Part 7

"Days, months and years must have an end; Eternity has none. 'Twill always have as long to spend As when it first begun.

"Great God! no finite mind can tell How much a thing can be: I only pray that I may dwell That long, long time with Thee."

JANE TAYLOR.

RUIN AND DARKNESS.

"Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear."--HEBREWS xi. 3.

"Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did He in heaven, and in earth, in the seas, and all deep places."--PSALM cxxxv. 6.

There are three words which God has used to tell us about His work which we call "The Creation."

We read, "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth."

"And God made two great lights."

"And the Lord God formed man."

"Created," "made," "formed," these are the words; and it is of the first of them we shall speak a little to-day.

Before my children came, I had been thinking how I could make it plain to the little ones that there is a very great difference between being able to create and being able to make anything. It happened that when they came in they were all talking so fast, of something which had greatly delighted them, that it was some time before I could find out what it was all about. At last Sharley told me that as they were racing along with their hoops a strange dog had followed them, and rubbed his nose against their hands, wanting to make friends with them.

"We are quite sure it is nobody's dog," she said; "or at any rate it is a dog that has lost its master, and has no home now. So after lessons we are going to call it, and get it to follow us home. It is waiting for us outside the door this minute."

"And I am going to make a kennel for it," said Ernest, who was very fond of sawing and hammering away in the shed behind, the house, and wished to be a carpenter, when he grew up; "at least, I am going to try, and I think I can."

I may as well tell you at once that this little stray dog soon got tired of waiting, outside the door. When lessons were over, and the children went to look, no doggie was to be found; and as they did not know his name it was not easy to call him. I have no doubt he found his own master and his own home again, and was much better off there than he would have been in the best kennel Ernest could have made, with seven boys and girls to take him for a walk every day.

However that may be, I tell you of this dog because it was while Ernest was talking about making a house for it that I was saying to myself, "I wonder whether this plan of Ernest's about making a kennel will help them to understand, what I so much want them to learn, about the difference which there is between the words make and create."

First of all I had to tell them not to talk any more just then, but to repeat their verses. Then we read--more than once--for Leslie and Dick would not have liked to miss their turn, and there were not enough verses for each to read one--what God has told us in the first five verses of His book.

"In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

"And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

"And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

"And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

"And God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day."

When we had finished I asked Chrissie what it means when we read that "God created the heaven and the earth." Why is the word "created" used? Would any other word have done instead of that one?

Chrissie said no other word would do, because to create means to make out of nothing. He was right, was he not?

The next question was, "Why is create a word which can never be used except when we are speaking of God?"

I don't know who answered, but someone gave the right reason--"Because only God can make a thing be when there was nothing before it; nothing to make it out of."

This seems quite plain, does it not? But do you know there was once a boy, who did not believe that he could not create things until he had tried to make something out of nothing, and found that only nothing came. He was quite sure he could create anything if he only told it to come; so at last his teacher said, "You had better try."

He was only a very little boy, so he thought he would try, and up he got and stood as straight as he could on his chair, while he said with a loud voice, "Fishes, be!"