Spiritual Reflections for the Saint and Sinner

God.

THE UNTRODDEN PATH

You have not passed this way before.Joshua 3:4

How solemn is the reflection that with a new cycle of time commences, with each traveler to Zion, a new and untrodden path. New events in his history will transpirenew scenes in the panorama of life will unfoldnew phases of character will developnew temptations will assailnew duties Will devolvenew trials will be experiencednew sorrows will be feltnew friendships will be formedand new mercies will be bestowed. How truly may it be said of the pilgrim, journeying through the wilderness to his eternal home, as he stands upon the threshold of this untried period of his existence, pondering the unknown and uncertain future, You have not passed this way before.

But there is another thought inexpressibly soothing. Untried, untrodden, and unknown as that new path may be, it is each step mapped and arranged, and provided for in the everlasting and unchangeable covenant of God. To Him who leads us, who accepts us in the Son of his love, who knows the end from the beginning, it is no new, or uncertain, or hidden way. We thank Him that, while He wisely and kindly veils all the future from our reach, all that futureits minutest eventis as transparent and visible to Him as the past. Our Shepherd knows the windings along which He skillfully, gently, and safely leads his flock. He has traveled that way Himself, and has left the traces of His presence on the road; and as each follower advancesthe new path unfolding at each stephe can exultingly exclaim, I see the footprint of my Lordhere went my Master, my Leader, my Captain, leaving me an example that I should follow his steps. Oh! it is a thought replete with strong consolation, and well calculated to gird us for the coming yearthe Lord knows and has ordained each step of the untrodden path upon which I am about to enter.

Another reflection. The infinite forethought, wisdom, and goodness which have marked each line of our new path have also provided for its every necessity. Each exigency in the history of the new year has been anticipated. Each need will bring its appropriate and adequate supplyeach perplexity will have its guidanceeach sorrow its comforteach temptation its shield each cloud its light. Each affliction will suggest its lessoneach correction will impart its teachingeach mercy will convey its message of love. The promise will be fulfilled to the letterAs your day so shall your strength be.

And how blessed to know that all the provision for the untrodden path is in Jesus. It pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell. All wisdom to guide, all power to uphold, all love to soothe, all grace to support, all tenderness to sympathize, dwells in Christ. Let us, then, gird ourselves to a fresh taking hold of Christ. We must walk through this year not by sight, but by faith, and that faith must deal simply and directly with Jesus. Without me you can do nothing. But with his strength made perfect in our weakness, we can do all things. Oh, be this our course and our posturecoming up from the wilderness leaning on our Beloved.

Living in a world of imperfection and change, we must expect nothing perfect, nothing stable, in what we are, in what we do, or what we enjoy. But amid the dissolving views of the world that passes away, let us take firm hold of the unchangeableness of God. The wheels may revolve, but the axle on which they turn is immoveable. Such is our covenant God. Events may vary providences may changefriends may diefeelings may fluctuatebut God in Christ will know no variableness, neither the shadow of a turning. Having loved his own that were in the world, He loved them unto the end. And will it not be blessed to receive each new event of our remaining history as directly under the government and appointment of God? He who sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. That new thing, be it what it may, which will transpire in your coming history, He will have created for your greatest good and his highest glory.

Reader! if you are a believer in the Lord Jesus, you will enter upon a new stage of your journey by a renewed surrender of yourself to the Lord. You will make the Cross the starting-point of a fresh setting out in the heavenly race. Oh, commence this year with a renewed application to the blood of sprinkling. There is vitality in that blood; and its fresh sprinkling on your conscience will be as a new impartation of spiritual life to your soul. Oh, to begin the year with a broken heart for sin beneath the Cross of Immanuel! looking through that Cross to the heart of a loving, forgiving Father! Be not anxious about the futureall that future God has provided for. All my times are in your hands. Casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. Cast your burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain you.

Let it be a year of more spiritual advance. Speak to the children of Israel that they go forward. Forward in the path of dutyforward in the path of sufferingforward in the path of conflictforward in the path of laborand forward in the path to eternal rest and glory. Soon will that rest be reached and that glory appear. This new year may be the jubilant year of your soul the year of your release. Oh, spirit-stirring, ecstatic thoughtthis year I may be in heaven! this year I may be with Jesus, leaning my head upon his breastmy conflict, my sin, my sorrow all over! this year all the glorious wonders of the upper world may burst upon my view, and I may mingle with apostles, and prophets, and martyrsthe general assembly of the church of the first-born who are written in heaven. What manner of people, then, ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness? Now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.

Reader! if you are not a believer in the Lord Jesus, Oh, that your New Year's Gift may be a new heart, a renewed mind, the second birth introducing you to a life for God. The Lord Jesus has solemnly, irrevocably affirmed, that unless you are born again of the Holy Spirit you shall not see the kingdom of God.

Let not this new year be another year spent for SELF. Think of eternity think of your solemn accountingthink of the coming of the Lord; and prepare to meet Him; Awake, you that sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you life. Are you wondering if a wretch so vile as you may hope to be saved? Do you feel the serpent's sting? Do you know the plague of your own heart? Then we have joyful news for you! Throw yourself for acceptance and eternal life upon the infinite merits of Jesus, and you shall be saved. No merit but his, no intercessor but Him, no mediator but Christ will avail you. All the saints and angels on earth and in heaven cannot give you peace here or glory hereafter. Go to God simply and entirely through Christ, breathing no name but the name of Jesus, and God, for Christ's sake alone, will accept, pardon, and save you. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved.

Dear reader, if Christ is in you, and you are in Christ, and these blessed truths are heartfelt truths in your experience, then may I not wish you joy of the New Year into which the good hand of the Lord has brought you? The year that is passed has brought you nearer home; the year that has commenced may bring you to that home. There may we, through the everlasting love and sovereign grace of God, at last meet and sing together, Worthy the Lamb that was slain!

Ah! I shall soon be dying, Time swiftly glides away; But on my Lord relying, I hail the happy day;

The day when I must enter Upon a world unknown; My helpless soul I venture On Jesus Christ alone.

He once, a spotless victim, Upon Mount Calvary bled! Jehovah did afflict Him, And bruise Him in my stead.

Hence all my hope arises, Unworthy as I am:

My soul most surely prizes

The sin-atoning Lamb.

To Him by grace united, I joy in Him alone;

And now, by faith, delighted Behold Him on his throne.

Then with the saints in glory The grateful song I'll raise, And chant my blissful story In high seraphic lays.

GOING HOME

You have not yet reached the resting place and the inheritance the Lord your God is giving you. Deut. 12:9

And is it so, that at the close of this lonely and weary pilgrimage there is rest above? And that after this earthly fleeting existence there is an inheritance reserved? May I unhesitatingly believe this assurance, and hopefully clasp it to my heart? Then with what a firm tread, and with what a buoyant spirit may I press my foot upon the mysterious threshold of the year now opening upon meeven as the morning's sun peers above the horizon, and as the early flower expands to the warm influence of its genial beams. Whether, like that sun, this new born year shall in its course be wreathed with storm-cloudsor whether, like that opening floweret, its earthly loves and joys and hopes shall pale and droop and die, I cannot tell nor wish to know. Enough that God is my Father, my Sun, and Shield; that He will give grace and glory, and will withhold no good and needed thing. Enough that Christ is my Portion, my Advocate, my Friend, and that whatever else may pass away, his sympathy will not cease, his sufficiency will not fail, nor his love die. Enough that the everlasting covenant is mine, and that that covenant, made with me, is ordered in all things and sure. Enough that heaven is my rest, that towards it I am journeying, and that I am one year nearer its blessed and endless enjoyment.

Thus may each Christian pilgrim commune with his own heart while standing beneath the shadowy portal of another cycle of time. Before yet we meet its new and sacred claims, its duties, its responsibilities, and its trialsit may be our wisdom to remember, that we are not as yet come to the rest and to the inheritance which the Lord our God gives us. Our path, pointing homewards, lies across a long and dreary desert. We have, as yet, many a milestone to passmany a stage to travelmany a foe to confrontmany a battle to win. We cannot exult as those who put off the armor and wave the palm. And yet we are going home. Going home! what a soothing reflection! what an ecstatic prospect! The heart throbs quickerthe eye beams brighterthe spirit grows elasticthe whole soul uplifts its soaring pinion, eager for its flight, at the very thought of heaven. I go to prepare a place for you, was one of the last and sweetest assurances that breathed from the lips of the departing Savior; and though uttered eighteen hundred years ago, those words come stealing upon the memory like the echoes of by-gone music, thrilling the heart with holy and indescribable transport. Yes! He has passed within the veil as our forerunner; He has prepared heaven for us, and by His gentle, wise, and loving discipline, he is preparing us for heaven.

Amid the perpetually changing scenes of earth, it is refreshing to think of heaven as our CERTAIN hope. In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began. This is no quicksand basis for faithno mirage of hope. Heaven is a promised restexquisitely expressive image!and that promise is the word of Him who cannot lie. Nothing can surpass, nothing can compare with this! Human confidences the strong and beautifulhave bent and broken beneath us. Hopesbright and favorablewe too fondly fed, have, like evening clouds of summer, faded away, draping the landscape they had painted with a thousand variegated hues, in the somber pall of night. But heaven is true! God has promised it Christ has secured itthe Holy Spirit is its pledgeand the joys we now feel are its pledges and first-fruits. Christian, consider this new epoch of time; unfold a new page of your yet unwritten history with the full, unwavering conviction that God is faithfulthat in all the negotiations, transactions, and events of the unknown futurein all the diversified and fluctuating phases of experience through which you may pass, it will be your mercy to do with Him of whom it is said, It is impossible for God to lie. Oh, take this precious truth into your heart, and it will shed a warm sunlight over all the landscape of your yet shadowy existence. He abides faithful, He cannot deny Himself. Receive the promise, and confide in the veracity of the Promiser, and He will make good to its utmost the word upon which He has caused you to hope. Standing yet within the solemn vestibule of this new and exciting year, could our fluttering hearts find repose in a more appropriate or sweeter truth than the Divine faithfulness of Him with whom there is no variableness, neither the shadow of a turning?

The Home to which we aspire, and for which we pant, is not only a promised, it is also a PERFECT and a PERMANENT Home. The mixed character of those seasons we now call repose, and the shifting places and