Primarily, this glorious outburst was addrest to the exiles as heads of families.  The father’s strength was broken and his children had been crusht and ground to earth.  The ancient patrimony was gone; he had gathered his little ones in from the huts where slaves dwelt.  He was leading his little band of pilgrims into a desert.  But the prophet spoke to the exiles as to men who believed that the family was the great national institution.  With us, the family is important, but with these Hebrew exiles the family was everything.  For them the home was the spring from whence the mighty river rolled forth.  The family was the headwaters of national, industrial, social and religious life.  Every father was revered as the architect of the family fortune.  The first ambition of every young Hebrew was to found a family.  Just as abroad, a patrician gentleman builds a baronial mansion, fills it with art treasures, hangs the shields and portraits of his ancestors upon the walls, hoping to hand the mansion forward to generations yet unborn, so every worthy Hebrew longed to found a noble family.  How keen the anguish, therefore, of this exile in the desert!  What a scene is that of the exiles upon the edge of the desert.  Darkness is upon the land and the fire burns low into coals.  Worn and exhausted, children are sleeping beside the mother.  Here is an old man, lying apart, broken and bitter in spirit—­one son stands forth a dim figure—­looking down upon his aged parents, upon the wife of his bosom and upon his little children.  Standing under the stars, he meditates his plans.  How shall he care for these, when he returns to his ruined estate?  In the event of death, what arm shall lift a shield above these little ones?  What if sickness or death pounce upon a home as an eagle upon a dove, as wolves upon lambs, or as brigands descend from the mountains upon sleeping herdsmen!

Every founder of a family knows the agony of such an hour!  We are in a world where men are never more than a few weeks from, possible poverty and want; little wonder then that all men seek to provide for the future of the home and the children.  But to the exile standing in the darkness, with love that broods above his babes, there comes this word of comfort:  God’s solicitude for you and yours will not let Him slumber or sleep!  God will lift up a highway for the feet of the little band of pilgrims.  The eternal God shall be thy guide in the march through the desert.  His pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night shall stand in the sky; He shall lead the flock like a shepherd; He shall gather the little ones in His arms, and carry the children in His bosom.  And if the father fall on the march, the wings of the Eternal shall brood the babes that are left.  His right arm shall be a sword and His left arm a shield.  The eternal God fainteth not, neither is weary.  Having time to care for the stars, and to lead them forth by name, He hath time and thought also for His children.  What a word is this for the home!  What comfort for all whose hearts turn toward their children!  What a pledge to fathers for generations yet unborn!  This truth arms every parent for any emergency.  For God is round about every home as the mountains are round about Jerusalem, for bounty and protection.