GOD hems me in!
(Alexander Smellie, "The Secret Place" 1907)
restrained HIS servant from doing evil."
1 Samuel 25:39
Even when my heart is resolute in its
pursuit of iniquity, GOD hampers and
hinders its unholy determination.
Mercifully, that HE may halt
me in my fatal course--
HE raises one barrier after another.
For example, there is HIS written Word.
In lands like India and China, there are
peoples with intellects and emotions
and aspirations as manifold and
high-soaring as mine.
Yet numbers among them are abandoned
to the shameless vices of paganism--
vices to which, with all my folly and
wrong-doing, I do not succumb.
Why am I morally better--
why am I less openly wicked, than they?
It is because GOD'S Word is in my hands.
It is because the truth of JESUS permeates
the atmosphere I breathe, and leavens
the world in which I live and move and
have my being. GOD hems me in, and
I cannot so easily and so foully transgress.
And there is HIS living SPIRIT. HE acts on
mind and will and conscience and affections.
Often HE snatches me from the brink of
the abyss, and from the jaws of the grave.
HE quenches my defiling thoughts.
HE rebukes my vain imaginations.
HE reins in my sinful passions as with
bit and bridle. HE prevents me from
the commission of much that is unworthy.
And there is HIS watchful providence.
GOD is so constantly and busily at work
in my biography, that it is difficult for me
to sin scandalously. HE places me in
the midst of a great multitude of sobering
and restraining influences:
the just laws of the country,
the social restraints of culture,
my godly friends,
the appealing voices of my home,
the wholesome chastisements
of my FATHER in Heaven.
By these, and by many other restraints
and constraints, the LORD WHO is
the Lover of my soul stops me when
I would run recklessly on to spiritual ruin!
I cannot thank HIM enough for
the whole array of HIS fences--
where would I have been without them?
I cannot hate enough the evil things which
HE hates. And, by HIS grace enabling me,
let me set about speaking and doing
the things which are pleasing to HIM.
have you, that he might sift you like wheat--
but I have prayed for you that your faith
may not fail." Luke 22:31-32
O LORD, held me up!" Psalm 94:18
and they follow ME. I give them eternal
life, and they will never perish--ever!
No one will snatch them out of MY hand!"
John 10:27-28
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