God's unknown ways.
"Thy footsteps were not known;" that is, they were not known or understood beforehand. They were not, they could not have been, anticipated. It is said that "the unexpected is the thing that happens." And so it is in connection with the ways of God. Man can but seldom find out the Almighty intent. God's "ways are higher than our ways, and his thoughts than our thoughts." The life of a godly man is full of the "surprises of grace;" and so he is taught lessons of trust. Recall the scene on the Egyptian side of the Red Sea. Observe that such were the hopeless features of the situation, that a way of rescue never came to the minds of any of the leaders. They must "stand still, and see the salvation of God;" and to the surprise of every one, his way proved to be "in the sea, and his path in the great waters." Of God's ways with his people, three things may be said.
I. EXPERIENCE CANNOT SUGGEST THEM. We fall back on our experience to guide our conduct under new circumstances. What happened before will explain what is happening now. But the sphere of human experiences is strictly limited. Men never do things that somebody has not done before them. "There has no temptation taken us but such as is common to man." But God is under no limitation to the circle of human experiences. He does, he is constantly doing, new things. Life forevery one of us is like the story of the children of Israel, full of Divine surprises, and we are never "straitened in God." Illustrations may be taken from Old Testament history, in which God delivered his people in ways which experience could not have suggested.
II. THOUGHT CANNOT ANTICIPATE THEM. "It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps." In a similar way, show how man's thought is limited by man's limited knowledge. No man has compassed the entire circle of Divine possibilities. The man who knows most must say, "These are parts of his ways." So man has not the material for deciding what God will be sure to do in any given case.
III. TRUST CAN ALWAYS WAIT FOR THEM, sure that God will unfold them in the best times and in the best ways. God's people are as safe as Israel at the Red Sea. God's unknown way for them will be revealed to them in good time.—R.T.