I90 TENDERNESS AND POWER
wonder of our text. It is He who calleth out the stars hy number, and maketh the pillars of the heaven to shake. And when He worketh, no man can stay His hand or say to Him, What doest Thou ? And it is this Kuler, infinite in power, before whom the princes of the earth are vanity, who is exquisitely and for ever gentle.^
1. "He telleth the number of the stars, he giveth them all their names." One would think that if He were busy building, and gathering together, and healing the broken in heart, and binding up their wounds, He would have no time to attend to the framework of the universe. Yet here is the distinct declaration that the universe is taken care of at every point. There is not one little wicket-gate that opens into the meadow of the stars that is not angel-guarded. God has no postern gates by which the thief can enter undiscovered. The word " telleth " is a singular word ; what is it when reduced to the level of our mother tongue ? " He telleth " is equal to " He numbereth " ; He looketh night after night to see that every one is there.
^ We have sometimes heard the shepherd muttering to him- self as the sheep came home in the gloaming — one, two, three, four. Why this enumeration ? Because he has so many, and he must know whether every one is at home or not. What does one matter in fifty ? Everything. It is the missing one that makes the heart ache ; it is the one thing wanting that reduces wealth to poverty ; it is the one anxiety that drives our sleep away. I have a thousand blessings ; on that recollection I will fall to slumber. Yet I cannot. Why not ? Because of the one anxiety, the one pain, the one trouble, the one child lacking, the one friend grieved, the one life in danger, the one legitimate aspiration imperilled and threatened with disappointment. But I have a thousand blessings ; why not pillow my head upon these and rest ? I cannot : nature is against me ; reason may have a long argument, but the one anxiety arises and sneers it down. So the Lord telleth, counteth, goeth over the number, as it were one by one, to see that every little light is kindled, every asteroid at home. The very hairs of your head are all numbered. He makes pets of the stars — He calls them by their names. He treats them as if they were intelligent ; He speaks to them as if they could answer Him.*
' G. H. Morrison, The Weaving of Glory, 181. ' J. Parker, Studies in Texts, vi. 84.
PSALM cxLvii. 3, 4 191
2. The God of the multitude is also the God of the individual soul. He attends to the innumerable host and to the single unit. Where we hear but a distant murmuring He hears the separate beating of every heart. This is one great distinction between natural and revealed religion, for the one thing that natural religion cannot do is to assure us of the individual care of God. The god of natural religion is like the driver of some eastern caravan ; and he drives his caravan with skill unerring over the desert to the gleaming city. But he never halts for any bruised mortal, or waits to minister to any dying woman, or even for a moment checks his team to ease the agonies of any child. That ; is the god of natural religion — the mighty tendency that makes , for righteousness. Imperially careful of the whole, he is | sovereignly careless of the one. And over against that god, so/ dark and terrible, there stands for ever the God of revelation; saying in infinite and individual mercy, " I am the God op Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob." He, too, is making for a city which hath foundations, and whose streets are golden. But He has an ear for every feeble cry, a great compassion for every bruised heart, and a watchful pity, like a mother's pity, for lips that are craving for a little water. It was a great thought which St. Peter uttered when he said to all who read, " He careth for you." But St. Paul was nearer the heart of the Eternal when he said, " He loved me, and gave himself for me."
This thought of God is countersigned in the clearest way by Christ. The God of Christ, in communistic ages, is the asylum of individuality. It is true that there was something in a crowd that stirred our Saviour to His depths. He was moved with com- passion when He saw the multitude, as a flock of sheep without a shepherd. And when He came over against the city of Jeru- salem, where the murmur of life was, and where the streets were thronged, looking, He was intensely moved, and wept. There was a place for the all within that heart of His. He " saw life steadily, and saw it whole." There was not a problem of these teeming multitudes but had its last solution in His blood. Yet He who thus encompassed the totality in a love that was majestic to redeem, had a heart that never for an instant faltered in its passionate devotion to the one. Living for mankind, He spoke His deepest when His whole audience was one listener. Dying