futile murmurings, why will ye not cease?"

But vain the word; vain, vain:

Not in submission lieth peace.

He said, "I will accept the breaking sorrow

Which God to-morrow

Will to His son explain."

Then did the turmoil deep within him cease.

Not vain the word, not vain;

For in Acceptance lieth peace.

-Amy Carmichael, Toward Jerusalem

Consider Christ Jesus...

Heb. 3.1: (Weymouth) Fix your thoughts on Jesus.

To read slowly and ponder Hebrews 2. 18 and 3. 1 is an immense help towards this kind of thinking and this kind of praying. All the versions are beautiful:

"For in that He Himself hath suffered being tempted, He is able to succor them that are tempted. Wherefore consider Christ Jesus."

"For inasmuch as He has Himself felt the pain of temptation and trial, He is also able instantly to help those who are tempted and tried. Therefore fix your thoughts on Jesus . . . Whose followers we profess to be."

It is the "For" and the "Inasmuch" that lifts us up here. Apart altogether from the comfort that lies on the surface of these wonderful words about our dear Lord and his power instantly to help us, because He knows all there is to know of the pain of temptation and trial, there is this: if we are His followers we, too, shall find that every experience of temptation and trial will turn to power to help others. Therefore "count it all joy", and that it may be so, "Fix your thoughts on Jesus . . . Whose followers we profess to be."
--Edges of His Ways, Amy Carmichael

Note: Amy Carmichael wrote these words during the last twenty years of her life; the majority of these years she was bedridden. "Count it all joy."

Your life and mine

"I endure all things for the sake of God's own people; so that they also may obtain salvation . . . and with it eternal glory." (2 Tim. 2:10.) (Weymouth.)

If Job could have known as he sat there in the ashes, bruising his heart on this problem of Providence--that in the trouble that had come upon him he was doing what one man may do to work out the problem for the world, he might again have taken courage. No man lives to himself. Job's life is but your life and mine written in larger text. . . . So, then, though we may not know what trials wait on any of us, we can believe that, as the days in which Job wrestled with his dark maladies are the only days that make him worth remembrance, and but for which his name had never been written in the book of life, so the days through which we struggle, finding no way, but never losing the light, will be the most significant we are called to live.--Robert Collyer.

"Father, I need you to guide my sword..."

Phil 2.13: For it is God Which worketh in you both to will and to do His good pleasure.

Do any of you feel the need of renewing will-power? Satan loves to attack our wills. This is a great word for that--it came with fresh force this morning: this is Dr. Way's rendering: "You have not to do it in your unaided strength: it is God Who is all the while supplying the impulse, giving you the power to resolve, the strength to perform, the execution of His good-pleasure."

With Heavenly power endue us,
With Heavenly love fulfil,
Perform in us Thy pleasure,
Teach us to do Thy will.
-from Edges of His Ways, by Amy Carmichael

If only we receive His gifts of myrrh

"Shall I refuse to drink the cup of sorrow which the Father has given me to drink?" (John 18:11.) (Weymouth.)

God takes a thousand times more pains with us than the artist with his picture, by many touches of sorrow, and by many colors of circumstance, to bring us into the form which is the highest and noblest in His sight, if only we receive His gifts of myrrh in the right spirit.

But when the cup is put away, and these feelings are stifled or unheeded, a greater injury is done to the soul that can never be amended. For no heart can conceive in what surpassing love God giveth us this myrrh; yet this which we ought to receive to our souls' good we suffer to pass by us in our sleepy indifference, and nothing comes of it.

Then we come and complain: "Alas, Lord! I am so dry, and it is so dark within me!" I tell thee, dear child, open thy heart to the pain, and it will do thee more good than if thou wert full of feeling and devoutness.--Tauler.

Dear God, make me a bird, so I can fly far--far, far away from here

"Look from the top." (Song of Solomon 4:8.)

Crushing weights give the Christian wings. It seems like a contradiction in terms, but it is a blessed truth. David out of some bitter experience cried: "Oh, that I had wings like a dove! Then I would fly away, and be at rest" (Psa. 55:6). But before he finished this meditation he seems to have realized that his wish for wings was a realizable one. For he says, "Cast thy burden upon Jehovah, and he will sustain thee."

The word "burden" is translated in the Bible margin, "what he (Jehovah) hath given thee." The saints' burdens are God-given; they lead him to "wait upon Jehovah," and when that is done, in the magic of trust, the "burden" is metamorphosed into a pair of wings, and the weighted one "mounts up with wings as eagles."--Sunday School Times

Through Christ, Our Comfort

The God of All Comfort

"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort." (2 Cor 1:3-7.)

It is far better for us to learn to trust God than to enjoy life

"We are troubled on every side." (2 Cor. 7:5.)

Why should God have to lead us thus, and allow the pressure to be so hard and constant? Well, in the first place, it shows His all-sufficient strength and grace much better than if we were exempt from pressure and trial. "The treasure is in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us."

It makes us more conscious of our dependence upon Him. God is constantly trying to teach us our dependence, and to hold us absolutely in His hand and hanging upon His care. This was the place where Jesus Himself stood and where He wants us to stand, not with self-constituted strength, but with a hand ever leaning upon His, and a trust that dare not take one step alone. It teaches us trust.

There is no way of learning faith except by trial. It is God's school of faith, and it is far better for us to learn to trust God than to enjoy life.
The lesson of faith once learned, is an everlasting acquisition and an eternal fortune made; and without the trust even riches will leave us poor.-Days of Heaven upon Earth.

The Discipline of Faith

"All things are possible to him that believeth." (Mark 9:23.)

The "all things" do not always come simply for the asking, for the reason that God is ever seeking to teach us the way of faith, and in our training in the faith life there must be room for the trial of faith, the discipline of faith, the patience of faith, the courage of faith, and often many stages are passed before we really realize what is the end of faith, namely, the victory of faith.
Real moral fibre is developed through discipline of faith. You have made your request to God, but the answer does not come. What are you to do?

Keep on believing God’s Word; never be moved away from it by what you see or feel, and thus as you stand steady, enlarged power and experience is being developed. The fact of looking at the apparent contradiction as to God’s Word and being unmoved from your position of faith make you stronger on every other line.

Often God delays purposely, and the delay is just as much an answer to your prayer as is the fulfillment when it comes.

In the lives of all the great Bible characters, God worked thus. Abraham, Moses and Elijah were not great in the beginning, but were made great through the discipline of their faith, and only thus were they fitted for the positions to which God had called them.

For example, in the case of Joseph whom the Lord was training for the throne of Egypt, we read in the Psalms:
"The word of the Lord tried him.” It was not the prison life with its hard beds or poor food that tried him, but it was the word God had spoken into his heart in the early years concerning elevation and honor which were greater than his brethren were to receive; it was this which was ever before him, when ever step in his career made it seem more and more impossible of fulfillment, until he was there imprisoned, and all in innocency, while others who were perhaps justly incarcerated, were released, and he was left to languish alone.

These were hours that tried his soul, but hours of spiritual growth and development that, “when his word came” (the word of release), found him fitted for the delicate task of dealing with his wayward brethren, with a love and patience only surpassed by God Himself.

No amount of persecution tries like such experiences as these. When God has spoken of His purpose to do, and yet the days go on and He does not do it, that is truly hard; but it is a discipline of faith that will bring us into a knowledge of God which would otherwise be impossible.
-from Streams in the Desert