THE RAINBOW IN THE CLOUDS

This Sunday's service was great, as Ryan preached through Philemon 1-16. Ryan will be putting the notes up here as well as on the Facebook page for Hill Country Church. The facility at Spray Lakes is looking good, we checked on the video component of the room and it works great. We are down to one final week before we meet officially at Spray Lakes on September 4th. We will be running through our order of worship and looking at the design and set-up on that day, but we will be holding a service. We will update as we move forward.

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THE RAINBOW IN THE CLOUDS

By John MacDuff

"Whenever I bring clouds over the earth — and the rainbow appears in the clouds." Genesis 9:14

SOVEREIGNTY

"The Lord reigns!" Psalm 93:1

No rainbow of promise in the "dark and cloudy day" shines more radiantly than this. God, my God, the God who gave Jesus — orders all events, and overrules all for my good! "When I," says He, "send clouds over the earth." He has no wish to conceal the hand whichshadows for a time earth's brightest prospects. It is He alike who "brings the cloud," who brings us into it, and in mercy leads usthrough it! His kingdom rules over all. "The lot is cast into the lap — but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord." He puts the burden on, and keeps it on — and at His own time will remove it!

Beware of brooding over second causes. It is the worst form of atheism! When our most fondly cherished gourds are smitten; ourfairest flowers lie withered in our bosom; this is the silencer of all reflections: "The Lord prepared the worm!" When the temple of the soul is smitten with lightning, and its pillars rent: "The Lord is in His holy temple!" Accident, chance, fate, destiny — have no place in the Christian's creed. He is no unpiloted vessel left to the mercy of the storm. "The voice of the Lord is upon the waters!" There is but one explanation of all that befalls him: "I will be silent, I will not open my mouth, because You are the One who has done this!"

Death seems to the human spectator, the most capricious and severe of all events. But not so! The keys of Death and Hell are in the hands of this same reigning God! Look at the parable of the fig-tree. Its prolonged existence, or its doom as a cumberer, forms matter of conversation in Heaven; the axe cannot be laid at its root — until God gives the warrant! How much more will this be the case regarding every "Tree of Righteousness, the planting of the Lord?" It will be watched over by Him, "Lest anyone hurt it." Every trembling fiber — He will care for; and if made early to succumb to the inevitable stroke, "Who does not know — that in all these things, that the hand of the Lord has wrought this." Be it mine to merge my own will in His; not to cavil at His ways, or to seek to have one jot or tittle of His will altered; but to lie passive in His hands; to take the bitter as well as the sweet, knowing that the bitter cup is mingled by One who loves me too well to add one bitter ingredient that might have been spared!

Who can wonder that the sweet Psalmist of Israel should seek, as he sees it spanning the lower heavens, to fix the arrested gaze of a whole world on the softened tints of this Rainbow of Comfort, "The Lord reigns — let the earth rejoice!"

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Macduff, John Ross, D.D., second son of Alexander Macduff, of Bonhard, near Perth, was born at Bonhard, May 23, 1818. After studying at the University of Edinburgh, he became in 1842 parish minister of Kettins, Forfarshire, in 1849 of St. Madoes, Perthshire, and in 1855 of Sandyford, Glasgow. He received the degree of D.D. from the University of Glasgow in 1862, and about the same time also from the University of New York. He retired from pastoral work in 1871, lived at Chislehurst, Kent and died in 1887. He has published many practical and devotional works which have attained a wide circulation. In 1857 he was appointed by the General Assembly a member of their Hymnal Committee. His 31 hymns appeared in his Altar Stones, 1853, and were also included with his later poems in his The Gates of Praise, 1876. (taken from hymnary.org)