forget that every child comes into the
world with the Father's kiss upon its clean soul regardless of the
circumstances of its birth. We forget also that that child is no more
to blame for those circumstances than it is to be blamed for the
currents of the sea or for the darkness of the night.

But Jephthah was blamed. Ugly names were flung at him before he was
old enough to know their dark and sinister meaning. He was forbidden
to go to the big house of his father before he knew why he was not
allowed to go. He was excluded from the games of those more
fortunately born than he, when he could no more understand why he was
excluded than he could keep back the bitter tears of childish
disappointment. I can see him as he watches his half brothers and
sisters play in the distance, and his little heart is lonely and he is
hungry for a playmate. And the gate is shut in his face, the gate of a
shame not his own.

By and by youthhood comes, and early manhood. The parental estate is
to be divided. Jephthah is disinherited. He is driven from among his
people. He is forced to flee for his life. And he goes to take refuge
in Tob with its mountain fastnesses and with its rude heathens who are
less unkind than those kinsmen of his who claim to be worshippers of
Jehovah.

So we have here the material out of which this young man is called on
to build a life. He has no parentage. He has no kindred. He has no
friends. Nobody believes in him. Everybody expects him to go wrong.
It seems even at times as if everybody wanted him to go wrong. They
said, "Oh, yes, I know him. I used to know his mother. She died in
the gutter. You can't expect anything of him."

And it is not at all difficult to go down when everybody expects you to
go down. It is a great thing to have somebody to trust you. That is a
tremendous help. As long as you feel that there is somebody who counts
on you, who believes in you, you are not without an anchor. I read the
other day of a little newsboy who was given a quarter that he might get
change. And on his way back he was run over and crushed by an auto.
And the last word he said was, "Be sure and hunt him up and give him
back the change. He trusted me." But here is a young fellow exiled,
robbed, persecuted and mistrusted. And out of this charred and ugly
material he is called upon to build a life.

And what is the result? Well, he refused to surrender. He said, "If
nobody else will b