"I love my master......I will not go out free -" Exodus 21:5
Has the Master become the One whom we really love?
Those of us who have been travelling the way a little longer do not love Him as we ought, ...but we can say that we love Him, and that all we have been discovering about Him these past years has made us love Him more; and if there is one title which grows more precious to me with the passing years, it is that title which became so precious to George Herbert, vicar of Bemerton, near Salisbury, in the 17th centuary - you may have heard or read his story.
Inducted to the Pastorate in middle life,....... after the service all the friends were to meet at the rectory: but George Herbert the newly inducted vicar was missing. They could not find him, until they went to the small church, where they found him prostrate in the chancel, saying over and over again, 'My Master!'
Then he gave us that word in a beautiful poem -
How sweetly doth 'My Master' sound! ...My Master!
As ambergris leaves a rich scent...unto the taster;
So do these words a sweet content,
An oriental fragrancy....My Master.
George Herbert chose Him for his Master, and he began a ministry in Bemerton that should be a model to every Anglican vicar and every Noncomformist minister. He went through the parish, he visited the farmhouses, he installed the word of God into the dairymaids and the farm hands until every man and woman and boy and girl knew the doctrines of grace by heart and experienced them in their lives.
In some of the farmhouses they sang the whole 150 psalms every day and night by relays....keeping up the praise of God for twenty four hours incessently.
And all because one man had seen the loveliness of Christ and had said, ........... 'My Master'
