ROM. Viii. 28. “We know that all things work together for good to
them that love God.”

THE incarnation of the Son of God is the highest expres-
sion of that love which presides, although not always
visibly, in nature and in history. Here is the fact, here
is the faith, which makes us certain that everything is
ordered for the good of the servants of God. If “God so
loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son,” it
is not difficult to believe our text.
I. All things are working together for God’s glory.
“The Lord hath made all things for Himself,” and volun-
tarily or reluctantly, consciously or unconsciously, all things
work together for Him. He would not be God if it could
be otherwise.
II. The good of them that love Him is the object of
God’s providence. This is not a presumptuous idea on the
part of God’s servants. God’s greatness is not inconsis-
tent with His lavishing the very treasures of His thought
upon the least considerable things in Nature, and we
believe that “Like as a father pitieth his children, so is the
Lord merciful unto them that fear Him.”
The Apostle does not mean by “good,” material visible
prosperity in this present life. Success in life is not linked
to the love of God in the majority of cases. But it is real,
absolute, eternal good—the good of the soul rather than
of the body. The misfortunes and disappointments which
await those who love God here are so far from falsifying
the Apostle’s statement, that they illustrate its truth. The
love of God can transform all circumstances into blessings.
The soul which loves the imperishable can never be doomed
to a real disappointment. Earthly misfortunes do but in-
tensify its hold upon the one great source of happiness.
The very same set of circumstances may chisel out the
finest lineaments in the saintly character, or the darkest
traits of the desperate criminal. That which makes the
mighty, the infinite difference, is the presence or the
absence of the love of God in the soul.
Henry Parry Liddon, D.C.L.