Snippets from the Last Few Days of Devotionals in "Streams in the Desert"

If anyone still reads this, you may get tired of reading quotes from my favorite devotional "Streams in the Desert." Well, either get over it or stop visiting this site. I love that book and especially over the last few days--with all the passport drama--have found much encouragement in it. So here are some snippets from the last few days that have spoken to my spirit during this time of great stress:

"The Lord, when He hath given great faith, hath been known to try it by long delayings. He has suffered His servants' voices to echo in their ears as from a brazen sky. They have knocked at the golden gate, but it has remained unmovable, as though it were rusted upon its hinges...Thus have true saints continued long in patient waiting without reply, not because their prayers were not vehement, nor because they were unaccepted, but becaust it so pleased Him who is Sovereign, and who gives according to His own pleasure. If it pleases Him to bid our patience exercise itself, shall He not do as He will with His own?!...There is no such thing as prayer unanswered or unnoticed by God, and somethings that we count refusals or denials are simply delays. Christ sometimes delays His help that He may try our faith and quicken our prayers."

"Unbelief sees God through circumstances, as we sometimes see the sun shorn of his rays through smoky air; but faith puts God between itself and circumstances, and looks at them through Him."

"Be willing to live by believing and neither think nor desire to live in any other way. Be willing to see every outward light extinguished, to see the eclipse of every star in the blue heavens, leaving nothing but darkness and perils around, if God will only leave in thy soul the inner radiance, the pure bright lamp which faith has kindled."