Editor's Letters

by T. Austin-Sparks

February 1928

Beloved of our Lord,

In times of fiercest trial we have to fall back upon the sure fact that His love never faileth.

After all, faith is not a dogma but the trust we have in a Person, and though we may think we have travelled beyond Job, there is no grander word than, "I know that my Redeemer liveth."

And if we also know this with all the added light of Calvary to cheer us, is not Paul's assertion just suited for the hour of the enemy's most cruel pressure and raging; "I know in whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day."

There come hours when we can only hang on to His faithfulness to see us through. But is not this faith? We simply trust with our eyes fixed on a Person - Jesus. He said, "If it were not so I would have told you," and our tried hearts whisper back, "Thank you, truest Lord, whose blood seals Your love, I trust Your word."

This may not seem like a conquering faith, for it is not faith in its shouting mood; yet one would say it is faith at its best, faith in the dark, faith hanging on with just the grip of an unalterable trust that Jesus is Jesus, God is God. It is faith's fortitude, and out of its trial shall emerge the satisfaction of proving God even as He also proves us. He proves true, and by His grace we prove true also.

We do not want Him to come saying "Wherefore didst thou doubt?"

Wherefore "Stand fast in the Lord," beloved. He is the Rock. Who was it said, "I have often trembled on the Rock, but the Rock never trembled under me"? But we would say "Even when my faith is small, trusting Jesus, that is all." But it is ALL!

Yours in the same spirit of faith,
T. Austin-Sparks,
T. Madoc-Jeffreys.