The Psalmist does not despise visible amd temporal things as a means of support, but he realizes that there is one above and behind all, and that there is no real and abiding assurance unless God is made the object of our trust. David was a great soldier and had a brave an well-equipped army, and yet he s ome trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will put our trust in the name of the Lord." And it is because, looking back, he sees that not only in his own, but in days of old, every great deliverance and mighty victory was the work of God. He sums it up in another psalm: "Far they got not the land in posses sion by their own sword," he says. speaking of Joshua's army, "neither did their own arr save them; but thy right hand ana thy arm." We are taught not to despise human aid and assistance, but we must not place our whole reliance in them. The prevailing tendency is to turn to God only after we have exhausted every human agency. We are all more or less like the comrades of Columbus, of whom the poet sings. They had passed beyond all known marks, sailing toward the setting sun "Behind them lay the gray Azores Behind the gates of Hercules Before them only ghosts of shores, Before them only shoreless seas." m" their anxiety. they turn to Gos. It was then, "The good mate said New. must we pray For lo! the very stars are gone."
In the early days of the last Great War, we rather thought that if only some superhuman force would hold the enemy back until we had time to forge big guns, to make sufficient stocks of ammunition, and to train and equip our armies, then we could manage very well; but all human means have in them only the virtue God bestows, and God can withdraw.
And no matter how carefully we plan and calculate that certain means will produce certain ends, a thousand counteracting influences and circumstances may intervene. In the last analysis all is in God's hands, and when all means seem insufficient, God is able to work as well as when they abound. What David could not do in Saul's armour, he did with five smooth stones from the brook. Gideon, with two hundred men, discomfited the host of the enemy. Samson, with the jaw-bone of an ass, slew a thousand armed men. God can use the weak things of this world to confound the things that are mighty; with twelve humble men he found his mighty Church. Further, not once nor twice human experience testifies to the fact that if we place our trust excessively in earthly things, God takes them away, like Jonah's gourd, they wither. God can work with a handful of meal, or five smooth stones from the brook, and yet we poor, faithless Christians cling So desperately to temporal things as ig our salvation depended upon them alone and God were found only in human. might and silver dollars.
He is Willing And then, just one other thought very briefly. These psalms are right-Jy included in our Prayerbook. They are prayers and the Psalmist was, above all, a man of prayer. Here is a source of confidence that never fails. "As for re," he says, "I will call upon God and the Lord shall save re." He is able, He is willing, I claim that aid. The Psalmist had no doubt, he was sure that God heard and would answer, and t. was that faith that sent him with springing step to meet his Goliaths, that carried him through dark and trying days. Yes, even through the valley of the shadow of death and into the gates of glory. May we in like manner put our trust in God. Then we, too, shall say, at all times, "In God I have Put my trust, I will not be afraid."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.