Is the reader conscious of anything like this? If so, would it not be a peculiar mercy if at this very moment he were called back to the old terms? Doubtless. Well, then, let him be assured that the heart of Jesus is waiting and ready. His love is unchanging; and not only so, but He would remind you that He cannot be satisfied without a true response from you. Wherefore, beloved friend, whatever has drawn you away from the measure of your earliest dedication to Him, let your heart now spring up and get back at once to Him. Do not hesitate. Linger not. Cast yourself at the feet of your loving Lord--tell Him all--and let your heart fully turn to Him, and let it be only for Him. This is the secret spring of all true service. If Christ has not the love of your heart, He does not want the labor of your hands. He does not say, "Son, give Me thy money, thy time, thy talents, thine energies, thy pen, thy tongue, thy head." All these are unavailing, unsatisfying to Him. What He says to you is, "My son, give Me thy _heart_." Where the heart is given to Jesus, all will come right. Out of the heart come all the issues of life; and if only Christ have His right place in the heart, the work and the ways, the walk and the character, will be all right. But we must return to Jacob, and see further how our subject is illustrated in his fruitful history. At the close of Gen. xxxiii. we find him settling down at Shechem, where he gets into all sorts of trouble and confusion. His house is dishonored, and his sons in avenging the dishonor endanger his life. All this Jacob feels keenly, and he says to his sons Simeon and Levi, "Ye have troubled me ... among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the Perizzites; and I being few in number, they shall gather themselves together against me; and I shall be destroyed, I and my house." All this was most deplorable; but it does not appear to have once occurred to Jacob that he was in a wrong place. The defilement and confusion of Shechem failed to open his eyes to the fact that he was not up to the old terms. How often is this the case! We fall short of the divine standard in our practical ways; we fail in walking up to the height of the divine revelation; and although the varied fruits of our failure are produced on every side, yet our vision is so dimmed by the atmosphere around us, and our spiritual sensibilities so blunted by our associations, that we do not discern how low we are, and how very far short of the proper mark. However, in Jacob's case we see the divine principle again and again illustrated. "And God said unto Jacob, "Arise, _go up to Bethel, and dwell there_; and make there an altar unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother."