Haggai 1:5 Now therefore thus said the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways. Lent is the season which our forefathers have appointed for us to consider and amend our ways, and to return, year by year, heart and soul to that Lord and Heavenly Father from whom we are daily wandering. We need a particular time in which we may sit down deliberately and look our own souls steadily in the face, and cast up our accounts with God, and be thoroughly ashamed and terrified at those accounts, when we find, as we shall, that we cannot answer God one thing in a thousand. The hurry and hustle of business is daily putting repentance and self-examination out of our heads. Much for which a man ought to pray, he forgets to pray for. Many sins and failings of which he ought to repent slip past him out of sight in the hurry of life. Much good that might be done is put off and laid by, often till it is too late. It may be said that the bustle will go on just as much in Lent as ever. "How can we give up more time to religion then than at other times?" There is a sound and true answer to this. It is not too much more time which you are asked to give up, as it is more heart. The time will come when you will see yourselves in a true light; when your soul will not seem a mere hanger-on to your body, but you will find that you are your soul. Then there will be no forgetting that you have souls, and thrusting them into the background, to be fed at odd minutes, or left to starve, — no more talk of giving up time to the care of your souls; your souls will take the time for themselves then — and the eternity too; they will be all in all to you then, perhaps when it is too late! Then try, for this brief Lenten season: the plan which the Lord of heaven and earth advises, and seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. You need not be idle a moment more in Lent than at any other time. You can get ten minutes more in the morning, and tea at night. When there is a will there is a way. Then make up your minds that there shall be a will. Examine yourself and your doings. Ask yourself, "Am I going forward or back?" Can we not all find time this Lent to throw over these sins of ours, — to confess them with shame and sorrow, — and to try like men to shake them off? (C. Kingsley, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: Now therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways.WEB: Now therefore this is what Yahweh of Armies says: Consider your ways. |
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