The many inquiries that have come to the author from all quarters relating to the subject considered in this volume, and the scarcity of treaties that deal with it, except, perhaps, in a merely incidental way, indicate the need for some more full and specific treatment of this theme. While he does not assume to know more of God’s will than others of like experience, the writer believes that a record of some of his thoughts may be useful to those who have to solve the daily problems of life, and who, perhaps, have not been able to solve some of them to their own satisfaction. He gratefully acknowledges the assistance he has derived, in the preparation of this work, from the writings of others who have gone over the way before him, especially that prince of preachers Alexander Maclaren, from whose works most of the quotations are taken. Direct quotations have been marked; indirect quotations could not very well be indicated, but are hereby acknowledged.

With a prayer that this volume may help many a traveler on the way of life, it is sent forth on its mission.
---C. W. Naylor

In a recent investigation of a certain public institution, a blind child was bound shut up in a cage. His keepers had made this cage, and had shut the child in it, so they could avoid giving to him the care and attention that he otherwise would have required. Though he was six or seven years of age, there had been little normal development of his intelligence, because he had been kept from contact with most of the things about him, outside his cage. He did not even know the ordinary articles of furniture, for since he was blind, he could learn only by touch and hearing. When he had been removed from his cage, and given the freedom of an apartment, he went about handling all the objects with which he come in contact, and constantly saying, “What is this? What is this?”

Everything new excited his interest, and drew forth questions. These questions revealed in him a something that lies inherently in all of us. Every new object or substance, every new experience or emotion, is the progenitor, when presented to our minds, of a brood of new questions. Our curiosity and interest are aroused, our minds are made alert, and our thirst for knowledge impels us to seek an understanding of that which is new. When our questions are answered, the mind is satisfied. If they are not answered, they will probably recur again and again, as the mind searches for a solution.

The material realm holds many mysteries that challenge our attention. It is not strange, therefore, that the spiritual realm should also hold many locked secrets, the key with which we may gain access to them we feel impelled to seek. He, who approaches the threshold of spiritual things, finds the door locked before him, and turns away with the thought that it is useless to try to understand that realm, is more foolish than he who turns back from all the mysteries of the natural world.

Is there a God? If so, what kind of a being is he? What are my relations to him? What is his attitude toward me? These, and a thousand other similar questions, at times arise spontaneously in our minds. Somewhere along the path of life they confront us. Upon the way in which we answer them depends to a great extent, the outlook of our lives and the attitude of our souls. Can these questions be answered with any certainty? Can we really know whether there is a God? And if there is one, what is he like? What is his character? What is his attitude toward us? And what is our duty toward him? Or, must all these questions remain unsolved riddles?

While the Deity is veiled in clouds of mystery, and while many of his purposes and ways are inscrutable to us, we deem it no more improper to inquire reverently and earnestly as to his being, character, and will, than to investigate any other legitimate subject. It is manifest that the same laws of evidence establishing other facts are capable of being applied to such an inquiry with good prospect of yielding satisfactory results. Through this process, the author has arrived at some conclusions, which he believes are fully justified by the evidence, and which agree in substance with the conclusions of a multitude of other godly people. While he has explored but a small portion of the great continent of truth, he believes that he has something of interest and value to report. Proceeding, then, we inquire “the reason for the hope that is within us.”

We find, in our physical being, many appetites and desires. For each such appetite or desire, we find in the natural world about us an answer. There is provision in nature, or, at least, there exists in nature, something to gratify and satisfy each and every natural appetite, and every such desire may find in nature the responding element for its fulfillment. Each appetite and desire, therefore, has it correlative. Hence, each appetite or desire has within it the assertion of the existence of that which will satisfy or gratify it.

Within ourselves are other desires not capable of being gratified with natural things, but which look to a different realm for satisfaction. They reach into the sphere of moral and spiritual being, for they cannot be satisfied with material things any more than hunger can be satisfied with stones, or thirst with dust. In every life, this outreach of moral and spiritual desire is found at some time, and it usually asserts itself at frequent intervals. When desire thus looks to moral or spiritual things, only moral or spiritual things can gratify it. Some of these classes of desires we can gratify ourselves, but as for the greater part of them, satisfaction cannot be found in self, or from self. Those who repress and silence their desires may cease to realize the direction of those desires, or what is required for the gratification of them. Then, they may think that they find in themselves and in nature all that they require for satisfaction. But those who rightfully analyze their desires, or those who by any means become conscious of the direction and nature of those desires, have in their consciousness a sense of the deep significance of them. That inner consciousness speaks with finality, and with convincing utterance. Those who cultivate moral and spiritual desires, by seeking their gratification, become most conscious of their inability entirely to satisfy them from within. Only those who neglect, repress, or destroy their inner spiritual yearnings fail to feel the need of relations to corresponding elements from without, including relations to the source of responding, satisfying, correlative of desire.

The desire for high and holy things proves there is a source of such things, and proves by analogy, at least, that there can be a drawing from that source of whatever may be necessary to supply that deep need of our higher nature. The mind’s and heart’s sense of need of a God proves that there is a God, even as the appetite for natural food proves that there is natural food to satisfy that appetite, or even as the thirst for water proves that there is water to gratify and satisfy the desire. The human heart is never at rest until it is trusting in some supreme power greater than that which is has within itself. It is never satisfied until it draws its satisfaction from a source which it feels is infinitely higher and nobler than itself. This inner sense of the kind of a God the soul needs, proves what kind of a God exists. Gross and sensual ideas of God come from allowing ourselves to be so influenced by those parts of our being that may be satisfied with natural things that we seek only the fulfillment of natural desires. The savage believes in a savage and sensual god, because he lives almost entirely in the realm of the natural. But wherever, even in the state of savagery, a man rises to think and desire higher and nobler things, his idea of God rises accordingly. When once his desire, and with it his idea of God, has risen above the natural, he knows from thenceforth of a realm of being higher and nobler than mere natural things.

The true idea and consciousness of God must come from that higher part of self which cannot find its gratification purely in natural things. An idea of God coming in this way is always pure, and corresponds with the true need of the soul. When I know my soul’s own deepest desires and highest aspirations, its most earnest out-reaching that cannot always be formulated in words, it’s unsatisfied yearnings that run out to that which is greater than itself, then I know God as he is, because I know what I need him to be. There is no surer knowledge than that wordless voice that speaks in the depths of our souls.

There are those who tell us that there is no God; there are others who tell us that there is a God, but that we can know nothing of him. Such assertions can be made only by those who have stifled their spiritual desires, and have turned a deaf ear to the cry of their own hearts. For to know ourselves, is to come to a knowledge of God, because God must answer to that which is greatest and noblest within us. Most persons feel that they know there is a God, that they have the same evidence for knowing him that they have for knowing anything else. That inner consciousness, the testimony of their own being, is to them fairly convincing, even without the addition of those other arguments and evidences that may be brought out to prove God’s existence and nature.

To be sure, we cannot know spiritual things with our physical senses; so we cannot thus know God. Neither can we know honor, fidelity, friendship, the existence of angels, nor, in fact, any mental or spiritual fact through our physical senses alone. But we are not limited to these physical senses as the medium through which all knowledge reaches us. There are some things that we learn which are even contrary to our physical senses, and some things that in the spiritual world are contrary in principle to natural things. Nevertheless we are capable of learning them.

But, has God a will toward man? Interest in or obligation to others affects the attitude of our will toward them. Since man is the handiwork of God, we may naturally expect God’s will to be actively engaged in relation to man. The further fact that man is conscious of obligation to and dependence upon God is abundant evidence that he not only can know, but does know God’s will toward him. The consciousness of obligation to God’s will can rest on nothing but a knowledge of that will. So where there is this sense of obligation to his will, there is likewise the sense of what his will is.

Some people are much more conscious of God’s will than are others; hence, they are more conscious of obligation. There are reasons why some know more of God’s will than others. Some have sought to know his will, while others are indifferent or even hostile to it. Even those who are hostile know it in a measure, or they could not be hostile to it. Some men know science, not accidentally, but because they have devoted themselves to an intelligent study of it. They have taken a course that brings them to such knowledge. Some know the will of the president of the United States, and others do not. Some know his will very well; others, much less fully. Some know him well because they are closely associated with him. They hear his voice expressing his will and purpose. They see his actions that reveal his will. They know his manner of thought, his likes and dislikes. There are others who never saw him, but who know his will in some particulars through having had communications from him.

We are privileged to know God. We have the capacity to know him. We may come into an association with him so that we can learn his character, his likes and dislikes, and what he desires. We may have communications from him, revelations of his purpose and will. We may hear his voice speaking in our hearts. And so we may know God and his will. To be sure, we shall know him only as a man knows, which means that our knowledge will not be absolutely perfect. Nevertheless, if we make use of the means to obtain knowledge of him that are open to us, we may come to know much of him.

It is not the author’s purpose to discuss the will of God from a scientific standpoint, as a matter of philosophical reasoning, but to view the question from its practical aspects, and in the main, to give attention to those phases of the question which relate especially to the Christian, to the man who already believes that he knows something of God’s will, personality, and character.

All Christians believe that the Lord is with his people, that he is Immanuel---“God with us.” They believe that Jesus Christ is the revealer of God, that he revealed the character, fatherhood, purpose, and will of God. When they read in their Bibles that all shall know God from the least to the greatest (Jer. 31:34) and that all shall be taught of God (Isa. 54:13) and that the Holy Spirit is sent to guide us into all truth (John 16:13) they feel in their hearts the assurance that they are not following “cunningly devised fables” or being led in the ways of folly, but that they really and truly do know at least something of the will of their Father which is in heaven. We are commanded, “Be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is” (Eph. 5:17). In view of these things, we seek his will earnestly, reverently, confidently, assured that he will reveal unto us as much of it as may be necessary in our own individual cases, in order that we may be acceptable and well pleasing in his sight.

We may know his will for the race---it is certain that in some things he deals with humanity as a whole. But the individual is not so lost in the whole that he has no personal relation with God, no personal obligation to him as an individual. This being true, God has a will toward us individually. Not only should we know his will for the race, but more particularly his will for us as individuals. We should know it, not only in the general outline of his purpose for us as one of the race, or in the general course of our lives, but also in regard to us from day to day, in the details of our lives, where we need to know his will in order that we may be guided aright. Thus we may walk with sure footsteps in a plain path, not fighting or striving in uncertainty or darkness, not laying our course with dead reckoning, but using a reliable chart and a trustworthy compass. Uncertainty is a great bane. Having a conscience toward God, yet being uncertain of his will, loses us in a maze. The heart can be at rest only when sure it is in harmony with God, for only then is the conscience giving approval. God’s promise, “I will give you rest,” is a pledge that we shall not only know his will, but be able also to fulfill it, and be conscious that we are so doing.

The fact that some know not God’s will, and think others do not know it and can not know it, is no valid proof that others do no know it, any more than the fact that some do not know how to count proves that there is no such thing as mathematical science, or that because some one does not know that air is composed of a number of gases is proof that there is no such thing as chemical affinity or the science of Chemistry. Knowing this, the Christian is not troubled with the argument of unbelievers, stating that he can not know the will of God. He is conscious that in some respects, at least, he does know it, and he knows when he conforms to it.

It is reasonable that God should have a will for the race, because the race is of his creation. He tells us that he created man for his own glory. He had a purpose in creating him, for he does nothing without a purpose---intelligence acts only for adequate reasons. It is just as reasonable that God should have a definite will for each one of us individually as for the race as a whole. Since he created us, he is, therefore, interested in the outcome of our lives. Being moral creatures, there must be a moral outcome to our lives. As a moral being, God cannot be indifferent to this outcome. We have great need of such a God as the Bible reveals. This need must be fulfilled in him, and the kind of a God we need is the kind of a God we inevitable find the God we serve to be. Since we need a God upon whom we can rely, and since we are often conscious of the limitations of our knowledge, and since the awakened heart hungers for love, we know that God answers to all these needs in being to us knowledge, wisdom, and help, and in loving us as our hearts crave to be loved.

He is “our Father”; so the interest of a father is manifested toward us. He is benevolent; therefore he holds a benevolent attitude toward us. He is love; therefore he has an abiding interest in our welfare, and a warm affection for us. And having these attributes which he exercises for us, he has a will for us in harmony therewith. Since he had a purpose in our creation---a purpose of his own---he is interested that we know and do his will in order to carry out that purpose. How comforting and inspiring are these thoughts! How satisfying they are to the heart that craves for a God of just such a character and such an attitude toward man’s finite weakness!

Let us turn now and note some of the effects of doctrines and beliefs that are contrary to the facts just stated. What is the effect of the doctrine that our lives are unguided, that is, guided only by human reason; of the idea that God is far off, unapproachable and unknowable; of the teaching that he has not revealed himself as the Bible declares, and as Christians believe? What is the result of such negation? Are those who hold such things profited thereby? Do those theories afford them comfort and satisfaction? Do such ideas sustain them in the hour of darkness and sorrow? Is there anything in these doctrines to ennoble or uplift the race? Not so. Instead their effect is to bring darkness, uncertainty, and despair. They wither all lofty aspirations, dry up the springs of joy, and becloud the pathway of life.

Did you ever see a really happy unbeliever? He may find some satisfaction in his unbelief, and even some pleasure, but it is the satisfaction and pleasure of the debater. It is the satisfaction that comes from showing an opposition to something---a sort of negative satisfaction. He is utterly devoid of that constant joy, comfort, rest of soul, peace, and quietness of spirit that comes to the believer through the truth of God. To be sure, he may have the happiness that comes from the gratification of natural desire, but such happiness has a very narrow basis, resting on bare materialism or a hazy spiritism---it is evanescent, and soon passes away. Take the cynic of things spiritual, the hostile critic, the infidel, the skeptic. They stand only on a platform of negation. Outwardly they may present a bold front, but let their heart be opened, let on gaze into their depths, and it will then be found that little genuine happiness or contentment is there, for their system of negation furnishes no possible basis for genuine happiness.

On the other hand, there is nothing so joyful or so abiding as the pleasure arising from Christian faith. The Bible doctrine believed is a source of true joy and rest. Herein lies: the great practical advantage of the Christian faith as a system of philosophy. Negation hangs like a dead weight upon the neck of him who makes it his creed, while faith is like wings to him who possesses it. While the one sinks down to despair, the other rises above the perplexities and troubles, cares, and disappointments of life into a realm of pure joy, into a place where his soul is at rest---not the ephemeral joy of the opiate, or the rest that it gives, but the joy of harmonious being, and conformity to the highest laws of his being.

The wholesomeness, reality, and truth of Christian faith are shown in the power it gives one to surmount obstacles in life, and to rejoice, even in disaster. Who but a Christian can joy in tribulation, and in the darkest hours see gleams of hope? The Christians’ faith is attacked, despised jeered, mocked, and made the butt of flippant wit. It is denounced and pitied, ridiculed and misrepresented. Under all this treatment it neither fails nor perishes, but waxes stronger and more joyful, for its strength is in its truth. The more faith a man has, the more truly he believes in God and God’s interest in the care over him, the more settled and steadfast he is, the more fruitful and blessed his life, and the more wonderful those spiritual fruits that he bears which the opponents of Christianity try in vain to produce.

The Christian believes that he knows God. Resting in that assurance, he goes calmly upon his way, finding in his life from day to day a thousand unanswerable proofs of the correctness of his faith. Every day there is added to his settled conviction new assurances that God is with him, that his ‘times are in his hands’, that God knoweth the way that he takes, and that he walks with him all that way. And so as his locks grow hoary, and as his form is bent with age, his spiritual horizon grows clearer and clearer, his faith becomes more steadfast, his assurance more certain, his rest of spirit more sweet, his peace and tranquility greater, and he has the satisfying consciousness that he is drawing nearer and nearer to the blessed fulfillment of his hope, to the full fruition of his faith. If the doubts that have obscured the lives of others, like dark clouds cast their shadows down upon his pathway, he can boldly say, “I know whom I have believed”. So he comes to his end in peace, and says his last earthly good-bys in a quiet, confident expectation of a glorious hereafter.

Chapter 2
GOD’S WILL IN THE NATURAL AND SPIRITUAL REALMS

There are two realms of being, the natural or material, and the moral or spiritual. God is the creator of both. All things are the work of his hand, and came into existence through the operation of his will. He created the forces and laws of nature. He controls nature. He is the creator of spirits, and of the laws of spiritual life. In his omnipotent power he is supreme over all. If we believe his will to be supreme, we naturally ask: Is everything that happens, a manifestation of his will? Is every phenomenon an expression of his will? If he is all powerful, there must be some way or some sense in which this is true. At least we can assert that he does not use his available power to prevent it.

Notwithstanding the fact that God’s will must be involved in some way in all the operations of force, still he declares of many things that they are not his will. He tells us that it is not his will that any soul should perish. At the same time he makes it clear that many are perishing. He causes us to understand that the sufferings of his children are grievous to him, and that in all their afflictions he is afflicted. We naturally ask, if such be the case, why does he not interfere in order to prevent these things? Is he restrained from doing what he wills? As there is no greater power to restrain him, if he is restrained, that restraint must come from one of two things, namely, either from voluntary self-limitation, or from the necessities of the case. There are certain necessities that limit God, as well as man.

We know God’s will best through man’s will, which must of necessity be similar in its processes to the Divine will, and must act according to similar laws. We find ourselves restricted by certain necessities. These necessities are of such a nature that all will, must be bound by them. To illustrate these necessities: Nature cannot be orderly, and at the same time each thing therein be independent, and each force working alone. A harmonious whole necessitates an orderly relation of the various parts of which it is composed. There can not be at the same time both disorder and order. Planets cannot remain in an orderly system, and still move irregularly, or without regard to others. A thing cannot, at the same time, be both heavy and light. In other words, gravitation cannot be acting upon it and not acting upon it. A thing cannot be both hot and cold at the same time. One thing necessarily shuts out and renders impossible its opposite, or that which is contradictory to it.

Men do not seem to be able to harmonize God’s expressions of tender care for his people with the calamities that sometimes come upon them from the action of natural forces. If the action of natural force is an expression of God’s will, which Christians commonly believe, and if evil results from such action while God has control over that action, how can this be harmonized with his benevolent nature? Some, seeing the calamities that befall mankind, deny that God is just, or merciful, and say that he is cruel. The Christian who personally knows God, who have fellowship with him, and to whom the secrets of the Almighty have to some extent been revealed, knows that he is not cruel or vindictive, but that he is the loving, kind, benevolent Father that he represents himself to be. But if he is such, how can he permit some of the things that happen?

Two Phases of God’s Will, Considered

There are two phases of God’s will, or two ways in which that will is revealed, or two modes of its action. It is revealed in two different spheres. First, it operates through natural law, or perhaps we may say, it is the basis for natural law. Through his will he originates and controls natural forces. Therefore, the operation of these natural forces is an expression of his will. The other phase of his will, or the other sphere of the manifestation of his will, is called providence; it is the manifestation of his particular attitude toward mankind as a whole, and as individuals. So we may speak of these two phases of his will as his natural will, or his will in nature, and his providential will. The latter is his particular will, in the realm of the moral.

We shall now turn our attention to the manifestation of God’s will through the operation of natural forces. One thing to be observed at the out set is that, in his nature, God is not necessitated to a specific act of the will for each action of force. Like men, he can set in motion a train of movements each related to, and dependent upon, the others. This being the case, we need not look upon each several natural phenomenon as being distinctly and directly the expression of God’s will, but rather as a link in the chain of consequences of what he has willed. It is very important that Christians understand the place of God’s will in natural phenomena in order that they may adopt an intelligent and proper attitude toward God in nature. It is through a misunderstanding of this subject that men are led to believe that God is cruel, harsh, vindictive and merciless. We must not overlook the fact that there are some necessities of natural law in the operation of force, and that these necessities must not be left out of the account if we are to adjust and harmonize our ideas of God’s goodness with some of the operations of nature.

There are some necessary characteristics of natural law. A few of these we shall notice. First, natural law must be universal in its application. One law cannot apply to one part of the universe, and another to another part. Gravitation must work according to the same law everywhere in the material universe. Otherwise there would be no order and chaos would result. Since order is a necessity of nature, natural law must be universal in its application. We cannot, therefore, expect that on our earth, natural law will work in one way in inhabited regions and in another way in uninhabited regions. We cannot expect that the forces, which in one place produce volcanic action, a tornado, or a flood, should not act everywhere, under similar conditions, and produce similar results.

Second, natural law must be of unvarying uniformity of action under similar conditions. It must be absolutely unvarying in time and place. If man could not depend upon this unvarying quality, nothing would be certain with him. Frost might come on the hottest day of summer, or a mixture that today would make paint, might make cement tomorrow, or the food that today sustains life might destroy it tomorrow. It is the uniform and unvarying action of natural law that makes natural things stable, and an orderly universe possible.

The forces of nature do not always act in the same manner, but always in the same manner under similar circumstances. Under identical conditions they have no variability. But conditions constantly differ. Electricity, that mighty but unknown force, is limited in its action by the conductivity of substances. Centrifugal power is limited or balanced by centripetal power, and so on through the course of nature.

The Character of Natural Forces

All purely natural forces are unmoral; they possess no moral qualities. They have, and can have, no regard for moral considerations. If I deliberately thrust my hand into a fire, I am burned. If by accident I fall into a fire, I am burned. Whether I am righteous or wicked, whether I am engaged in something laudable or something contemptible, does not alter the result. Natural forces do not discriminate. They know nothing of moral considerations or principles. The lightning knows no mercy. It does not distinguish between a man and a tree, or the house of a righteous man and the house of iniquity. The tornado knows no pity. It ruins all without consideration. The earthquake has not more respect for that which can suffer than for that which is inanimate.

God’s Will in the Natural Realm

We come now to the discussion of a question that troubles many souls. They often wonder why God’s creatures are left subject to destructive natural forces. They cannot understand why God permits storms, floods, pestilences, famines, accidents, fires, and the like. The argument is often made that if God loved mankind he would shield them from these things. Since, many times, he does not shield them from these, it is often asserted that he is not good, but is cruel and unjust.

The mother whose little one has been taken from her arms by the death-angel often questions the love and kindness of God, and sometimes even his justice. When a tornado sweeps through a city, destroying churches, and killing Christian people, there are those who doubt God and sometimes even condemn him. They cannot harmonize these things with their idea of the goodness of God. This is because they do not take into consideration the two phases of God’s will; that is, God’s will as manifested through the operation of natural law, and God’s will as manifested in his providences.

We have already pointed out the necessity of force operation in a constant, unvarying way, under the same natural circumstances. Rain is brought about through the evaporation of water and its subsequent condensation in cooling, usually by the meeting of the warm moisture-laden air with a current of cold air. This is according to natural law, and in general it works out well, for its beneficial results are everywhere seen. But there may be a combination of circumstances that brings about the condensation of an immense amount of moisture at on time, and in one locality. The result is a flood. The combined action of these natural forces producing rain cannot be controlled except through the exercise of a continual special providence, and this, too, in a way that God does not usually see fit to act. God does not will the flood, ordinarily at least, any more than the man who makes a machine wills that someone will get his fingers mashed in the cogs thereof. He makes the machine for a purpose; the mashing of the man’s fingers is accidental, the result of a combination of circumstances.

Natural forces, in general, work for the greatest wellbeing of all, but must necessarily sometimes combine destructively. This destructive combination, however, is not the ordinary working of these forces, but an incidental or accidental combination that works harmfully. God’s general will in nature is that all things work together for good. Who will say that they do not do so to the greatest possible extent? We must not suppose that because man is sometimes the victim of nature there is no “heart full of love at the center of the universe” and no will guided by love at the center of the universe” and no will guided by love watching over man, working for his welfare. For who knows the ultimate---who knows what shall be the end? We see in part and we know in part, but when that which is perfect is come we shall see and know perfectly. When we shall know even as we are known, we shall know that “the heart of the eternal is most wonderfully kind” in spite of all those things which seem to argue differently in the present sphere of existence.

God’s will in the Moral Realm

God’s will is dependent on his moral qualities. His attitude toward man is fully determined by his justice, love, mercy, fidelity, etc. God is not the unlimited being that some suppose him to be, in their thoughtless suppositions. While he is supreme and over all, he must have regard for the consequences of all that he does or permits. He must consider remote consequences no less than those consequences that lie close at hand. Those remote consequences are often beyond our vision, and if we judge his actions by the immediate consequences that only are visible to us, our judgment may be unjust. We read in the Bible about seeing “the end of the Lord.” By this is meant the final outcome of his attitude and conduct. We are prone to pass snap judgment on action, looking no farther than the present hour.

God must look farther; he must look to the final outcome. Hence, very often he cannot do what he would do for us if he looked only as far as immediate consequences. The parent who looks only so far as immediate consequences with his child, gives him his own way, satisfies all his desires, and places no obstacle in the way of his temporary enjoyment, and who fails to take into consideration what this will mean for the future character of the child and for his happiness in years to come, will inevitably do great harm to his child, and destroy that very happiness which he seeks to further. So God must often deny us the present help, or the present blessing or the present interference with natural things in our behalf, for the ultimate good that will come to us, or because of the ultimate harm that would come through giving us what we desire and seem, according to our way of viewing it, to need.

God is also limited by the will of man. Having made man a free moral agent, he cannot coerce him, except where conditions render it absolutely necessary. For this reason man is left to choose his own pathway, and to use his own will, even though this results in his hurt. Then, too, God can interfere either with natural law or in the spiritual realm only where it is wise to do so. Being all-wise, he will, (and must) act in accordance with that wisdom. This being true, he will interfere in the natural sphere only when it will accomplish some wise end. So he must often let the innocent suffer with the guilty, and the righteous, be the prey of the wicked. He must often let the destructive forces of nature work, even if the temporary results are evil. God’s loving desire for us must often be sacrificed to the need that only his wisdom sees. The goal to which he would lead us may require the suffering of present pain. Again, we should remember that he teaches us in the Bible that earthly loss has its compensations, and that there is another world where the inequalities, the injustices, and other things that people suffer, are adjusted, balanced, and compensated. So the present evils which he seems to allow, after all may be only the upward steps which we would willingly climb if we understood the outcome as he knows it.

It would be unwise in many ways for God to be always interfering in order to save his people from the common lot of humanity. The Christian is subject to the same laws of the natural world as the skeptic and atheist. So if he suffers from the action of these laws, it is only a part of man’s inheritance. It is only the necessary consequence of his being a part of the natural world. There is often no way in which God can consistently save the righteous from the fate of the wicked in temporal affairs. To be sure, he could find a way by his wisdom, but the exercise of his power in this direction would often result in evils somewhere else that would much more than over balance the good that would be done through his action. So it is God’s wise intellect which, in spite of his loving heart, sees the necessity of leaving us in a present situation, unless, indeed, there be some just and adequate reason for his interference. He loves to interfere and protect his own. Tens of thousands of such interferences have declared his kindness. But he is under the necessity to preserve nature in a proper balance. Therefore, he must not interfere with it too often or to greatly. Since nature must be preserved in order, God will interfere with that order only when he sees that it is wisest and best. But where we suffer from that order of nature, God’s goodness and love will provide for us a full and complete compensation, so that at the last we shall be able to say, “Great is Jehovah, and his loving kindness hath no end. He hath dealt kindly with us, and shown his bountifulness.”