The End of the Lord

The following is from Handley Moule's  book From Sunday to Sunday:

"It is the very nature and function of faith, of reliance, to wait.  'What a man seeth,' says the great Apostle (Rom. 8:24), 'why doth he yet hope for?'  Similarly, what a man sees, what is before him this moment, why does he yet trust for?

"Faith, to take a practical definition, is reliance, more or less in the dark, upon the undisclosed action and purpose of a trustworthy person.  And it will be more or less true to its nature, it will be more or less patient and willing to wait, other things being equal, as the person trusting more or less known, is sure of, is satisfied with, the character and capacity of the person trusted.

"In the case of Christian faith, the trusting person is the mortal man who has, by grace, got some sight of the trustworthiness of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.  And in proportion to his insight into the divine character of the Person trusted will be the simplicity, the repose, the inextinguishable hope, of his reliance.

". . . Let us remember this when our own life, in its personal experiences, has the shadows upon it.  Those shadows are not 'the end of the Lord.'  It is His character not to bring the clouds finally upon the sun, but the sun finally out of the clouds."