"The Good Shepherd"--well can the sheep who know His voice attest the truthfulness and faithfulness of this endearing name and word. Where would they have been through eternity, had He not left His throne of light and glory, travelling down to this dark valley of the curse, and giving His life a ransom for many? Think of His love to each separate member of the flock--wandering over pathless wilds with unwearied patience and unquenchable ardour, ceasing not the pursuit _until_ He finds it. Think of His love _now_--"I AM the Good Shepherd." Still that tender eye of watchfulness following the guilty wanderers--the glories of heaven and the songs of angels unable to dim or alter His affection;--the music of the words, at this moment coming as sweetly from His lips as when first He uttered them--"I know my sheep." Every individual believer--the weakest, the weariest, the faintest--claims His attention. His loving eye follows me day by day out to the wilderness--marks out my pasture, studies my wants, and trials, and sorrows, and perplexities--every steep ascent, every brook, every winding path, every thorny thicket. "He goeth before them." It is not rough driving, but gentle guiding. He does not take them over an unknown road; He himself has trodden it before. He hath drunk of every "brook by the way;" He himself hath "suffered being tempted;" He is "able to succour them that are tempted." He seems to say, "Fear not; I cannot lead you wrong; follow me in the bleak waste, the blackened wilderness, as well as by the green pastures and the still waters. Do you ask why I have left the sunny side of the valley--carpeted with flowers, and bathed in sunshine--leading you to some high mountain apart, some cheerless spot of sorrow? Trust me, I will lead you by paths you have not known, but they are all known _to_ me, and selected _by_ me--'Follow thou me.'" "And am known of mine!" Reader! canst thou subscribe to these closing words of this gracious utterance? Dost thou "know" _Him_ in all the glories of His person, in all the completeness of His finished work, in all the tenderness and unutterable love of His every dealing towards thee? It has been remarked by Palestine travellers, that not only do the sheep there follow the guiding shepherd, but even while cropping the herbage as they go along, they look wistfully up to see that they are near him. Is this thine attitude--"_looking unto Jesus_?" "In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and he will direct thy paths." Leave the future to His providing. "The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want." _I shall not want!_--it has been beautifully called "the bleating of Messiah's sheep." Take it as thy watchword during thy wilderness wanderings, till grace be perfected in glory. Let this be the record of thy simple faith and unwavering trust, "These are they who _follow_, whithersoever He sees meet to guide them." "THE SHEEP FOLLOW HIM, FOR THEY KNOW HIS VOICE." 8TH DAY.