March 27
Evenings With JesusI will be with him in trouble. - Psalms 91:15.
MANY are the afflictions of the righteous, but they have not to bear their trials, endure affliction, or to tread the path of tribulation, alone. Knowing the anxieties and fears of his people, the Lord has graciously assured to them the comfort and help of his presence in every time of trouble. “When thou passest through the waters,” he says, “I will be with thee, and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee; when thou walkest through the fire thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flames kindle upon thee.” He is a Friend that more than realizes the expectations of his people. “Confidence in an unfaithful man in the time of trouble,” says the Wise Man, “is like a broken tooth and a foot out of joint.” These are worse than useless, for not only do they fail us but cause us much pain.
Job found it so; and so did Paul, when he said, “At my first answer no man stood by me, but all men forsook me.” But the Lord had not forsaken him; for he adds, “Notwithstanding, the Lord stood by me and strengthened me.” Yes, whoever fails or forsakes us, “he abideth faithful.” Jacob found him so in Bethel. Driven from home, and travelling through a desert land, in a forlorn and solitary condition, and full of anxious forebodings, he “lights on a certain place and tarries there all night, because the sun was set:” -the darkness was his curtain, the ground his bed, and a stone his pillow. There he falls asleep. There God assured him that he would be with him in all places, and would not leave him until he had done all he promised him.
Thus his people now find him to be better than their fears, and surpassing in lovingkindness their highest hopes. He is with his people really, efficiently, and peculiarly, in the day of trouble. If, therefore, we “faint in the day of adversity,” it is by losing sight of Him whose grace is always sufficient for us, whose strength is made perfect in our weakness. In all times of trouble, therefore, let us make the language of Doddridge our own:-
“If thou, my Jesus, still be nigh,
Cheerful I live, and joyful die;
Secure, when mortal comforts flee,
To find ten thousand worlds in thee.”