Morning “For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations,

like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the

earth.” Amos 9:9

 Every sifting comes by divine command and permission. Satan must ask leave

before he can lay a finger upon Job. Nay, more, in some sense our siftings are

directly the work of heaven, for the text says, “I will sift the house of

Israel.” Satan, like a drudge, may hold the sieve, hoping to destroy the corn;

but the overruling hand of the Master is accomplishing the purity of the grain

by the very process which the enemy intended to be destructive. Precious, but

much sifted corn of the Lord’s floor, be comforted by the blessed fact that the

Lord directeth both flail and sieve to his own glory, and to thine eternal

profit.  

The Lord Jesus will surely use the fan which is in his hand, and will divide the

precious from the vile. All are not Israel that are of Israel; the heap on the

barn floor is not clean provender, and hence the winnowing process must be

performed. In the sieve true weight alone has power. Husks and chaff being

devoid of substance must fly before the wind, and only solid corn will remain.

 Observe the complete safety of the Lord’s wheat; even the least grain has a

promise of preservation. God himself sifts, and therefore it is stern and

terrible work; he sifts them in all places, “among all nations”; he sifts them

in the most effectual manner, “like as corn is sifted in a sieve”; and yet for

all this, not the smallest, lightest, or most shrivelled grain, is permitted to

fall to the ground. Every individual believer is precious in the sight of the

Lord, a shepherd would not lose one sheep, nor a jeweller one diamond, nor a

mother one child, nor a man one limb of his body, nor will the Lord lose one of

his redeemed people. However little we may be, if we are the Lord’s, we may

 rejoice that we are preserved in Christ Jesus.

 

Evening “Straightway they forsook their nets, and followed him.” Mark 1:18

 When they heard the call of Jesus, Simon and Andrew obeyed at once without

demur. If we would always, punctually and with resolute zeal, put in practice

what we hear upon the spot, or at the first fit occasion, our attendance at the

means of grace, and our reading of good books, could not fail to enrich us

spiritually. He will not lose his loaf who has taken care at once to eat it,

neither can he be deprived of the benefit of the doctrine who has already acted

upon it. Most readers and hearers become moved so far as to purpose to amend;

but, alas! the proposal is a blossom which has not been knit, and therefore no

fruit comes of it; they wait, they waver, and then they forget, till, like

 the ponds in nights of frost, when the sun shines by day, they are only thawed

in time to be frozen again. That fatal to-morrow is blood-red with the murder of

fair resolutions; it is the slaughter-house of the innocents. We are very

concerned that our little book of “Evening Readings” should not be fruitless,

and therefore we pray that readers may not be readers only, but doers, of the

word. The practice of truth is the most profitable reading of it. Should the

reader be impressed with any duty while perusing these pages, let him hasten to

fulfil it before the holy glow has departed from his soul, and let him leave his

nets, and all that he has, sooner than be found rebellious to the

 Master’s call. Do not give place to the devil by delay! Haste while opportunity

and quickening are in happy conjunction. Do not be caught in your own nets, but

break the meshes of worldliness, and away where glory calls you. Happy is the

writer who shall meet with readers resolved to carry out his teachings: his

harvest shall be a hundredfold, and his Master shall have great honour. Would to

God that such might be our reward upon these brief meditations and hurried

hints. Grant it, O Lord, unto thy servant!