Songs in the Night / By: William Taylor
who gives songs in the night (Job 35:10b)
Today's Scripture & Insight:
Job 35:5-13
5 Look up at the heavens and see; gaze at the clouds so high above you.
6 If you sin, how does that affect him? If your sins are many, what does that do to him?
7 If you are righteous, what do you give to him, or what does he receive from your hand?
8 Your wickedness only affects humans like yourself, and your righteousness only other people.
9 “People cry out under a load of oppression; they plead for relief from the arm of the powerful.
10 But no one says, ‘Where is God my Maker, who gives songs in the night,
11 who teaches us more than he teaches[a] the beasts of the earth and makes us wiser than[b] the birds in the sky?’
12 He does not answer when people cry out because of the arrogance of the wicked.
13 Indeed, God does not listen to their empty plea; the Almighty pays no attention to it.
Sometimes, God likes to keep us temporarily trapped in trials and afflictions. The harder we struggle, the more the shackles will be tightened around us.
The impatient horse which will not quietly endure his halter only strangles himself in his stall. The high-mettled animal that is restive in the yoke only galls his shoulders; and every one will understand the difference between the restless starling of which Sterne has written, breaking its wings against the bars of the cage, and crying, "I can't get out, I can't get out," and the docile canary that sits upon its perch and sings as if it would outrival the lark soaring to heaven's gate.
No calamity can be to us an unmixed evil if we carry it in direct and fervent prayer to God, for even as one in taking shelter from the rain beneath a tree may find on its branches fruit which he looked not for, so we in fleeing for refuge beneath the shadow of God's wing, will always find more in God than we had seen or known before.
It is thus through our trials and afflictions that God gives us fresh revelations of Himself; and the Jabbok ford leads to Peniel, where, as the result of our wrestling, we "see God face to face," and our lives are preserved. Take this to thyself, O captive, and He will give thee "songs in the night," and turn for thee "the shadow of death into the morning." --William Taylor
"Submission to the divine will is the softest pillow on which to recline."
Today’s Hymns: I Turn To You
God Is There
Scripture to Respond: Psalm 32:9-11
9 Do not be like the horse or the mule, which have no understanding but must be controlled by bit and bridle or they will not come to you.
10 Many are the woes of the wicked, but the LORD’s unfailing love surrounds the one who trusts in him.
11 Rejoice in the LORD and be glad, you righteous; sing, all you who are upright in heart!
Psalm 42:8
By day the LORD directs his love, at night his song is with me— a prayer to the God of my life.
Reflection: Believers in every age are prone to sufferings. How would you rely on God’s teaching and promises to stand firm to the end?
Prayer: Although I am faced with afflictions and struggles, I am willing to trust in your promises and be submissive to your guidance.
Wong Wai Tung
(Chief executive officer of The Great Wall Education Foundation) & Sam Chow
(Administrative officer of The Great Wall Education Foundation) Reflection and prayer translated by Jenny Hung
