The wilderness is yet to "bud and blossom as the rose."This is to be a literal fact, no doubt. Like all other such it conveys to us also an assurance that is full of comfort. The wilderness is the familiar type for us of the world in its present aspect, which the history of Israel has made our own in a multitude of precious lessons never to be forgotten. Who would blot out that inimitable record which Exodus and Numbers give first, and then Deuteronomy recapitulates, for practical wisdom when the land at last is reached, and the people of the Lord enjoy their heritage?

True, it is a record of difficulty, danger, and privation; of weakness, failure, and defeat. Little there is to minister to the pride of man. From Marah to Abel-shittim, the road is marked with monuments and sepulchers of those whose carcasses had fallen there. Every hand, from infancy to feeble old age, seems to have been writing only epitaphs with this inscription:" Cease ye from man!" But this is the first necessary lesson for us, and the only painful one. Once we have put our seal to this, we need not carry the crape of the funeral any longer. "Out of death life "is the voice of all nature round us. " Let the dead bury their dead," utters a greater Voice:" Go thou, and preach the kingdom of God."

Then look again at this wilderness, and see how on its barren sands you can every-where trace the pathway of the power of the Almighty. Day by day, the utter weakness manifests and glorifies the unfailing Strength. Everlasting arms are round about. The guiding Pillar, always nature's opposite, shuts out the scorching rays of midday,-lights up at night into a blaze of glory,-that by day or night they may go forward at its bidding. And all this not merely to meet need ; that could be done with such economy of power as in general God's wise and holy government displays:but here with a lavish miracle which witnesses of One meaning to make His people know His nearness and His transcendence over nature. "In all their affliction He was afflicted, and the angel of His presence saved them; in His love and in His pity He redeemed them; and He bare them, and He carried them all the days of old." (Isa. 63:9.)

How precious all this, when we learn that all this amazing forth-putting of power in their behalf "happened to them for types, and is written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages are come"! As type is less than antitype,-as the natural pales before the spiritual,-so the wilderness, for the eye that can take it in, must be for us a scene of wonderful unvailing of the divine glory indeed! and the meanness of our lives, with what significance it is invested! For faith-for faith- this is how God is with us! how He seeks to make known to us His presence and His love.

A celebrated philosopher undertook to show that this world, notwithstanding the sin and evil of it, is the best of possible worlds. We may say that for its purpose it is surely the best. None other could so exhibit the weakness of the creature in contrast with the omnipotent love of the Creator. In no other could it have been so said, " We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us." (2 Cor. 4:7.) And this same earthen vessel has given to the bird of heaven a capacity for suffering and death (Lev. 14:), in which the grace of God has found its only adequate expression.

Here is the great example of matchless obedience that has been given us, "that we should walk in His steps;" and what angel might not covet the opportunity to do so? In what other world could all the graces of Christian life be so exhibited, where power is manifested in renunciation and self-sacrifice? Read the list in Colossians (chap. 3:12-16), and see how this spirit characterizes it:" Put on, therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering; forbearing one another, and forgiving one another:. . . even as Christ for gave you, so also do ye."How little reason have we to complain, if God has given us an opportunity to develop and exhibit such things, and in this follow and glorify our common Master! Trial this means, of course:what else? But the trial of a faith more precious than of gold, that it may be found to praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ. A trial which now works patience, and patience experience, and experience hope.

The world is a wilderness; and just the good of it is that it is a wilderness. To the men of the world it is not that, but an Egypt, through which the judgments of God sweep indeed and desolate it, but leave it Egypt still. To the redeemed it is a wilderness; but as that, not orderless, not meaningless, not unfruitful; but whose harvests are reaped for eternity, and whose harvest-song is sung in heaven.