February 23

Morning

I will never leave thee. — Heb 13:5

No promise is of private interpretation. Whatever God has said to any one saint—He has said to all. When He opens a well for one, it is that all may drink. When He opens a granary-door to give out food, there may be some one starving man who is the occasion of its being opened but all hungry saints may come and feed too. Whether He gave the Word to Abraham or to Moses, matters not, O believer; He has given it to you as one of the covenanted seed. There is not a high blessing too lofty for you, nor a wide mercy too extensive for you. Lift up now your eyes to the north and to the south, to the east and to the west—for all this is yours! Climb to Pisgah’s top, and view the utmost limit of the divine promise—for the land is all your own! There is not a brook of living water—of which you may not drink. If the land flows with milk and honey, eat the honey and drink the milk, for both are yours. Be bold to believe, for He has said, “I will never leave you, nor forsake you.”

In this promise, God gives everything to His people. “I will never leave you.” Then no attribute of God can cease to be engaged for us. Is He mighty? He will show Himself strong on the behalf of those who trust Him. Is He love? Then with loving-kindness will He have mercy upon us. Whatever attributes may compose the character of Deity, every one of them to its fullest extent, shall be engaged on our side. To put everything in one—there is nothing you can lack, there is nothing you can ask for, there is nothing you can need in time or in eternity, there is nothing living, nothing dying, there is nothing in this world, nothing in the next world, there is nothing now, nothing at the resurrection morning, nothing in heaven which is not contained in this text, “I will never leave you, nor forsake you!”

Evening

Take up the cross, and follow me. — Mark 10:21

You have not the liberty of making of your own cross; although unbelief is a master carpenter at cross-making. Neither are you permitted to choose your own cross; although self-will would gladly be lord and master. Your cross is prepared and appointed for you by divine love and you are cheerfully to accept it. You are to take up the cross as your chosen portion, and not to stand caviling at it.

This night Jesus bids you to submit your shoulder to His easy yoke. Do not kick at it in petulance, or trample on it in vain-glory, or fall under it in despair, or run away from it in fear but take it up like a true follower of Jesus. Jesus was a cross-bearer; He leads the way in the path of sorrow. Surely you could not desire a better guide! And if He carried a cross—what nobler burden would you desire?

The Way of the Cross is the way of safety—do not fear to tread its thorny paths.

Beloved, the cross is not made of soft feathers, or lined with velvet—it is heavy and galling to disobedient shoulders! But it is not an iron cross, though your fears have painted it with iron colors, it is a wooden cross, and a man can carry it, for the Man of sorrows carried the load. Take up your cross, and by the power of the Spirit of God—you will soon be so in love with it, that like Moses, you would not exchange the reproach of Christ for all the treasures of Egypt!

Remember that Jesus carried it, and it will smell sweetly! Remember that the cross will soon be followed by the crown, and the thought of the coming weight of glory—will greatly lighten the present heaviness of trouble. May the Lord help you to bow your spirit in submission to the divine will before you fall asleep this night, that waking with tomorrow’s sun, you may go forth to the day’s cross with the holy and submissive spirit which befits a follower of the Crucified.