The Test

 “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” —Psalm 139: 23

       The other day I went with a friend through the great Carnegie steel mills where men were busy at the fires and furnaces and forges making steel and turning it out into rails and beams and rods and great sheets of steel. It was very interesting and very noisy.
       But the most interesting thing to me was not the fire, nor the forge, nor the furnace, but what I saw in a little quiet room fitted up with strange cold looking machines, each run by two young men. This was what they called the testing room.
       From every furnace a sample of steel was taken. A piece about as long as my arm or less, and as wide and thick as my four fingers. This piece of steel was gripped at each end by one of these machines and pulled or stretched, just as you would stretch a piece of rubber. You could see the steel as it was drawn becoming thinner and thinner until suddenly it snapped. Each of these little pieces of pure steel stood the test up to about 56,000 pounds pressure, and then it broke. The men then knew where to put the great pieces of steel to which the piece that had been tested belonged. If it stood a high pressure they put the steel into railroad trains and automobiles where safety was required and if it stood only a low pressure they used it for something less worthy.
       We, too, are tested. We are tested out in the great world, at home, at school, everywhere we are being tested and tried and if we prove worthy we are given a place of honor and usefulness. The Bible tells us over and over again that God tests and tries us:

“The righteous God trieth the hearts.”
“Search me, O God, and know my heart:
Try me, and know my thoughts.”
“When he hath tried me I shall come forth as gold.”
“Thou, O God, hast tried us as silver is tried.”

       Shortly after the time of Jesus there lived a great and good man by the name of John Chrysostom. He was called “the golden-mouthed” preacher. He was a great man and a great preacher of the Gospel. The Roman Emperor ordered him to give up his Christian faith or he would be exiled. Chrysostom replied, “Thou canst not, for the world is my Father s house; thou canst not banish me.” Then said the emperor, “I will slay thee.” Chrysostom replied, “Nay, but thou canst not, for my life is hid with Christ in God.” “I will take away thy treasure,” said the emperor. “Nay,” said Chrysostom, “but thou canst not, for I have none that thou knowest of. My treasure is in heaven.” “Then,” said the emperor, “I will drive thee from thy friends and thou shalt have no friends left.” “Nay,” said this brave man, who was being tested and tried, “thou canst not, for I have a Friend from whom thou canst not separate me. I defy thee. There is nothing thou canst do to hurt me.”
       What a brave man he was, and how nobly he stood the test, and like Job came forth as gold. Let us make this text our prayer:

“Search me
O God
And know my heart;
Try me
And know my thoughts.
And see if there be any wicked way in me
And lead me in the way everlasting.”

"Search me, Oh God" hymn