272 A GOODLY HERITAGE
True sunlight of the soul, Surround me as I go ;
So shall my way be safe, My feet no straying know.
Great love of God, come in, Well-spring of heavenly peace,
Thou Living Water, come, Spring up, and never cease.
Love of the living God, Of Father and of Son,
Love of the Holy Ghost, Fill Thou each needy one.^
II.
A Secure Tenure.
"Thou maintainest my lot."
God Himself is the guardian of the estate. The land, the partition of which amongst the tribes lies at the bottom of the allusive metaphor of the text, was given to them under the sanction of a supernatural defence ; and the law of their continuance in it was that they should trust and serve the unseen King. It was He, according to the theocratic theory of the Old Testament, and not chariots and horses, their own arm and their own sword, that kept them safe, though the enemies on the north and the enemies on the south were big enough to swallow up the little kingdom at a mouthful. And so, says the Psalmist allusively, in a similar manner, the Divine Power surrounds the man who chooses God for his heritage, and nothing shall take that heritage from him.
1. Our possession is secure, because it enters into the fibre of our being, and becomes part of ourselves. The lower forms of possession, by which men are called the owners of material goods are imperfect, because they are all precarious and temporary. Nothing really belongs to a man if it can be taken from him. What we may lose we can scarcely be said to have. They are
^ Horatias Bouai".
PSALM XVI. 5, 6 273
mine, they were yours, they ivill he some other person's to-morrow. Whilst we have them we do not have them in any deep sense ; we cannot retain them, they are not really ours at all. The only thing that is worth calling ours is something that so passes into and saturates the very substance of our soul that, like a piece of cloth dyed in the grain, as long as two threads hold together the tint will be there. That is how God gives us Himself, and nothing can take Him out of a man's soul. He, in the sweetness of His grace, bestows Himself upon man, and guards His own gift, in the heart, which is Himself. He who dwells in God and God in him lives as in the inmost keep and citadel. The noise of battle may roar around the walls, but deep silence and peace are within. The storm may rage upon the coasts, but he who has God for his portion dwells in a quiet inland valley where the tempests never come. No outer changes can touch our pos- session of God. They belong to another region altogether. Other goods may go, but this is held by a different tenure. The life of a Christian is lived in two regions ; in the one his life has its roots, and its branches extend to the other. In the one there may be whirling storms and branches may toss and snap, whilst in the other, to which the roots go down, may be peace.
^ Often we do not learn the depth and riches of God's love and the sweetness of His presence till other joys vanish out of our hands and other loved presences fade away out of sight. The loss of temporal things seems ofttimes to be necessary to empty our hearts, that they may receive the things that are unseen and eternal. The door is never opened to Him until the soul's dead joys are borne out ; then, while it stands open, He enters bearing into it joys immortal. How often is it true that the sweeping away of our earthly hopes reveals the glory of our heart's refuge in God ! Some one has beautifully said, " Our refuges are like the nests of birds : in summer they are hidden among the green leaves, but in winter they are seen among the naked branches." Worldly losses but strip off the foliage and disclose to us our heart's warm nest in the bosom of God,^
2. God will fortify our hearts, so that we may not weakly barter away our possession. None can dispossess us against our wills, but the offers of the world are persistent and alluring, and
^ J. R. Miller, The Shining Life. JOB-PS. XXX. — 18
i274 A GOODLY HERITAGE
we need a special defence. This God provides for all who trust Him. He sets up within us an impregnable defence, even His own presence. He is near unto all them that put their trust in Him ; no harm shall come to them. We have at once the joy of possession and in the possession safety.
^ Transfiguration is wrought in human life by the indwelling of Christ. In what measure Christ enters into us, and fills us, and abides in us, depends upon the measure of our surrender to Him. He is ready to fill us and live in us. A perfumer bought an earthenware vase and filled it with attar of roses. The rich perfume entered into the material of the vase, and completely permeated it. Long after it ceased to be used, it still carried the fragrance. Even when it was old and broken, its shattered and worthless fragments retained the sweetness. So it is when the love of God has been shed abroad in a human heart by the Divine Spirit, and the earthly life has been struck through with the life of Christ. It is all Christ ; self dies. Christ lives in the soul, and His beauty shines out in the life.^