Again and again we have gone to that town, but to-day those men go round that tree, and to-day that town is a fort unwon.
Petra, I have called it; the word stands for many a town walled in as that one is. In Keith's Evidence of Prophecy there is a map of Petra, the old strong city of Edom, and in studying it a light fell upon David's question concerning it, and his own triumphant answer, "Who will lead me into the strong city? Who will bring me into Edom? Wilt not Thou, O God?" for the map shows the mountains all round except at the East, where they break into a single narrow passage, the one way in. There was only one way in, but there was that one way in!
Here is a town walled up to heaven by walls of Caste and bigotry, but there must be one way in. Here is a soul walled all round by utter indifference and pride, but there must be one way in.
"Who will lead me into the strong city? Who will bring me into Edom? Wilt not Thou, O God?"
CHAPTER XIII
Death by Disuse
"There is a strong tendency to look upon the Atonement of Christ as possessing some quality by virtue of which God can excuse and overlook sin in the Christian, a readiness to look upon sinning as the inevitable accompaniment of human nature 'until death do us part,' and to look upon Christianity as a substitute for rather than a cause of personal holiness of life."
Rev. I. W. Charlton, India.