We can therefore feel assured that in that day, when the Lord makes up His

jewels there will be none lacking, all will have been delivered.

Even in the day of David's distress, during the rebellion of Absalom

and Ahithophel, we find this same word used concerning his own 'there lacked

not one of them that had not gone over Jordan' (2 Sam. 17:22).  The word is

not only used of the victorious David, but of the glory of Solomon.  In order

to impress upon us the magnificence of Solomon's reign, we are told what the

daily provision was:

'Thirty measures of fine flour, and threescore measures of meal, ten

fat oxen, and twenty oxen out of the pastures, and an hundred sheep,

beside harts, and roebucks, and fallow deer, and fatted fowl ... for

all that came unto king Solomon's table ... they lacked nothing' (1

Kings 4:22 -27).

The word adar means not only to fail or to lack, but to keep rank in an

army (1 Chron. 12:33), to be digged (hoed) as of a vineyard (Isa. 5:6).  The

underlying idea being that of order or arrangement which if observed would

prevent 'failure' or 'lack'.  Another strange derivative of adar is eder 'a

flock of sheep' (Song of Sol. 6:6), possibly because of the well -known

tendency for sheep to keep close together and to follow a leader.

We can look back upon fulfilled prophecy also to encourage our faith.

We think of the triumphant reply of Moses to Pharaoh's suggestion that Israel

should leave behind in Egypt their flocks and herds.  'There shall not an

hoof be left behind' (Exod. 10:26).  Not an Israelite perished in the Red

Sea, not one under twenty years of age died during the forty years wandering

in the wilderness, every one of them crossed the Jordan under Joshua.  So

shall it be at the end; every one whose name is in the book of life shall be

found in his lot at the close.

Let us sum up the testimony of these seven Hebrew words:

he faileth not (gamar to finish).  He will not halt, be turned

aside or in any way fail to reach His goal.  He is the Perfecter.

He Who once said 'It is finished' from the cross, will yet say

'It is done' from the throne.

'I will cry unto God Most High; unto God that performeth

(gamar) all things for me' (Psa. 57:2).

Christ is the Beginning and the Ending, and the purpose of God

must reach its goal.

he faileth not (kahah to burn dimly).  He does not grow old, His

eye does not become dim.  He ever lives, and in the power of that

resurrection life is found the pledge of ultimate victory.

he faileth not (naphal to fall).  None of His words can fall to

the ground.

'For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and

returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh

it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower,

and bread to the eater: so shall My word be that goeth

forth out of My mouth: it shall not return unto Me void,

but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall

prosper in the thing whereto I sent it' (Isa. 55:10,11).