Call Back

If you have gone a little way ahead of me, call back--
'Twill cheer my heart and help my feet along the stony track;
And if, perchance, Faith's light is dim, because the oil is low,
Your call will guide my lagging course as wearily I go.

Call back, and tell me that He went with you into the storm;
Call back, and say He kept you when the forest's roots were torn;
That, when the heavens thunder and the earthquake shook the hill,
He bore you up and held you where the very air was still.

Oh, friend, call back, and tell me for I cannot see your your face,
They say it glows with triumph, and your feet bound in the race;
But there are mists between us and my spirit eyes are dim,
And I cannot see the glory, though I long for word of Him.

But if you'll say He heard you when your prayer was but a cry,
And if you'll say He saw you through the night's sin-darkened sky
If you have gone a little way ahead, oh, friend, call back--
'Twill cheer my heart and help my feet along the stony track. 

--Lettie Cowan

Life during the last 2 weeks

I was feeling guilty about my productivity since finals until I came across this. Ah, PhD comics - a reminder that I'm not alone.

Darkness

"Sometimes the darkness in our lives is worse, because we cannot even see the web we are weaving or understand what we are doing. Therefore we are unable to see any beauty or any possible good arising from our experience. Yet if we are faithful to forge ahead and 'if we do not give up' (Gal. 6:9), someday we will know that the most exquisite work of our lives was done during those days when it was the darkest."
     ~J. R. Miller


The shuttles of His purpose move
     To carry out His own design;
Seek not too soon to disapprove
     His work, nor yet assign
Dark motives, when, with silent tread,
     You view some somber fold;
For lo, within each darker thread
     There twines a thread of gold.
                ~from Canadian Home Journal

Peace in the Storm

There is a peace that springs soon after sorrow,
Of hope surrendered, not of hope fulfilled;
A peace that does not look upon tomorrow,
But calmly on the storm that it has stilled.

A peace that lives not now in joy's excesses,
Nor in the happy life of love secure;
But in the morning strength the heart possesses,
Of conflicts won while learning to endure.

A peace there is, in sacrifice secluded,
A life subdued, from will and passion free;
It's not the peace that over Eden brooded,
But that which triumphed in Gethsemane.

~Streams in the Desert, by Lettie Cowman

Obedience

I said: “Let me walk in the fields.”

He said: “No, walk in the town.”

I said: “There are no flowers there.”

He said: “No flowers, but a crown.”

I said: “But the skies are black;

There is nothing but noise and din.”

And He wept as He sent me back –

“There is more,” He said; “there is sin.”

I said: “But the air is thick,

And fogs are veiling the sun.”

He answered: “Yet souls are sick,

And souls in the dark undone!”

I said: “I shall miss the light,

And friends will miss me, they say.”

He answered: “Choose tonight

If I am to miss you or they.”

I pleaded for time to be given.

He said: “Is it hard to decide?

It will not seem so hard in heaven

To have followed the steps of your Guide.”

I cast one look at the fields,

Then set my face to the town;

He said, “My child, do you yield?

Will you leave the flowers for the crown?”

Then into His hand went mine;

And into my heart came He;

And I walk in a light divine,

The path I had feared to see.

~George MacDonald