Streams in the Desert

Devotional For

August 14

      Hold on Until the End
      
      "We are made partaker of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end" (Heb. 3:14).
      
      It is the last step that wins; and there is no place in the pilgrim's progress where so many dangers lurk as the region that lies hard by the portals of the Celestial City. It was there that Doubting Castle stood. It was there that the enchanted ground lured the tired traveler to fatal slumber. It is when Heaven's heights are full in view that hell's gate is most persistent and full of deadly peril. "Let us not be weary in well doing, for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." "So run, that ye may obtain."
      
      In the bitter waves of woe
      Beaten and tossed about
      By the sullen winds that blow
      From the desolate shores of doubt,
      Where the anchors that faith has cast
      Are dragging in the gale,
      I am quietly holding fast
      To the things that cannot fail.
      
      And fierce though the fiends may fight,
      And long though the angels hide,
      I know that truth and right
      Have the universe on their side;
      And that somewhere beyond the stars
      Is a love that is better than fate.
      When the night unlocks her bars
      I shall see Him--and I will wait.
      --Washington Gladden
      
      The problem of getting great things from God is being able to hold on for the last half hour. --Selected