THE LORD REMEMBERS OUR BRIGHTEST DAY

THE LORD REMEMBERS OUR BRIGHTEST DAY

My text for you entering on another year is, “Thus saith the Lord; I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown” (Jeremiah 2: 2). The blessed God keeps in memory the brightest and best note in our hearts, even though it be silent now, the harp hung on the willows. The best note is the finest apprehension of God that the Spirit of Christ has generated in the heart. He will remember it even though you may forget it. The evidence and effect of the work of Christ living in you must ever remain before Him. The best fruit which the tree has borne, secured a name with Him for that tree. The tree may suffer from blights, but it has obtained a name with Him because once at the start it had borne fruit of the best quality. This is exceedingly encouraging. The thing that has been is the thing that shall be. It is not possible to return to a lower quality after having reached a higher. You must come up to your highest apprehension. When there is real fruitfulness it must be of that order. You must come back to it, you must sing as in the days of your youth. It is not that you will sing well merely, but you will sing in the way you have sung in your most vigorous day. The Lord must have His memory renewed with gladness. It may take time to put us back to our highest note, the one that in His tender love we are remembered of by Him, but to it, though it take forty years, we shall return. I remember at my marriage feeling so distressed because at the meeting there was no prayer for me as a servant of the Lord that ^[p. 208] I left the whole company and went straight to my own room! Surely many years elapsed and many sorrows were inflicted before I was able to sing as in the days of my youth, but the Lord remembered the best note in my heart all that time. There is, however, a very interesting fact in connection with this, and it is that we have to return to the point of departure — to the first wrong step. In a way there can really be no advance from the first wrong step. The wrong step occurs when self, in any form, is paramount to the Lord. It is very solemn, while very interesting, to note the various influences which succeed in diverting men of God from His interests to seek their own interests first. Now, when this is the case there must be a wrong step, however good the object desired. As far as I can see no one advances, however lengthened the interval — that is, no one ever really grows — until the first wrong step is retraced, and thence starts afresh. Thus it was with Israel. Though forty years had elapsed, they had really made no advance to the land. In the wilderness they learned what God was in His gracious care of them, and they learned themselves; but they were no nearer the land at the end of forty years than at the beginning. The young generation, detached from their fathers, were then prepared to enter the land. It is very important to see that though they were learning themselves in the wilderness and the daily care of God, yet they had made no advance in the song that filled their hearts when they crossed the Red Sea. This explains the state of many. They have taken a wrong step, and, until it is retraced, they are as exiles, they have no enjoyment of their own country, though cared for by God in the most perfect way, and have real gain in increased dependence on God. Thus there are two things to interest you — one of unspeakable cheer, that the Lord ever remembers your highest note of love and delight in Himself; and the other, that if you are not advancing according to that note, you have taken a wrong step which you will one day retrace, but in the interval you are learning because of the trials of the wilderness to be more dependent on God.