[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":4},["ShallowReactive",2],{"reading-1018":3},"OCTOBER 18\r\nKnow of a surety that thy seed shall be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, . . . they shall afflict them four hundred years, .\r\n. . and afterward they shall come out with great substance (Gen. 15:12-14).\r\nAn assured part of God's pledged blessing to us is delay and\r\nsuffering. A delay in Abram's own lifetime that seemed to put God's\r\n\r\npledge beyond fulfillment was followed by seemingly unendurable  delay of Abram's descendants. But it was only a delay. they \"came out with great substance.\" The pledge was redeemed.\r\nGod is going to test me with delays; and with the delays will come  suffering, but through it all stands God's pledge: His new covenant with me in Christ and His inviolable promise of every lesser\r\nblessing that I need. The delay and the suffering are part of the\r\npromised blessing; let me praise Him for them today; and let me\r\nwait on the Lord and be of good courage and He will strengthen my heart. --C. G. Trumbull.\r\nUnanswered yet the prayer your tips have pleaded In agony of heart these many years?\r\nDoes faith begin to fail? Is hope departing?\r\nAnd think you all in vain those falling tears?\r\nSay not the Father hath not heard your prayer;\r\nYou shall have your desire sometime, somewhere.\r\nUnanswered yet? Nay do not say ungranted; Perhaps your work is not yet wholly done.\r\nThe work began when first your prayer was uttered, And God will finish what He has begun.\r\nIf you will keep the incense burning there,\r\nHis glory you shall see sometime, somewhere.\r\nUnanswered yet? Faith cannot be unanswered, Her feet are firmly planted on the Rock;\r\nAmid the wildest storms she stands undaunted, Nor quails before the loudest thunder shock.\r\nShe knows Omnipotence has heard her prayer,\r\n'And cries, \"It shall be done\"-sometime, somewhere. --Miss Ophelia G. Browning.",1783499793954]