HITHERTO…
Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.
I Samuel 7:12.
It was on this date one year ago that my wife faced serious surgery scheduled for next morning. We opened our daily devotional reading for that evening and found it headed “Ebenezer…Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.” We encouraged ourselves in the Lord our God as did David of old, confident that the same grace which had brought us safe “thus far” would be sufficient from there on. The God of the Hitherto is the God of the Henceforth!
The backward look is a good look if we review the path already trod to raise our Ebenezer and sing, “Hither by Thy help I’m come.” This is the way to check with the past in order to cope with the future. The faithfulness of God will stand our inventory any time. We shall find that “there failed not ought of any good thing which the Lord had spoken…all came to pass.”
And be sure to give God credit. Don’t call it your wits or luck or fortune. Let your testimony be, “Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.” Some have reversed Ebenezer to read, “Hitherto have I helped the Lord.” “Tell how great things the Lord hath done for thee.”