Spiritual Preservation

 " Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time," 1 Peter 1:5.

       I understand St. Peter to mean "we are kept from going wrong by the power of looking forward - by faith in the nearness of a coming revelation." Nothing hinders the sustaining of goodness like monotony - the want of a prospect. It is easier to be good at the beginning than in the middle. Why? Not because the middle has more dangers, but because it has less freshness, '' while the bridegroom tarried they all slumbered and slept." Peter himself is the finest example of this. He was always courting danger. Why? Because he felt that a monotonous life would lead him into temptation. A monotonous life does not mean a want of something to do, but a want of something to think of. I do not agree with Dr. Watts' lines: - " Satan finds some mischief still For idle hands to do."

       It is not the idle hands, but the idle minds, that are in danger. I should say the dreams of youth are times of idle hands; but I should not regard them as special seasons of temptation. The mind is then full. There is a vision of glory everywhere. Faith is singing in every meadow; hope is budding in every flower; love is shouting over the withered autumn leaves ''O death, where is thy sting; O grave, where is thy victory!"

       Let me dream again, O Christ; revive for me the vision of the morning. It may have been a time of idle hands; but it was Elijah's chariot to me - it held me aloft, it kept me pure. Canst Thou give me back my vanished youth? Yes; what is Thy Life Eternal but vanished youth restored! The thing which kept me pure in the morning was always the vision of the evening - the golden sky that should come with ripest years. Renew that vision, O Christ. Why should my nature droop because I recede from the morning? Was not my glory always in the west; did not I ever say ''at evening time there shall be light"? It was always to "the last time" that I looked for my revelation of glory. Let me look again. It was always the west that made the east so charming; my morning was lighted by the evening star. Light me still by that star, O Lord. Lift me out of the mid-day by the vision of the climax. Give me something to look forward to. Break the monotony of the stream. Renew the rainbow in the waters. Draw aside the curtains of the golden west, and let faith look through. My feet shall be kept from the mire when I see the good time coming.