SHE was a little girl of seven years, and the proud possessor of a patch in the garden to which she devoted much attention.
One day she went to purchase seed in order that she might have some pretty flowers. The kindly seedsman said to her, “Do not put in the seed at present. We have had so much rain that the soil is very wet, and if you sow now your seed will rot, and it will be lost.”
When she returned home she told her mother, who said. “That was good advice, be sure to keep the seed until the ground is in better condition, and do not put it in for some time.”
The little girl however became impatient and one day she dug up the earth and put in the seed. No sooner had she done so than her conscience smote her. She told her mother, and she reproved her, saying she had disregarded the advice of the seedsman; had disobeyed mother; and that the seed would simply be lost. Feeling sore at heart the poor little girl wept.
Some weeks after, mother happened to be in the garden, passed this corner, and, to her delight, saw flowers peeping through. Calling her little girl she exclaimed, “See dearie! You are going to have pretty flowers after all! “Miss Seven-years-old surveyed the ground, saw that what mother had told her was true, and then said: “A WASTED WEEP!”
As her mother told us this we thought how many “Wasted Weeps” we Christians have in our life! That which saps the juice out of our life; increases gray hairs; adds to the furrows; and, it may be, shortens the life of many is just — Wasted Weeps. It is said that we worry most about the things that never happen. This is not a new disease. It evidently obtained when Christ was upon earth. He said―
“Take no thought for your life,”
“Consider the ravens,”
“How much more are ye better than the fowls?”
“Consider the lilies,”
“O ye of little faith” (Luke 12:22-30),
and the Holy Spirit has caused to be written.
“Be careful for nothing: but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus” (Phil. 4:6, 7).
“The peace of God” is to be preferred rather than worry, and is the sure preventive of “Wasted Weeps.” Worry and weeping, care and anxiety are God-dishonoring, peace-robbing, misery-producing, and are the work of the enemy. Confidence, obedience, quiet waiting, unquestioning trust, are grateful to our God, and produce that peace in our hearts that nothing can disturb.
We know there are some people so constituted that it seems impossible for them to do other than worry. The Lord is very gracious, kind and considerate: — “For He knoweth our frame; He remembereth that we are dust” (Psa. 103:14). Yet He would seek so to comfort us, to assure us and to encourage us, that His grace triumphing in us, we might be rendered superior to all this, and that His peace might fill our heart. Shall we ask Him so to take us in hand, and so to work in us “both to will and to do of His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13), that instead of having constantly to lament “A WASTED WEEP,” we shall go happily on our way singing: —
“Trusting as the moments fly,
Trusting as the days go by,
Trusting Him whate’er befall,
TRUSTING JESUS, THAT IS ALL.”
W. Bramwell Dick.