Can you not understand what it
means to go to God, as it were, and fling yourself, like a child,
against his breast and feel yourself folded in the everlasting arms?
Your sorrow may not be removed, the burden may not be taken away, the
life of your friend may not be saved, the sickness may not be healed;
but there is comfort, there is strength, there is peace, there is help.
Why, even in our human life do you not know how it is? You go to some
friend you trust and love with your trouble. Perhaps he cannot lift it
with one of his fingers; but he can tell you that he loves you, he
cares, he would help you if only he were able. He can put his arm
around you, he can say, God bless you; and you are stronger. You go
away with lifted shoulder and with head that fronts the heavens; and
you are able to bear the burden. Is there nothing akin to this in the
sense of coming into intimate relations with the eternal Father, when
troubled, pressed, when the outside world is dark, and feeling that
here is refuge in a love deeper, higher, unspeakably more tender than
that of the dearest friend that ever lived?
And this suggests another point. I have no doubt that sometimes, in my
attempts to lead the devotions of this congregation, I use words which,
if I were to sit down and critically analyze, I could not logically
justify. I do not mean to; but, perhaps, sometimes I do. What of it?
When my children were small, and my little boy came and climbed up in
my lap and expressed himself in all sorts of illogical and foolish
ways, telling me every sort of thing he wanted, impossible things,
unwise things, things I could not get for him, things I would not get
if I could, because I thought myself wiser than he, did these things
trouble me? I loved to have him pour out his whole little soul into
mine, because he was my child and because I did not expect him to be
over-wise.
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