The Palm Tree Blessing

by William Edward Shepard

Does the reader still find himself flourishing like the palm tree? The perplexing and persecuting times will come more or less to all of us, and then how we will need the palm tree blessing!

Take the professor of religion minus the real possession, and let him be placed under the distressing ordeal of certain lines of adversity. Let him be cut with the cruel tongue of the talker, peeled with popular prejudice, girdled with the scalpel of the religious dissecter, crunched by cruel cannibals who love to devour one another, and see how quickly the spiritual sap ceases to flow. See how soon he withers and shrinks up and says, "What is the use of trying any more; I might as well give up my religion." He may not come out openly and above board and declare his intentions, but that is about the outcome. But see how it works on the palm tree saint, whose life is "hid with Christ in God." Drag him through the streets by the hair of his head as they did John Wesley; incarcerate him as they did John Bunyan; incinerate him as they did the martyrs of old; excommunicate him and revile him as they did some in our own day; ecclesiastically decapitate him and skin him alive and girdle him clear around, and then see him leap and dance, and sing and shout "Hallelujah! You can't hurt me, for I have the palm tree blessing, and my life is hidden inside." The sap flows right on, and, though the outside may be somewhat worse for the wear, yet the Christ-life within surmounts it all and shouts its victorious way over all obstacles.

Had the early saints not known this wonderful blessing, they surely would have failed in the struggles of life. Hear the Apostle Paul as he faces the guillotine block: "For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith; henceforth, there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing" (2 Tim. 4:6-8).

Hear the Apostle John on that dreary Isle of Patmos: "He that overcometh, shall inherit all things." "These are they which come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb."

See the martyrs all down the ages with an inner current of joy as they faced fagots, and with unfaltering step gave up their lives and flew to heaven in chariots of fire. There were no outside punishments that could cut off their life flow. It was hidden so deep that stripes, nor stocks, nor sword, nor stones, nor any other kind of affliction or infliction could reach its fountain head.

There are those of our present day who know by actual experience the joys of this inner, invulnerable gift. Had it not been for this, they would have been swept into the vortex of discouragement and despair long ago. O, the unspeakable joy of a life that is not superficial, but hidden so deep that the Devil's darts or any of his devices can not reach it!

How is it that sister can sing and smile when a thousand trials conspire to cut off the flow of holy joy? Because she has the palm tree blessing, and her life of devotion and blessing is not external where the things of earth can reach it.

When one murmurs and complains, and finds fault with environments and the things which would tend to annoy, let him know that he is living at the external, and does not know the joys of internal rest where these things do not intrude. Thank God for an inner current of holy life, which flows on, supplying the life more abundant and keeping the soul in blessed equipoise amidst the surging of life's storms.

So we see that the palm tree is endowed with an abundant life. Jesus said in John 10:10, "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." The palm tree is certainly a fine type or illustration of life more abundant. Now, if the Christian is to measure up alongside of this characteristic, then he must have that which Jesus meant by the more abundant life. It is not sufficient to have life in Christ; he must have it abundantly.

What is this life more abundant? Look at the schoolboys as they file out of school. They can scarcely contain themselves, having been pentup through the day. Some are yelling, some are running and some are manifesting their life in other ways. They seem to have more than they know what to do with. Look at the stall-fed calf. See it gamboling over the meadow. Notice the lambs frisk and frolic. Every action signifies abundant life. This is all physical life; yet the Holy Ghost coming into the believer's heart and life will impart the spiritual life more abundant. Wherever there is life, we may hope to see the manifestation of that life. If there is life more abundant, then we may hope to see more abundant manifestations of that life. The sinner is dead in trespasses and sins. The believer is made alive in Jesus Christ. The difference between a Christian and a sinner is the difference between a living body and a corpse. If a funeral was in progress and Jesus Christ should come by as He did when the procession was on the way from Nain to the cemetery, and speak life into the dead body, how long would it be before the person in the coffin would find it out, and also the people looking on? When a soul is born again, regenerated by power divine, there are manifestations of that life, and the individual certainly finds it out, and it is obvious to those who know him. Where there are no manifestations of life it is certainly taxing to one's credulity to believe there is life. The other day we read in the paper of a funeral in progress, and in the midst of the service the child who was dead or supposed to be, arose in the casket and looked quietly around. The grandmother sitting near by was so shocked at the sight that she instantly fell over dead. It would not take the observers long to ascertain that the child on the one hand was alive and that the grandmother on the other hand was dead. There is too much in these latter days that passes for life when it is death. It is certainly a marvelous experience to be made alive unto God. We pick up a paper and read of a certain revival where hundreds and perhaps thousands have been converted. The question is: Have they really been made alive from the dead, or have they simply made a resolution and joined the church?