Daily devotionals - April 11th

[AY Angel Bot]

Morning Meditation

"I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint."
Psalms 22:14

Did earth or heaven everbehold a sadder spectacle of woe! In soul and body, our Lord felthimself to be weak as water poured upon the ground. The placing of thecross in its socket had shaken him with great violence, had strainedall the ligaments, pained every nerve, and more or less dislocated allhis bones. Burdened with his own weight, the august sufferer felt thestrain increasing every moment of those six long hours. His sense offaintness and general weakness were overpowering; while to his ownconsciousness he became nothing but a mass of misery and swooningsickness. When Daniel saw the great vision, he thus describes hissensations, "There remained no strength in me, for my vigour was turnedinto corruption, and I retained no strength:" how much more faint musthave been our greater Prophet when he saw the dread vision of the wrathof God, and felt it in his own soul! To us, sensations such as our Lordendured would have been insupportable, and kind unconsciousness wouldhave come to our rescue; but in his case, he was wounded, and felt thesword; he drained the cup and tasted every drop.
"O King of Grief! (a title strange, yet true
To thee of all kings only due)
O King of Wounds! how shall I grieve for thee,
Who in all grief preventest me!"

As we kneel before our now ascendedSaviour's throne, let us remember well the way by which he prepared itas a throne of grace for us; let us in spirit drink of his cup, that wemay be strengthened for our hour of heaviness whenever it may come. Inhis natural body every member suffered, and so must it be in thespiritual; but as out of all his griefs and woes his body came forthuninjured to glory and power, even so shall his mystical body comethrough the furnace with not so much as the smell of fire upon it.
Evening Meditation

"Look upon mine affliction and my pain; and forgive all my sins."
Psalms 25:18

It is well for us whenprayers about our sorrows are linked with pleas concerning oursins-when, being under God's hand, we are not wholly taken up with ourpain, but remember our offences against God. It is well, also, to takeboth sorrow and sin to the same place. It was to God that David carriedhis sorrow: it was to God that David confessed his sin. Observe, then,we must take our sorrows to God. Even your little sorrows you may rollupon God, for he counteth the hairs of your head; and your greatsorrows you may commit to him, for he holdeth the ocean in the hollowof his hand. Go to him, whatever your present trouble may be, and youshall find him able and willing to relieve you. But we must take oursins to God too. We must carry them to the cross, that the blood mayfall upon them, to purge away their guilt, and to destroy theirdefiling power.
The special lesson of the text isthis:-that we are to go to the Lord with sorrows and with sins in theright spirit. Note that all David asks concerning his sorrow is, "Lookupon mine affliction and my pain;" but the next petition is vastly moreexpress, definite, decided, plain-"Forgive all my sins." Many suffererswould have put it, "Remove my affliction and my pain, and look at mysins." But David does not say so; he cries, "Lord, as for my afflictionand my pain, I will not dictate to thy wisdom. Lord, look at them, Iwill leave them to thee, I should be glad to have my pain removed, butdo as thou wilt; but as for my sins, Lord, I know what I want withthem; I must have them forgiven; I cannot endure to lie under theircurse for a moment." A Christian counts sorrow lighter in the scalethan sin; he can bear that his troubles should continue, but he cannotsupport the burden of his transgressions.



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