Where There Is No Way

Message by Paul Rader during the annual missionary rally, Friday evening, June 1, 1917.

Don’t you remember concerning the disciples in the tempest on the sea, that it was just when the storm had beaten the hardest that Christ came with help; that when the waves tossed the highest He was there to calm them; that when the watch was the loneliest He came to comfort; that when the disciples were at their wits end Jesus came with a way out?

It was in the hardest hour then, the crisis time, when they were greatly discouraged, that they saw Jesus walking on the very waves that had been making all the trouble for them. God’s grace walks in at the darkest hour, holding a lamp aloft.

What a precious rule of grace this is for the saint to learn by heart. God’s Word puts the rule into language thus: “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound” (Romans 5:20).

Again: in the bottom of that storm-tossed vessel Paul prayed, and in the crisis hour an angel of God stood by him telling of victory and a way out, saying, “Fear not Paul; thou must be brought before Caesar, and lo—God hath given thee all them that sail with thee.”

Men all about Paul were crying and howling “We’re going down, we’re going down,” but Paul had already gone down, down low at Jesus’ feet, knowing this precious rule by heart. In the crisis hour God manifested His power. There is not only a way out in the crisis hour, but God always has a way a little further out than when the trouble started.

This then, is not only winning the battle, but using the places where the bombs have struck as clearings for new bases of operations.

Oh, then, beloved of the Lord, in this hour of world stress let us use the rule of grace, and expect our mighty Lord to use even these awful blasts of battle to clear the path into the hearts of men for His glory. Let us get down low where Paul did and let the Lord tell us what grace can do in these frightful days.

He is not allowing evil that good may come, but in spite of all the failure, the hate and the horror, He will show His mighty hand, His all sufficient hand. God is going to get the Gospel out—grace will much more abound.

God will go to the hardest and darkest places, through the greatest difficulties, just to show what grace can do. Our very weak and undone condition moves Him to action.

The cold air is heavy, so, falling and pressing down it forces the warm air, which is lighter, to rise; and sometimes with sudden changes of temperature it causes the air to move with great velocity, and we say the wind is high. A cold wicked world pressing against the warm heart of the God of love, sent His saving Son to Earth in pity and power.

This is a crisis hour with this old world, and I am sure we may look for Him to manifest Himself in some wonderful way of grace at the very darkest hour. Let us expect Him with a new way to get the Gospel out on these present waves, to this poor needy Earth with millions who have never heard the name of Jesus. Let us expect the very need to draw out His grace at this time.

Oh, I am very sure that as He looks on the heathen world today, dark and dreary and dismal and cruel, His great heart of love will so feel the pressure that His grace will rush forth to minister through new missionary effort; and thus in spite of war, He will cause the very battlefields, the very movement of millions of men, the very mixing of men of differing languages, the unseating of rulers, to open the way to the regions beyond for His own chosen ones to go carrying the Bread of Life to those who have never heard.

Oh, He has found you and me. He, with the same grace in the hardest place, will make His way through the dark and find them. Yield yourself fully to Him for this task in giving, going and in groanings of deep fervent prayer. Pray and He will find a way where there is no way.