What does the Lord require of
you? by Alexander Smiley from On the
Secret Place 1907 What does the Lord require of
you? To act justly and love mercy
and walk humbly with your God. Micah chapter 6 verse 8 Simplicity
and comprehensiveness mark the requirements of my God. He can
abbreviate His demands into the fewest words, but they are words
which embrace the inward and outward, the present and future,
the earthly and the heavenly. I may fall into serious error
regarding His will for me. It is not a religion of ritual
observances which He requires. How easily I attach an undue
importance to ceremonies and forms, rites and penances and
fasts. Nor does he solicit primarily
a religion of external moralities. God looks on my heart. Nor is it a religion of emotions
of which he is in quest. I must not put excitement and
tears in the place of saving grace and childlike obedience. But see, my soul, God asks us
to act justly. I cannot be His unless I do justly. Everything that takes an improper
advantage of another, and all that departs from the straightest
line of absolute rectitude, I must hate and abjure. It is a demand
which pierces deeper than it seems, for the integrity of conduct
he desires is the outcome only of a conscience he has quickened. and a will he has bent into submission
to his law. The ethics of the gospel are
preceded and rendered possible by the redemption and regeneration
of the gospel. And God asks tenderness. He counsels me to love mercy. The world is full of sorrow,
and I am to move through it as a good physician, befriending
and uplifting those in need. It is what He does Himself. Every
glorious quality has its fountain in Him, but preeminently the
quality of mercy. He is the great forgiver and
the great helper. No earthly father loves like
Him, and no mother is half so mild. So my feeble torch is but
kindled at His altar. My charities and philanthropies
must be learned in His school, who pardons my ten thousand transgressions. And God asks humility. He commands me to lay my hand
in His and to walk humbly in His company. Nothing is so essential
as poverty of spirit. It is the source and spring from
which alone runs the fertilizing river of a holy life. The humble
heart is where the flowers of heaven find their congenial soil
and grow into beauty and fragrance. I only begin to be a disciple
when my proud heart is brought low and my Savior is lifted high. Now, my father, if these are
to be the features of my soul, then it is manifest that none
but you can create them and can nurture them and can lead them
to their perfection. Do the work, Lord, and have the
glory. you