Give Me That Old Time Gospel

[Soldier4Christ]

A GLORIOUS REUNION

"I will come again, and receive you unto myself, that where I am, there you may be also." —John 14:3

If the meeting of a long absent friend, or brother, on earth, be a joyous event, what, my soul, must be the joy of your union with this Brother of brothers, this Friend of friends! "I will come again!" Oh! what an errand of love, what a promised honor and dignity is this!—His saints to share, not His Heaven only, but His immediate presence. "Where I am, there you shall be also!" Father, I will (It was His dying wish—a wondrous addition in that testamentary prayer) that those whom You have given me be with me where I am." Happy reunion! Blessed Savior, if Your presence be so sweet on a sin-stricken earth, and when known only by the invisible eye of faith, what must be that presence in a sinless Heaven, unfolded in all its unutterable loveliness and glory!

Happy reunion! it will be a meeting of the whole ransomed family—the Head with all its members—the Vine with all its branches—the Shepherd with all His flock—the Elder Brother with all His kinsmen. Oh, the joy, too, of mutual recognition among the death-divided—ties snapped asunder on earth, indissolubly renewed—severed friendships reunited—the triumph of love complete—love binding brother with brother, and friend with friend, and all to the Elder Brother! My soul! what do you think of this Heaven? Remember who it is that Jesus says shall sit with Him upon His throne—"He who overcomes."

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EVERLASTING ESPOUSALS

"And I will betroth you unto Me forever." —Hosea 2:19

How wondrous and varied are the figures which Jesus employs to express the tenderness of His covenant love! My soul! your Savior-God has "married you!" Would you know the time of your betrothal? Go back into the depths of a bypast eternity, before the world was; then and there, your espousals were contracted: "I have loved you with an everlasting love." Soon shall the bridal-hour arrive, when your absent Lord shall come to welcome His betrothed bride into His royal palace. "The Bridegroom tarries;" but see that you do not slumber and sleep! Surely there is much all around demanding the girded loins and the burning lamps. At "midnight!" (the hour when He is least expected) the cry may be—shall be heard—"Behold, the Bridegroom comes!" My soul! has this mystic union been formed between you and your Lord? Can you say, in humble assurance of your faith in Him, "My beloved is mine, and I am His!" If so, great, unspeakably great, are the glories which await you! Your dowry, as the bride of Christ, is all that Omnipotence can bestow, and all that a feeble creature can receive. In the prospect of those glorious nuptials, you need dread no pang of widowhood. What God has joined together, no created power can take asunder; He betroths you, and it is—"forever!"

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 JOYFUL RESURRECTION

"This corruptible must put on incorruption." —1 Corinthians 15:53

Marvel of marvels! The sleeping ashes of the sepulcher springing up at the tones of the archangel's trumpet!—the dishonored dust rising into a glorified body, like its risen Lord's! At death, the soul's bliss is perfect in kind; but this bliss is not complete in degree, until reunited to the tabernacle it has left behind to mingle with the sods of the valley. But tread lightly on that grave, it contains precious, because ransomed dust! My body, as well as my spirit, was included in the redemption price of Calvary; and "those also who sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him." Oh! blessed Jubilee-day of creation, when Christ's "dead men shall arise"—when, together with His dead body, they shall come; and the summons shall sound forth, "Awake, and sing, you who dwell in the dust!"

All the joys of that resurrection morn we cannot tell; but its chief glory we do know—"When He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is." Like Him!—My soul, are you waiting for this manifestation of the sons of God? Like Him!—Have you caught up any faint resemblance to that all-glorious image? Having this hope in you, are you purifying yourself, even as He is pure? Be much with Jesus now, that you may exult in meeting Him hereafter. Thus taking Him as your Guide and Portion in life, you may lay down in your dark and loathsome grave, and look forward with triumphant hope to the dawn of a resurrection morn, saying, "What time I awake, I am still with You!"

[Soldier4Christ]

 NIGHTLESS HEAVEN

"There shall be no night there." —Revelation 21:25

My soul! is it night with you here? Are you wearied with these midnight tossings on life's tumultuous sea? Be still! the day is breaking! soon shall your Lord appear. "His going forth is prepared as the morning." That glorious appearing shall disperse every cloud, and usher in an eternal noontide which knows no twilight. "The sun will never set; the moon will not go down. For the Lord will be your everlasting light. Your days of mourning will come to an end." Everlasting light! Wondrous secret of a nightless world!—the glories of a present God!—the everlasting light of the Three in One, quenching the radiance of all created orbs—superseding all material luminaries. "My soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning!" The haven is nearing—star after star is quenched in more glorious effulgence—every bound over these dark waves is bringing you nearer the eternal shore. Will you not, then, humbly and patiently endure "weeping for the night," in the prospect of the "joy that comes in the morning?" Strange realities! a world without night—a heaven without a sun; and, greater wonder still, yourself in this world—a joyful citizen of this nightless, sinless, sorrowless, tearless Heaven!—basking underneath the Fountain of uncreated light! No exhaustion of glorified body and spirit to require repose; no lassitude or weariness to suspend the ever-deepening song—"Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty—the one who always was, who is, and who is still to come."

[Soldier4Christ]

A CROWN OF LIFE

"And when the Chief Shepherd comes, your reward will be a never-ending share in His glory and honor." 1 Peter 5:4

What! is the beggar to be "raised from the ash-heap, set among Princes, and made to inherit a throne of glory?" Is dust and ashes, a puny rebel, a guilty traitor—to be pitied, pardoned, loved, exalted from the depths of despair, raised to the heights of Heaven—gifted with kingly honor—royally fed—royally clothed—royally attended—and, at last, royally crowned? O my soul, look forward with joyous emotion to that day of wonders, when He whose head shall be crowned with many crowns, shall be the dispenser of royal diadems to His people; and when they shall begin the joyful ascription of all eternity, "Unto Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us Kings—to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen."

Will you not be among the number? Shall the princes and monarchs of the earth wade through seas of blood for a corruptible crown; and will you permit yourself to lose the incorruptible diadem, or barter it for some perishable nothings of earth? Oh! that you would awake to your high destiny, and live up to your transcendent privileges as the citizen of a Kingly Commonwealth, a member of the blood-royal family of Heaven. What would you not sacrifice—what effort would you grudge, if you were included at last in the gracious benediction, "Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world?"

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THE VISION AND FRUITION OF GOD

I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, "Look, the home of God is now among his people! He will live with them, and they will be his people. God himself will be with them. He will remove all of their sorrows, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. For the old world and its evils are gone forever." And the one sitting on the throne said, "Look, I am making all things new!" And then he said to me, "Write this down, for what I tell you is trustworthy and true." Revelation 21:3-5

Glorious consummation! All the other glories of Heaven are but emanations from this glory that excels. Here is the focus and center to which every ray of light converges. God is "all in all." Heaven without God!—it would send a thrill of dismay through the burning ranks of angels and archangels; it would dim every eye, and hush every harp, and change the whitest robe into sackcloth. And shall I then, indeed, "see God?" What! shall I gaze on these inscrutable glories, and live? Yes, God Himself shall be with them, and be their God; they shall "see His face!" And not only the vision, but the fruition. Oh! how does sin in my holiest moments damp the enjoyment of Him! It is the "pure in heart" alone who can "see," far more—who can "enjoy" God. Even if He did reveal Himself now, these eyes could never endure His intolerable brightness.

But then, with a heart purified from corruption—a world where the taint of sin and the power of temptation never enters—the soul again a bright mirror, reflecting the lost image of the Godhead—all the affections devoted to their original high destiny—the love of God the motive principle, the ruling passion—the glory of God the undivided object and aim—the will no opposing or antagonist bias—man will, for the first time, know all the blessedness of his chief end—"to glorify God, and to enjoy Him forever!"

[Soldier4Christ]

TELL ME THE OLD, OLD STORY

Tell me the old, old story of unseen things above,
Of Jesus and His glory, of Jesus and His love.
Tell me the story simply, as to a little child,
For I am weak and weary, and helpless and defiled.

Tell me the old, old story, tell me the old, old story,
Tell me the old, old story, of Jesus and His love.

Tell me the story slowly, that I may take it in,
That wonderful redemption, God’s remedy for sin.
Tell me the story often, for I forget so soon;
The early dew of morning has passed away at noon.

Tell me the story softly, with earnest tones and grave;
Remember I’m the sinner whom Jesus came to save.
Tell me the story always, if you would really be,
In any time of trouble, a comforter to me.

Tell me the same old story when you have cause to fear
That this world’s empty glory is costing me too dear.
Yes, and when that world’s glory is dawning on my soul,
Tell me the old, old story: “Christ Jesus makes thee whole.”

[Soldier4Christ]

A Loving Purpose

"The Lord has pleasure in the prosperity of His servant." Psalm 35:27

What is "prosperity?" Is it threads of life weaved into a bright outcome? a full cup? ample riches? worldly applause? an unbroken circle? No, these are often a snare; received without gratitude; dimming the soul to its nobler destinies. Often spiritually it rather means God taking us by the hand into the lowly Valleys of Humiliation; leading us as He did his servant Job of old; out of his sheep, oxen, camels, health, wealth, children; in order that we may be brought before Him in the dust, and say, "Blessed be His holy name!"

 Yes! The very reverse of what is known in the world as Prosperity (generally) forms the background on which the Rainbow of Promise is seen. God smiles on us through these rainbows and teardrops of sorrows! He loves us too well. He has too great an interest in our spiritual welfare to permit us to live on in what is misnamed "Prosperity." When He sees duties languidly performed, or coldly neglected; the heart deadened, and love to Himself congealed by the absorbing power of the present world, He puts a thorn in our nest to drive us to the wing, and prevent our being grovelers forever!

 I may not be able now to understand the mystery of these dealings. I may be asking through the tears, "Why this unkind arrest on my earthly happiness? Why so premature a lopping of my boughs of promise? Such a speedy withering of my most cherished gourd?" The answer is plain. It is your soul’s prosperity He has in view. Believe it, your true Ebenezers will yet be raised close by your Zarephaths (the place of furnace).

 His afflictions are no arbitrary appointments. There is righteous necessity in all He does. As He lays His chastening hand upon you, and leads you by ways you know not, and which you never would have chosen. He whispers the gentle accents in your ear, "Beloved I wish above all things that you would prosper, and be in health."

 Rest in the quiet consciousness that all is well. Murmur at nothing which brings you nearer His own loving Presence. Be thankful for your very cares, because you can confidently cast them all upon Him. He has your temporal and eternal "prosperity" too much at heart to appoint one superfluous pang, one needless stroke. Commit therefore, all that concerns you to His keeping, and leave it there.

[Soldier4Christ]

The Safe Refuge

"A man shall be a shelter from the wind; and a refuge from the storm; like streams of water in the desert; and the shadow of a great rock in a thirsty land." Isaiah 32:2

"A man!" This first word forms the key to the precious verse, It is "The man Christ Jesus!" And when and where is He thus revealed to His people as their hiding place and shelter? It is, as with Elijah of old, in the whirlwind and the storm! Amid the world's bright sunshine, in the tranquil skies, uninterrupted prosperity, they seek Him not! But when the clouds begin to gather, and the sun is swept from the firmament; when they have learned the insecurity of all earthly refuges, then the prayer ascends, "My heart is overwhelmed, lead me to the Rock that is higher than I." The Earthquake, the Tempest, the Fire, and then "the still small voice!" Sorrowing believer, you have indeed a Sure Refuge; a Strong Tower which cannot be shaken! The world has its refuges too. But they cannot stand the day of trial. The wind passes over them and they are gone! But the louder the hurricane, the more will it endear to you the abiding Shelter; the deeper in the clefts of this ROCK, the safer you are.

 A Man! Delight often to dwell on the humanity of Jesus; you have a brother on the throne! a "living Kinsman," one who "knows your frame," and who, by the exquisite sympathies of His exalted human nature, can gauge, as none other can, the depths of your sorrow.

 An earthly friend comes to you in trial, he has never known bereavement, and therefore can not enter into your woe. Another comes; he has been again and again in the furnace; his heart has been touched tenderly as your own; he can feelingly sympathize with you. It is so with Jesus. As man, He has passed through every experience of suffering. He has Himself known the storm from which He offers you shelter. He is the ROCK, yet "a Man!" "Mighty to save;" yet mighty to compassionate! "Emmanuel, God with us!" He is like the rainbow in the material heavens, which, while its summit is in the clouds, each base of its arc rests on earth; or like the oak which, while it can wrestle with the tempest, yet invites the most feeble bird to fold its wing on its branches!

 Mourner! Go sit under your "Beloved's shadow with great delight." Hide in His wounded side! The hand which pierced you is ordering your trials; He who roused the storm is the hiding place from it; and as you journey on, gloomy clouds mustering around you, let this bright rainbow of comfort ever arrest your drooping eye; "For this reason He had to be made like His brothers in every way... since He Himself has gone through suffering and temptation, He is able to help us when we are being tempted."

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The Reason for Chastisement

"Whom the Lord loves He chastens." Hebrews 12:6

What! God loves me when He is discharging His quiver upon me! emptying me from vessel to vessel! causing the sun of my earthly joys to set in clouds? Yes! O afflicted, tossed with tempest; He chastens you because He loves you! This trial comes from His own tender, loving hand; His own tender, unchanging heart!

 Are you laid on a sickbed; are sorrowful months and wearisome nights appointed unto you? Let this be the pillow on which your aching head reclines. It is because He loves me!

Is it bereavement that has swept your heart and desolated your dwelling? He appointed that chamber of death, because He loves you! As it is the suffering child of the family which claims a mother's deepest affections and most tender solicitude, so have you at this moment embarked on your side the most tender love and solicitude of a heavenly Father. He loved you into this sorrow, and will love you through it. There is nothing capricious in His dealings. LOVE is the reason of all He does. There is no drop of wrath in that cup you are called to drink. "I do believe," says one, "He has purchased these afflictions for us, as well as everything else. Blessed be His name, it is part of His covenant to visit us with the rod." What says our adorable Lord himself? The words were spoken, not when He was on earth, a sojourner in a sorrowing world, but when enthroned amid the glories of heaven. "As many as I love I rebuke and chasten." (Revelation 3:19)

 Believer! rejoice in the thought that the rod, the chastening rod, is in the hands of the living, loving Savior, who died for you! Tribulation is the King's Highway and yet that highway is paved with love. As some flowers before shedding their fragrance require to be crushed, so does your God think it suitable to bruise you. As some birds are said to sing their sweetest notes when the thorn pierces their bosom, so does He appoint affliction to lacerate, that you may be driven to the wing, singing, in your upward soaring, "My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed!"

Be it ours to say, "Lord, I will love You not only despite Your rod, but because of your rod." I will rush into the very arms that are chastening me!

[Soldier4Christ]

mmutability

"I the Lord change not; therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed." Malachi 3:6

The Unchangeableness of God. What an anchor for a storm tossed sea! "Change is our portion here!" Scenes are altering. Joys are fading. Friends! some of them are removed at a distance; others have gone to their 'long home'. Who, amid these checkered experiences, does not sigh for something permanent, stable, enduring? The vessel has again and again slipped its earthly moorings. We long for some secure and sheltered harbor.

 "I change not!" Heart and flesh may faint; yes, do faint and fail but there is an unfainting, unfailing, unvarying God. All the changes in the world around cannot affect Him. Our own fitfulness cannot alter Him. When we are depressed, downcast, fluctuating, our treacherous hearts turning aside "like a broken bow," He is without one "shadow of turning." "God who cannot lie," is the superscription on His eternal throne; and inscribed on all His dealings.

 "I change not!" Precious name! It forms a blessed guarantee that nothing can befall me but what is for my good. I cannot doubt His faithfulness. I dare not arraign the rectitude of His dispensations. It is covenant love which is now darkening my earthly horizon. This hour He is the same as when He "spared not His own Son!" Oh, instead of wondering at my trials, let me rather wonder that He has borne with me so long. It is of the Lord's unchanging mercies that I am not consumed. Had He been man, changeful, vacillating, as myself, long before now would He have spurned me away, and consigned me to the doom of the cumberer. But, "My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, says the Lord." He is without any variableness.
 

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Divine Sympathy

"I know their sorrows." Exodus 3:7

Man cannot say so. There are many sensitive fibers in the soul the best and most tender human sympathy cannot touch. But the Prince of Sufferers, He who led the way in the path of sorrow, "knows our frame." When crushing bereavement lies like ice on the heart, when the dearest earthly friend cannot enter into the peculiarities of our grief, Jesus can, Jesus does! He who once bore my sins also carried my sorrows.

 That eye, now on the throne, was once dim with weeping! I can think in all my afflictions, "He was afflicted," in all my tears, "Jesus wept."

"I know their sorrows!" He may seem at times thus to forget and forsake us; leaving us to utter the plaintive cry, "Has God forgotten to be gracious," when all the while He is bending over us in the most tender love. He often allows our needs to attain their extremity, that He may stretch forth His succoring hand, and reveal the plenitude of His Grace! "The Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy."

 And "knowing" our sorrows, is a guarantee that none will be sent but what He sees to be needful. "I will not," says He, "make a full end of you, but I will correct you in measure." (Jer. 30:11) All He sends is precisely meted out; wisely apportioned. There is nothing accidental or fortuitous; no unneeded thorn; no superfluous pang. He "puts our tears in a bottle." (Psalm 61: Each one is counted, drop by drop, tear by tear, they are sacred things among the treasures of God! Suffering believer, the iron may have entered deeply into your soul; yet rejoice! Great is your honor; you are partaker with Christ in His sufferings. Jesus a sorrowing, sympathizing Jesus, "knows" your aching pangs and burning tears, and He will "come down to deliver you!"
 

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A Gracious Condition

"If need be." 1 Peter 1:6

What a blessed motto and superscription over the dark lintels of sorrow! "If need be!" Every sharp arrow from the quiver of God is feathered with it! Write it, child of affliction, over every trial your God sees fit to send! If He calls you down from the sunny mountain heights to the dark glades, hear Him saying, "There is a need be." If He has dashed the cup of prosperity from your lips, curtailed your creature comforts, diminished your "basket and your store," hear Him saying, "There is a need be." If He has ploughed and furrowed your soul with severe bereavement; extinguished light after light in your dwelling; hear Him therefore stilling the tumult of your grief "there is a need be." Yes! believe it, there is some profound reason for your trial, which at present may be indiscernible. No furnace will be hotter than He sees to be needed.

Sometimes indeed, His teachings are mysterious. We can with difficulty spell out the letters, "God is love!" We can see no "bright light," in "our cloud." It is all mystery; not one break is there in the sky! No! "Hear what God the Lord speaks." "If need be."

 He does not long leave His people alone, if He sees the chariot wheels dragging heavily. He will take His own means to sever them from an absorbing love of the world; to pursue them out of self; and dislodge usurping clay idols that may have vaulted on the throne which He alone may occupy. Before your present trial He may have seen your love waxing cold, or your influence for good lessening. As the sun puts out the fire, the sun of earthly prosperity may have been extinguishing the fires of your soul. You may have been shining less brightly for Christ, effecting some guilty compromise with an insinuating and seductive world. He has appointed the very discipline and dealing needful; nothing less could have done!

 Be still, and know that He is God! That "need be," remember, is in the hands of Infinite Love, Infinite Wisdom, Infinite Power. Trust Him in little things as well as great things, in trifles as well as emergencies.

 Seek to have unquestioning faith. Though other paths, doubtless, would have been selected by you had the choice been in your hands, be it yours to listen to His voice at every turn in the road, saying, "This is the way, walk in it." We may not be able to understand it now, but one day we shall come to find, that AFFLICTION is one of God's blessed angels; a ministering spirit, "sent forth to minister to those who are heirs of salvation." Lovelier, indeed, to the eye, is the azure blue; the fleecy summer vapors, or gold and vermilion of western sunsets. But what would become of the earth if no dark clouds from time to time hung over it; distilling their treasures, reviving and refreshing its drooping vegetable tribes?

 Is it otherwise with the soul? No. The cloud of sorrow is needed. Its every raindrop has an inner meaning of LOVE! If, even now, afflicted one, these clouds are gathering, and the tempest sighing, lift up your eye to the divine scroll gleaming in the darkened heavens, and remember that He who has put the Rainbow of promise there, saw also a "need be" for the cloud on which it rests!

[Soldier4Christ]

Presence and Rest

"My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest." Exodus 33:14

Moses asked to be shown "the way." Here is the answer: The way is not shown; but better than this, God says, "Trust Me, I will go with you!" Afflicted one! hear the voice addressing you from the cloudy pillar. It is a wilderness promise which "the God of Jeshurun" speaks to His spiritual Israel still. He who led His people of old "like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron," will manifest towards you the same Shepherd love. The way may be very different from what we could have wished; what we would have chosen. But the choice is in better hands. He had His own wise and righteous ends in every devious turning in it.

 Who can look back on the past leadings of God without gratitude and thankfulness? When His sheep have been conducted to the rougher parts of the wilderness, He, their Shepherd, has "gone before them. When their fleece was torn, and footsore and weary, He has borne them in His arms. His presence has lightened every cross and sweetened every care. Let us trust Him for an unknown and checkered future. Other companionships we cherished may have failed us, but One who is better than the best, goes before us in His gracious pillar cloud. With Him for our portion, take what He will away, we must be happy; we can rise above the loss of the earthly gift, in the consciousness of the nobler possession and heritage we enjoy in the Great Bestower. He may have seen fit to level clay idols, that He, the All Satisfying might reign paramount and supreme. He may have seen to take earthly "presences" away, to give us to breathe more earnestly the prayer "If YOUR presence go not with us, carry us not hence." He will not allow us to rear havens on earth, and to write upon them, "This is my rest." No- 'tenting time' here; resting time yonder! But "Fear not," He seems to say "You are not left without a friend or without solace on the way Pilgrim in a pilgrim land! 'My presence shall go with you.' In all your dark and cloudy days; in your hours of faintness and depression; in sadness; in life and in death! And when the journey is ended, the Pillar needed no more, 'I will give you rest'."

 The pledge of Grace will be followed with the fruition of Glory!

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The Giver and the Taker

"The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." Job1:21

Noble posture this; to kneel and to adore! To see no hand but ONE! Sabeans; Fire; Whirlwind; Sword; are all overlooked. The Patriarch recognizes alone "The Lord" who gave and "The Lord" who has taken. What is the cause of so much depression, needless sorrow, ungospel murmuring in our hours of trial? It was what Rutherford calls "our looking to the confused rollings of the wheels of second causes;" a refusal to rise to "the height of the great argument," and confidently to say, "The will of the Lord be done!" a refusal to hear His voice; His own loving voice, mingling with the accents of the rudest storm; "It is I!" "Is there evil in the city, and the Lord has not done it?" Is there a bitter drop in the cup, and the Lord has not mingled it? He loves His people too well to intrust their interest to any other. We are but clay in the hand of the Potter; vessels in the hand of the Refiner of silver. He metes out our portion. He appoints the bounds of our habitation. "The Lord God prepared the gourd." "The Lord God prepared the worm." He is the Author alike of mercies and sorrows, of comforts and crosses. He breathes into our nostrils the breath of life; and it is at His summons the spirit returns "to the God who gave it!"

 Oh, that we would seek to regard our own lives and the lives of those dear to us as a loan. God, as the Great Proprietor, Who, when He sees fit, can revoke the grant or curtail the lease He gave! All mercies by Him bestowed; by Him continued; by Him withheld.

 And how often does He take away, that He may Himself enter the vacuum of the heart and fill it with His own ineffable presence and love! No loss can compensate for the lack of Him, but He can compensate for all losses. Let us trust His love and faithfulness as a taking as well as a giving God. Often are Sense and Sight tempted to say, "Not so, Lord!" But Faith, resting on the promise, can exult in this Rainbow spanning the darkest cloud, "Even so, Father, for it seems good in your sight!"