The first subject then was, The actuality of the Lord's presence.

• The second, The company who enjoyed His presence: two or three gathered together to His name; the "holy priesthood"; that is, in moral keeping with Himself.

• I do not say that others will not find benefit there; all the sons of Aaron were to eat of the holy bread, but they were not all in company with the high priest in the holy places.

• Many a one in the assembly gets great benefit from the presence of the Lord, although he may not enjoy His presence, to which he is called. If his feet are not washed, he has no communion with the Lord.
  • "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me".

• He does not say, 'no part in Me', but "with me".

The third subject was, That any person who understood the nature and dignity of being in His company – of association with Him – his individual path must now be in keeping with his position in the holiest, and the better he apprehended his dignity there, the more would he insist that everything must be in keeping with it in private life.

• A clergyman lays aside his surplice because he can say, I am a priest already in the presence of God.

• A soldier lays aside his sword, saying, How can a priest in heaven fight for a world where Christ is rejected? I belong to Christ inside the veil. This fact characterises me in my individual path.

• Christendom excuses itself by distinguishing between the clergy and the laity. There is no such distinction in the New Testament. We are all priests inside the veil, through divine grace; and the more thoroughly you understand the profound nature and blessedness of that position, the more it will affect you in very detail of daily life.

• It cannot be otherwise, unless you submit to have two faces – a religious face and a worldly face; a thing most abhorrent to a good man, how much more to the Spirit of God.

• It is from this that all devotedness springs. Why is there not more devotedness in the present day? Because we are not more affected by association with Christ, and the wonderful nature of it; therefore we do not carry the moral effect of it into the details of our daily life.

I come now to the fourth mark of the Lord's presence. I have not a thought that I have exhausted the subject; on the contrary, I should be sorry in one way if I could, because I should leave nothing for you to acquire.

• I want you to understand the reality of this grace, in a day of imitation; because, remember we have to do with worse than magicians now. There were magicians in Moses' day –
  • "Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth".

• But how did they do it? They said, We can do it as well as you. That was imitation; and that is what we have to contend with. They assume to be as right as you; they rely on the very Scripture that you do – on Matthew 18: 20.

• Then what are we to do? Prove that we have something more – the power of what we profess. There are actual marks consequent on His presence. You can see the first three plainly enough. The characteristics of His presence; the company who command His presence; and the effect upon private life individually.

Now this evening, I desire to occupy your attention with Christ's chief interest at the present time. This, you will find, is the testimony. Nothing can be simpler to any one who thinks for a moment.

• Could you be in the company of anyone whom you valued very much, and not know, or seek to know, his chief interest? It would be impossible.

• Very often earnest believers have an instinct of this truth, though they are not taught in Scripture. As a rule, you will find that you have an instinct of the truth, even before you learn it. The person with the instinct before the education really values the education.

• Now, I do not believe a person could be in the presence of the Lord and not know something of His chief interest. You could not be near the Lord without knowing that there was no cloud between Him and you – in fact you could not be there at all if there were.

• But supposing you were near Him, surely you would feel that there is a great link between Him and you, even though you did not know anything about union. You would like to hear of it; you enjoy the sense of the link between Him and you; you could not put it in words.

• Well, Scripture is your divine warrant for it. Nothing like nearness. Many a person might be well up in Scripture, and able to open up all the different parts of it like a science, or a dissected map, and yet that person not really understand it; because, as another has said, you must be in it to understand it. This you learn by nearness.

Now, I trust, you will all admit that Christ has a chief interest. I will turn to what it is presently, but the first thing is, you must bear in mind, that He has a chief interest; for if He has a chief interest, it ought to be your chief interest.

• It is not a question whether your family, or your service, or this, or the other, is your chief interest. No, it is, what is Christ's chief interest? He has a chief interest. I have not yet said what it is, but I trust you will accept that – that He, the One dearest to your heart, has a chief interest.

• No one can understand it but by love, and we never understand Christ's love till we know His love. Nothing understands love but love itself. The mind cannot form a heart; it might enlighten it, but it could not form it. A heart only can understand a heart.

• Though this is very elementary, the very rudiments as it were, still it is an immense thing to get hold of that simple fact – Christ has a chief interest; and if I am in His confidence, if I am one of His friends, then His chief interest is my chief interest.

I think it will be helpful to any inquirer to see that God always had a chief interest from the time He called Abraham. No matter what it was, whether it was conducting the people to Canaan with the tabernacle in the midst, or whether the city, or the temple, still He always had a chief interest.

• Beloved friends, I desire to interest your hearts in this simple fact, that God always had a chief interest on the earth. I think it is an immense thing for the heart to get hold of this line of Scripture.

• Supposing I were an advocate pleading for a client, and I could bring the whole weight of law to bear upon the case, how effective I should be; so here, the whole weight of Scripture can be brought to establish the fact, that God always had a chief interest; and the conclusion is that He has a chief interest now.

• There is always an effort of the enemy to contravene what I am saying, but I ask any person to open the Bible at any point from Abraham onwards to the Lord's first coming, and show me that God had not a chief interest.

• And further, the man, the most honoured of God, was the man who unflinchingly adhered to it; while the man who wavered from it, lost all.
  • "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning".

  • "I will not give sleep to mine eyes, or slumber to mine eyelids, until I find out a place for the Lord, an habitation for the mighty God of Jacob".

• Why? Because it was God's interest. Where does any one fail? He has lost faith in God's chief interest. The returning captives went through much, but they lost faith in God's chief interest.
  • "Ye looked for much, and lo, it came to little; and when ye brought it home I did blow upon it. Why? saith the Lord of hosts. Because of mine house that is waste".

• They did not make God's chief interest their chief interest; and this is the history of many a soul this day. Many a soul would be in a different position this day, if Christ's chief interest were his chief interest. I have no doubt that if even weighed down with your cares, you would rise up in the energy of the Spirit, if you were set for God's interest.

• Look at Daniel. In Babylon and surrounded by enemies, he prayed three times a day looking towards Jerusalem. It was at the time a waste. No matter; his heart is on the spot where God's heart is. Can you honestly say that, beloved friends, tonight – that your heart is on the very spot where Christ's heart is?

• Three times a day he threw up his window, and prayed towards Jerusalem. And see the distance Jerusalem was from Babylon, and he too on the eve of being thrown into the den of lions. There is a man of God! single handed, too. See how God sustained him. See how he prospered; read the last verse of chapter 6 –
  • "So this Daniel prospered in the reign of Darius, the Persian".

It is not a question of numbers; I have not a doubt in my mind that one man or one woman, faithful to Christ's interest in a place, will promote wonderful light and blessing in that place. It is the only refuge in a day like this. Look at Moses: he faces 600,000 armed men.

• "Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother".

• He did not fear, though humanly speaking they could have destroyed him in a moment. On the contrary, the power of God was with him.
  • "The righteous is bold as a lion".

The Lord has an interest, a chief interest; and if that interest is not your interest, and you are not set for it, you are not prospering in soul. Prosperity is a very interesting word in Scripture; as in Psalm 1 –

• "Whatsoever he doeth shall prosper".

• The peace-offering is called the prosperity-offering. If the Lord's chief interest is my chief interest, I have divine prosperity; for I am in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, and I have His power. Is it not plain to every one of you, that if you want to have the power, the support, the cheer, the comfort of the Holy Spirit, you must go in company with Him?
  • "The fellowship of the Holy Spirit"

• – how many know what that is? If I am a man of faith, I depend on nothing but God; and as I am faithful to God's interest on the earth, I have the support of God.

• I might turn to Genesis 33 to establish the fact, that if I am not here maintaining the interest of God, I lose His support for myself. How could I have it? I am out of the line of His testimony. Jacob had come back to the land; God had met him and changed his name, had given him a new start; and what now? He buys a bit of land! Oh! I say, he is out of the divine way; he will certainly come to grief.

• I will not read the next chapter. We would like to draw a veil over it. You cannot conceive a more miserable picture than Jacob there. It is an instance how a man of God was forsaken of God, because of his frowardness.

There were different testimonies; properly we fulfil them all. The first was Abraham, called to go out of the land of Ur of the Chaldees, unto a land which God would show him; where he was to be a stranger dependent on God.

• Babylon was in its incipient stage at that time. If you want to know the beginning of Babylon, you must turn to Genesis 11. Abraham was called away from the place where there was the greatest independence, to show entire dependence on God. The end of this world will be Babylon marked by complete independence of God.
  • "I sit a queen, and am no widow".

• And what characterises that great city? All the delicacies of this world. Everything that is vile and refuse is refused – the principle of Saul in his war with Amalek.

• The next testimony was Exodus 3: 8.
  • "I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey, unto the place of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites".

• Israel after one march &38211; see Numbers 10 and 11 – complained, then fell a-lusting, and eventually refused to go up and possess the land. Caleb and Joshua remained faithful.

Mark now, the place that terrified Israel, the place of the giants, becomes the possession of the man of faith. Where there is most against you, there you can record your greatest victory.

• "Hebron therefore became the inheritance of Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenezite unto this day, because that he wholly followed the Lord God of Israel", Joshua 14: 6-15.

Now I come to a subject of peculiar interest. I am sensible how little I can present it, though I trust I understand it. It is, that seeing His interest is here, there will always be those who "call on the Lord out of a pure heart"; that is commonly called a remnant, though I do not like the word, because it generally gives an incorrect idea.

• The word in Scripture translated "the rest" in some places, is translated "remnant" in other places. In the Acts of the Apostles, and in the address to Thyatira, it is translated "the rest", and this gives me more the idea of what I understand by "the remnant".

• If you bear in mind that the Lord has a chief interest here, and if you look around and see what a state of confusion everything is in, how broken up everything is, how failing the testimony is, what have you to do? Plainly the answer is, To be faithful to His interest. Be of the "rest", or remnant.

There are three great marks always of the remnant.

1. The first is, That while the Lord's chief interest is your chief interest, you are sensible that the church has fallen; therefore there is no effort at being conspicuous, no effort to set up anything, as if we had not lost our first estate.
   • Now, if you look around you and follow the history of the church, you will find that there is no true apprehension of Christ's interest. What is the Reformed Church but an effort to reconstruct? God never restores a thing that is fallen; He continues a remnant to set forth and maintain His own interest.

   • Therefore, the first thing is, that you maintain His interest, while you own the failure in testimony.

2. You do not assume to be anything, which is the second mark; a poor and afflicted people that trust in the Lord. You are very sensible of the reproach that is on the church.
   • When a man is sensible of the reproach that is on his family, he knows he cannot reverse it by assuming that it does not exist. One should say, I am not insensible to the reproach that is on my family, but I am determined not to add to that reproach; on the contrary, my great purpose is to show that my life is an unvarying contradiction of the reproach that is on my family.

   • We have lost our title to be credited by the world, we present no appearance to men;
     • "as a teil tree, or an oak, when they cast their leaves", but "whose substance is in them".

     The Lord is with us.

3. And the third mark is I am more devoted in serving than ever. Devotedness to God is demonstrated by the zeal with which I serve His people.

Next, we have two classes of enemies to contend with: one which works for reconstruction; and the other, who say, Oh, it is no use; a fox will break it all down; the corporate thing is over.

• Well, in a sense, I respect those who try to reconstruct, though I know they will find the attempt a failure.

• But to the others, all I say is, Your despondence as to the Lord's chief interest is only a reflection of your own state. There never was a disordered mind yet that did not think everyone was as disordered as himself.

• All over! It is all over with those who say so. How could it be over? The same power is here that ever was here; the same love for the assembly exists as ever: what you want is faithfulness in the vessel. "In it shall be a tenth". Be you a true remnant.

• You are not to try to reform the church; you are not to begin anew, though you are to start from the beginning. You cannot disconnect yourself from the old family, the church; you must bear all the reproaches on that family, you are not honest if you do not; but the Lord's chief interest is here.

No dispensation closes without a manifestation of God's power as setting forth His heart in connection with His chief interest at the time, though there is little to indicate it outwardly.

• You can be according to His pleasure; not a faded fraction; but the divine quality at the beginning comes out in great distinctness. It is like the lighting up before death, it comes out more intensely in contrast to the surrounding declension.

• There are the two things which you must bear in mind in connection with the remnant;
  • one, that you are a living contradiction of the reproach on the church; the other,

  • that you most earnestly set forth the mind of God as expressed at the beginning.

I may give you one example here, though out of place, which will explain what I mean. The widow, who gave her two mites for the restoration of the temple, was nothing pretentious in the sight of men, but she was most pleasing in the sight of the Lord. She gave all she had. She even surpassed Solomon!

• That is the right trait of the remnant. I believe it was a beautiful sight to our Lord as He went out of the temple. The rich men were casting in of their abundance, but this poor widow cast in all that she had. For what? For God's chief interest, though we know the hopeless state of the temple then.

• I say she surpassed Solomon; Solomon out of his great riches built the house, but here is a poor widow who gave all the living that she had, for maintaining it. Thus the end is morally greater than the beginning.

• There will be some to stand forth and maintain what is due to God on the earth, at the sacrifice of everything. God grant that every heart here may be in true fidelity to His interest.

The first scripture I turn to is Genesis 48: 1-7.

• "And it came to pass after these things, that one told Joseph, Behold, thy father is sick: and he took with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim. And one told Jacob, and said, Behold, thy son Joseph cometh unto thee: and Israel strengthened himself, and sat upon the bed.

• And Jacob said unto Joseph, God almighty appeared unto me at Luz in the land of Canaan, and blessed me, and said unto me, Behold, I will make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, and I will make of thee a multitude of people; and will give this land to thy seed after thee for an everlasting possession.

• And now thy two sons Ephraim and Manasseh, which were born unto thee in the land of Egypt before I came unto thee into Egypt, are mine; as Reuben and Simeon, they shall be mine, and shall be called after the name of their brethren in their inheritance.

• And as for me, when I came from Padan, Rachel died by me in the land of Canaan in the way, when yet there was but a little way to come unto Ephrath: and I buried her there in the way of Ephrath; the same is Bethlehem".

Now here, beloved friends, there is a sample of one at the close. This was the end of the Abrahamic period, and the great feature of the testimony at that time was to be a stranger in the land, with no possession.

• If I look at Jacob, in another day, as at the end of chapter 33, I get his failure; many fall into it now. There Jacob had an altar; he called it El-elohe Israel, but he gave up the testimony.

• The testimony was that he should be a stranger and a pilgrim in the land, but he bought a parcel of a field. He did not give up the true ground – as you will find many say in this day – but he gave up the testimony, which was no possession save a burying place.

• Now in chapter 48 we come to the close of the Abrahamic period, and we find Jacob, as recorded in Hebrews, "leaning upon the top of his staff": nothing imposing to look at; feebleness itself; dying.

• All his pristine vigour, all that marked him as a man of great activity, gone; but he is worshipping God, and he is blessing the sons of Joseph – a beautiful combination!

• He is interested about the Lord's concerns on the earth, but as for himself, he has no link to it; a veritable pilgrim. He says, Rachel died, and I buried her at Ephrath. I have not a single link to this scene. Never was a man so thoroughly dissociated in heart and spirit from the earth, as he was at that moment.

• Thus he portrays the three marks of those who stand for the Lord in a day of ruin. He is in Egypt, the place of reproach. There is no effort to conceal his own feebleness; he is worshipping God, a thorough pilgrim; and blessing the sons of Joseph; devoted to God and His people.

Another example is in 1 Samuel 7. I turn to these in the hope that you may study for yourselves, and others may occur to you.

• This is a particularly interesting one, because it is at the close of the period of the Judges, which is, in a way, the type of our present period. In the times of the judges there was no king, and God personally was the One to rule; in that way typical of the place of the Holy Spirit at this present time.

• They were in a peculiar embarrassment from the Philistines; very like the way the true are hindered by the professing in the church now. They were in the land; they were in the right place; but the Philistines had so overwhelmed them that they were actually prisoners in their own houses. They had even to go to the Philistines to sharpen their tools. In the land, but not allowed to enjoy it.

• The Philistines were a people who had come up from Egypt; you get their origin in Genesis 10.

• The condition is lamentable. What does Samuel propose? Samuel closes this period; and it is remarkable that he came in by prayer, he was given in answer to prayer. Read verse 3,
  • "And Samuel spake unto all the house of Israel, saying, If ye do return unto the Lord with all your hearts, then put away the strange gods and Ashtaroth from among you, and prepare your hearts unto the Lord, and serve him only: and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines".

There was no disguising the state they were in still they were to be delivered out of it. He does not tell them to make any demonstration; but he says,

• "I will pray for you".

• Then as we read in verse 6,
  • "And they gathered together to Mizpeh, and drew water, and poured it out before the Lord, and fasted on that day, and said there, We have sinned against the Lord. And Samuel judged the children of Israel in Mizpeh.

  • And when the Philistines heard that the children of Israel were gathered together to Mizpeh, the lords of the Philistines went up against Israel. And when the children of Israel heard it. they were afraid of the Philistines.

  • And the children of Israel said to Samuel, Cease not to cry unto the Lord our God for us, that he will save us out of the hand of the Philistines. And Samuel took a sucking lamb, and offered it for a burnt-offering wholly unto the Lord: and Samuel cried unto the Lord for Israel; and the Lord heard him.

  • And as Samuel was offering up the burnt-offering, the Philistines drew near to battle against Israel: but the Lord thundered with a great thunder on that day upon the Philistines, and discomfited them; and they were smitten before Israel. And the men of Israel went out of Mizpeh and pursued the Philistines, and smote them, until they came unto Beth-car.

  • Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and Shen, and called the name of it Eben-ezer, saying, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us".

There you get a great manifestation of His favour. You might say, What are we to do in our present confusion? – the Philistines actually swamping and hindering everything even in the place of blessing – what are we to do?

• Two things must be insisted on and maintained: namely, separation, and dependence on God. Those were the two things here – separation and dependence – and God wrought a great victory.
  • "The Philistines were subdued, and they came no more into the coast of Israel; and the hand of the Lord was against the Philistines all the days of Samuel".

• Samuel was the last of the judges. We see, then, that at the close of that period, there was a company who had really turned to the Lord; sensible indeed of their condition, because Ichabod was written on the nation. There was no denying their low estate, the family reproach.

• What could more give you the idea of humility than praying? The very attitude expresses need. They poured out water, the water is the line of separation; and they fasted. There was an entire abnegation of human resources, and they turned to God in absolute dependence on Him.

• Then God comes forth in His own power: He thundered. Thunder is a thing outside the compass of man. The wonder is that we do not pray more. You cannot pray without acceptance, and that is what the burnt-offering set forth. We are in acceptance:
  • "Now is the accepted time".

• Here they are in very different circumstances from the days of Joshua; but still it was the same power. There is no passage fraught with more instruction for us than this. It is typical of the church period. And Samuel at the close of that period can record by a stone, typically Christ:
  • "Hitherto hath the Lord helped us".

One more example from the Old Testament: it will explain a good deal. I turn to Haggai.

• I am sure that every obstruction will be thrown in your way as you endeavour to stand for the Lord. The enemy begins to plot against you the moment you try to be released from indifference. That is always so. You see it in the case which we have just been looking at.
  • "When the Philistines heard that the children of Israel were gathered together to Mizpeh, the lords of the Philistines went up against Israel".

• The moment you seek to progress, you may be sure the power of the enemy is at work to baffle you. Now this is very interesting in connection with the captives who had come up from Babylon in Ezra's time, and had gone through a great deal of suffering.

• They were sensible that everything was in a broken condition, yet they returned to Jerusalem. The walls were broken down, and the temple in ruins. Still they were so assured of the Lord's favour that they kept the feast of tabernacles before even they had a harvest.

• And this is an immense encouragement for us, and has encouraged many; for if they could overcome all obstruction, and could again be occupied with God's chief interest here, how much more should we who have the Holy Spirit!

• But hindrances were thrown in their way, and so successfully, that for fourteen years they ceased building. They were baffled; though they could say, We are come back to the right place.

• Now this is our danger. On the one hand, there is a danger lest, like Jacob, although you have returned to the right ground, and though you retain the truth, you disregard the testimony. I mean by that, the distinct special line of divine interest. In Haggai His interest was the house:
  • "Ye looked for much, and lo, it came to little, and when ye brought it home. I did blow upon it. Why? saith the Lord of hosts. Because of my house that is waste, and ye run every man unto his own house".

• It was not worldliness. They were seeking their own blessing, and not God's interest. Israel was entitled to earthly blessing, but they were not making God's chief interest their first interest.

• Those who have suffered a great deal in order to stand for the Lord, are in peculiar danger of being turned aside. There is not only the danger I have alluded to in Jacob; but that you will be so baffled and hindered by the opposers that you cease to be engrossed with God's chief interest. Then it happens to us, as to Israel:
  • "I did blow upon it. Why? saith the Lord of hosts. Because of mine house that is waste".

• God's interest is overlooked. The only true revival is in zeal for God's chief interest.
  • "Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house; and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the Lord. And they came and did the work in the house of the Lord, of hosts, their God".

And further on, we read in chapter 2: 15:

• "And now, I pray you, consider from this day and upward, from before a stone was laid upon a stone in the temple of the Lord: since those days were, when one came to an heap of twenty measures, there were but ten: when one came to the pressfat for to draw out fifty vessels out of the press, there were but twenty.

• I smote you with blasting, and with mildew, and with hail, in all the labours of your hands; yet ye turned not to me, saith the Lord.

• Consider now from this day and upward, from the four and twentieth day of the ninth month, even from the day that the foundation of the Lord's temple was laid, consider it. Is the seed yet in the barn? yea, as yet the vine, and the fig-tree, and the pomegranate, and the olive-tree, hath not brought forth: from this day will I bless you".

• The great thing to maintain is that God's chief interest is ours. The danger is that one may have suffered a great deal to arrive at the true ground, and then fail to maintain what is God's chief interest on that ground; to be stranded there.

How beautifully this course is pursued by our Lord! In John 2, when He comes into the temple – and that was not the temple built by Ezra, this had been thrown down; it was rebuilt by Herod, and took forty-six years to rebuild – He cleared it.

• I know nothing more affecting than that the Lord makes a scourge of small cords and drives them all out, saying to them that sold doves,
  • "Take these things hence; make not my Father's house an house of merchandise. And his disciples remembered that it was written, The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up".

• Nothing more touching.

• There were two classes in those days, as now – the Pharisees and publicans. The Pharisees tried to keep up appearances; the publicans trafficked on the ruin of the dispensation, they were the tax-gatherers. The Pharisee studies appearance in works and ways; the publican says, It is all ruin, but I may turn it to my account.

Now turn to Luke 2 for an example of the remnant in our Lord's time – Simeon and Anna, who met the Lord when, for the first time, He was taken, an infant, into the temple.

• Simeon was waiting for the consolation of Israel. There was nothing pretentious about him; he was an old man, but his heart was set for the Lord.

• The man and the woman together make a full type; the man denotes the energy, the woman the condition.

• Simeon is looking for the salvation of Israel, and he, with the Saviour in his arms, can say to the Lord:
  • "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word: for mine eyes have seen thy salvation".

• As I have seen You, I can let everything else go. Anna, on the other hand, did not depart
  • "from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayers night and day: and she coming in that instant gave thanks likewise unto the Lord, and spake of him to all them that looked for redemption in Jerusalem".

• Look at their beautiful fidelity to God. Nothing in the eyes of men: an old man and an old woman. Anna was over eighty years of age; see her activity. She is not imposing or conspicuous, but the Lord's chief interest was her chief interest, and she sedulously sought the welfare of His people.

Now let us look at our responsibility. The word Isaiah 17: 6, may give you an idea of it.

• "Yet gleaning grapes shall be left in it, as the shaking of an olive tree, two or three berries in the top of the uppermost bough, four or five in the outmost fruitful branches thereof, saith the Lord GOD of Israel".

• They were only four or five, but they were all good fruit.
  • Again, Psalm 72: 16; "There shall be an handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the mountains; the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon: and they of the city shall flourish like grass of the earth".

• One more, to which I have alluded, Zephaniah 3: 12,

• "I will also leave in the midst of thee an afflicted and poor people, and they shall trust in the name of the Lord".