Preparation For Praise
"Beloved, do not be surprised at the ordeal that has come to test you…you are sharing what Christ suffered; so rejoice in it" (1 Peter 4:12).
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Many a waiting hour was needful to enrich the
harp of David, and many a waiting hour in the
wilderness will gather for us a psalm of
"thanksgiving, and the voice of melody," to cheer
the hearts of fainting ones here below, and to
make glad our Father's house on high.
What was the preparation of the son of Jesse for
the songs like unto which none other have ever
sounded on this earth?
The outrage of the wicked, which brought forth
cries for God's help. Then the faint hope in
God's goodness blossomed into a song of rejoicing
for His mighty deliverances and manifold mercies.
Every sorrow was another string to his harp;
every deliverance another theme for praise.
One thrill of anguish spared, one blessing
unmarked or unprized, one difficulty or danger
evaded, how great would have been our loss in
that thrilling Psalmody in which God's people
today find the expression of their grief or
praise!
To wait for God, and to suffer His will, is to
know Him in the fellowship of His sufferings, and
to be conformed to the likeness of His Son. So
now, if the vessel is to be enlarged for
spiritual understanding, be not affrighted at the
wider sphere of suffering that awaits you. The
Divine capacity of sympathy will have a more
extended sphere, for the breathing of the Holy
Ghost in the new creation never made a stoic, but
left the heart's affection tender and true.
--Anna Shipton
***
"He tested me ere He entrusted me" (1 Tim. 1:12, Way's Trans.)
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