21st November 2017

What a comfort to know that God hears the groans of the saints when they see His laws voted against and trampled upon. And what a double consolation to know that He writes their names in His Book of Remembrance, not because He is in any danger of forgetting them, but because He ‘honours those who honour Him’; and stands for them, even when the majority stand against them. 

Says the prophet Malachi whose book finishes the Old Testament: ‘Then those who feared the Lord spoke to one another, and the Lord listened and heard them. So a Book of Remembrance was written before Him for those who fear the Lord and who meditate on His name. “They shall be Mine,” says the Lord of hosts, “On the day that I make them My jewels. And I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him.” Then you shall again discern between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve Him.’ 

Days when right is called wrong and wrong is called right are not days to celebrate. ‘There is a time to weep,’ says Solomon in his book of wisdom, and in another place he writes: ‘Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people.’ What shall the saints say in times like these, but “Lord have mercy upon us, for these are strange days, and there are many whose faces stream with tears.” 

DM 21^st Nov 2017