A Golden Motto for Every Christian

r~T1HE old Bible truths are the freshest, after -*- all. They have a perennial grandeur, like the Alps, at every new view of them; they have a perennial sweetness, like that honey which is set before you every morning on your Swiss mountain rambles. Many of these truths are condensed into portable mottoes that may be carried in every man’s memory. I find one of these golden watchwords in the twelfth chapter of Isaiah: “/ will trust.11

No word is interwoven more closely in the warp and woof of the Old Testament than this word “trust.” It is connected with the name of God no less than eighty-six times. In the

New Testament the Greek verb which corresponds to it is “believe,” and the Greek noun which corresponds to it is “faith.” These vital words occur more than an hundred times. There is no duty commended so often in God’s Word as the duty of trusting; with none are linked more exceeding great and precious promises.

This act of faith lies at the very threshold of the Christian life. When the penitent inquirer cries out, What shall I do to be saved? the one invariable answer is, Trust on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. The seeker’s first duty is to renounce his own sins and to trust the efficacy of Christ’s blood to cleanse him, and to renounce his own strength, which is weakness, and to trust himself to the mighty arm of Jesus. I received a touching letter this week from one of the most wretched and apparently hopeless inebriates that I have ever known. He had fairly wallowed in drunkenness. He writes to me: “When I had become almost a wreck, both physically and mentally, and friends had pronounced my case hopeless, then it was that Jesus came to my rescue and I gave him my heart. That saved meP This man has been for six months living sober and cleanly and happy. When drowning in his shocking sin and shame he had made his last clutch on the outstretched arm of Jesus, and this trust brought him divine help. He might well close his humble and grateful note by saying: “If you have any one in your congregation who is addicted to the use of intoxicants, please say to him for me that nothing but the grace of God can save him.” This reformed man will be safe just as long as his watchword is, I will trust! The scientific skeptic laughs at the bare idea of such a divine interference with the physical phenomena of appetite and using strong drink; but will the skeptic please to account for the stubborn fad of my friend’s conversion?

As trust in the sinner’s Saviour lies at the starting-point of Christianity, so it is the key-note of the whole after Christian experience.

The Christian life is a life of trust. As faith plays such an important part in human affairs from the babe who takes just what its mother gives it, on to the full-grown man who takes for his daily toil the Government’s paper promises as money, so faith is the central idea of our holy religion. The laboring man never saw “the Government”; but he knows that behind it lie all the vast resources of the Great Republic. The believer never saw his God; but he knows that in him are the resources of infinite wisdom and wealth and power and love. So he wisely says: I will trust!

This motto holds good for every decision we have to make and for every duty we have to perform: “Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him, and he will bring it to pass.” This means what it says: give the Lord the direction of your steps. Paul, when he felt drawn to Rome as a witness for Jesus, did not trouble himself whether he went there as a passenger or as a prisoner in chains. This trust must be a continuous process — the daily habit of our lives. When the Lord is driving us, we must not be all the time grasping the reins. The tourist who goes up the Matterhorn must not tell the guide the route or what implements it is safe to carry. If lie is not willing to trust his guide, he had better stay at the base of the mountain. For there will come many an emergency in which nothing but that guide’s steady brain and stout arm will lie between him and certain destruction. My brother climbers, before us rises the rugged up-hill of self-denial and of duty. At the summit are Heaven’s flashing glories. Can you grasp a stiff hold on the loving hand of your Guide and say, even on the dizziest places: / will trust?

Remember that for what you entrust to God you and I are not responsible. What we leave to him belongs to him. He is our trustee. It is his “lookout” whether we fail or succeed. Paul was not responsible for the number of converts at Athens and Rome, nor whether there should be one solitary convert to the truth. He had but to preach faithfully and to live righteously and leave results with his Master. All that I am responsible for is the honest employment of my faculties and my opportunities. God must look out for the rest. The Bible that lies on my pulpit bears the motto “I will trust.”

When four rowers are in a boat, with their backs toward the bow, their simple office is to pull the oars. The steersman’s office is to look ahead and work the helm. The moment that the rower turns steersman and tries to look over his shoulder or outpull his fellow oarsman the boat loses headway. So you and I are placed with our backs to the future. In our hands are the oars of Christian endeavor. Let God steer the boat and let us attend to the oars. The sweetest thought to every true believer is this: my Master is at the helm. He knoweth the way that I take. My times are in his hand. It is not in me to direct my steps. His grace is sufficient for me. I will trust.

Here is a golden motto for the walls of our prayer-rooms. The first duty when we come to the mercy-seat is to believe that God is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. We must not always expect immediate answers; nor always just such answers as we most desire. Lodge your prayer in the bosom of Jesus, and then go away composedly, saying to yourself: “I will trust.” How many a poor, troubled Christian comes to the prayer-meeting with a perfect backload of cares and fears and desires and worries, and then carries them all away again. He has not learned to cast his cares on God. If he comes to Jesus, it is very much in the same temper that the disciples did when they shook up their sleeping Master in the storm and cried: “Carest thou not, Lord, that we perish?” His answer to such panic-stricken followers is: “0 ye of little faith; wherefore do ye doubt?”

There is another place to hang up this golden motto. It is on the walls of a sick-chamber. Friend, let me put it up at the foot of thy bed, in full view of thine eyes when thouwakest: “I will trust.” Look at it; no medicine can do thee so much good. Feed on it; there is strength in it and marrow to thy bones. If you are restless, put it under your pillow and go to sleep on it. Get some one to read to you the fourteenth chapter of John. It will help you to get well; and if you are not to recover, it will help you to get ready to leave your bed and go into the open door of your Father’s house in glory.

In the abode of poverty, this is a welcome text to write up on the scanty walls. It will shine there like a lamp. When the barrel runs low and the cruse is getting empty, then is the time to trust. If God has given his dear Son to die for your soul, do not think it presumptuous to trust him for your daily bread. This text will breed patience and cheerfulness. Nail it to the wall.

And so for every emergency in life here is a watchword for every Christian. When temptation assails, trust. What time you are afraid, trust. My daily life is a march into an unknown future and I can not see an arm’s length ahead.

So I go onward, not knowing;

I would not if I might; I would rather walk in the dark with God

Than walk alone in the light; I would rather walk with him by faith

Than walk alone by sight.”