Shall your brethren go to war, and shall ye sit here? Numbers 32:6
"The Reubenites and Gadites would have been unbrotherly
if they 
had claimed the land which had been conquered, and had left the
rest of the people to fight for their portions alone.
---We have received
much by means of the efforts and sufferings of the saints in years gone
by, and if we do not make some return to the church of Christ by giving
her our best energies, we are unworthy to be enrolled in her ranks.
The Master of the vineyard saith,
"Why stand ye here all the day
idle?"
Shrinking from trial is
the temptation of those who are at ease in Zion: they would fain escape
the cross and yet wear the crown; to them the question for this
evening's meditation is very applicable.
Q: If the most precious are tried
in the fire, are we to escape the crucible?
Q: If the diamond must be vexed
upon the wheel, are we to be made perfect without suffering?
Q: Why and wherefore should we be treated better than our Lord?
Q: The
firstborn felt the rod, and why not the younger brethren?
---It is a
cowardly pride which would choose a downy pillow and a silken couch for a
soldier of the cross. Wiser far is he who, being first resigned to the
divine will, groweth by the energy of grace to be pleased with it, and
so learns to gather lilies at the cross foot, and, like Samson, to find
honey in the lion."
Charles Spurgeon