God’s Sight of Our Beginnings

Psalm cxxxix. 2 v. “Thou imderstandest my thought afar off.”

Love is longsighted; Divine love is the longest sighted. It sees me when I am standing on the very boundary -line between the good and the bad. What is that boundary-line? It is the wish to be. There is a time when I have no virtue but a longing, no gift but an admiration, no soaring but a sigh. I have only drawn the curtains and looked out upon the world of life, and. confessed that it is better to be out than in. No common eye would see in me any difference from other men. Who can tell where the last plant ends and the first sentient life begins? Often have I thought of these words, “two shall be grinding at the mill; one shall be taken and the other left.” The two are wondrously alike; the locality is the same, the occupation is the same, the outer deed is the same. What makes the difference? To each the mill of the universe utters one sound; both hear the voice of the grinding. But to each it is a separate voice. To the one it is only the mill; to the other it is the music of the mill. One hears but the monotonous hum of daily toil; to the other the mill is saying “bright fields beyond.”

And that, oh, my Father, is what Thou nearest, what Thou seest in me. It is a signal at the very end of the line; but Thou readest it afar off. Saul is persecuting the Church, and men are flying from him; but Thou seest in him the signal of need; Thou knowest that he cries for the Christ whom he disclaims. All men can greet me when my light from heaven comes; but to Thee my beginning is the darkness on the face of the deep. In the very warrings of my spirit Thou canst read my attraction to Thy Christ. Thou canst see my conscious blindness long before I reach

Damascus. Thou knowest that my journey to Damascus has been itself a groping, my loudness the loudness of despair, my courage the fear to pause and think. Men hear the grinding, but Thou nearest the music. I would rather have Thee than my brother to write my epitaph. My brother waits for Damascus; Thou findest me at Jerusalem. If I die on the road to Damascus, I have no chance from my brother; but even then, Thou shaft see the Paul beneath the persecutor. Unto whom can I go but unto Thee; Thou understandest my thought afar off.