Sept. 23
DELIVERANCE FROM DUST AND CHAFF
"For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among
all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the
least grain fall upon the earth!" Amos 9:9
The sifting process is going on still. Wherever we go, we are still
being winnowed and sifted. In all countries God's people are being
tried "like as corn is sifted in a sieve." Sometimes the devil holds
the sieve, and tosses us up and down at a great rate, with the earnest
desire to get rid of us for ever. Unbelief is not slow to agitate our
heart and mind with its restless fears. The world lends a willing hand
at the same process, and shakes us to the right and to the left with
great vigor. Worst of all, the church, so largely apostate as it is,
comes in to give a more furious force to the sifting process.
Well, well! Let it go on. Thus is the chaff severed from the wheat.
Thus is the wheat delivered from dust and chaff. And how great is the
mercy which comes to us in the text, "yet shall not the least grain
fall upon the earth"! All shall be preserved that is good, true,
gracious. Not one of the least of believers shall be lost, neither
shall any believer lose anything worth calling a loss. We shall be so
kept in the sifting that it shall be a real gain to us through Christ
Jesus.