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TOPIC: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks on Personal Problems (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: 35. In Step with God.
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In Step with God.
And God is unhurried; though our word for it is " slow.'' We say slow because the fever of sin is in our blood, and sends us down the road on a rush. All life is fevered. The heart beats faster than normal; the temperature is too high; the eyes have an unnatural brightness; the nerves are strung up dangerously near to a break. And all the time breaks are happening. But the fever seems to intensify.
Man calls nature slow. The growth of the trees, the passing of the year through its seasons— we call these things slow. But nature reveals God. It tells both of Himself, and of His method of work. Nature seems slow because of this riot of fever in our blood. Nature is normal; the other is abnormal, not true to nature.
I suppose the insects at our feet, if they could think, would probably think our movements very slow. How long it must seem that a man's foot stays on the ground when he is walking, even walking fast. The ant down there can scurry along several times its own length while that foot remains unmoved. But the length of the foot's stay on one spot tells of the size of the body it is holding up and swinging forward.
God's movements seem so slow to us. His march through history, the coming of justice to the weak and oppressed, the shining of light in the dark places—all this has so often been called slow. God is so big, so great. He is moving steadily on. The apparent slowness only spells out the greatness of His size and of His plans. It takes time to swing great things forward. Time is but a hyphen between two eternities. God lives and moves in eternity. He breathes in the atmosphere of greatness.
We are too apt to play the part of the ants scurrying hastily, hurriedly, breathlessly along, and when we do look up, if we do, think how slow that One up there does seem. But in this we are not true to our real selves. We are like God. We belong to eternity more than to time. It is this fever that's bothering us. Man needs the soothing, controlling touch of God ever upon his life if the fever is to go, and never to return.
God is unhurried. He is keenly watching; never indifferent. He is accurate; never missing the mark of His purpose. He is prompt; never ahead of time, and never late. Man was made in the image of God. As he turns his face full up to God, and breathes in slowly and fully his native air again, he will rise again into the fine self-mastery promised for him.
But unhurried does not mean slow, nor indifferent, nor sleepy. It means the measured, onward movement of a great spirit with a great purpose and limitless power behind.
The other word for unhurriedness is patience. Nothing reveals strength more than patience, the power to hold still while waiting. Nothing disturbs much fine planning of good people more than the lack of patience. We are all children in our impatience. Patience is the most Godlike quality that man can have. It has keen eyes, and quick ears, and a warm heart; it means seeing keenly, and feeling deeply and acutely, yet holding still until the fullness of time has come for action.
Self-mastery is keeping step with God. Not running ahead of Him, nor lagging behind Him, but going at His pace. We miss much of what He is saying to us because we don't keep His pace, and stay alongside. We lose the immense uplift of seeing His great plans and far-reaching movements in our feverish haste to do things for Him. Self-mastery means keeping His pace. It is unhurried.