Evening, March 21
Go To Morning Reading
“Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands
of Orion?”
Job 38:31
If inclined to boast of our abilities, the grandeur of nature may
soon show us how puny we are. We cannot move the least of all the
twinkling stars, or quench so much as one of the beams of the morning.
We speak of power, but the heavens laugh us to scorn. When the Pleiades
shine forth in spring with vernal joy we cannot restrain their influences,
and when Orion reigns aloft, and the year is bound in winter’s fetters, we cannot relax the icy bands. The seasons revolve according
to the divine appointment, neither can the whole race of men effect
a change therein. Lord, what is man?
In the spiritual, as in the natural world, man’s power is limited on all hands. When the Holy Spirit sheds abroad
his delights in the soul, none can disturb; all the cunning and malice
of men are ineffectual to stay the genial quickening power of the
Comforter. When he deigns to visit a church and revive it, the most
inveterate enemies cannot resist the good work; they may ridicule
it, but they can no more restrain it than they can push back the spring
when the Pleiades rule the hour. God wills it, and so it must be.
On the other hand, if the Lord in sovereignty, or in justice, bind
up a man so that he is in soul bondage, who can give him liberty?
He alone can remove the winter of spiritual death from an individual
or a people. He looses the bands of Orion, and none but he. What a
blessing it is that he can do it. O that he would perform the wonder
tonight. Lord, end my winter, and let my spring begin. I cannot with
all my longings raise my soul out of her death and dulness, but all
things are possible with thee. I need celestial influences, the clear
shinings of thy love, the beams of thy grace, the light of thy countenance;
these are the Pleiades to me. I suffer much from sin and temptation;
these are my wintry signs, my terrible Orion. Lord, work wonders in
me, and for me. Amen.