Genesis 24:1-67

I go back often to Genesis 24 for the illustration and the figure in the Old Testament reminding us of the adornments of grace and beauty that will mark the believing Body of Christ. Abraham sent his trusted servant to his former homeland to select a bride for Isaac. The adornment of Rebekah's beauty consisted of jewels and the raiment that came as gifts of love from the bridegroom whom she had not yet seen. It is a reminder of what God is doing in...

For Reading and Meditation:     Ruth 2:3

We spend another day considering how Ruth finds herself gleaning a field which belonged to Boaz, not by chance but by divine guidance. Eliezer, Abraham's servant, you remember, experienced similar leading when he went to search for a bride for Isaac: "I being in the way, the Lord led me" (

Very admirable was his occupation. If those who spend so many hours in idle company, light reading, and useless pastimes, could learn wisdom, they would find more profitable society and more interesting engagements in meditation than in the vanities which now have such charms for them. We should all know more, live nearer to God, and grow in grace, if we were more alone. Meditation chews the cud and extracts the real nutriment from the mental food gathered elsewhere. When Jesus is the...

Just as Abraham's servant had a sense of urgency in connection with his mission, so should we. This does not mean we must race around in all directions at once. It does not mean that we must do everything in nervous haste. But it does mean that we should give ourselves to the task before us as a matter of top priority.

We should adopt the attitude expressed in Robert Frost's lines:

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,

But I have promises to keep

And miles to go before...

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my strength and my Redeemer.When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained, what is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You visit him? § The works of the Lord are great, studied by all who have pleasure in them.Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of...