Chapter 14: The Secret Of Strength
CHAPTER 14: THE SECRET OF STRENGTH
(Genesis 49:24)
"My faith looks up to claim that touch divine
Which robs me of this fatal strength of mine,
And leaves me wholly resting. Lord, on thine
"Yea. make me such an one as Thou canst bless;
Meet for thy use, through very helplessness
Thine, only thine, the glory of success."
LUCY A. BENNETT.
AS THE BATTLE swept over the fatal field of Mount Gilboa, on which David wished that no dew might ever fall again, as if to mark his horror at the tragedy enacted there; we are told that "the battle went sore against Saul, and the archers hit him; and he was sore wounded of the archers." A side-light is thus cast on the dying words of Jacob, in which he referred to the cruelty and malignity which had followed his beloved Joseph from childhood. "The archers," said the old man, "have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him." One can almost see the faces of those bitter foes, stem with cruel hate, the bowstrings drawn tight back against their ears, as they hotly follow on the steps of their prey, and sorely grieve him.
Is it not marvellous then that he should be able to add, "but his bow abode in strength"? It is one of those strange paradoxes, of which there are so many instances in Scripture, Here are some of them: "The lame take the prey "; "When I am weak, then am I strong"; "God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty." These are specimens of many more, in which the natural weakness and impotence of the mortal is nevertheless made sufficient to withstand the onsets of the foe, and huff them back, becoming more than victorious.
Has not this been also proved true in our own experience? We too are weak enough, sorely pressed by our foes, and sometimes almost driven to despair. And yet we have continued until now; nay, we have been enabled to abide in some measure of strength. The foe has not prevailed. At the moment when he seemed on the point of victory, he has suddenly been compelled to give way; his legions have been scattered as by the invisible, but irresistible breath of God. The fire has burned under water. One has chased a thousand; and two have put ten thousand to flight.
The secret is not a hidden one. It is clearly revealed in the following words, which tell us that
"The arms of his hands were made strong
By the hands of the mighty God of Jacob."
It is a beautiful picture. There stands the weak child in whose slender arms there are no muscles strong enough to draw the string or bend the bow, which he vainly tries to use. They resist his utmost endeavours. Evidently he has neither might nor strength.
But now see, on his weak hands there are laid other hands, mighty hands, hands that wove the tapestry of the heavens, and that hold in their hollows the depths of the seas: one of these is placed where the left hand holds the bow; the other where the right hand plucks the string. And now with what ease those thin hands wield the bow; it is a plaything in their grasp; and without apparent strain the arrow flies to its mark. Is not this what David meant in after-days, when he sang,
He teacheth my hands to war,
So that a bow of steel is broken
By mine arms?
There is another Old Testament incident, which gives vivid illustration and enforcement of these striking words, Elisha was near his end. His had been a mighty life. Like a war-chariot with its fiery steeds he had brought deliverance to his fatherland. What wonder then, in that sad time when disasters were falling thick and fast on Israel and the royal house, that the king came down for a final word of cheer and help. The answer of the dying seer was remarkable. It seemed as if the heart of a soldier had beaten under his prophet's robe, and that the ruling passion had flamed up strong in death.
"Take bow and arrows," said he. "And the king took unto him bow and arrows." Then as the king put his strong muscular sun-browned hands on the bow, the old man put his above them, and the two shot the arrow of the Lord's deliverance through the window opened toward the sun-rising, where beyond the Jordan valley the land of the Syrians lay.
Perhaps this touching incident would have better illustrated the words of Jacob, if the chill hands of the dying prophet had been under the warm powerful palms of the king. But still the main point is to notice the combination; and to see how weakness becomes able for deeds of strength, when it permits itself to be moulded, guided, wielded, used, by the hands of a mighty man of valour.
The Apostle, who was the most like Christ, and the best loved, tells us a secret when he says, "Our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son, Jesus Christ." And the word rendered fellowship might be translated partnership; the common interests into which the saintly heart may cuter with the mighty God. Ah, what a combination is here! We cannot; but He can! Our weakness supplemented by his Strength! Our impotence married in immortal union with his Omnipotence. Here, indeed, is a compensating balance. The less there is of us, and the feebler our condition, the greater scope is there for the forth-putting of a Might before which cables snap as stalks of straw; and by which opposition is swept away as the cobweb swung across the garden path is caught on the dress of the impetuous child rushing along in an ecstasy of exuberant life.
The old legend tells us that Ulysses, returning home after long years, proved his identity by bending a bow which had defied the efforts of the stoutest heroes who had tried it in his absence. There are a good many of these defiant bows lying all around us. Tasks that deride our puny efforts; empty churches that will not fill; wicked neighbourhoods that will not yield; hardened soils that will not admit the ploughshare to cut into their crust. The one thing of which we need to assure ourselves is--whether it be God's will for us to take them in hand: if not, it is useless to attempt the task; we may as well husband and reserve our strength. But if it is made dear to us that we are to take up armour, methods, instrumentalities, once wielded by giant-hands, but now as unbefitting these poorer times as the armour of the age of chivalry mocks at the smaller make of modem warriors--let us not hesitate for a single moment, let us assume the armour of defence and the weapons of attack; and, as we do so, we shall become aware of a strength being infused into us--not ours, but his: "the arms of our hands will be made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob."
The condition of this strength is our consciousness of utter weakness. We are too strong for God. Our self-confidence shuts Him out of our lives. We require to be taken down to Gideon's brook, that we may be reduced to the minimum of our own energy, and be filled to the maximum of his. It was this that made Paul glory in his infirmities, where other men would have thought their infirmities debarred them from Christian usefulness. He accounted that they were the greater reason for anticipating success. Tell him that his words lacked eloquence, or that his appearance was unprepossessing, or that his thorn in the flesh made him a cripple in Christ's army--he would have answered, "I rejoice in them all--nay, I glory in them. All hail, ye blessed arguments for self-abasement, and for reckoning more completely on the mighty power of Christ!"
Do not longer assume that you cannot bend the bow of difficulty lying at your feet. You cannot do it alone; but God and you can do it together. Only do not try to feel able to do it before you take it up. You will never feel strong enough; but when you take it in hand and try to bend it, you will discover that as your day so is your strength. In the act of getting up, the paralyzed man received strength to stand. Act as if you had omnipotent power; and you will discover that you have it allied with you, and working through you, to the accomplishment of purposes of which you had not dared to dream in the wildest flights of fancy.
"All power," said our Lord, "is given to Me in heaven and on earth: go ye therefore, and teach." And it is added, with blessed emphasis, by another evangelist, and in beautiful corroboration of the spirit of these words, "They went forth and preached everywhere; the Lord working with them, and confirming the Word with signs following." This was no extraordinary circumstance; it is simply the normal state of those who have yielded themselves up as channels for the mighty God to work through their lives.
A telegraph wire may as easily carry the power generated by a Niagara as by a water-wheel, to light some distant city, or drive some vast machinery. And we can be vehicles through whom Divine power can reach a dying world. Till now our own energy and might have passed through us as a slow goods train over the metals; but they will as easily sustain the rush of the express. There is no reason why, from this moment, each earnest reader of these lines may not become a medium through whom the mighty God of Jacob shall work some marvellous exhibition of power: and when it is achieved there shall be no envy or pride; because it will be obvious that He has a perfect right to use what vessel He pleases, and the glory of the issue must be given to Him whose mind planned, and whose power executed, the fair and blessed result.