Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1913-01-22

selves, may be the actual within us, strug-
Cling to get its realization. Born with
various capacities and characters to be
formed, God knows all we are.
! We wonder at our surroundings, tenn
tations and dispositions and do not under
stand why we are not like others, who
seem to rise above their temptations and
conquer their circumstances. But each
as an individual must live his own life to
show some particular manifestation OF
| Gods life. And He knows. He knows
our temptations, our sins and victories,
our struggles and falls, our cropping after
the best, OF our abiding purpose and our
/ prayers. He calls us, knowing US. He
| calls us as we are to an obedience to His
life within. Do not be afraid to answer as
He calls.
Again, God sees not alone the life that
! is but the life that is possible for us,
Abraham was far from righteous when he
was called, but God saw the possible
righteousness in him. Past the deceit
and lying, past the testing and the victory,
God saw the glorifod life. With God
there is no future. Things that are be-
fore US are all alive and actual now with
Him.
God saw the king in David. 1t was a
simple shepherd lad whom Samuel an
| nointed but God saw past the growth,
the failure, the sins, the murder, to man
after his own heart.
God saw the man OF rock, unmovabIe,
unterrified in the impulsive, wavering
Peter. 1t took many days Of companion
| ship with the steadfast Christ, many
hours Of inner struggle, many tears in
secret, before the Peter showed itself in
the man. But God saw.
God saw an immortal dreamer in the
cheap tinker. But John Bunyan did not
fail.
The unseen to man is the real to God.
1t is not enough, then, that We have our
own high ideas, that we live the best we
know. We must have His ideas, and live
the best He knows.
Iou have seen men with proud step and
confident air and patronizing tone. They
have attained their ideals. But did it
never occur to them that a man who has
reached his ideal and is satisfied that
nothing more is before him, must have
had an earth bound ideal? man may
build as he may SET and men may say and
think he has done we'll, and still he has
not reached what God saw as possible for
MIN.
Each has his own particular mission, his
own possibilities. He may not judge
himself by others, that may be very in
adequate standard, nor by what he has
attained, but by what God sees he might
attain.
What we may be and do is in the mind
OF the Eternal.
This has its application for US, too, in
our thought of and work for others. We
see as We have the power OF seeing, and
God may see with very different eyes.
A young country lad wanted to unite
with the church. He was told not yet, as
he did not know enough of the Christian
life. By and by he came in. Good people
advised him not to speak in meeting, as
he made mistakes in grammar and people
were not edited by his words. People
saw a raw, country illiterate. God saw
the Moody IN him, whom we revere and
honor.
"Was anyone converted to-night?''
was asked OF preacher in London. No
one. Oh, yes; a little tow-headed boy.
The tow headed boy was all the preacher
saw. God saw Charles Spurgeon, one of
the greatest men of the world.
1t is not ours, then, to judge men but to
work that each may have his chance. 1t
is ours to know that God sees as we do not
see and knows what we do not know.
But the connecting link is not to be
left QUO. Abraham believed God, believed
God, had confidence in God. How much
faith? How much confidence? Enough
to obey God. Enough to cooperate with
God. 1t is of no use that man has plan
OF life il he does not carry it out. 1t is OF
less consequence that God has plan for
us if we are unwilling to obey, to CO.
operate with him in making it the reality.
'sThere is a divinity that shapes our ends,
rough hew them as we will" Yes, that IS
true, but it is also true that "we must work
out our own salvation, we must cooper
ate.
Prof. James, late of Harvard, has this
thought: suppose we had been at the
creation Of the world with God. He puts
before us the world, with it's possibilities,
not sure to be saved morally, or lost, hut
Just dependent on ourselves; a real
| struggle, real chance for it to rise or fall,
and Gods asks US if we would care to have
him create and we enter the struggle" In
the mind of Prof. James, this is real
problem, really the real problem that IS
before us to cooperate or not to cooper
ate with God in saving the world.
Some of the deep stories in life are
founded op this possibility. In THE
Masquerader", one rises and his double
goes down. There is a DIR. Jeekyi and