Had God left Israel to choose their path from Egypt to Canaan, they would, we may rest assured, never have chosen the way He led them. But it was His way, the right, the only right way _ a slow, tedious journey of forty years, suited to the slow, fleshly hearts of a people who required all this time, with its numerous lessons, to learn how evil they were, and how good, and patient, and holy, was their God.

And all this is a life-picture of what the history of every child of God is:a lovely beginning, full of new affections and joys; a song of praises, as the Red Sea of judgment delivers us forever from the bondage of Egypt; a delightful sense of His tabernacling Presence; and then weary marches, long and trying stops, where progress seems at an end; and even backward journeys, as if to make their hearts hopeless.

All this is to learn self, and grow sick enough of it to find that "Christ is all." What an important end this must have, to call out such dealings of our God and Father with us!

May we be in communion with Him, and thus learn our lesson in such a way as to reap at the end all He would have us reap!

(From ‘Help and Food’)

FRAGMENT "They forgot God their Saviour, which had done great things in Egypt; wondrous works in the land of Ham, and terrible things by the Red Sea….They despised the pleasant land, they believed not His word."

FRAGMENT ‘How oft did they provoke Him in the wilderness, and grieve Him in the desert! Yea, they turned back and tempted God, and limited the Holy One of Israel. "

FRAGMENT The ways of the Lord are right, and the just shall walk in them:but the transgressor shall fail therein."