^ In this God's-world, with its wild-whirling eddies, and mad foam-oceans, where men and nations perish as if without law, and judgment for an unjustly thing is sternly delayed, dost thou think that there is therefore no justice ? It is what the fool hath said in his heart. It is what the wise, in all times, were wise because they denied, and knew forever not to be. I tell thee again, there is nothing else but justice. One strong thing I find here below: the just thing, the true thing. For it is the right and noble alone that will have victory in this struggle; the rest is wholly an obstruction, a postponement and fearful imperilment of the victory. Towards an eternal centre of right and nobleness, and of that only, is all this confusion tending. We already know
442 SOWING AND REAPING
whither it is all tending ; what will have victory, what will have none ! ^
^ Before commencing his campaign, he called on two ancient intimates, Lord Heddon and his distant cousin Darley Absworthy, both Members of Parliament, useful men, though gouty, who had sown in their time a fine crop of wild oats, and advocated the advantage of doing so seeing that they did not fancy themselves the worse for it. He found one with an imbecile son, and the other with consumptive daughters. " So much," he wrote in his Notebook, " for the Wild Oats theory !"»
3. The text has been commonly interpreted as solely a warn- ing to the profligate. Yet the context shows that the words were intended rather as a solemn encouragement to the faithful. The Apostle is writing not to terrify evildoers, but to cheer those good men who else might grow weary of sowing the good seed. And he invokes this profound and awful truth as an exceeding great and precious promise for all the dejected and disconsolate people of God. Christians in some respects are peculiarly apt to be deceived. The illusions of life can dazzle and perplex the wisest children of this world. But those who strive to walk by faith are doubly vexed by the falsehood of appearances. From the nature of the case, their goal and their recompense must lie out of sight. The fair fruit of their labour hardly ripens in our earthly climate, and even the bravest workers will faint and grow weary because after long husbandry they can discern hardly a trace of the blade and the ear.
" Be not deceived ; Grod is not mocked." We may lose heart and hope, but His will never wavers. We seem vanquished, but His dominion ruleth over all. Though we be faithless He abideth faithful ; He cannot deny Himself. Whoever else is cheated and betrayed, there is no such thing as failure in the counsels of God. Our schemes and our works miscarry, but " the fabric of God's holy Kingdom is slowly rising, while He patiently, but certainly, fulfils His purposes." The universe shall not disappoint its Creator and Redeemer at last.
^ While Zinzendorf was still a lad at school, he united his companions in a guild, which he called " The Order of the Grain
' Carlyle, Past aixd Prtsent, bk. i. ch. ii.
' George Meredith, The Ordeal of Richard Feverei.
GAL. VI. 7 443
of Mustard Seed," and of which the badge was a ring with this motto, " No man liveth unto himself." It was very little of course that these boys could do to help others. But they planted a seed, and the seedling grew into the great Moravian Missionary Brotherhood, with branches extending throughout the world. And so with all other great efforts. They must have a beginning ; they must have a seed. And if only the seed is there, sown in good ground, it will, like the seed of our Lord's parable, bring forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirty- fold, for our reaping in the after-days.^
What matter if I stand alone ?
I wait with joy the coming years; My heart shall reap where it has sown,
And garner up its fruit of tears.
The waters know their own, and draw The brook that springs in yonder height.
So flows the good with equal law Unto the soul of pure delight.
The stars come nightly to the sky:
The tidal wave unto the sea ; Nor time, nor space, nor deep, nor high,
Can keep my own away from me.^
* 6. Milligan, Lamps and Pitchers, 151. * John Burroughs.
Weariness in Well-Doino.
Literature.
Benson (E. W.), Living Tlieology, 129.
Blair (H.), Sermons, i. 379.
Brown (J. B.), The Sunday Afternoon, 295.
Home (C. S.), The Rock of Ages, 77.
Hutton (J. A.), The Fear of Things, 172.
Keble (J.), Sermons for the Christian Year : Easter to Ascension Day, 211,
Macgilvray (W.), The Ministry of the Word, 145.
Macmillan (H.), The Spring of tlie Day, 289.
Moore (A. L.), From Advent to Advent, 87.
Nicoll (W. R.). Sunday Evening, 127.
Pearse (M. G.), Parables and Pictures, 33.
Potts (A. W.), School SerTnons, 85.
Raleigh (A.), Rest from Care and Sorrow, 172.
Reynolds (H. R.), Notes of the Christian Life, 334.
Service (J.), Sermons, 92.
Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, xxiii. (1877), No. 1383.
Watkinson (W. L.), Studies in Christian Character, i. 73.
Christian Age, xliv. 162 (L. Abbott).