The cries of a parent for a child rise swiftly to the throne, for He who compares His own love to that of a mother toward her sucking child will not despise such prayers. You have inscribed that dear one upon the palms of your hands through many a tearful hour, yet know this, the Lord has inscribed that child, with all his circumstances, his sins, his temptations, his very court case, upon the palms of His own hands in eternal, indelible grace. Not an outline sketch, but the whole matter is there. If you are a child of God, though your troubles be as innumerable as the waves of the sea, this truth can contain them all.
Yet let us speak plainly. When we ask for freedom and victory in earthly courts, we must first seek that the prisoner be released from the iron bondage of sin. The Lord takes the fetters off the one whom He makes to be His child; He does not leave him with a long chain on one leg and say, "You are free, all but that." Oh no, it is unconditional emancipation! And that freedom, purchased by the blood of the Covenant, is freedom indeed. No earthly judge can grant what Grace alone bestows. Seek first that your boy may stand discharged at the High Court of Heaven, that word, "It is God that justifies, who is he that condemns?", and then bring your petition to the lower court with a weaned child's quiet submission. A weaned child is not fretting after this or that, but his desires lie still. Are you content that the Lord should do as He wills, even if the trial goes otherwise than you wish? To believe is to trust, simply as a child trusts its mother’s arms.
Moreover, examine your own heart. Do not sin against the child by seeking what is hardly justifiable as from yourself. Many a fond parent would do harm by employing worldly stratagems to snatch a child from the consequences of his deeds. Shall we educate him for the gallows by teaching him that sin bears no sting? Yet be ready to forgive, as you hope to be forgiven. How can we say "Our Father" while there is towards our own child something we cannot forgive? If you have confessed your own soul’s indictment and found mercy, pour out that same mercy.
And let faith take hold: Jesus wins the victory, but He will not enjoy it alone; He divides the spoil with His people. In answer to the pleading of His own blood, the Father will give power and victory. Myriads of souls have been redeemed from darker prisons than stone walls, and that same mighty Victor can command the judge’s heart or overrule the prosecutor’s words. He who is the Holy Child Jesus, ever tender and mighty, hears when a mother cries. Lay hold of this promise: at the last, victory, victory, victory through the blood of the Lamb shall be the song of every true child of God, and of every parent who wrestled in prayer. Whether the chains fall now in that courtroom or through a deeper work in the soul, trust the covenant-keeping God. He does no more forget His own than a woman forgets her nursing child.