“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” Ps. xlvi, 1. What a blessed reflection! God is our refuge. How inexpressibly consoling and sustaining to the child of God to realize it. My soul greatly rejoices in view of a refuge so safe and secure. O let me hasten to this shelter for protection from the fast-hurrying storm.
“In the fear of the Lord is a fountain of life.” “In the fear of the Lord is strong confidence; and his children shall have a place of refuge.” Prov. xiv, 26.
“Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. Selah. Ps. xlvi, 2, 3.
Dear brethren and sisters, there is a stormy day coming, it is near and hasteth greatly. “That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness, a day of the trumpet and alarm against the fenced cities, and against the high towers. And I will bring distress upon men, that they shall walk like blind men, because they have sinned against the Lord; and their blood shall be poured out as dust, and their flesh as dung. Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord’s wrath; but the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy: for he shall make even a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land.” Zeph. i, 15–18.
This awful storm will fall heavily upon the shelterless! It will overtake the sinner in an unexpected moment. It will reach the thoughtless, the stupid and sleeping professor, while his dreams of peace and prosperity are pleasing and deceptive.
The antediluvians “knew not until the flood came, and took them all away;” they would not believe the warning voice of mercy and love. So will it be with this generation. Destruction, sudden and unparalleled will find them unprepared.
“What will ye do in the day of visitation, and in the desolation which shall come from far? To whom will ye flee for help? and where will ye leave your glory?” Isa. x, 3.
“In that day a man shall cast his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which they made each one for himself to worship, to the moles and to the bats; to go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth.” Isa. ii, 20, 21.
No human arm will be sufficiently strong to lean upon in that awful day. No earthly power can save nor earthly glory shelter us from the unmingled wrath of the Most High.
Dear brethren and sisters, are we securing a shelter from the gathering storm with that diligence we should? Are we getting ready for the coming of the Lord? Do we hold his advent nigh, or does it seem to be far away?
There is danger of losing sight of the fact that the coming of the Lord is near, very near. A long, cold winter has just passed. The hills and plains are again covered with their beautiful robe of green. The forest is again clothed with its foliage. Vegetation springs forth once more, and we “know” that summer is nigh. We cannot be made to believe otherwise.
With as much certainty do the signs of the times herald the near approach of the Son of man. “So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that IT IS NEAR, (or he, margin) EVEN AT THE DOORS.” Shall we be ready to stand when a thousand fall at the side, and ten thousand at the right hand of the people of God? Shall we be found among those of whom it is said “There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling. For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.” Ps. xci. May we all be there, and safely sheltered from the impending wrath.