"The heaviest penalty for declining to rule is to be ruled by someone inferior to yourself.”

 THE FAMILY ALTAR

August 12.

"He that planted the ear, shall He not hear? He that formed

the eye, shall He not see?" Ps.94:9.

God's children must often suffer great wrong from wicked

oppressors in this world. "Lord, how long shall the wicked, how

long shall the wicked triumph?" they cry, with the Psalmist, in

their helplessness. But it seems as if God does not hear them;

as if He were blind to their suffering, deaf to all their anxious

cries for help. "Careless seems the great Avenger : History's pages

but record One death grapple in the darkness 'twixt false systems

and the Word; Truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on

the throne; Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the

dim unknown Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch

above His own." Yes, God keepeth watch above His own. Our

Lord Jesus gives us the assurance: "Shall not God avenge His

own elect, which cry day and night unto Him, though He bear

long with them? I tell you that He will avenge them speedily!"

(Luke 18:7.) "He that planted the ear, shall He not hear? He

that formed the eye, shall He not see?" He sees and knows all

the mischievous plans His and His people's enemies concoct in

their secret councils, and will put them to shame. He hears every

unuttered groan of our overburdened heart; He sees every bitter

tear we weep in the lonely vigils of our sleepless nights; nothing,

nothing is hid from His all-seeing eye. When His appointed hour

comes, He will arise in His might and prove to all the world

that justice and judgment are the habitation of His throne; that

mercy and truth go before His face. (Ps. 89:14.) Then will

His delivered people see that He, their God, never breaks His

covenant nor alters the thing that is gone out of His mouth, and

they will praise and glorify Him for His great salvation for-

evermore.