cally minute. There is nothing so small that it is beneath His notice; there is nothing so great that He does not control (Matt. x. 30).

2. This God, that thus leads the blind by a way that they know not, is the Christian's Father. If it were God only that is in all things, it would not be comfort; it would be awe, &c. Nothing can touch His children till He has given it its mission and its commission.

3. Do not hastily judge, when adversities overtake you, what the issue will be. We are prone to infer from what overtakes us now what must betide us always such is not Christian logic. Whatever be the issue, all afflictions that overtake us have a present beneficent action. Never let us employ in estimating what God has done that unhappy monosyllable IF. These ifs are the steps of God-the stages of Providence, &c. (Isa. 1. 10). Therefore, whenever you cannot explain the circumstances that surround you, &c., remember that God your Father is leading you, a blind man, by ways that you do not know. Wait, trust, pray, hope, and God will make crooked things straight, and dark places light.J. Cumming, D.D.: Redemption Draweth Nigh, pp. 357-369.

God has foreordained everything which He Himself will do (Acts xv. 18). And He has been gradually unfolding His designs from the beginning. The restoration of the Jews from Babylon and the calling of the Gentiles into the Church were very wonderful events, but in them this

prediction was fulfilled. It receives further accomplishment daily.

L God's dealings are mysterious. 1. The dispensations of His providence have been at all times dark.

2. The dispensations of His grace are equally inscrutable. This is seen in the first quickening of men from their spiritual death, and in their subsequent spiritual life.

II. His intentions are merciful. The perplexities of His people are often very great, but He has gracious designs in all (Jer. xxix. 11; Job xlii. 12, 13, with James v. 11). Joseph (Gen. xxxvii. 6-10, 28; xxxix. 17– 20). The same mercy is discoverable in God's dealings with all His afflicted people. He suffers their path to be for a time dark and intricate, but He invisibly directs and manages their concerns; He gradually removes their difficulties, and clears up their doubts (Gal. iii. 23, 24; John xv. 2; Mal. iii. 3; Ps. xcvii. 2). They are often ready to doubt His love, but—

III. His regards are permanent. God did not forget His people when they were in Babylon, neither will He now forsake those who trust in Him (Isa. xliv. 7, 8, xlix. 14-16; 1 Sam. xii. 22; Phil. i. 6). The prophets declare this in the strongest terms (Isa. liv. 9, 10; Jer. xxxi. 37 and xxxii. 40). St. Paul abundantly confirms their testimony (Rom. xi. 29; Heb. xiii. 5, 6).

INFERENCES.-1. How careful should we be not to pass a hasty judgment on the Lord's dealings! (H. E. I. 40384048). 2. How safely may we commit ourselves to God's disposal!-C. Simeon, M.A.: Claude's Essay, &c., p. 229.

upon God for guidance and succour. Such persons may plead this promise in reference-1. To ignorance which they wish to have removed (James i. 5). 2. To mysterious providences. God's dealings with us and others are often incomprehensible, and inexpli

cable by us; but let us wait patiently, believingly, and prayerfully, and in due time this promise will be fulfilled (H. E. I. 4040-4058). 3. To Christian duty. The sincere Christian constantly asks, "What is the will of God concerning me?" But many difficulties may be in the way of deciding this question; a variety of points may require to be nicely adjusted; contrary claims may leave the balance of the scales almost in a state of equipoise; but in due season the sincere seeker for Divine direction shall be directed (Prov. iii. 6). 4. To formidable difficulties that appear insurmountable. "There is a crook in every lot;" but in regard to the Christian all "crooked things shall be made straight." They may give a great deal of trouble for a time, but in the end they will prove helpful and not hurtful to the patient believer.-William Reeve: Miscellaneous Discourses, pp. 434-440.

Sin has its fascinating lustre and flaring splendour; murky clouds often rest upon the way of righteousness and truth; but sin's splendours go out in pitch darkness, while at eventide there is light for the Christian.

I. The believer's darkness is turned into light, and the crooks of his lot are straightened.

1. The frequent grim darkness. (1.) Much of it is of his own imagining. Many of our sorrows are purely homespun, and some minds are specially fertile in self torture; they have the creative faculty for the melancholy; enjoyments even cause them to tremble lest they should be shortlived. (2.) Much existing darkness is exaggerated. "Joseph is not, Simeon is not; "but Jacob pictured Joseph devoured of an evil beast, and Simeon given up to slavery in a foreign land. Take up the cross, and mountains will shrink to molehills. (3.) Troubles disappear just when we expect them to become overwhelming. The waters of the Red Sea stood upright as a heap to make a pathway for God's people. Who can tell what plan

God may have in store for him? Hezekiah was sore dismayed before Rabshakeh. Little did he know that the talk and boasting were all that would come of it. (4.) When the trial comes, God has a way of making His people's trials cease just as they reach their culminating point. culminating point. As the sea when it reaches to the flood pauses awhile and then returns to the ebb, so our sorrows rise to a height and then recede. Hear God bid Abraham sacrifice his son! He makes darkness light when the darkest hour of the night has struck. (5.) Every trial was foreseen, and has been forestalled. God can furnish a table in the wilderness. (6.) However severe the trial, God has promised that as our days our strength shall be. Considering that the grace is always. proportioned to the trial, and that trials produce manliness, one might even choose trial for the sake of obtaining the grace which is promised with it; the mingled trial and grace will make our lives sublime. (7.) Especially dwell upon the promise that the Lord will make your darkness light. How soon, and how perfectly, can Omnipotence accomplish this! How soon is it done in the physical universe! A fulness of consolation can be poured forth in a moment. is it done? Sometimes by the sun of His providence. Often by the moon of Christian experience, which shines with borrowed light, but yet with sweet and tranquil brightness. Frequently by a sight of Jesus going_before, and by hearing Him say, Follow me; fear not; for in all your afflictions I am afflicted." God had one Son without sin; but He never had a son without chastisement. And often by snatching a firebrand from the altar of His Word, and waving it as a torch before us, that we may advance in its light.

How

2. The crooks of the believer's lot. (1.) One may lie in your poverty. (2.) Another in some very crooked calamity. (3.) If he is free from these, he has at least a crooked self. The others would matter little but for this. It may be you have crooked

temptations temptations to profanity or to certain vices.

3. God will make all the crooked things straight. (1.) It may be that some are straight now; the making straight. is only to make them seem so to us. Our crosses are our best estates. (2.) God can bend the crooked straight, and what will not bend, He can break. The crooked character has been bent straight; the judgment of God has taken away the crook out of the household, so that the righteous might have peace. If He do not this, He will give power to overleap the difficulty (2 Sam. xxii. 30).

II. Some words to the seeker. 1. Some doctrines are dark to you. God makes all light to faith.

2. Perhaps your darkness rises from deep depression of mind. Faith must

precede its dispersion; faith will disperse it.

"

3. Your crooked natural disposition God can make straight. Note-(1.) That which saves is not what is, but what will be. "I will make darkness light; I will make crooked things straight.' There is a transformation in store. (2.) It is not what you can do, but what God can do. "I, Jehovah, will do it." (3.) This work may not be yours at once, but it shall be soon. It does not say, "I will make darkness light today;" still it does say, "I will."

III. Two lessons to believers.

1. If God will thus make all your darkness light and all your crooked things straight, do not forestall your troubles. 2. Always believe in the power of prayer.-C. H. Spurgeon, Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit (1868), pp. 709-720.

We

xlii. 18-20. Thus the Lord expostulates with His ancient people, and thus He has reason to expostulate with us. succeed them, both in religious privileges and in the abuse of those privileges. Where does the light of the Gospel shine more clearly? But do we excel other people in knowledge and virtue, in faith and patience, in temperance and goodness, as we surpass them in the means of acquiring these Christian graces? No! There is here no one who could challenge the justice and propriety of this expostulation, if it were addressed to him. In our text we have

I. A DESCRIPTION.

"Deaf," "blind," &c. We are "deaf," in a spiritual sense, when we do not attend to the Divine admonitions, or give earnest heed to the word of instruction; "blind," when we do not perceive the glory of the Gospel, and the force and beauty of Divine truth. This description is

1. Absolutely true of most men. The ignorance of numbers who constantly enjoy the best religious instruction is far beyond what any person can ima

gine who has not made it a matter of special investigation. Nothing they have ever heard or seen during their attendance upon the ordinance of religion has made any effectual impression upon them. The first principles of Christianity are unknown to them. They have never learned to understand what is meant by repentance, faith, holiness, the Divine character or their own, the evil of sin, the extent of their own sinfulness, or even what is required of them in the common duties of life. Yet some of them delude themselves with the hope that there is before them a future of eternal blessedness! They are not all equally ignorant. Some of them amidst the light of the Gospel and the sound of religious instruction occasionally receive a little. But the whole truth they will not receive. Many doctrines and precepts of Christianity oppose their passions and prejudices, and therefore against these they obstinately close their ears and shut their eyes.

2. In some measure true of all men. The sincerest followers of Christ may

be charged with not exercising, as they ought, the spiritual senses which God has given them. The best Christians would have been better still, if they had never, by their siothfulness and inattention, lost the benefits conveyed by the means they have been favoured with (H. E. I. 2570-2584, 2654-2658).

As far as this description is true of us, our condition is a terrible one. 1. It is the result of sin. Is it not a terrible sin even to be heedless of the messages sent us by Almighty God? But many have deliberately shut out the rays of the Sun of righteousness, because light was troublesome, and would not permit them to enjoy those works of darkness on which they were bent. 2. While it continues, all the means intended to deliver us from sin will fail to benefit us. As the most improving advice given in conversation is useless to a deaf person, and the most delightful objects are displayed to no purpose before the blind, so the word of truth is preached in vain to those who have neither ears to hear nor eyes to see its meaning and excellency. Before one step in the way of salvation can be taken, this hindrance must be removed. 3. Our condition is nearly hopeless, and tends to become absolutely hopeless. (a) 4. We ought to be ashamed of it. You ought to be ashamed of your ignorance of Christianity in a Christian country, and still more ashamed and humbled for the cause of it, which is always sloth, stubbornness, or selfconceit. 5. We ought to be alarmed on account of it. For the reason already given that our condition tends to become a hopeless one. And also because the penalty of wilful blindness in the midst of sunlight is consignment to eternal darkness and woe.

II. AN ADMONITION.

There is a call to the deaf to hear, and to the blind to look that they This is like the command may see. of our Saviour to the man with the

withered hand to stretch it forth, and implies that this deafness and blindness was their fault as well as their misfortune. Every command of God is accompanied with grace and strength. He requires nothing of His people but what He has promised to enable them to perform. In dependence upon His promise, they ought therefore to stir themselves up to the discharge of their duty. The spiritually deaf should endeavour to open their ears to instruction, the spiritually blind to open their eyes to that wondrous display of grace which the Gospel exhibits. The effort will be as successful as that of the man to stretch out his withered hand, when it is made in obedience to the Divine command, and in dependence on the Divine blessing. (6) And when this fatal obstruction is removed, and we have got ears to hear and eyes to see, the means of grace and salvation will have their proper influence.-William Richardson: Sermons, vol. i. pp. 470–482.

(a) When the habit of inattention is formed, or men's minds are so armed by prejudice as to be determined not to hear or embrace certain truths which are offensive, their condition is nearly hopeless. He who does not use his spiritual senses, and keep them in constant exercise, must expect to find them impaired, and, in time, lost. Those congregations which have long enjoyed a sound and animated course of instruction without any particular benefit, become in the end more stupid and hardened than those which have not been so favoured. What can be said or done to do them good, which has not been repeatedly tried in vain ? As time and increasing years have a happy effect in strengthening and confirming good habits, so they have a still more powerful influence in confirming bad ones. So that those persons who suffer their passions and prejudices, their disrelish for the word of truth, their blindness and inattention, and all their other inveterate habits to accompany them till the decline of life, are likely to lie down with them in their graves, and to be found encumbered with them on the morning of the resurrection.-Richardson.