Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1902-03-24

hand, and the pounding of him with
stones until he was taken up for Dead
and the jamming against him of prison
gates, and the Ephesan vOciferatiOn
and the ankles skinned by the painful
stocks. ard the laundering of the Alex
andran corn ship, and the beheading
stroke of the Roman sheriff to bring
Paul to his proper development. 1t
was not because Robert MOffat and
Lady Rachel Russell and Frederick
Oberlin were worse than other people
that they had to suffer. 1t was be-
cause they were better, and God want
ed to make them best. BY the careful
ness of the thrashing you may always
conclude the "alue of the grain.
Helps Us Bear Burdens.
Next, my text teaches us that God
proportions our trials to what we can
bear-the staff for the fitches, the rod
for the cummin, the iron wheel for the
corn. Sometimes people in great trou-
BILE say, "Oh, | can't bear it!' But you
did bear it. God would not have sent
it upon you if he had not known that
you could bear it. You trembled and
you swOoned, but you got through.
God will not take from your eyes one
tear too many nor from your lungs
one sigh too deep nor from your tenn
pies one thrOb too sharp. The perpleX-
tiles of your earthly business have not
in them one tangle too intricate. You
sometimes feel as if our world were
| full of bludgeons flying haphazard.
Oh, no; they are thrashing instruments
that God just suits to your case. There
is not dollar of bad debts on your
| ledger or disappointment about goods
| that you expected to go up. but that
! have gone down, or q sWindle of your
! business partner or trick on the part
! of those who are in the same kind of
| merchandise that you are, but God in
tended to Overrule for your immortal
! help. oh" you say, there is no need
! talking that way to me. l don't like
to be cheated and outraged" Neither
| does the corn like the corn thrasher,
! but after it has been thrashed and
winnowed it has a great deal better
! opinion of winnowing mills and corn
thrashCrs.
We'll" you say, ''if l could choose
|
troubled" All, my brother, then it
would not be trouble You would
choose scratching that would not hurt,
and unless it hurt it does not get sane
titled. Your trial perhaps may be child
! lessness. You are fond of children.
! You say. why does God send children
to that other household, where they are
unwelcome and are beaten and banged
about when | would have taken them
in the arms of my affection" You say,
ANY other trial but this" Your trial
| perhaps may be disfigured cOunte-
nance or n face that is easily caricatur-
ed, and you say, Il could endure any
thing if only was good looking" And
your trial perhaps is n violent temper.
| and you have 20 drive it like six I'M
broken horses amid the gunpOwder eX-
blossoms of a great holiday, and ever
and anon it runs away with you. Your
trial is the asthma. You say, IF it
were rheumatism or neuralgia or cry
sipelas, but it is this asthma, and it is
such an eXhausting thing to breathe"
Your trouble is Il husband, sharp, snap
Ply and cross about the house and rails
ing Il small riot because a button is off.
How could you know the button is off?
Your trial is a wife ever in contest
with the servants, and she is a SlOVen
Though she was very careful about her
appearance in your presence once, now
she is careless, because, she says, her
fortune is made! Your trial is a hard
school lesson you cannot learn, and you
have bitten your finger nails until they
are a sight to behold.
Complaining Against GCd.
Everybody has some veXation or an
nOyance or trial, and he or she thinks
it is the one least adapted. "Anything
but this" all say; anything but this -
My nearer, are you not ashamed to
be complaining all this time against
God? Who manages the affairs of this
world anyhow? Is it an infinite Mo-
doc or Il Sitting Bull savage or an ON
nipotent Mana Sahib? No; it is the
most merciful and glorious and wise
being in all the universe. You cannot
teach OmnipOtence anything. You have
fretted and worried almost enough
Do you not think so? Some of you are
ulIhluS yourselves FlulculOuS III Tue
sight of the angels. Here is a naval
architect, and he draws out the plan CT
L ship of many thousand tons. Many
wOrkmen are engaged on it for long
while. The ship is done, and some day
with the flags up and the air gorgeous
with bunting, that vessel is launched
for Southampton. At that time lac
six years of age comes running dowr
the dock with a toy boat which he has
made with his own jackknife, and he
says: Here, my boat is better thar
yours. Just look at this jibboom and
these weather crossjack braces" AnC
he drops his little boat beside the grea1
ship, and there is roar of laughter OF
the decks All, my friends, that grea
ship is your life as God planned it
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