God Comforting His People
(No. 3012)
A SERMON PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1906.
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON THURSDAY EVENING, JULY
11, 1867.
"The LORD has comforted His people." Isaiah 49:13.
THE JOY of the Prophet was too great for him to give adequate
expression to it with his own solitary tongue and, therefore, he would
have even the angels of God and the redeemed from among men in Heaven
to praise the Lord for His super-abounding mercy! He would also have
the redeemed upon earth and all the works of God's hands take up the
joyful strain of praise to the Most High! And he would have even the
great mountainous masses of inanimate Nature find tongues with which to
express the greatness of God's loving kindness and tender mercy in
having comforted His people!
And, when we come to think of it rightly, we see at once that it is a
theme for wonder, worthy of the consideration of Heaven and of earth
that ever the Infinite God should stoop so low as to comfort finite and
fallible creatures such as we are. Had He nothing better to do than
that? Were there no more worlds to be created? Were there no other
deeds of power and glory to be performed that He must come to this poor
earth to comfort the sick, the sad and the sorrowing? To speak
comfortably even to those who had rebelled against Him and to give them
peace and joy when their penitent hearts were breaking in earnest
longing for His pardoning mercy? That is a wonderful passage in the
147th Psalm–"He heals the broken in heart, and binds up their wounds.
He counts the number of the stars. He calls them all by their names."
He is truly great in the majesty of His power, but He is equally great
in the condescending Character of His love and, as "the morning stars
sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy" when Jehovah's
great creative works were worked, let them not be slack in their music
when His condescending works are worked–when, from the highest
heavens, He stoops to the couch of deepest woe to lift us up from our
sins and sorrows by the power of His eternal love!
Taking the text somewhat out of its immediate context and speaking
simply upon these six words, "The Lord has comforted His people," we
see that in the first place, the Lord has a people. Secondly, they are
a people who need to be comforted. And thirdly, the Lord gives them the
comfort that they need.
I. First, then, it is clear, from the very wording of our text, that
THE LORD HAS A PEOPLE. Isaiah does not say, in general terms that the
Lord has comforted the children of men as a whole, but he says, "the
Lord has comforted His people." Here is, as Dr. Watts says–
"A garden walled around, Chosen and made peculiar ground! A little
spot, enclosed by Grace Out of the world's wide wilderness"– and it is
concerning this particular portion of the human race–selected and
elected by God–that the Prophet was moved by the Holy Spirit to write,
"the Lord has comforted His people."
Observe, in the first place, that the children of God are "His people"
in this sense, that they enjoy His special love. Never let us doubt the
universal benevolence of God. Let us hold it as a fundamental Doctrine
that "the Lord is good to all; and His tender mercies are over all His
works." And let us firmly believe that if any man shall be consigned to
carnal misery, it will be because it is just that he should so suffer
and he has brought his terrible doom upon his own head, for, as the
Apostle Peter tells us, God is "not willing that any should perish, but
that all should come to repentance." Yet, we must never forget that
inside this universal love, there is a private, secret, distinguishing,
discriminating love which is set only upon those whom God chose, before
the foundation of the world, to be His own peculiar people. Paul writes
to his
son, Timothy, "We trust in the living God who is the Savior of all men,
specially of those that believe." And Moses, long before, was Inspired
to write, "The Lord's portion is His people." There is something
peculiarly personal in His affection for them. He is kind and generous
to all His creatures, but He is lavishly liberal to His own people. And
Paul bids us imitate him when he says, "Let us do good unto all men,
especially unto them who are of the household of faith."
The Lord, then, has a people whom He regards with a special love which
is not shed abroad in the hearts of others. These people He set apart
for Himself from eternity. They are a people who are near and dear unto
Him, to whom He says, by the pen of the Apostle Peter, "You are a
chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar
people; that you should show forth the praises of Him who has called
you out of darkness into His marvelous light."
They are not only God's people because He has thus chosen them unto
Himself, but because, having fallen into sin, they are now His by
particular and special redemption. Again let me remind you that the
Scriptures plainly teach us that the Atonement of our Lord Jesus Christ
has a universal bearing and it seems to me that those who limit the
value of the Atonement do most seriously err from the faith. I believe
the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ was so Infinite that if there had been
ten thousand worlds full of sinners to have been redeemed, it was amply
sufficient to have redeemed them all! Paul writes to Timothy, "There is
one God, and one Mediator between God and man, the Man, Christ Jesus,
who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time." And I
am not known to put a limit where I see no limit put by God's Word.
Yet, notwithstanding that Truth of God, you cannot diligently read the
Scriptures and study them under the guidance of the Holy Spirit without
learning that there is a special aim and objective in the redemptive
work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He Himself said, "I lay down My life for
the sheep." The singers in Heaven, in their new song, declare that
"these were redeemed from among men"–they were bought out of the great
mass of mankind, "not with corruptible things, as silver and gold…but
with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and
without spot." Paul says that "Christ also loved the Church and gave
Himself for it."
The special objective of Christ, in coming to this world, was that He
might "save His people from their sins." That is the very meaning of
His name, Jesus. It is in them that redemption attains its great end.
It is in them that Christ sees of the travail of His soul and is
satisfied. It is for each of them, personally and individually, that
the Lord Jesus Christ shed His blood on Calvary with the distinct
purpose of saving them. Christ did not die for Judas as He did for
Peter. He did not shed His blood for Demas as He shed it for Paul.
There is, in the redemptive work of Christ, an inner and select circle
into which none but those who are spiritually quickened by the Spirit
of God are ever privileged to enter–and herein, Beloved, we see that
God has a people who are specially His–a people especially loved and
specially redeemed.
These same people, too, are especially called by the Spirit of God.
Again, to keep up the parallel with which I commenced, let me remind
you that all sinners are called to repentance and faith in Christ
wherever the Word of God is faithfully proclaimed. It is true that
Christ Himself said, "Many are called, but few are chosen," yet the
call of the Gospel is a universal call to all mankind. Wisdom truly
says, "Unto you, O men, I call; and my voice is to the sons of men,"
but, Beloved, there is another call, a special, peculiar, personal,
effectual callby which only the Lord's chosen and redeemed people are
called out from among the mass of men by whom they are surrounded. The
New Testament title for the Church of Christ is the ecclesia–the
assembly of those who are "called out" from among men by the
distinguishing Grace of God. The Holy Spirit has breathed upon those
who were, spiritually, like the dry bones in the valley–and they have
"stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army." Though they were,
once, heirs of wrath even as others, and far off from God by wicked
works, they have been brought near by the blood of Christ and now they
are "heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ." They are now
regenerated, quickened and so completely changed that "all things have
become new" with them! They now enjoy the indwelling of the Holy Spirit
in a way which others know nothing at all. The Holy Spirit may "strive"
with some men who ultimately perish, yet He does not operate upon them
as He does upon those in whom He works effectually, making them what He
would have them to be, without violating their will, yet so effecting
the Divine Purpose as to constrain them to be obedient to the will of
the Most High.
These, then, are the Lord's people–especially loved, especially
redeemed and especially called.
Besides that, they are especially cared for in the world. God's
Providential care extends not only to the righteous, but also to the
wicked–yes, and not only to the wicked among men, but to the very
beasts of the field. You know what I said to you, the other Sabbath
morning, about the God who makes the grass to grow for the cattle. [See
Sermon No. 767, Volume
13–IN THE HAY FIELD] It is the same great Provider who feeds the
young ravens when they cry, and the hungry lions when they roar for
their food. God's Providence not only extends to mankind in general,
and to the beasts of the field, and the birds of the air, and the
innumerable fish in the sea, but also to every atom of matter in the
universe. The grain of dust that is blown from the threshing floor is
steered as certainly as "the stars in their courses." It is the same
God who provides for the little and for the great–though all must be
infinitely little to Him who alone is great. Yet, while all that I have
said is true, we cannot read the Bible without knowing that there is a
special Providence always watching over and caring for the people of
God. That comforting assurance in Psalm 34:7 applies not to all men,
but only to some men–"The Angel of the Lord encamps around them that
fear Him, and delivers them." Then there is that cheering question
concerning the holy angels, "Are they not all ministering spirits, sent
forth to minister"–not for all men, but–"for them who shall be heirs
of salvation" Turn to Romans 8:28. "We know that all things work
together for good"–to whom? Not to every son or daughter of Adam,
but–"to them that love God, to them who are the called according to
His purpose." The wheels of Divine Providence are like those wheels
which Ezekiel saw–full of eyes, but everyone of those eyes gazes upon
everything out of love to the chosen people of God who are thus
especially cared for, as well as especially loved, especially redeemed
and especially called.
I need not try to describe the sense in which the saints are to be
God's people throughout the never-ending eternity of bliss which is
especially reserved for them. It will suffice if I remind you that God
has said of them that they are to be His special treasure, His royal
regalia, His crown jewels–"They shall be Mine, says the Lord of Hosts,
in that day when I make up My jewels." Just as a man sometimes says of
a certain thing that he prizes beyond everything else, "I will give all
else away, but I will reserve this for myself," so God gives to kings
and princes the power to rule in the world and He frequently gives to
the ungodly the very fat of the land–but He gives away everything but
His people–and of them He says, "They shall be Mine." He claims such
complete ownership of them that He will never give them away. For them
the Lord Jesus Christ came into this world and lived, loved, labored
and died. For them that same Jesus still lives to plead before His
Father's Throne above. Their names are engraved on His hands and on His
heart. He carries them upon His shoulders as the shepherd carries the
sheep that was lost and He will never let go His hold of any one of
them till He has brought it home and called together the holy angels
and the redeemed from among men, and said to them, "Rejoice with Me,
for I have found My sheep which was lost."
Thus I have shown you that God has a people.
II. Now, secondly, and very briefly, because I do not want to make the
roll of lamentation too long, THEY ARE A PEOPLE WHO NEED TO BE
COMFORTED.
You never find God giving any blessings that are not really required.
"Works of supererogation" are talked of by fools and knaves, but such
works are never performed by God, nor by man either! So that, when the
Lord comforts His people it is because they needcomfort.
If I began to tell you why the people of God need to be comforted, you
would think that I was attempting a work of supererogation! You do not
need to be told that–some of you can find enough reasons in your own
recollections to assure you that the people of God often need comfort.
Yet I may, perhaps, give you one or two reasons that occur to me.
We need comfort because we are in the valley of tears. We do not travel
long in that gloomy valley without finding that the dewdrops of tears
are hanging thickly every morning and every evening upon the briers and
the brambles by the wayside. Many of you have troubles in your family
and they are very heavy troubles. Some of you have dead crosses in the
form of those who have been taken from you, and living crosses–which
are much heavier to carry–in the form of those who seem to live only
to trouble you. Others of you meet with serious losses in your business
and you have to ask how that bill is to be met and how that liability
can be honorably discharged. There are troubles in the house and
troubles in the field–troubles on the land and troubles on the sea
and, worst of all, there are troubles even in the Church of God.
"Man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward." But when we were
born-again, we were born to a double set of troubles. Both our births
bring us troubles! Our first birth brings us the troubles that are
incident to sin and our second birth brings us the troubles that are
incident to fighting against sin. But, though we get a double share of
trouble, we get a double share, a triple share, a sevenfold share, a
thousand-fold share of joy when we become partakers of the new life in
Christ Jesus! There are troubles incident to ordinary manhood and
troubles incident to Christian manhood. But the worst trouble of all is
that caused by our inbred sin. I would not mind all the trouble that
comes from the world if I could but get rid of sin–if I could but live
without temptation, or even with temptation if it came only from the
devil. We could manage very well, even with him, if it were not for the
evil that is within our own hearts–for we are worse enemies to
ourselves than even the devil is! Our great enemy cannot do us much
harm if he is kept locked outside the gates–as long as there is no
traitor within the walls of Mansoul to admit him into the castle of our
heart. The sailor does not fear the roaring billows outside his vessel,
but when he finds that a leak in the ship gives the water power to rise
in the hold, then he begins to fear. And, alas, we have many a leak in
the ship of our soul and, in that way, temptation gets great power over
us. We need comfort from God while we are wrestling with inbred sin.
That fearful trinity, "the world, the flesh and the devil," will keep a
Christian from imagining that this world is his rest, for one or other
of them will stuff his pillow with thorns and make his bed hard for him
to lie on and cause the pilgrimage of his life to be like passing
through a hedge of thorns and briers which lacerate the flesh and weary
the spirit.
The sorrows of God's people not only come from within and from without,
from Satan beneath and from the world around, but they also come from
God, Himself, when He chastens His people for their good. Is there any
son, anywhere, whom his father chastens not? If so, he is not a son of
God, for He "scourges every son whom He receives." Among the mercies of
the Covenant, the rod is very conspicuous, and when the Lord chastens
us with it, He causes us to smart! Yet every twig of the rod is
sanctified and every stroke we receive from it is for our lasting good.
I said that I would not enlarge upon this part of the subject. Neither
will I. But I know that there is not a little trouble in the lives of
many whom I am now addressing. As I look around this area and these
galleries–though I know far less of many of you than I would like to
know, and if there were fewer of you, I could know you better–I
remember some of your sorrows and I know that many of you are seldom
long at ease, yet, with all your troubles, you enjoy that peace which
is like a river, for you have learned to drink of that river, the
streams of which make glad the city of our
God!
III. Now I must pass on to the third point which is more comforting to
us. It is this–as God has a people who need to be comforted, the
Prophet Isaiah is Inspired to tell us that "THE LORD HAS COMFORTED HIS
PEOPLE.
It is profitable to us to note the various ways in which God has
provided for our comfort in our ever-recurring sorrows. He knew that we
should have many fountains of grief and, therefore, He appointed quite
as many fountains of joy and even more. And besides opening the
fountains for us, blessed be His name, He draws the water for us and
puts it to our parched lips, as the Holy Spirit applies to us the
precious promises which God has provided for us in His never-failing
fountain of comfort.
In the first place, in providing for the comfort of His people, God has
been pleased to give us this grand old Book, the Bible. What a
storehouse of comfort this is! Many times have we gone to it, under the
guidance of the Holy Spirit, and we have never gone there without
finding a portion that just exactly met our needs. Some of you, my
Brothers and Sisters in Christ are, perhaps, in old Giant Despair's
castle, but if you use this precious Book rightly, you will find in it
a key that will open every lock in Doubting Castle and make the way
clear for you to pass through the great iron gate. O Beloved, what
would we do without this Bible of ours? Let us prize it, among other
reasons, because through it, "the Lord has comforted His people."
Then He has also been pleased to give us that blessed institution which
is not second in importance even to the Bible, namely, the Mercy Seat.
Wherever we may be, that Mercy Seat is always accessible! What a mercy
it is that there are no longer any specially holy places, like the
Temple at Jerusalem but that–
"Wherever we seek Him, He is found, And everyplace is hallowed ground!"
If I thought that I had always to go up to a certain "sacred" building
in order to be able to pray to God, or that there were certain "holy"
hours in which it was right to pray, I would often be miserable–but it
is not so. At midnight, in prison, prayer is in season and in place,
for Paul and Silas thus prayed at Philippi–and the prison walls began
to shake and the prison doors flew open! Prayer is in season at all
hours, for David says, "Evening and morning, and at noon, will I pray
and cry aloud, and He shall hear my voice." No matter where you are,
nor into what state you may have fallen, nor how low and desponding you
feel–and no matter how sinful you are–for God has said, "Call upon Me
in the day of trouble. I will deliver you and you shall glorify Me."
After providing for us the Mercy Seat, over which is written, "Ask,
and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it
shall be opened unto you," surely you may truly say, "The Lord has
comforted His people!"
You all know that prayer to God is necessary in great things, but it is
equally necessary in little things. None of you doubt that when much is
at stake you ought to pray, but you ought equally to pray when little
is at stake. I do not think that many true Believers go wrong in the
difficult places of their pilgrimage, for they then kneel down and ask
God's guidance. And so they go right. But when they get to the very
plain places, they think they know all about the road and then it is
that they are sure to make a mistake. The warrior was not slain in
battle for lack of courage, nor for want of armor–why was he slain? It
was because one nail was missing from his horse's shoe, as the old
saying puts it, "For the want of a nail, the shoe was lost; for the
want of a shoe, the horse was lost; for the want of a horse, the rider
was lost"– and many a Christian has been almost lost "for the want of
a nail." Mind that you look after the nails and take care of them. Take
the little things to God in prayer, for the little is the mother of the
great and that of the greater, and even the little is great if we only
look at it rightly. Just as the brush of a bird's wing sets the first
snow-flakes moving, which afterward accumulate into a ball, which grows
into a great mass, which comes rushing down the mountain in a mighty
avalanche, so it is the little thing that sets the great in motion! And
it is for this that we need particularly to enquire of the Lord–
"There is no sorrow, Lord, too light To bring in prayer to Thee. There
is no anxious care too slight To wake Your sympathy. You who have trod
the thorny road Will share each small distress. The love which bore the
greater load Will not refuse the less."
Besides that, He has been graciously pleased to give us the means of
Grace. I trust that you have often gone out of this House of Prayer
saying, "Truly, 'the Lord has comforted His people' this morning." Or,
"We have certainly had our burdens taken away from us while we have
been listening to His precious Truth this evening." When God the Holy
Spirit has spoken through the preacher, you have found that the Word
preached has been to you a delightful spiritual repast and cordial, so
that you have been able, at least for the time, to forget your sorrows!
The Lord has, however, comforted us in a still higher way, by forgiving
all our sins. I recollect the time when I would gladly have made a
strange bargain with God, if He would have agreed to it. My sin was
such an awful burden to me that I thought that if I might but have it
all pardoned, I would even be willing to be imprisoned for a hundred
years. If you have ever felt the weight of your sin, you must
acknowledge that there is no bodily affliction that is at all
comparable to it. If you once really know, by sad personal experience,
what the word, "guilt," means–if its horrors are clearly revealed to
your soul–you will be distracted in mind and know not what to do. And
you will admit that all the griefs that could possibly be heaped upon
you could not equal the horror of great darkness which comes over the
soul under a sense of sin. But, then, "the Lord has comforted His
people," because He has forgiven their sin. Your coat may be
threadbare, my Brother, but your sins are forgiven you for Christ's
sake! Your loaf may be but a very small one, and your bed may be a very
hard one, but, being justified by faith, you have peace with God
through our Lord Jesus Christ! If you are the very poorest of God's
saints, in pardoning your sins "the Lord has comforted His people." Is
not this the best comfort you could possibly have? Long ago the Prophet
Isaiah was Inspired to write, "Comfort you, comfort you My people, says
your God. Speak you comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that
her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned." The
forgiveness of all their sins is the greatest comfort that the Lord's
people can ever enjoy!
Moreover, in addition to giving us the pardon of all our sins, the Lord
has graciously adopted us into His family. Ah, poor son of toil, your
brow may often be covered with sweat, but you shall, by-and-by, be made
like unto your Divine Elder Brother, for you have become, by Grace, a
child of God! How delightful it is to us to know that "we have received
the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father"! There is no
other peace like this, no other joy like this! The angel Gabriel has
not half so much reason to be happy as I have. It is true that he has
not my cares, nor my troubles, but then, he is not a child of God, for,
as Paul wisely asks, "Unto which of the angels said He at any time, You
are My
Son?"But He does say that to us who have believed in His Son, Jesus
Christ! We are the sons and daughters of the Most High God! The holy
angels are highly favored in having been kept from sinning, yet the Son
of God took not up angels, but He became a Man that He might redeem us
from destruction and, through Him, we are brought into closer communion
with God than the angels ever have! Oh, what cause we have, then, for
thankfulness when we think of our adoption as well as of our pardon!
My Brothers and Sisters in Christ, I have not time to even mention all
the blessings which are already in your possession. Truly, the full
roll of them would need eternity in which to display it rightly before
your eyes, "for all things are yours…whether the world, or life, or
death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours and you are
Christ's and Christ is God's." So you have every reason to rejoice and
no cause to be disconsolate, for God has comforted you with the richest
of consolations in the blessings which He has already bestowed upon
you!
But think of what is yet to come! Let the pearly gates be opened for a
moment. You will soon be inside them–how soon, none of us can tell.
Unless our Lord shall first come–as He may–we who have believed in
Jesus shall all pass through the gates of pearl and our disembodied
spirits shall see our Savior face to face! Glory be to God, there is a
crown there that no head but yours shall wear, Believer! A harp that no
hands but yours shall play, a mansion that none but you shall inhabit.
Without you, Christ's mystical body would not be complete–one of its
members would be missing without you! The hallelujah chorus of Heaven
would lack some of its jubilant notes and the eternal orchestra would
miss one of its players on golden harps–so you must be brought there.
The Apostle Paul, speaking of glorified saints who have gone to Heaven
before us, says, "They without us should not be made perfect." They
must have us to perfect the company of the redeemed, to gather in Glory
the full complement of the elect! Come, Brothers and Sisters, take off
your sackcloth and ashes. Take down your harps from the willows. Put
away the sackbut and bring out the Psaltery and all kinds ofjoyous
music, and let us sing, in the words of the familiar hymn–
"My God, I'll praise You while I live,
And praise You when I die!
And praise You when I rise again,
And to all eternity."
Well now, what follows from all that I have been saying to you? This
question surely follows–who would not be one of the Lord's people I
pity those of you who have great grief, but no consolation. I do not
know how some of you manage even to live! You work hard, but what do
you get by it all–food and raiment? Yes, and then you go on again and
again, and all your life is like that of the blind horse at the mill,
going round and round and round, and you never make any real progress.
You bring up your children–in a fashion. You grow old, and you die,
and that is the end. It would be better for you if it were the end,
but, alas, there is something far worse to come! How can you keep on
living as you do, without any objective beyond this poor groveling
world? I can understand a Christian galley-slave, chained to the oar
and flogged all day long, feeling that he was living up to the dignity
of a man in Christ Jesus, for he could say, "I have a Savior on high
and though my legs and wrists are bound, yet my free, immortal spirit
has fellowship with the eternal God." But I cannot understand how men
can work on, day after day, or, being above work, can roll along in
their carriages and yet have no thought beyond this present,
sin-stained world! It is not even fit for immortal spirits to think
much about–it is too base, too scant, too poor, too barren a thing to
satisfy immortals! Its atmosphere is a coverlet too narrow for a man to
wrap himself and all that earth calls good or great is a bed too short
for a never-dying spirit to stretch itself upon! How do you live
without your God? Especially you who are sick and ill! You young people
who have consumption stamped upon your cheeks–you young men who are
mortally ill and know you must soon depart, you graybeards who are not
only awaiting the assaults of Death, but are already attacked by
him–how can any of you bear the thought that God's short sword of
Infallible Justice is furbished against you? How can you make mirth on
the very edge of the bottomless Pit? Oh, that you would flee away to
Christ, lay hold upon Him by a simple faith and so be saved forever!
If a man suffers much trouble, some persons draw from that an inference
that he is one of God's people. I have sometimes heard very great
professors of religion pacify their consciences with the idea that
because they were going through much tribulation, they must, therefore,
inherit the Kingdom–because they were tried and troubled, they have,
therefore, inferred that they must necessarily be the children of God.
Let such understand that there is a rod for the wicked as well as a rod
for the righteous! 'Tis true that many go through much tribulation to
the Kingdom of Heaven,
but it is equally true that many go through all their tribulations to
the depths of Hell. "Well" says good Mr. Watson, an old Puritan, "The
path to Hell is hard and rough to many. Many a man has gone to
Perdition in the sweat of his brow and has toiled harder to win for
himself eternal damnation than ever the Christian has labored to serve
his Master." I doubt not that this is exactly the truth, or may even
come short of it!
There is another thought that is suggested by what I have been saying.
It is this, If God comforts His people, we should imitate Him. If we
are His, let us be God-like. I do not know when a man is more like God
than when he wipes the tears from a mourner's eyes. God wipes away the
tears from all eyes in Heaven, so, whenever we have wiped a tear from
the eye of a saint here below, we have been doing similar work to
God's. If you do not yet know what joy and satisfaction are to be found
in helping the fatherless and the widow, I hope you will all soon have
that joy and satisfaction by helping them in every way that you can.
When you go to visit the widow and see those many little children,
their heads rising one above another like a set of stairs, the father
dead, the mother doing a little needlework to provide for her
children– when you see all this, I am sure you will help them all you
can! It has been a great joy to some of us, this very night, to receive
some six or seven fatherless children into the Orphanage which has yet
to be built–and we could not help feeling great joy as we accepted
them. There is great joy in helping the fatherless and the widow,
relieving the poor and needy, comforting those who are broken-hearted,
speaking a cheering word to the mourner, or a guiding word to the soul
that is seeking Christ, repeating a word of promise in the ear of a
backslider, or of one who, for a while, has lost his evidences. So, my
Brothers and Sisters in Christ, as God has comforted His people, mind
that you try to do the same good work, remembering that in ministering
to them, you are also ministering to HIM, as our hymn puts it–
"They who feed YOUR sick and faint
For YOURSELF a banquet find!
They who clothe the naked saint
Round YOUR loins the raiment bind!" And then, finally, as Godhas
comforted His people, why do they go about the worldas ifthey were not
comforted I thank God that there are so many members of this Church the
sight of whose face is enough to make us glad even in the worse
weather! Some of my Brothers and Sisters, when I am the most
disconsolate, cheer me up with the very grasp of their hands! These are
cheerful Christians who live near to God and who so firmly believe in
Christ that they will not believe the devil's lie when he tells them
that God has forsaken them. Dear Brothers and Sisters, should we not
all try to be like them? It is a great blessing to be of a happy,
thankful spirit and to carry a cheerful countenance wherever we go. Yet
some Christians, when you go to see them, are always telling you how
poor they are, how badly they have had the rheumatism, how many aches
and pains and trials and troubles they have, and so on. I remember one
visitor who had heard this sort of story so often from one good old
lady whom he used to visit, that one day he said to her, "My dear
Sister, I have heard all about your troubles so many times that I think
I could repeat them word for word! So could you now change the subject
for once, and tell me something about your joys?" Whenever we must
touch the mournful theme, let us do as the swallow does when it just
brushes the brook with its wing and flies up into the clear air as if
its whole being were full of joy. So let it be with us–sometimes
touching the waters of trouble, as we must, yet swiftly mounting in
sweet contemplation and holy meditation–leaving the sinful, sorrowing
world behind us and entering into the very Presence of our Lord and
Savior, Jesus Christ–
"Why should the children of a King
Go mourning all their days?
Great Comforter, descend and bring
Some tokens of Your Grace." God bless you, dear Friends, with the
Spirit of consolation! The Holy Spirit is the Comforter! May He comfort
you, for Jesus' sake! Amen!