Now why take so much time speaking about all that? Listen! I will tell you why. Living is like traveling. Life is a journey. It is a trip through a strange land where you have never been before, and you never know a moment ahead where you are going next. Strange languages, strange scenes, strange dilemmas; new tangles, new experiences, and some old ones with new faces so you do not know them. It is just as chock-full of pleasure and enjoyment as it can be, if you could only make some provision for the drudgery and hard things that seem to crowd in so thick and fast sometimes, as to make people forget the gladness of it.
Now I have something to tell you that seems too utterly good to be believed, and yet keeps getting better all the way along. It is this: the Master has planned that your life journey shall be a personally conducted one on this ideal plan. It was said a night or two ago that the Master has thought into your life and made arrangement for all its needs. Let me add to-night this further fact: _He has arranged with His best friend, who is an experienced traveler, to go with you and devote Himself wholly to your interests._
Some of you, I am afraid, will smile, and think that I am just indulging in a fancy sketch--drawing on my imagination. And so I pray our Master to burn into our hearts that it is plain, matter-of-fact truth, for every day life. I would say that it is cold fact were it not that such a fact can never be cold.
Each of these talks, you have noticed, has led up to the one idea of surrender. That word surrender stands for one side only of a transaction--_our_ side. As in all transactions, there is another side--_His_ side to whom the surrender is made. To-night we want to take a step in advance and talk about the part which Jesus has in this surrender-transaction. All truth goes in pairs. The partnership word with surrender is mastery. Surrender on my part is followed by mastery on His part. There are two personalities in this transaction. You are one: an important one, but only one. To-night we shall try to get a better acquaintance with the other One. The One who assumes control of the surrendered life, who is to be our personal guide and friend.