Daily Devotionals

Mornings and Evenings with Jesus

Devotional: March 27th

I will be with him in trouble. - Psalms 91:15.

MANY are the afflictions of the righteous, but they have not to bear their trials, endure affliction, or to tread the path of tribulation, alone. Knowing the anxieties and fears of his people, the Lord has graciously assured to them the comfort and help of his presence in every time of trouble. “When thou passest through the waters,” he says, “I will be with thee, and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee; when thou walkest through the fire thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flames kindle upon thee.” He is a Friend that more than realizes the expectations of his people. “Confidence in an unfaithful man in the time of trouble,” says the Wise Man, “is like a broken tooth and a foot out of joint.” These are worse than useless, for not only do they fail us but cause us much pain.

Job found it so; and so did Paul, when he said, “At my first answer no man stood by me, but all men forsook me.” But the Lord had not forsaken him; for he adds, “Notwithstanding, the Lord stood by me and strengthened me.” Yes, whoever fails or forsakes us, “he abideth faithful.” Jacob found him so in Bethel. Driven from home, and travelling through a desert land, in a forlorn and solitary condition, and full of anxious forebodings, he “lights on a certain place and tarries there all night, because the sun was set:” -the darkness was his curtain, the ground his bed, and a stone his pillow. There he falls asleep. There God assured him that he would be with him in all places, and would not leave him until he had done all he promised him.

Thus his people now find him to be better than their fears, and surpassing in lovingkindness their highest hopes. He is with his people really, efficiently, and peculiarly, in the day of trouble. If, therefore, we “faint in the day of adversity,” it is by losing sight of Him whose grace is always sufficient for us, whose strength is made perfect in our weakness. In all times of trouble, therefore, let us make the language of Doddridge our own:-

“If thou, my Jesus, still be nigh,

Cheerful I live, and joyful die;

Secure, when mortal comforts flee,

To find ten thousand worlds in thee.”

Be not slothful. - Hebrews 6:12.

A PHILOSOPHER, when he was asked “What is the sin most universal to mankind?” answered, truly and justly, “Idleness and sloth.” But mental sloth is greater than bodily sloth, and Spiritual sloth is greater than mental. It seems very astonishing, as well as unnatural, that any man can see such honours as those which come from God and not feel something like ambition, or behold the unsearchable riches of Christ and not covet them, and learn that the Judge standeth at the door and not be afraid; see such a heaven and not agonize to enter it; see hell moving to meet him at his feet and not tremble and flee from the wrath to come.

When we consider the infinite importance of eternal things, that with such consequences depending, and with such a prize exhibited before us, it is most marvellous that we should so faintly “fight the good fight of faith,” and so sluggishly “run the race that is set before us.” How diligent men in general are in the ordinary transactions of life; they rise early and sit up late, eating the bread of carefulness; they compass sea and land to advance their temporal concerns, which, after all, have very little connection with their happiness; a hint is sufficient there: but to stir us up to be followers of Christ, there must be sanctuaries, preachers without and conscience within-various dispensations of providence; we must be goaded and wooed, blessed and chastised, in order to induce us to think of a better, even a heavenly inheritance; and yet, alas! all this is too little, all this is in vain. It was not by the indulgence of sloth that those characters who “through faith and patience inherit the promises” rose to their eminence and distinction and entered the kingdom.

Let us watch against the very beginning of sloth, and cultivate a holy activity of mind, ever keeping in view our station and our resources, and see how we can best glorify our Saviour and serve our generation. Our time is flying, and we ought not to be creeping; but while we should be followers of the good, we may also, in works of faith and labours of love, be ourselves examples to others. O let us be followers of Him who said, “I must work the work of him that sent me while it is day, for the night cometh when no man can work.”