How comprehensive a petition you have spread before the mercy seat! It is well that you have asked for so much, for His store is inexhaustible, and He giveth liberally to all who ask in faith. Yet let us ever remember that the root of all true receiving is to set our love upon Him. For it is written, “Because he has set his love upon Me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high because he has known My name.” If the heart be wholly given to God, all these other things shall be added according to His wisdom. The one great safeguard against wasting life, against idle words, and against fruitless days is this, that the soul is anchored in Christ and affectionately cleaves to Him. When the Lord possesses the center, every part moves by His direction.
You plead the blood of Jesus over your household and all that concerns you. That is a prevailing plea. No fowler’s snare can hold the soul that is sheltered beneath that crimson canopy. Our Lord Jesus, who died for His sheep, is Himself the Good Shepherd who leads them in safe paths. Trouble and trial may come, nay, they will come, but they do not spring out of the dust. “The Lord has chastened me sorely,” said the Psalmist, “but He has not given me over unto death.” Mark that the chastening comes from a Father’s hand, and therefore it bears a blessing in its smart. To be kept from evil is greater mercy than to be kept from pain; thus He oftentimes closes a door that we thought led to a garden, and instead it would have been a pit. Trust Him when He seems to deny the request, for He is answering it in a deeper way.
For the work of your hands, pray indeed, as you have done, that He establish it. But remember, if He prospers the labour, it must be that you may thereafter declare His works. “I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord.” A silent faith robs God of His glory; a life poured out in telling of His goodness is the sweet-smelling myrrh that delights Him. Let your words, then, be guarded, as you have asked, let them be full of His wisdom, flowing from a heart that knows Him. Speak of His deliverances, that others who are cast down may hear and take courage. The single mothers, the weary patients, the straying children, point them not to empty comfort but to the living God who has said, “Deliver him from going down to the pit; I have found a ransom.”
You have committed your ways to the Lord, asking that angels keep charge over you. It is a scriptural promise, but it comes with a condition: He keeps you in all your ways. That is, in the ways of obedience, the path of His precepts. If we take the serpent by the tail at His command, the very thing we fear becomes a rod of power. If we walk in the smooth places or the stony, the lion shall not destroy us there. Only see that you are in the King’s highway of holiness, and then you may sing with boldness, “Surely He shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler.”
For your unspoken burden, He knows it altogether. Did not David say, “My soul melts for heaviness”? He that counts the stars and calleth them all by names knoweth the silent ache, the hidden grief. Cast it upon Him, for He careth for you. And though the answer tarry, yet the clock of mercy will strike at the predestined moment. The eternal decree of Jehovah has fixed the time of your deliverance; wait for it, and meanwhile let patience have her perfect work.
Let this be your confidence: He who hath said, “I will never leave thee nor forsake thee,” is the God who stilled the sea, who rent the heavens, who shall one day shake the earth. Yet is He your God, the God of your salvation. Therefore, though the fig tree blossom not, and though all outward things should seem to fail, you may rejoice in Him. The one great deliverance, salvation from sin and death, already accomplished at Calvary, seals all other mercies to you. Go forward, then, in prayer without ceasing, in praise without end, until faith gives place to sight and you see the King in His beauty. Amen.