The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1898-05-27

and afflicted. There are times in grief
when one cheerful face, dawning upon
a mans soul, is worth 81. 600 to him Do
not whine over the afflicted Take the
promises of the gospel and utter them
smile if You feel like It. Do not drive
any more hearses through that poor
soul Do not tell him the trouble was
foreordained. It will not be any comfort
to know it was 10000 years coming. II
you want to find splints for a broken
bone, do not take cast iror. Do not tell
them 1t is o justice that weighs out
grief. They want to hear OF o ten
der mercy. In other words. do not give
them aquafortis when they need vale
rian.
GODS MINISTER'S.
Again, / remark that those persons are
trouble themselves. A larkspur cannot
lecture on the nature of a snowflake. 1t
never saw a snowflake, n those peo-
pie who ave always lived in the sum-
who are frozen in disaster. God keeps
aged people in the world, 1 think, for
this very work OF sympathy. Iney nave
been through all these trials. They
know ali that which initiates and all
that which soothes. If there are men
and women here who have old people
in the house or near at hand SO that
they can easily reach them, l congratu-
late you. Some OF us have had trials in
life, and although we have had many
friends around about US we have wished
that father and mother were still alive
hat we might go and tell them. Per-
haps they could not say much, but it
would have been such a comfort to have
them around. These aged ones who nave
been all through the trials Of life know
how to give coincidence. Cherish them,
let them lean on your arm, these aged
people. If when you speak to them they
cannot hear just what you say the first
time an6 n va II SaV II a G1Hnnd
time, when you say it a second time do
not say it sharply. If you do, you will
be sorry for 1t On the day when you take
the last look and brush back the silvery
locks from the wrinkled brow just before
they screw the lid on Blessed be God
for the old people! They may not have
much strength to go around, but they
are Gods appointed ministers OF COM
fort to a broken heart.
People who have not had trials them
selves cannot give comfort to others.
They may talk very beautifully and they
may give you a great deal Of poetic SEN
timent, but while poetry is perfume that
smells sweet, it makes a very poor salve.
If you have a grave in a pathway and
somebody comes and covers it all over
with flowers it is a grave yet. Those who
have not had grief themselves know not
the mystery Of a broke heart. They
know not the meaning of childlessness,
and the having no one to put to bed at
night or the standing in a room where
every book and picture and door are
full of memories-the doormat where she
sat, the cup out Of which she drank, the
place where she stood at the door and
clapped her hands, the odd figures that
she scribbled, the blocks she built into a
house. All, no, you must have trouble
yourself before you can comfort trouble
in others. But come all We who have
been bereft, and We who have been COM
forted in your sorrows, and stand around
these afflicted souls and say to them, Il
had that very sorrow myself; God COM
fort cd M anI ho uil1 n0mfnrt Won - and
that will go right to the spot. In other
words, to comfort others we must have
faith in God, practical experience and
good, sound common sense.
FOR THE sORROWFUL.
But there are three or four considera-
tfons that 1 will bring to those who are
sOrrOwful and distressed and that we
can always bring to them, knowing that
they will effect a cure. And the first
consideration is that God sends our trou-
bles in love. I often hear people in their
troubles say, why I wonder what God
has against me?" They seem to think
God has some grudge against them be-
cause trouble and misfortune have come.
o a moi Of % ser zou not ';WThom th hea' h pasi
loveth he chasteneth?' A child comes in
with a very bad splinter in its hand, and
you try to extract it. It is a very pain
you, but you persist. You are going to
take that splinter out, so you take the
child with a gentle, but firm grasp, for,
although there may be pain in it, the
splinter must come out. And it is love
that dictates it and makes you persist.
My friends, I really think that nearly
all our sorrows in this world are only the
hand Of our Father extracting some
thorn. If all these sorrows were sent by
enemies, l would say, Arm yourselves
against them, and as in tropical chimes
when a tiger comes down from the noun
tains and carries off a child from the
village the neighbors band together and
go into the forest and hunt the monster
SO / would have you, If [ thought these
misfortunes were sent by an enemy, go
out and battle against them. But, no,
they come from a Father so kind, so
loving, so gentle, that the prophet,
speaking Of his tenderness and mercy,
drops the idea of a father and says, AS
one whom his mother comforteth 50 will
I comfort you"
Again, I remark there is comfort in
the thought that God by all this process
is going to make you useful. Do you
know that those who accomplish the
most for Coo and heaven ave all been
under the harrow? Show me a mar that
has done anything for Christ in this day
in a public or private place who has had
no trouble and whose path has been
smooth. Ah, no.
1 once went through an ak factory,
and l saw them take the bars of iron
and thrust them into the terrible fur
naces. Then besweated workmen with
long tongs stirred the blaze. Then they
brought out a bar of iron put 1t In
a crushing machine. and then. they put
it between jaws that bit it in twain.
Then they put it on an anvil, and there
were great hammers swung by machin-
ery-each one half a ton in weight-that
went thump, thump, thump! If that iron
could have spoken, it would have said:
Why all this beating? Why must I be
pounded any more than any other iron?"
The workmen would have said: We
want to make axes out of you, keen,
sharp axes-axes with which to hew
down the forest, and build the ship, and
erect houses. and carry on a thousand
enterprises of civilization. That is the
reason we pound YOU Now. God puts
a soul into the furnace of trial, and then
it is brought out and run Through the
crushing machine, and then it comes
down on the anvil, and upon it. blow at
ter blow. blow after blow, until the soul
cries out, 'Oh, Lord, what does all this
mean?" God says: Il want to make
something very useful out Of you. You
shall be something to hew with and
something to build with. 1t is a prac-
teal process through which / am put