r speak more tenderly than on that last Thursday night
when He said to those constant companions of two years, "I have called
you _friends_, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made
known unto you"? Out of his own experience David writes, "The friendship
of the Lord is with those that reverently love Him, and He will give
evidence of His friendship by showing to them His covenant, His plans,
and His power." And David knew. Abraham had the reputation of being a
friend of God. He even trusted his darling boy's life to God when he
_could not_ understand what God was doing. And he found God worthy of
his friendship. He spared that darling boy even though later He spared
not His own darling boy. It thrills one's heart to hear God saying,
"Abraham _my friend_." Friendship with God means such oneness of spirit
with Him that He may do with us and through us what He wills. This and
this alone is the true power--God in us, and God with us free to do as
He wills.

Now trust is the native air of friendship. A breath of doubt chills and
chokes. If one is filled and surrounded by trust in God as the
atmosphere of his life his touch with God then becomes most intimate.
Satan cannot breathe in that atmosphere. It chokes him. Air is the
native element of the bird. Away from air it gasps and dies. Water is
the native element of the fish. Out of water it chokes and gasps and
dies. Trust is the native element of friendship--friendship with God. A
constant feeling of confidence in GOD that believes in His overruling
power, and in His unfailing love, and rests in Him in the darkness when
the thing you prize most is lying bound on the stony altar.

The Spirit of God is a friend, a lover. He is ever wooing us up the
heights. Let us climb up. He is every wooing us into the inner recesses
of friendship with Himself. Shall we not go along with Him? This is the
secret of a life ever fresh with the presence of God. It is the only
pathway of increasing youthfulness in the power of God.

"And in old age, when others fade,
They fruit still forth shall bring;
They shall be fat, and full of sap,
And aye be flourishing."

A Bunch of Keys.

To those who would enter these inner sacred recesses here is a small
bunch of keys which will unlock the doors. Three keys in this bunch; a
key-time, a key-book, and a key-word. _The key-time_ is time alone with
God daily. With the door shut. Outside things shut outside, and on