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Every fresh inspiration is a new beginning of life. Over the years as they slip by there will always be inscribed the apostolic saying, "Not as though I had already attained." But though perfection is ever in front, we may thank God for every experience that opens out new roads, and helps us to move forward to that which is holy and good.

1. Renewal is essential in all things. When the body ceases to form new ceils the hour of its dissolution quickly arrives. Does the imperial mind cease to delight itself in, and eagerly search after, new and brilliant aspects of truth? You know the result, how soon that mind becomes either as sweet bells jangling out of tune, or is enervated, crusted, stale, and unprofitable. Carried out into nature, the same law ordains that the capacity of the earth to sustain mankind shall depend on bursting seeds, prolific roots, opening buds, and the renewal of generous fruits. Repeated in form, they are new every year. But while renewal is at once a law, and a most marvellous manifestation of the Divine Providence, it never assumes such a profound significance as it does in the world of thought and feeling. Your ideals are opportunities for renewal; from the splendid aims and hopes they reveal you may go on to the greatness and beauty of the deeds that make them real.

2. The redemptive and saving purposes of Divine love work by and through the same law. Renovation is the guarantee of spiritual health; recreation is the secret of sustained energy, and of triumphant faith. In "Jesus our Immanuel" the words of the psalm before us find their verification. He came that He might say to the weary and storm-tossed, to the evil who repented, to the bowed-down and forsaken, to those in the guilt and slavery of iniquity, "Thy youth is renewed like the eagle's." He is still saying it; He is still offering to satisfy our mouths with good, that our youth, too, may be renewed.

3. Consider the powerful contrast hero set forth. Age, even though veiled with poetic grace, and having many compensations, is a time of waning powers. There is less generous enthusiasm and more of caution and prudence. On the other hand, youth is marked by splendid impulse and ardour; radiant in energy, care sits lightly on its shoulders. It is "like a morning gladness before the heat and burden of the day." In this world these conditions, so strangely distinct in features and qualities, are equally essential. We must have beginnings, the sweeter and purer the better; and we must have endings, and always is it cause for rejoicing when they are full and honourable, and the garments of time and the tools of nature are laid aside after long and faithful use. But there is no such thing as age in heaven. "Growing old in heaven is growing young." "Those that are in heaven are continually advancing to the spring of life, with a greater advance towards a more joyful and happy spring the more thousands of years they live," because "it is goodness and charity that forms and presents in them its own likeness."

(J. T. Freeth.)

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KJV: Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's.

WEB: who satisfies your desire with good things, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.