1 Samuel 11:14

"Then said Samuel to the people, Come, and let us go to Gilgal, and renew the kingdom there." 1 Samuel 11:14 .

The mind should be fixed upon the possibility of renewal in life. Life is full of beginnings; that is, full of new chances and new opportunities. Take, for example, the Sabbath, as opening a new week; the morning, as opening a new day; the birthday, as introducing a new period of time; the new year, as an hour when the old may be forgotten and a deeper order of things may be inaugurated: take youth and manhood, leaving school, entering business, forming associations and companionships: all these indicate the possibility of reformation, reconstruction, the utterance of larger prayer, and entering into the bondage of Christ, which is the sweetest liberty. It is beautiful also to notice how at certain places we make certain vows with fitness. Samuel would have the people go to Gilgal, that the kingdom might be renewed. It is well to associate given places with the best exercises of the religious life. This is the birthplace, the place where the word of trust was first spoken, the spot of ground on which the first altar was built, the point in space at which the first great prayer was consciously uttered, the church wherein the deepest religious impressions were made and the holiest relations of life were formed; in going back to such places we revive memories, and rekindle hopes, and awaken inspirations, that may have been suspended. Blessed are they whose life-road is crowded with places at which holy words were spoken, and sweet realisations of Christ were enjoyed. We might thus plant the earth like a garden, and make many places not beautiful in themselves supremely beautiful by moral association and spiritual suggestion. If any man has broken away from the true kingdom, he may even now renew it. If any man is conscious of unfaithfulness to Christ's sceptre, let him go to some consecrated place and there repent of his sin and renew his fealty. We need voices such as Samuel's to encourage us in the attempted renewal of all lofty purposes. People become depressed, they are cast down by reason of the weight of their burdens, they are overcome by a consciousness of their sin and shame, and they have not heart to think of rekindling the fire that has expired: it is in such periods of depression and gloom that the voices of such men as Samuel come as music from heaven, giving men to feel that even yet they may be recovered of the plague of disloyalty, and even yet may renew associations in which they once delighted. Whosoever will, let him come. Preachers of the everlasting kingdom should be the most cheerful of men, full of spiritual animation, characterised by all intellectual and moral vivacity, always alluring men to brighter worlds, and always leading the way.