Chambers Filled

Twenty-four church folk gathered at mine for supper last week for one of our Friday Light events. It was rather nice, even if I say so myself. We had chance to talk to people we might barely see on a Sunday, while sharing food and singing around the piano hits from The Sound of Music and The Wizard of Oz. All very 1950s, all very homely. Folk who have not been to my house before inevitably remarked on some of the contents, what I truthfully dismiss as clutter, but to the untrained eye appears to be an interesting and unusual collection of miscellanies. Such items include a copy of Cromwell’s death mask, models of castles and a half dozen chessboards. Yet also displayed in my house is a tea towel, conveniently utilised as a sun screen for a large Velux window. Upon it is written Proverbs 2:3-4, which in the translation of 1611 translates:

Through wisdom is an house builded; and by understanding it is established: and by knowledge shall the chambers be filled with all precious and pleasant riches.

This is of course a rather helpful, if superficial, justification for my accumulation of miscellany and ephemera. Yet as one journeys through life, the experiences through which we go, be they good or ill, enrich our memories and spiritual diaries. The Lord allows us to endure all sorts of ventures- including their resulting scars and bruises- for He uses them to sanctify the spirit and educate the soul. Your house may not be as cluttered, but your life will have in its storerooms as many interesting testimonies and proofs of God’s doings as I have in mine.

I’ve wrestled on towards heaven,
‘Gainst storm, and wind, and tide;
Now like a weary trav’ller
That leaneth on His guide;
Amid the shades of evening,
While sinks life’s lingering sand,
I hail the glory dawning
In Immanuel’s land.

-Samuel Rutherford, compiled by Anne Ross Cousin