I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary. REVELATION 2:2–3

Our Lord took His apostles aside when they were fatigued, and said, “Let us rest awhile.” He never drove His overtired faculties. When tired, He “sat down by the well.” He used to go and rest in the home of Martha and Mary after the fatigue of working in Jerusalem. The Scripture shows it was His custom. He tells us all—you, and me, and all—to let tomorrow take care of itself, and merely to meet the evil of the present day.

As Elijah slept under a juniper tree, an angel touched him and said, “Arise and eat” (1 Kings 19:5 KJV). God had sent His wearied servant to sleep. In his overwrought condition sleep was his greatest need, and it is precisely under such conditions that sleep is often wooed in vain. Are we ever astonished at the miracle of sleep? Remember you have to do with the same God who ministered to Elijah, and Though thy way be long and dreary, Eagle strength He’ll still renew.

Real foresight consists in reserving our own forces. If we labor with anxiety about the future, we destroy that strength which will enable us to meet the future. If we take more in hand now than we can well do, we break up, and the work is broken up with us.

Bakers of bread for others to eat must be very careful to husband their strength. They are not much seen, but much felt; unknown multitudes would feel their loss, and their failing means others famishing.

We need to take lessons of Sir William Cecil, once Lord Mayor of London. Upon throwing off his gown at night he would say to it, “Lay there, Lord Treasurer!” and forget all the cares of State until he resumed his official garb in the morning. THE GOLDEN MILESTONE

“Be still, and know” (Psalm 46:10)! The Hebrew word for still signifies more than quietness and meditation before God; it means to let the tension go out of our life, just as the great cable holds in place the great steamer until the vessel reaches its channel and can go with its own steam. JOHN TIMOTHY STONE