He is the wisest servant of God who can pray from the camp that he may conquer if his cause be really just. The preacher who enters his pulpit with an almost agonizing prayer that God would aid him in his presentation of the Christ to men must ever ask that God will turn aside any arrow which would do harm to the cause. In his ignorance or weakness he may mistake the Gospel message, or may not present the whole truth, and he must ever ask that, whether he gain or lose in the esteem of his congregation, the truth shall always prevail. Christian nations are often wrong in their diplomacy or in their wars, as they discover after a while. The Lord, therefore, gave them that for which they would have asked had their hearts been right with God and their intentions been Christlike toward men. Sometime we shall understand. But now the seeming inconsistency of asking the Lord to aid his own cause, or praying that Christ may soon come into his own kingdom, is ever a stumbling block to the doubtful ones. If the Lord has all power and has a sincere desire to make the world good, why does he not do it by one sweep of his hand or by one magic word? What is the reason for his commandment to pray to him and to ask him to do that which he wishes to do and can do himself? All these questions lead into the wilderness. We do not know. We cannot suggest any hypothesis which would make the sovereignty of God and the free will of man reconcilable. Man's mind is so constructed that it is impossible to believe that the Creator controls all things and arranges the details of even our thoughts and yet leaves man free to choose to defeat the Lord by his own thoughts and actions. It is impossible fully to believe that man can voluntarily do evil without in some way interfering with the designs and power of God. If God undertakes to save the world, and "would not that any should perish," but that all should come unto him and live, and yet sinful man can defeat or hinder the accomplishment of his purpose, then the thinker must conclude that God is not supreme. Yet when we keep our minds within their reasonable limits and fall back on our common sense we must believe that God is all-powerful and also that man is free to be sinful. The facts are actual facts, although we cannot reconcile them. There is but little we frail mortals can understand about such matters. Let us, therefore, carefully hold to the facts which we can comprehend, and never assume that things which are, surely are not, or that things which are not, most surely are. There was a bowlder in the highway yesterday. We don't know how it came to be there. We know it should not be there. But there it is, and he would be idiotic who tried to go on as if the stone were not there. Behold! there is set before every man good and evil. "Choose good that thou and thy seed may live." We know that in a thousand matters we can choose the good or choose the evil. We see also that liberty is limited by great laws and