| Week-Day Religion |
Chapter 9 |
Page 3 |
Afflictions, sanctified, soften the asperities of life. They tame the wildness of nature. They temper human ambitions. They burn out the dross of selfishness and worldliness. They humble pride. They quell fierce passions. They reveal to men their own hearts, their own weaknesses, faults, blemishes and perils. They teach patience and submission. They disciple unruly spirits. They deepen and enrich our experiences. Ploughing the hard soil and cutting long and deep furrows in the heart, the heavenly Sower follows, and fruits of righteousness spring up. It has been said that “the last, best fruit which comes to late perfection, even in the kindliest soul, is tenderness toward the hard, forbearance toward the unforbearing, warmth of heart toward the cold, and philanthropy toward the misanthropic.” But there is no influence under which these late fruits ripen so quickly as under the power of sorrow. It makes us gentle toward all. It softens every harsh feeling and fills the heart with tender sympathy, kindly charity and benevolent dispositions. Many a home is saved from wreck by a sorrow that comes and draws estranged hearts close together again. Many a cold, icy nature is made warm and tender by the grief that crushes it.
Then sorrow cuts the chains that bind us to this earthly life and sends us out to sea on voyages of new discovery. It opens windows in our poor prison life here through which we get glimpses of the better things of immortality and glory.
Especially is this true of the loss of friends by death. We live absorbed in the earthly life about us, thinking of no other, our eyes fixed on the dusty soil at our feet and not seeing the radiant heavens that glow and shine above our heads. Then suddenly one whom we love is plucked away from our side, and for the first time we begin to look up and to obtain glimpses of the invisible and eternal things of the life above and beyond us. Thus viewed from any side, affliction appears as a messenger of God sent to minister to us in the truest way. As one has beautifully written of sorrow,
“I turned and clasped her close with sudden strength,
And slowly, sweetly, I became aware
Within my arms God’s angel stood at length,
White robed and calm and fair.
‘Look thou beyond the evening sky,’ she said,
‘Beyond the changing splendors of the day,
Accept the pain, the weariness, the dread–
Accept, and bid me stay.’”
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