retreated, that he would thenceforth receive no fixed salary for any service rendered to God's people. While calmly assigning scriptural grounds for such a position he, on the same grounds, urged voluntary offerings, whether of money or other means of support, as the proper acknowledgment of service rendered by God's minister, and as a sacrifice acceptable, well-pleasing to God. A little later, seeing that, when such voluntary gifts came direct from the givers personally, there was a danger that some might feel self-complacent over the largeness of the amount given by them, and others equally humbled by the smallness of their offerings, with consequent damage to both classes, of givers, he took a step further: he had a box put up in the chapel, over which was written, that whoever had a desire to do something for his support might put such an offering therein as ability and disposition might direct. His intention was, that thus the act might be wholly as in God's sight, without the risk of a sinful pride or false humility.
He further felt that, to be entirely consistent, he should ask no help from man, even in bearing necessary costs of travel in the Lord's service, nor even state his needs beforehand in such a way as indirectly to appeal for aid. All of these methods he conceived to be forms of trusting in an arm of flesh, going to man for help instead of going at once, always and only, to the Lord. And he adds: "To come to this conclusion before God required more grace than to give up my salary."
These successive steps are here recorded explicitly and in their exact order because they lead up directly to the ultimate goal of his life-work and witness. Such decisions were vital links connecting this remarkable man and his "Father's business," upon which he was soon more fully to enter; and they were all necessary to the fulness of the world-wide witness which he was to bear to a prayer-hearing God and the absolute safety of trusting in Him and in Him alone.
On October 7, 1830, George Müller, in finding a wife, found a good thing and obtained new favour from the Lord. Miss Mary Groves, sister of the self-denying dentist whose surrender of all things for the mission field had so impressed him years before, was married to this man of God, and for forty blessed years proved an help meet for him. It was almost, if not quite, an ideal union, for which he continually thanked God; and, although her kingdom was one which came not with observation,' the sceptre of her influence was far wider in its sway than will ever be appreciated by those who were strangers to her personal and domestic life. She was a rare woman and her price was above rubies. The heart of her husband safely trusted, in her, and the great family of orphans who were to her as children rise up even to this day to call her blessed.
Married life has often its period of estrangement, even when temporary alienation yields to a deeper love, as the parties become more truly wedded by the assimilation of their inmost being to one another. But to Mr. and Mrs. Müller there never came any such experience of even temporary alienation. From the first, love grew, and with it, mutual confidence and trust. One of the earliest ties which bound these two in one was the bond of a common self-denial. Yielding literal obedience to Luke xii. 33, they sold what little they had and gave alms, henceforth laying up no treasures on earth (Matthew vi. 19-34; xix. 21.) The step then taken—accepting, for Christ's sake, voluntary poverty—was never regretted, but rather increasingly rejoiced in; how faithfully it was followed in the same path of continued self-sacrifice will sufficiently appear when it is remembered that, nearly sixty-eight years afterward, George Müller passed suddenly into the life beyond, a poor man; his will, when admitted to probate, showing his entire personal property, under oath, to be but one hundred and sixty pounds! And even that would not have been in his possession had there been no daily need of requisite comforts for the body and of tools for his work. Part of this amount was in money, shortly before received and not yet laid out for his Master, but held at His disposal. Nothing, even to the clothes he wore, did he treat as his own. He was a consistent steward.
This final farewell to all earthly possessions, in 1830, left this newly married husband and wife to look only to the Lord. Thenceforth they were to put to ample daily test both their faith in the Great Provider and the faithfulness of the Great Promiser. It may not be improper here to anticipate, what is yet to be more fully recorded, that, from day to day and hour to hour, during more than threescore years, George Müller was enabled to set to his seal that God is true. If few men have ever been permitted so to trace in the smallest matters God's care over His children, it is partly because few have so completely abandoned themselves to that care. He dared to trust Him, with whom the hairs of our head are all numbered, and who touchingly reminds us that He cares for what has been quaintly called "the odd sparrow." Matthew records (x. 29) how two sparrows are sold for a farthing, and Luke (xii. 6) how five are sold for two farthings; and so it would appear that, when two farthings were offered, an odd sparrow was thrown in, as of so little value that it could be given away with the other four. And yet even for that one sparrow, not worth taking into account in the bargain, God cares. Not one of them is forgotten before God, or falls to the ground without Him. With what force then comes the assurance: "Fear ye not therefore; ye are of more value than many sparrows!"
So George Müller found it to be. He was permitted henceforth to know as never before, and as few others have ever learned, how truly God may be approached as "Thou that hearest prayer." God can keep His trusting children not only from falling but from stumbling; for, during all those after-years that spanned the lifetime of two generations, there was no drawing back. Those precious promises, which in faith and hope were "laid hold" of in 1830, were "held fast" until the end. (Heb. vi. 18, x. 23.) And the divine faithfulness proved a safe anchorage-ground in the most prolonged and violent tempests. The anchor of hope, sure and steadfast, and entering into that within the veil, was never dragged from its secure hold on God. In fifty thousand cases, Mr. Müller calculated that he could trace distinct answers to definite prayers; and in multitudes of instances in which God's care was not definitely traced, it was day by day like an encompassing passing but invisible presence or atmosphere of life and strength.
On August 9, 1831, Mrs. Müller gave birth to a stillborn babe, and for six weeks remained seriously ill. Her husband meanwhile laments that his heart was so cold and carnal, and his prayers often so hesitating and formal; and he detects, even behind his zeal for God, most unspiritual frames. He especially chides himself for not having more seriously thought of the peril of child-bearing, so as to pray more earnestly for his wife; and he saw clearly that the prospect of parenthood had not been rejoiced in as a blessing, but rather as implying a new burden and hindrance in the Lord's work.
While this man of God lays bare his heart in his journal, the reader must feel that "as in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man." How many a servant of God has no more exalted idea of the divine privilege of a sanctified parenthood! A wife and a child are most precious gifts of God when received, in answer to prayer, from His hand. Not only are they not hindrances, but they are helps, most useful in fitting a servant of Christ for certain parts of his work for which no other preparation is so adequate. They serve to teach him many most valuable lessons, and to round out his character into a far more symmetrical beauty and serviceableness. And when it is remembered how a godly association in holiness and usefulness may thus be supplied, and above all a godly succession through many generations, it will be seen how wicked is the spirit that treats holy wedlock and its fruits in offspring,—with lightness and contempt. Nor let us forget that promise: "If two of you agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of My Father which is in heaven." (Matt. xviii. 19.) The Greek word for "agree" is symphonize, and suggests a musical harmony where chords are tuned to the same key and struck by a master hand. Consider what a blessed preparation for such habitual symphony in prayer is to be found in the union of a husband and wife in the Lord! May it not be that to this the Spirit refers when He bids husband and wife dwell in unity, as "heirs together of the grace of life," and adds, "that your prayers be not hindered"? (1 Peter iii. 7.)
God used this severe lesson for permanent blessing to George Müller. He showed him how open was his heart to the subtle power of selfishness and carnality, and how needful was this chastisement to teach him the sacredness of marital life and parental responsibility. Henceforth he judged himself, that he might not be "judged of the
