4 And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.

WE often have to remark it,‭ ‬but it never ceases to be remarkable and instructive,‭ ‬that,‭ ‬wherever we read in the Scriptures,‭ ‬God is before us,‭ ‬in some way or other.‭ ‬It is this that makes the Bible so necessary to us,‭ ‬because we do not see God anywhere else.‭

We do not necessarily see Him in the works of Creation,‭ ‬except in so far as by a process of reasoning they tell us of His existence.‭ ‬We certainly do not see Him in the company of man,‭ ‬nor in the reading of ordinary books.‭ ‬In the Bible we cannot read without seeing Him,‭ ‬and in a shape never indistinct,‭ ‬with a light never dim.‭ ‬God is never absent from its pages.‭

In Genesis He is the Maker of all things,‭ ‬and the Starter of His purpose with the earth,‭ ‬through Abraham.‭ ‬In the subsequent books of Moses,‭ ‬He is the speaker of His will concerning Israel,‭ ‬and of His mind concerning many matters.‭ ‬In the historical books He deals with Israel‭; ‬in the Psalms He is addressed and praised and implored hundreds of times,‭ ‬and hundreds of times in them speaks directly to us.‭ ‬In the prophets,‭ ‬He alone is the speaker.

‭ ‬In the Evangelists we have Christ,‭ ‬who tells us that all He said and did was to be directly attributed to the Father,‭ ‬who spoke through Him.‭ ‬In the Acts of the Apostles it is a work of God that is recorded,‭ ‬and in all the Epistles there is a continual beam of light from God.

Because of all this,‭ ‬we may become acquainted with God by reading the Bible‭; ‬and,‭ ‬because of His absence from all the ways and thoughts and devices of men,‭ ‬we cannot know Him if we restrict ourselves to intercourse with men,‭ ‬and if we stand apart from the Bible we must be ignorant of God.‭ ‬We can only know Him by His communicated word.‭ ‬That communicated word is in various forms,‭ ‬and reveals various things,‭ ‬all of them converging on a centre of glory and comfort.‭

Sometimes the revelation has a stern aspect,‭ ‬as when we are told of‭ "‬the wrath of God revealed from heaven.‭" ‬Yet even this has its comforting side.‭ ‬If God had no capacity for anger,‭ ‬how chaotically the universe would develop in the course of ages.‭ ‬The sparkling orbs of heaven would become so many hells,‭ ‬instead of abodes of light and joy,‭ ‬where the will of God is done.‭ ‬We see it partly illustrated in the as yet unfinished history of the earth.‭ ‬For the time,‭ ‬God is not speaking nor acting directly.‭ ‬Wickedness is apparently unnoticed by Him,‭ ‬and He shows no visible anger with those who set Him at nought.‭

What is the consequence‭? ‬That throughout the earth the wicked flourish like a green bay tree,‭ ‬and righteousness cowers helplessly in dark corners.‭ ‬If the will of God will yet be done on earth as it is in heaven,‭ ‬it is because of a day appointed for the wrath and the revelation of the righteous judgment of God,‭ ‬who will render indignation and wrath,‭ ‬tribulation and anguish,‭ ‬to every soul of man that doeth evil.‭ ‬This terrible day of trouble will only be terrible in its bearing upon the enemies of God‭; ‬to His friends even His anger is comforting,‭ ‬just as we feel a sense of comfort under the wing of a strong friend who can be tempestuous in our defence.

The Christadelphian, June 1896

20 Shall evil be recompensed for good? for they have digged a pit for my soul. Remember that I stood before thee to speak good for them, and to turn away thy wrath from them.

Might not Jeremiah have supposed at such a time that God had forsaken him? Especially considering that the cause of his horrid imprisonment was his faithfulness in adhering to the divine Word. Had he thought so, he would have made the mistake which some short-sighted people fall into with regard to the incidents of ordinary life.

The fact is, God's dealings with the prophets had regard to the prophets themselves as well as those to whom He sent them. God accomplishes many ends with simple means. In sending the prophets, He not only reproved the generation addressed, but brought out His Word for the enlightenment of subsequent generations, and at the same time developed circumstances for trying, purifying and disciplining the prophets themselves. Jesus testifies that the prophets are to be in the Kingdom of God-

"Ye shall see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and the prophets in the Kingdom of God."

We also read in Revelation that the time is come for God "to give reward unto His servants the prophets." It was therefore needful that they should be tried by adversity.

A man is unfit for use - even in the human sphere - till he is tried. A character is without value till it has gone through the fire in some way or other. A person who is all the time in agreeable circumstances cannot have that hearty appreciation of the Truth which adversity engenders; neither is it possible that his character can be brought out distinctly.

Development depends upon activity. "Pleasure" does not tend to spiritual activity, but rather to spiritual lassitude and death. It blunts the perception of the need for the truth. It makes the mind contented with the present. It brings mental rust and moral sluggishness. It hides the spiritual mind.

When he is tried you see him, and get to know what he is made of, and he knows himself as he never can with a pleasant breeze on all sides. The man who has come through trial and suffering is a more complete and a more precious man in every sense than one who does not know what trouble is.

He is qualified to judge justly of other men, and to sympathise with the erring; and we must remember that the object of God's operations towards us in the Gospel, is to develop an order of men who will be qualified to be the associates of Jesus in the administration of the Divine law in the earth, in the day of the Messiah's glory.

Seasons 2.2.