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

  "I saw in the visions of my head upon my bed, and behold, a Watcher, and an Holy One came down from heaven."  -Daniel 4:13 [KJV] See my soul, that which terrified the impious monarch in his visions of the night, ought to be to thee a subject of holy joy! When Jesus proclaims "the day of vengeance which is in his heart;" he adds also, "the year of My redeemed is come!" A day is enough for destruction; a year, yea, an everlasting year, will not be too long to make His people happy. But what a striking character is this of "a Watcher, and an Holy One!"   To whom but to Jesus can it possibly refer? Jesus, at the call of God His Father, stood up from everlasting, to watch over His church, to water it every moment; yea, to keep it night and day least any hurt it. And who shall describe in how many ways the Lord Jesus is for ever performing this blessed office, and hath been, and will be to all eternity? Is He not for ever in the midst of them, to do

  "That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ."   -I Peter 1:7 [KJV] Trials and temptations are the means which God employs to manifest to the soul the reality and strength of the faith which He bestows upon it; for there is in every trial and temptation opposition made to the faith that is in the heart; and every trial and temptation, so to speak, threaten the life of faith. And they threaten it in this way. Under the trial God for the most part hides Himself. He puts forth, indeed, a secret power whereby the soul is held up, or otherwise it would sink into utter despair, and be overcome and swallowed up by the power of unbelief. Hence comes the conflict between the trial that fights against the faith and the faith which fights against or rather under the trial.   Now, when in this trial, in this sharp conflict, in this hot f