But, whether there are or not, my point is that the difficulties themselves are “witnesses to the truth of the Word of God.” The Bible says, plainly and repeatedly, that there are things “hard to be understood,” and, therefore, if I were to meet with nothing of the kind, and if everything contained in St. Paul’s Epistles and the other Scriptures were perfectly plain, the only conclusion at which I could arrive would be that those Scriptures had not given a true description of the fact. Now, however, I find them in this most important matter perfectly true. The objection of the sceptic only leads me to trust my Bible. If there were no difficulties, then I should begin to be afraid that my Bible could not be from God. But now the infidel himself is one of the best “witnesses” that I can put into the witness-box, and the very argument which he brings against the possibility of the fulfilment of the promises of God is an evidence, as clear as the noonday sun, of the wisdom, the foreknowledge, and the perfect acquaintance with the human understanding, with which God inspired, 1800 years ago, (by His Holy Spirit) the Scriptures of truth. It reminds me of the words of the apostle—“Let God be true, but every man a liar.” But this is not all; for not only are these difficulties exactly what are revealed in the Scriptures, but they are also exactly what, as thinking men, we ought to expect in a divine revelation. Let us think what we mean by a divine revelation. We mean, the communication from an infinite God to fallen man, of His own plan for the salvation of the sinner. Now what would a reasonable person expect in such a communication? He would expect Him to inform us of all that concerned our own action, and to make plain to us the way of life in which it is His will that we should walk; but he would not expect Him to indulge our craving after full information respecting His own hidden being, or the mode and power by which He would carry out His promises. He would expect Him to make His promises plain, but he would not expect Him to explain to us His divine plan for their fulfilment; he would expect Him to do exactly what He has done in the case of the resurrection—promise it faithfully, and so lead us to trust Himself, without giving any explanation as to the mode or the instrumentality by which that promise should be fulfilled. And this is exactly the principle which He Himself has laid down in His own Word, as when He said (Deut. xxix., 29), “The secret things belong unto God,” _i.e._ they are hidden in the depths of His own infinite mind; “but those things which are revealed belong unto us, and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law;” _i.e._ all that He has revealed we may freely make use of, and even our little children may learn in it the blessed secret of a Father’s love.