From this subject we may learn,
1 . To seek God without delay —
[There is no period of life when we can call one day, or one hour, our own. We are altogether " in God's hands;" and, if he withdraw his support for one moment, we perish, as cer- tainly as a stone gravitates to the earth. Shall we then, when so entirely dependent on our God, provoke him to cast us out of his hands ? Shall we continue to despise his patience and for- bearance, till he swear in his wrath that our " time shall be no longer •^ ? " Think, how many have lost the time afforded them, and how bitterly they now bewail their folly : and beg of God, that he would "so teach you to number your days, that you may apply your hearts unto wisdom **."]
2. To serve him without fear —
[We are too apt to keep back from serving God through fear of the persecutions we may endure from man. But, if our times be in God's hands, all our concerns must be there too ; and nothing can befall us but by his appointment. " Who art thou then, that thou shoulde^t be afraid of a man that shall die, and forgettest the Lord thy Maker'?" Are we not told, that " the wrath of man shall praise him ; and that the remainder of it he shall restrain" ? " Be bold then for God; " set your face as a flint against the whole worlds" and trust in him for protec- tion. He will not indeed screen you from all trials ; because it is on many accounts necessary that you should feel them^: but
he
*" Isai. liv. 17. ' Ps. xxxiv. 7. '' Ps. xci. 11, 12.
' ib. ver. 5 — 7, "" Matt, iv, 6, 7.
" Ps. xci. 13. Acts xxviii. 3—6. " Mark xvi. 18.
P Dan. iii. 25—27. "^ 1 Pet. iii. 13. ^ Rev. x. 6.
' Ps. xc. 12. ' Isai. li. 12, 13. " Ps. Ixxvi. 10.
Msai. xlix. 7—9. " 1 Pet. i. 6. >-