Evening, December 9
Go To Morning Reading
“My people shall dwell in quiet resting places.”
Isaiah 32:18
Peace and rest belong not to the unregenerate; they are the peculiar
possession of the Lord’s people, and of them only. The God of Peace gives perfect peace to
those whose hearts are stayed upon him. When man was unfallen, his
God gave him the flowery bowers of Eden as his quiet resting places;
alas! how soon sin blighted the fair abode of innocence. In the day
of universal wrath when the flood swept away a guilty race, the chosen
family were quietly secured in the resting-place of the ark, which
floated them from the old condemned world into the new earth of the
rainbow and the covenant, herein typifying Jesus, the ark of our salvation.
Israel rested safely beneath the blood-besprinkled habitations of
Egypt when the destroying angel smote the first-born; and in the wilderness
the shadow of the pillar of cloud, and the flowing rock, gave the
weary pilgrims sweet repose. At this hour we rest in the promises
of our faithful God, knowing that his words are full of truth and
power; we rest in the doctrines of his word, which are consolation
itself; we rest in the covenant of his grace, which is a haven of
delight. More highly favoured are we than David in Adullam, or Jonah
beneath his gourd, for none can invade or destroy our shelter. The
person of Jesus is the quiet resting-place of his people, and when
we draw near to him in the breaking of the bread, in the hearing of
the word, the searching of the Scriptures, prayer, or praise, we find
any form of approach to him to be the return of peace to our spirits.
“I hear the words of love, I gaze upon the blood,
I see the mighty sacrifice, and I have peace with God.
’Tis everlasting peace, sure as Jehovah’s name,
’Tis stable as his steadfast throne, for evermore the same:
The clouds may go and come, and storms may sweep my sky,
This blood-sealed friendship changes not, the cross is ever nigh.”