Complete in Christ

Complete in Him! Oh, Lord, I flee,
Laden with this great thought, to Thee
With tears and smiles contending, cry,
Are words like these for such as I?

Complete in Him! No word of mine
is needed, Lord, to perfect Thine;
Wise Master-Builder, Let Thy hand
Fashion the fabric Thou hast planned.

Complete in Him! I nothing bring,
Am an imperfect, useless thing;
But human eyes shall joy to see
What God's dear hand shall add to me.

Complete in Him! Oh, longed-for-day,
When my poor, sinful heart can say,
Naught in myself, for ruin meet,
In Jesus Christ I stand complete!

~ From Golden Hours: Hymns and Songs of the Christian Life

Some Truths Discovered

We are imperfect creatures, wayward and foolish as little children, horribly unreasonable, selfish, and willful. We are not capable of enduring the shock of finding, at every turn, that our idol is made of clay and that it is prone to tumble off its pedestal and lie in the dust till we pick it up and set it in its place again. I was struck with Ernest's asking in the very first prayer he offered in my presence, after our marriage, that God would help us love each other; I felt that love was the very foundation of which I was built and that there was no danger that I should ever fall short in giving my husband all he wanted in full measure. But as he went on day after day repeating this prayer, and I naturally made it with him, I came to see that this most precious of earthly blessings has been and must be God's gift, and that while we both looked at it in that light and felt our dependence on Him for it, we might safely encounter together all the assaults made upon us by the world, the flesh, and the devil. ~ From Stepping Heavenward - Katy to Helen, February, 1847

The Sands of Time are Sinking

Exact Moment of Salvation

"There is one thing more that troubles me," I said. "Most persons know the exact moment when they begin real Christian lives. But I do not know of any such time in my history. This causes me many uneasy moments."

"You are wrong in thinking that most persons have this advantage over you. I believe that the children of Christian parents, who have been judiciously trained, rarely can point to any day or hour when they began to live this new life. The question is not, Do you remember, my child, when you entered this world and how? It is simply this: Are you now alive and an inhabitant thereof? . . .
~ Dr. Cabot to Kay, Stepping Heavenward, February 21, 1834 entry.

A Pastor's Wife

You can't think how sweet it is to be a pastor's wife; to feel the right to sympathise with those who mourn, to fly to them at once, and join them in their prayers and tears. It would be pleasant to spend one's whole time among sufferers, and to keep testifying to them what Christ can and will become to them, if they will only let Him. ~ From a letter to Miss E.A. Warner, January 7, 1870.

[Wonderful reasons to enjoy one's lot in life, wouldn't you say? ~ mr]

The Sweet By and By

Lest we forget...

Jesus Had Eyes

. . .So Charlie's papa often took his poor little boy in his arms and let him lay his head on his shoulder while he walked gently up and down talking about Christ. He told him all those sweet stories from the Bible, how Jesus pitied sick people, and how he cured them, and how many lame men he made to walk, and how many blind to see. So one day, after he had been talking so, he had to give Charlie to his nurse while he went out for a time, and Charlie lay with his head on [her] shoulder, just as he had done on his papa's, till all at once he lifted it up and said:

"Mary, did you know that Jesus hadn't any eyes?"

"Oh! yes, Jesus had eyes," said Mary.

"He had some once, but He gave them to a poor blind man," said Charlie.

You see Charlie was such a little boy that he thought when his papa told him that Jesus gave eyes to a blind man that He had to give him His own.

Little Charlie is in heaven now and has been there a great many years. And he has long known more about the goodness of God than anybody who still lives in this world. And if he could speak to you he would tell you that it is better to be without eyes and hands and feet than not to love Him who was willing rather to die than that you should not know and love Him. ~ From "Little Susy's Little Servants", Little Susy's Stories