_ CHAPTER EIGHT. GOD THE SOURCE OF COURAGE
II. BANKING ON GOD'S PROMISES
Isn't it strange that so many Christians while believing, theoretically, in the reality and trustworthiness of God's promises, do not have the same sort of practical belief in Him which they show in the promise of their bank to pay them, on demand, the sum written down in their book of deposit?
And banks have been known to fail in keeping their very limited promises, while God has never failed in keeping His unlimited assurances of blessing.
For so many the strange delusion that God's promises are not to be counted on in the same literal sense as the promises of our associates persists through life, but there are fortunate Christians who have their eyes opened to the truth. And what a difference the knowledge makes to them!
F. B. Meyer told in one of his public addresses of the transformation wrought for him when his eyes were opened to the truth. As a boy of thirteen he had been a student at Brighton College. He was timid and sensitive, and the older students soon learned that they could make his life a burden to him. With a sigh of relief he went home at the end of the first week of school. On Sunday, however, the thought that he must return came to him with oppressing force. How could he stand up against the older students? He was idly turning the pages of his Bible when he came to the 121st Psalm. "How voraciously I devoured it!" he said. "How I read it again and again, and wrapt it round me! How I took it as my shield! And the next day I walked into the great expanse in front of the college so serene and strong. It was my first act of appropriating the promises of God."
Three years later the student was agonizing because he wanted to be a minister, yet feared to plan for the work because his voice was weak, and he feared that he would not have the courage to speak. He had been asking God to show him His will, and to help him in his difficulty. Then he found Jeremiah 1:7, and read it for the first time. "With indescribable feelings I read it again and again, and even now never come on it without a thrill of emotion," he said of his experience. "It was the answer to all my perplexing questionings. Yes, I was the child; I was to go to those to whom He sent me, and speak what He bade me, and He would be with me and teach my lips."
Another man, who had learned to accept literally God's promise, "Ask, and it shall be given unto you," wrote gratefully of his experience:
"My life is one long, daily, hourly record of answered prayer. For physical health, for mental overstrain, for guidance given marvelously, for errors and dangers averted, for enmity to the Gospel subdued, for food provided at the exact hour needed, for everything that goes to make up life and my poor service, I can testify with a full and often wonder-stricken awe that I believe God answers prayer. I know God answers prayer. Cavillings, logical or physical, are of no avail to me. It is the very atmosphere in which I live and breathe and have my being, and it makes life glad and free and a million times worth living."
A worker among his fellows in India stated the ground of his belief in God's promise to supply the needs of his people. The sentence was written while he was at home on furlough:
"Whatsoever you ask, believe that you have received it, and you shall have it. The belief is not the denial of a fact, but rather the assurance that the petition is in accordance with God's will, and that He is as disposed to give as we to receive; our reception of the gift depends on our holding on to His will. Now the practical question is, What is God's will? Am I conforming to it? Through lack of faith am I failing to receive and appropriate for myself and Satara what I and Satara need? Is it God's will that I should return and that there should be better paid work? More of it? More school-houses? New houses for workers?"
A few days later he added to these notes the word "Yes." His faith enabled him to claim God's promise.
A Christian young man in Japan was accustomed to stand at the entrance to the park in Tokyo, offering Bibles and preaching the Gospel. Years passed, and he saw no results of his work. Yet he believed in Him who had promised that His name should be exalted among the heathen. At length a Testament was bought by a young man to whom the words of John 3:16 brought life and joy. He went back to the old man from whose hand he had received the book, and told him that he had become a Christian. The man was overcome with joy.
"Ten years," he said, "I have been selling New Testaments here at the park gates, and you are the first who has ever come to tell me you were helped."
But throughout those ten years the faithful worker was sustained by his belief in the faithfulness of Him who had promised to bless him in his work. He knew that God would not fail him. _