Evening, October 19
Go To Morning Reading
“God, my maker, who giveth songs in the night.”
Job 35:10
Any man can sing in the day. When the cup is full, man draws inspiration
from it. When wealth rolls in abundance around him, any man can praise
the God who gives a plenteous harvest or sends home a loaded argosy.
It is easy enough for an Aeolian harp to whisper music when the winds
blow—the difficulty is for music to swell forth when no wind is stirring.
It is easy to sing when we can read the notes by daylight; but he
is skilful who sings when there is not a ray of light to read by—who sings from his heart. No man can make a song in the night of himself;
he may attempt it, but he will find that a song in the night must
be divinely inspired. Let all things go well, I can weave songs, fashioning
them wherever I go out of the flowers that grow upon my path; but
put me in a desert, where no green thing grows, and wherewith shall
I frame a hymn of praise to God? How shall a mortal man make a crown
for the Lord where no jewels are? Let but this voice be clear, and
this body full of health, and I can sing God’s praise: silence my tongue, lay me upon the bed of languishing, and
how shall I then chant God’s high praises, unless he himself give me the song? No, it is not
in man’s power to sing when all is adverse, unless an altar-coal shall touch
his lip. It was a divine song, which Habakkuk sang, when in the night
he said, “Although the fig-tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in
the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall
yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there
shall be no herd in the stalls: yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I
will joy in the God of my salvation.” Then, since our Maker gives songs in the night , let us wait upon him for the music. O thou chief musician, let us
not remain songless because affliction is upon us, but tune thou our
lips to the melody of thanksgiving.