great, stressful,
straining life of trivialities. Some of these are not especially
harmful. But the calamity of it all is that they so absorb us that we
have no time left for the highest.

Down in Tennessee near where I used to live a house was burned one day.
The mother was out at the well doing the week's washing. The flames
were not discovered till they were well under way. Of course when they
were discovered the woman was seized with terror. She rushed into the
house and brought out a feather bed and a few quilts. But in her
madness she forgot her own baby and the child was burned to death.
Now, I submit to you that there was absolutely no harm in saving a
feather bed. There was no harm in saving a few old quilts. The
tragedy was that in the absorption of saving all these half worthless
things she lost the primary. In her interest in the good she became
utterly blind to the best.

I wonder if that is not your folly. You are busy here and there. You
go to work six days in the week. You are passionately in earnest about
amusing yourself. You do a thousand and one decent and respectable
things. But while you are busy here and there the peace of God slips
out of your life. While you are busy here and there you neglect the
Sunday School and the Church. While you are busy here and there you
lose your interest in the Word of God and you forget "the secret
stairway that leads into the Upper Room." "Busy here and there" you
lose the sense of God out of your life. "Busy here and there" you
allow the altar in your home to fall down. "Busy here and there" you
allow your sons and daughters to stumble over that broken down altar
into lives of Christless indifference.

Oh, men and women, there is but one remedy for us if we would avoid the
rock upon which this condemned guardsman wrecked himself. We must put
first things first. Let us listen once more to the voice of the sanest
man that ever lived. This is His message: "Seek ye first the kingdom
of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto
you." If you fail to do this, however noble may be the task at which
you toil, life for you will end in tragedy. If you do this, however
mean and obscure may be your task, life for you will end in eternal joy
and victory.

XIV

A MOTHER'S REWARD--JOCHEBED

_Exodus 2:9_

"Take this child away and nurse him for me and I will give thee thy
wages." This text refers to one of the big