Jeremiah 36

Copybooks

I wrote them with ink in the book. Jeremiah 36:18.

I wonder how many of you remember the first time you wrote with ink? Perhaps it was a very long time ago, but you still remember something about it. Do you remember how proud you were when you were given a pen and were allowed to use it? Before that you were only permitted to write in pencil, and that was very dull and uninteresting, but you might write on the walls or your hands. Now you had a pen and an inkpot all to yourself and a copybook to write in! It was a great occasion!

You began so proudly and so hopefully, but later mistakes crept in. A wrong letter was written, a blot fell here and there out of a too full pen, little inky fingers left ugly smudges. And perhaps, because you were very small, a few salt tears fell on the page. But the worst of it all was that the mistakes wouldn't come out. When you wrote in pencil or on a slate it was easy to remove the errors, but when you wrote in ink it was a different matter!

Now life is just like a great big copybook, and every day we are writing a page in that book. Each action and word and thought writes something on the page. And what we write we can't take out again, for we are writing in ink, not in pencil. Sometimes our page is clean and tidy and well-written, sometimes it is ugly and smudged and spoiled; but no matter what it is like, we can't alter it.

Well, I want you to remember three things about this copybook we are writing.

1. Do your very best with the page you have. Sometimes, you know, you begin a new page in your copybook very well. The first line is neat and even, and as like the head line as it could possibly be. But when you get down the page a bit you become more careless. Perhaps you grow tired writing the same words over and over again, perhaps you forget to look at the top line. Some of the letters jump off the line, others won't stand up straight, some are too fat and others are too lean, some are too tall and others too short. And when you come to the last line of all it is a sad failure. Well of course the best way is to keep on writing well to the bottom of the page. That is difficult, but you can do it if you try hard.

Now it is just the same with life's copybook. Sometimes we rise in the morning feeling very bright and fit, and we mean to do well and have a splendid day. But little by little the mistakes creep in. Perhaps we lose our temper over some small thing; perhaps we do something mean, or say something unkind. And soon our page is all blotted and ugly, our day is all spoiled.

And yet, just as it is with the pages of our copybook, so it is with the pages of our life. If we try very hard, and if we ask God to help us to try, we can keep out a lot of the mistakes.

2. Let God put right your mistakes. Once, when you were very little, you spoiled a page in your copybook. You tried your best, but everything went wrong and your little head ached and the tears were very near. Then mother came and took the book from you. And she cleaned it up in a wonderful way a way you couldn't manage. And somehow when she came to you everything seemed right again. Your head stopped aching and your troubles were at an end.

And God is just like mother. He can put right the things we spoil. He can wash out all our mistakes. You can't alter them but He can. And I want you to remember that not only now, but long, long after this, when you are grown men and women. Will you always take your spoiled pages to God? He wants to put them right. And the biggest mistake people ever make the only mistake that really counts is when they forget to take their spoiled pages to Him.

3. Never forget that there is always a new page. Some people forget to turn the new page, and when the new day comes they copy the old one over again with all its mistakes and ugly blots. And so they never get out of the bit.

If you have made a mess of the page that is just turned, you can make a fresh start with the new one and make this fresh one all the more beautiful. It is the best thing you can do, and God gives you the new page to let you have another chance.

So we must go on trying till we reach the very last page of all. Then when our work is done God will take away our copybook and give us another, fresh and unspoiled, in which we shall make no mistakes.