The Children For Christ by Andrew Murray

hand shall You require it; send it with me. Solemn thought! Amidst all
the dangers down in Egypt, and so many seen perishing, as parent I
take charge of the child, and the great God may hold me responsible if I
bring him not back to his father’s home in safety. With Judah I have
spoken: ‘If I bring him not unto thee, and set him before thee, then let
me bear the blame forever!’
Consider, too, the duties of such a suretyship, as illustrated in Judah. He
was thoroughly in earnest with the engagement he had undertaken.
When the governor of Egypt had commanded that Benjamin should be
kept as a slave, he at once came forward as a substitute. Not for a
moment does he think of his own home and children, of Egyptian
slavery and its hardships; everything gives way to the thought, My
father entrusted him to me, and I am surety for the lad. With the most
touching earnestness he pleads to be accepted in the youth’s stead: `Thy
servant is become surety for the lad with his father. How shall I go up to
my father, and the lad be not with me? Now, therefore, let thy servant
abide instead of the lad as bondman to my lord, and let the lad go up
with his brethren.’
Would God that Christian parents realized, as Judah did, what it means
that they are surety for their child! Alas! how often, when our children
are in danger from the prince of this world, when the temptations of
the flesh or the world threaten to make them prisoners and slaves, to
hold them back from ever reaching the Father’s home — how often are
we found careless or unwilling to sacrifice our ease and comfort in
seeking to rescue them from their danger! How often the spiritual
interests of the child are considered subordinate to worldly prospects
or position or profit, and the solemn covenant forgotten in which we
undertook to make it our first care that the child should not be lost to
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