"Salvation is of the LORD." -Jonah 2:9

"And David spake unto the L ORD when he saw the angel that smote the people, and said, Lo! I have sinned, and I have done wickedly; but these sheep, what have they done? " -II Samuel 24:17  [KJV] My soul! here is a subject of an heart-searching nature opened to thee this evening, in those expostulating words of the man after God's own heart. Summon up all thy faculties to the meditation; and yet, infinitely more than this, seek the teaching of the Holy Ghost, that thou mayest profit by them. The apostle was commissioned by the Holy Ghost to tell the church, that for man's sin the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. The slaughter of every beast, the sacrifice of every lamb, proclaimeth with a louder voice than words can declare, the baleful malignity of human transgression. And if David, when he saw the destroying angel brandishing his dreadful sword over Jerusalem, felt remorse in the recollection of his own sin, and the punishment fal

"Lord, all my desire is before Thee; and my groaning is not hid from Thee." - Psalm 38:9 [KJV] Many of the Lord's people cannot clearly read their names in the book of life; many are the doubts and fears that work in their bosom whether the Lord really has begun a work of grace upon their souls, and whether they truly are among the Lord's living family. But this thing they must know— whether at times and seasons they can lie in humility at the footstool of mercy, and appeal to a heart-searching God— "All my desire is before Thee."   They must know whether they ever fell down in humility and brokenness of heart before the divine Majesty, and felt these living desires going out of their bosom into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth; and whether they can, with honesty, uprightness, and godly sincerity, say to the Lord in the language before us, "O Lord, all my desire is before Thee."   "Thou seest my heart, and knowest everything that passes in my