To avoid mistake, with equal care he records the counter-arguments.
1. The new orphan house, No. 4, was about to be opened, and his presence was desirable if not needful.
2. A few hundred pounds were needed, to be left with his helpers, for current expenses in his absence.
3. Money was also required for travelling expenses of himself and his wife, whose health called for a change.
4. Funds would be needful to publish four thousand copies of his Narrative and avoid too high a market-price.
5. A matron for the new orphan house was not yet found, suitable for the position.
In this careful _weighing of matters_ many sincere disciples fail, prone to be impatient of delay in making decisions. Impulse too often sways, and self-willed plans betray into false and even disastrous mistakes. Life is too precious to risk one such failure. There is given us a promise of deep meaning:
"The meek will He guide in judgment; And the meek will He teach His way." (Psalm xxv. 9.)
Here is a double emphasis upon _meekness_ as a condition of such guidance and teaching. _Meekness is a real preference for God's will._ Where this holy habit of mind exists, the whole being becomes so open to impression that, without any _outward_ sign or token, there is an _inward_ recognition and choice of the will of God. God guides, not by a visible sign, but by _swaying the judgment._ To wait before Him, weighing candidly in the scales every consideration for or against a proposed course, and in readiness to see which way the preponderance lies, is a frame of mind and heart in which one is fitted to be guided; and God touches the scales and makes the balance to sway as He will. _But our hands must be off the scales,_ otherwise we need expect no interposition of His, in our favour. To return to the figure with which this chapter starts, the meek soul simply and humbly waits, and _watches the moving of the Pillar._
One sure sign of this spirit of meekness is the entire _restfulness_ with which apparent obstacles to any proposed plan or course are regarded. When waiting and wishing only to know and do God's will, hindrances will give no anxiety, but a sort of pleasure, as affording a new opportunity for divine interposition. If it is the Pillar of God we are following, the Red Sea will not dismay us, for it will furnish but another scene for the display of the power of Him who can make the waters to stand up as an heap, and to become a wall about us as we go through the sea on dry ground.
Mr. Muller had learned this rare lesson, and in this case he says: _"I had a secret satisfaction in the greatness of the difficulties which were in the way._ So far from being cast down on account of them, they delighted my soul; for I only desired to do the will of the Lord in this matter."
Here is revealed another secret of holy serving. To him who sets the Lord always before him, and to whom the will of God is his delight, there pertains a habit of soul which, in advance settles a thousand difficult and perplexing questions.
The case in hand is an illustration of the blessing found in such meek preference for God's pleasure. If it were the will of the Lord that this Continental tour should be undertaken at that time, difficulties need not cast him down; for the _difficulties could not be of God;_ and, if not of God, they should give him no unrest, for, in answer to prayer, they would all be removed. If, on the other hand, this proposed visit to the Continent were _not_ God's plan at all, but only the fruit of self-will; if some secret, selfish, and perhaps subtle motive were controlling, then indeed hindrances might well be interferences of God, designed to stay his steps. In the latter case, Mr. Muller rightly judged that difficulties in the way would naturally vex and annoy him; that he would not like to look at them, and would seek to remove them by his own efforts. Instead of giving him an inward satisfaction as affording God an opportunity to intervene in his behalf, they would arouse impatience and vexation, as preventing self-will from carrying out its own purposes.