Human Sympathy, a Medium of Divine Comfort
(An incident in the life of David)
"While David was at Horesh in the Desert of Ziph, he learned that Saul had come out to take his life. And Saul's son Jonathan went to David at Horesh and helped him find strength in God!" 1 Samuel 23:15-16
I was not one of the least remarkable and tender unfoldings of God's wisdom and love in David's early history, that within the palace where his chief and most powerful enemy abode, should also dwell his dearest and most sympathizing friend.
A more delicate and touching instance of Divine forethought and goodness, the mind cannot conceive. It was a conception in all its bearings worthy of Infinite wisdom and benevolence. In Saul, the king of Israel, David beheld his avowed and malignant foe, resolutely and irreconcilably bent upon his destruction. In Jonathan, the king's son, David recognized a sincere and confidential friend, as earnestly and determinately bent upon his rescue. And when from the palace there sallied forth, in quest of his concealed prey, the enraged monarch; from the same place, and at the same moment, there issued that monarch's son, hastening, with stealthful but fleet footstep, to shield and comfort his imperiled and oppressed friend. "And Saul's son Jonathan went to David at Horesh and helped him find strength in God!" What a marvelous provision of sympathy, and how delicately fitted to the nature and the occasion of David's sorrow! It was just the kind, and just the channel, of comfort that would most effectually meet his case.
The deadly hate of the jealous and wrathful father, would impart a peculiar intensity and tenderness to the son's love; while, in return, the tender and soothing friendship of the son would arrest the blow and soften the stern malignity of the father.
Thus kindly did God anticipate and provide for the circumstance and sorrow of His servant David. It was a peculiar sympathy for a peculiar grief. The channel through which the sympathy flowed was human, but the comfort which flowed through the channel was Divine. It was human sympathy conveying Divine consolation to the heart of David. God, who is acquainted with his people's grief, knows how and when to meet it. We are never so safe or so happy as when in His hands. "I know their sorrows!" is a Divine declaration, which should be enough to cheer every feeling of loneliness, stifle each murmur, and check each suggestion of unbelief. The Divine law of harmony, which pervades all of God's works, is signally and beautifully visible in the adaptation of our comfort, to our grief. It is always so strangely timed, and so delicately appropriate—the medium by which it is conveyed often imparting an additional charm to the comfort sent, thus rendering it all the more precious and soothing. "Whoever is wise, and will observe these things, even they shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord."
But to what may we trace this peculiar and touching outflow of Jonathan's kindness and sympathy? Doubtless to the existence of a friendship, which even among kindred alliances was unparalleled for its sincerity, tenderness, and depth. The affection which linked together the hearts of Jonathan and David, is described as "wonderful, surpassing the love of women." The Christian principles upon which their friendship was based, and the circumstances of trial which chastened and matured it—were all such as to justify an alliance the most intense and confidential between two hearts susceptible of the highest order of feeling.
There would seem, however, to have existed in the two friends—as an analysis of each character, were it appropriate to our object, would show natural qualities forming a decided and striking contrast. The vast difference, too, in their early training—the one bred amidst all the soft refinements of a luxurious court; the other amidst the cruder influences of a shepherd's home—would not appear favorable to the formation of a friendship so extraordinary. And yet, notwithstanding this dissimilarity of mold, it was so, that, from the moment that friendship was formed, until it closed in death, they had but one heart between them.
It would seem as essential to the formation of a close, mutual attachment, as to the perfect character of a beautiful landscape, or an exquisite picture—that there should exist, to some extent, a union of opposites, a mingling and blending of contrasts.
Harmony in a painting consists of a blending of opposite colors; and, in music, of a union of discordant chords. And thus, in friendship, we often find a strange and powerful sympathy, a strong and clinging attachment between the manly and the gentle; the timed and the brave—the nervous and the resolute—the melancholy and the cheerful-the intellectual, daring, and heroic, and the meek, warm, and pensive.
We do not mean, however, to affirm that in the formation of a friendship of perfect reciprocity of sentiment and affection there must necessarily exist a very great incongruity of feature. A contrast too striking would be as fatal as an assimilation too close. There must exist, as the basis of the union, some sympathy of taste, some congeniality of habits, certain kindred impulses and susceptibilities; prompting to a warm, close, and confiding union of hearts. Each bosom should be a mirror, looking into which the one friend would see his own image reflected in the heart of the other. Thus, entirely exclusive of this law of mutual attraction, there could not, in the nature of things, exist an attachment that would be close, confiding, and permanent. Such was the friendship of David and Jonathan.
But there was this additional and crowning feature—it was in the highest sense a sacred friendship. There entered into it no worldly, selfish, political elements.
Its seat, the concealed depths of the soul, it sprang from thence as sweet and crystalline as the mountain stream gushing from the hidden rock; as warm and transparent as the sunbeams flowing from the fountain of light. It was a union of hearts, cast into the same divine form, fashioned alike by the same Holy Spirit, based upon sentiments molded according to the same essential standard of truth, and in all its warm and delicate expressions shaped, directed, and governed by a mutual fear of God.
It was emphatically a friendship founded upon Christian principles, and, therefore, unlike the friendships of the world, it was holy, ardent, and imperishable. We marvel not, then, that we read that "Jonathan and David made a covenant, because he loved him as his own soul." That covenant of love remained inviolate until death. No coldness chilled it, no suspicions weakened it, no adversity shaded it; no time, nor separation, nor distance, impaired its freshness or its strength. It was the evergreen of the soul, the unwithering flower of the heart, unfolding its perfume and its bloom through all the seasons and vicissitudes of its brief and chequered, yet bright existence. Chastened by sorrow, and endeared by absence, strengthened by confidence, fostered and sanctified by prayer—it existed until death sundered the hearts it bound. Nor did death extinguish the affection it embodied. That affection glowed in David's bosom until life's last hour.
Who can contemplate the picture, and listen to the outpouring of his grief, when the tidings reached him of Jonathan's untimely death—without a deep, sympathetic emotion? "How are the mighty fallen in the midst of the battle! O Jonathan, you were slain in your high places. I am distressed for you, my brother Jonathan! Very pleasant you have been unto me: your love to me was wonderful, surpassing the love of women." And long after the grave had closed upon the friend of his early love, and he himself had succeeded to the kingdom, we hear David inquiring, "Are there any who are left of the house of Saul, that I may show him kindness for Jonathan's sake?" And when the crippled son of his friend came trembling into the presence of the king, "David said unto him, Fear not! I will surely show you kindness for Jonathan your father's sake, and will restore you all the land of Saul your father; and you shall eat bread at my table continually."
Such is the nature, such the constancy, and such the deathlessness of Christian friendship. Hearts that have oneness with Christ, and oneness with each other, are knit together by the strongest and purest of all sympathy—the sympathy of holiness. And this is only found to exist between individuals renewed, sanctified, and inhabited by the same Holy Spirit, and bent upon the same great purpose of existence—the glory of God.
And oh, how many a renewed heart, filled with the most generous impulses, and susceptible of the loftiest friendship—sickens and pines in solitude and sadness, for the full, unfettered enjoyment of an alliance like this.
Where this friendship does exist, how privileged its possessor! The imagination cannot picture a union on earth more heaven-like than it. Its antitype is only found in that bright and holy world, where all the endeared and sacred relations of the present life are merged and absorbed in one holy, perfect, and eternal friendship! Death dissolves all present ties—the conjugal, the parental, and the filial. In Heaven the glorified spirits meet and associate, not as now they do, but "as the angels of God."
How costly and precious, then, as types of Heaven, are the sacred friendships of earth. The influence which flows through this sacred channel—the sympathy, the soothing, and the support—sheds a warm and mellow sunlight over the heart in many an hour of gloom, of sadness, and despondency. And when personal fellowship is suspended, hearts thus united hold a mysterious yet real fellowship of affection, sympathy, and prayer, in distant, silent, and unseen communings. Meeting at the same Mercy Seat, spirit blends with spirit before one Heavenly Father, and in mutual intercession enter within the one celestial veil.
The pleasures resulting from the mutual attachment of kindred spirits are by no means confined to the moments of personal fellowship; they diffuse their fragrances, though more faintly, through the seasons of absence—refreshing and exhilarating the mind by the remembrance of the past, and the anticipation of the future. It is a treasure possessed when it is not employed; a reserve of strength ready to be called into action when most needed; a fountain of sweets to which we may continually resort, whose waters are inexhaustible." With such a treasure, who would recklessly sport? With such a friendship, who would willingly part, but with life itself?
But let us advert to the occasion of Jonathan's sympathy and kindness towards David. David was now in circumstances of great trial. We read, "While David was at Horesh in the Desert of Ziph, he learned that Saul had come out to take his life."
A careful reader of David's history cannot but be impressed with the early discipline into which this eminent servant of God was brought. He had scarcely slain Israel's vaunting foe, and while yet the flush of victory was upon his youthful brow, and the paean of applause was chiming on his ear, when he found himself placed in a position of the keenest trial, and most imminent peril. The jealousy of Saul at the unbounded popularity of the youthful warrior, in whom he at once beheld a rival of the popular affection, if not a successor to the throne—instantly dictated the most oppressive and murderous policy. From that moment, the king sought his life. And thus from being the deliverer of the nation, whom he had saved with his arm, an idol of the people, whom he had entranced with his exploit—David became a fugitive and an exile. Thus suddenly and darklingly did the storm-cloud rise upon his bright and flattering prospects.
We pause to gather two deeply spiritual and impressive lessons from this period of his history.
How rapidly, in the experience of the child of God, may a season of prosperity and adulation be followed by one of trial and humiliation. It is, perhaps, just the curb and the correction God sends to check and to save us. We can ill sustain too sudden and too great an elevation. Few can wear their honors meekly—and none apart from especial and great grace. And when God gives great grace, we may always expect that he will follow it with great trial. He will test the grace He gives. There is but a step from the "third Heaven" to the "thorn in the flesh!" O, the wisdom and love of God that shines in this! Who that sees in the discipline a loving and judicious Father, would cherish one unkind, rebellious thought?
Another lesson taught us is, that our severest and bitterest trials may be engrafted upon our dearest and sweetest blessings. It was David's popularity that evoked the storm now so fiercely beating upon him. The admiration and affection of the people for David, inspired the envy and hatred of king Saul. How often is it thus with us! God bestows upon us blessings, and we abuse them. We idolize the creature He has given, cling too fondly to the friend He has bestowed, settle down too securely in the nest He has made, inhale too eagerly the incense offered to our rank, talents, and achievements—and God often adopts those very things as the voice of his rebuke, and as the instruments of our correction. Thus may our severest trials spring from our sweetest mercies.
What a source of sorrow . . .
to Abraham, was his loved Isaac;
and to Isaac, was his favored Jacob;
and to Jacob, was his precious Joseph;
and to Jonah, was his pleasant gourd!And what deep, spiritual truth would the Holy Spirit teach us by all this? To seek to glorify God in all our blessings when He gives them, and to enjoy all our blessings in God when he takes them away.
But where was David now? In the wilderness of Ziph in a forest." With not a follower or companion, this favorite of the nation was a homeless wanderer, hunted like a partridge upon the mountain by the blood-thirsty king! But O, the deep teaching of which he would now be the subject!
The nothingness of earthly glory,
the emptiness of human applause,
the insufficiency of the creature,
the treachery of his own heart
—in a word, the vapid nature and utter insufficiency of all earthly good, would be among the many holy and costly lessons he would now learn.Nor this alone. Driven from man, he would now be more exclusively and entirely shut in with God. In his happy experience, that wilderness would be as a peopled world, and that forest as a blooming paradise. And from the profound depths of its solitude and stillness, there would ascend the voice of prayer and the melody of praise. The wilderness of Ziph would be another Patmos, all filled and radiant with the glorious and precious presence of Him who laid his right hand upon the exiled Evangelist, and said, "Fear not, I am he who lives!"
Do we see no foreshadowing of Jesus here? O yes! Very much. Nor is this strange, since David was pre-eminently a personal type of Christ. There were periods in our Lord's brief and humiliating history on earth when, indeed, he seemed for awhile to ride upon the topmost wave of popular favor. After some stupendous prodigy of his power, or some splendid outgushing of his benevolence, sending its electric thrill through the gazing and admiring populace—he would often become the envy and the dread of the Jewish Sanhedrin.
Jealous of his widening fame and growing power, the Jews would seek to tarnish the one by detraction, and to arrest the other by his death. Escaping from their fury, he would betake himself to the secureness of the rocks and to the solitude of the desert—but alas! with no human sympathy to strengthen his hands in God. Oh, how strangely has Jesus trodden the path along which he is leading his saints to glory!
Is there nothing analogous to this in the experience of the faithful? Conceive of some new idea of doing good—occupy some prominent post of responsibility and power—or prove successful in some enterprise of Christian benevolence—and while thus winning the admiration and applause of the many, not find himself an object of the unholy envy and vituperation of a few? "Woe unto you when all men shall speak well of you." Thus may an active, zealous, successful Christian be crucified between human idolatry on the one hand, and creature jealousy on the other.
Well, be it so—so long as self is slain, and God is glorified. The great secret, however, to learn here is, entire deadness to both. Going forward in the work of the Lord, as judgment dictates, as conscience approves, and as Providence guides—dead to human applause and indifferent to human censure, ever taking the low place, aiming at the Lord's glory, and seeking the honor that comes from God alone—this is happiness. Oh, to live and labor, to give and to suffer in the meek simplicity of Christ, and with eternity full in view! May the Lord grant us grace so to live, and so to die!
We turn yet once more to David. What would be the result of a review in after years, of this the early and severe discipline in which the God of love placed him? Would he not, when his great enemy was laid low, and he had come to the throne, awaken his harp to the sweetest praise and thanksgiving for the schooling of trial in the morning of life? O yes, when binding his sacrifice upon the horns of the altar, or administering the kingdom, he would think of the cave of Adullam and of the wilderness of Ziph. And as he recounted all the which way God had led him, and remembered the deep lessons he had learned in those seasons of deep trial—with what a swelling heart and tuneful voice would he exclaim, "Blessed is the man whom you chasten, O Lord, and teach him out of your law; that you may give him rest from the days of adversity, until the pit is dug for the wicked." Psalm 44 12, 13. What an echo to its truth does this sweet strain awaken in many a heart! We, too, can praise God for trial. We, too, can thank God for sorrow.
Oh, it has been to us, though a painful, yet a much-needed and a most blessed school.
The cave and the wilderness have been heavenly places on earth. True, it may be, the sorrow early came. It distilled its bitter into our cup, and flung its shadow upon our path, when that cup was so sweet, and that path was so bright with life's young dream of joy—yet it was well for us that we bowed to the yoke in our youth; it was good for us that we were early afflicted.
The lessons which we have been taught,
the truths which we have learned,
the preciousness of the Savior which we have experienced,
the love of God which we have felt,
the sweetness in prayer which we have tasted,
and the fitness for labor which we have derived
—all, all testify as with one voice to the unutterably precious blessings that flow through the channel of early, sacred, and sanctified sorrow.Dear reader, as painful and sad as may be the path you now are treading, fear not. The outcome will be most glorious. The seed you are sowing in tears, shall yield you a golden harvest of joy. Adversity is the school of Heaven! And in Heaven. . .
where no sorrow chafes,
and where no tears flow,
and where no blight withers,
and where no disappointment sickens,
and where no change or coldness, chills wounds and slays
—the sweetest chimes will be awakened by the recollection of the early and sanctified sorrows of earth. Thus the moral beauty of the redeemed soul here on earth, and its inconceivable glory hereafter in Heaven—will be found to have been deepened by those very circumstances that threatened to deface and becloud it.We are now conducted, in the progress of our subject, to the sympathy of Jonathan for David, as illustrating the medium through which Divine consolation is often conveyed to the sad and sorrowful heart. "And Jonathan arose, and went to David into the woods, and strengthened his hand in God."
Human sympathy is a wise, holy, and benevolent provision of God. All human affection is the offspring of the Divine Being. The love that glows in an angel's bosom, and the love that flows from man to man, with all its generous impulses, and costly offerings, and noble achievements, and celestial sweets—is a spring gushing from the Divine and Essential Fountain of Love, and partakes of the source from whence it flows.
"Love is from God." The existence of human sympathy would seem to have been contemporaneous with the birth of our nature, thus proving it to be one of the noblest and most sacred emotions of an intelligent mind, as consonant with the dictate of reason and the genius of refined humanity, as with the character and the spirit of true religion. As magnificent as was creation when it rose from beneath God's gracious hand, all penciled with beauty, vocal with music, and bathed in new-born light; as glorious as was the creature man when he started into being and lifted his serene brow to Heaven, mirroring forth the image of his Maker—one thing yet was lacking to perfect the scene and to complete the picture—it was SYMPATHY.
Created a social being, man could not be completely happy in himself. Alone, he could not live. He could enjoy his paradise only as he shared that enjoyment with another. There must be a reciprocation of feeling, a union of hearts, a fellowship of mind; in short, "another self, a kindred spirit," to whom he might exclaim, and who would respond, "How beautiful! how happy!" Thus participation heightens the beauty and enhances the joy.
What a terror would man have been to man after the fall without the existence of human sympathy! The lone rock of the ocean frowning above the foaming wave, not more an object of dread and an omen of ill to the mariner, than would man have been to man had there been no hearts that participated in each other's griefs, and that responded to each other's joys.
Human sympathy is a relic of paradise, a flower of Eden. It is not a mere appendage, but an attribute of our being. It is not a mere ornament of our nature, it is an essential perfection of our mental susceptibility. Sympathy is the harp of the soul, whose chords vibrate and thrill in responsive and simultaneous notes of sweet and soothing harmony. And where no false attraction causes a wrong direction to the feelings, where there is no counteracting influence in the affections—the heart of man insensibly and naturally accords with God's original design in his creation. So that the eye cannot light upon an object of misery, without a corresponding feeling of commiseration in the mind. The ear cannot listen to the sigh of the prisoner, or to the wail of the wretched, or the cry of the oppressed, without a participant emotion. And the heart cannot come in contact with another's distress without sharing in its woe and striving for its relief. This is sympathy.
But there is sympathy of a yet higher order than this—a sympathy more real, tender, and effective than that which belongs to our common humanity. I refer to the sympathy of holy, sanctified hearts, the incense offered on the altar of a sacred friendship. It were as much a libel upon the religion of Jesus to represent it as destroying the instincts of our sympathetic nature, as it were a dim conception of the Divine power of that religion, to suppose that it did not increase to an intensity and tenderness almost infinite the depth and power of those instincts.
It is generally admitted that, compared with the Christian economy, the Old Dispensation was characterized by many essential and palpable features of terror and harshness. And that those who lived under that Dispensation would naturally imbibe the spirit of the economy to which they belonged. And yet, oppressive as appear to have been many of its laws, and unfeeling many of its requirements, and harsh the spirit of its whole economy—we find in Old Testament Dispensation some of the most real, tender, and touching exhibitions of sympathy springing from holy hearts, recorded in the Bible.
Who, as he wanders amidst the vine-clad hills of Palestine with a heart of cultivated affections and an ear attuned to plaintive sounds, does not regard it as the sacred home of sensibility—its valleys and its mountains still vocal with the sighings of sympathy, and the lamentations of love? There would still seem to vibrate the touching tones of Jacob pouring forth the tenderness of his soul for his be loved Rachel, and for his darling son.
There, too, would seem yet to linger the mournful requiem of David for the fallen sovereign whom he venerated, for the faithful friend whom he loved, and for the unhappy son whose untimely death he deplored. Could sympathy be portrayed in a picture more vivid, or be embodied in words more heart-subduing, than this: "And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept: and as he went, thus he said, O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! O that I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!" Such is a recollection of Palestine. And who can thus think of that hallowed land, and not associate it with all that is elevating, grateful, and touching in sympathy?
But another and a more sympathetic economy has followed. Christianity is the embodiment, the incarnation of love. It not only inculcates, but it inspires—it not only enjoins but it originates—the most refined sensibility of soul. Sympathy is no bylaw of Christianity, it is the embodied essence of all its laws. And Christianity itself is the embalmed sympathies of Him in whom dwelt bodily the fullness of Divine and Essential Love. And if the ancient economy, with all its coldness, harshness, and severity, dedicated its temples and tuned its lyres, lent its holy oracles and consecrated the very scenes and scenery of nature to the highest, noblest, and purest sympathies of the soul—surely the Gospel will not frown or pour contempt upon the feelings, emotions, and breathings which the law held precious and sacred. O no! the religion of Jesus is the religion of love. It is the school of the affections. And it is only here that they are fully developed, properly regulated, sanctified, and trained. To love man as man should be loved, GOD must be the first and supreme Object of our love.
To many hearts, bending entranced over the record of the Savior's unparalleled history, one of its most touching pages will be that which records the deep and earnest yearning of his own soul for human sympathy. Partaking of our nature, nothing that was human was foreign to him but the sin that tainted and defaced it.
Separate from it all that is fallen,
exorcise every evil spirit from the soul,
expel every low sentiment from the mind,
extirpate every selfish feeling from the heart,
and let all that remains of our humanity be its pure affections, its exquisite sensibilities, its refined feelings, its noble purposes, its lofty, generous, and delicate sentiments of sympathy and love, and you have a perfect portrait of our Lord and Savior. Our Lord, as man, was truly and purely human. Entering himself into every affinity of our nature, he became intimate with each thought and feeling, with each sentiment and emotion, with each sorrow and pang, with each tear, groan, and sigh of our humanity—all, all were his, but its sin. Nor was it essential to the exquisite and perfect tenderness and sympathy of his nature that he should, like us, be sinful. Nay, this had but beclouded, blunted, and impaired all the gentle sensibilities and intellectual perceptions of his human soul, as in us it has woefully done. The human susceptibilities which Jesus possessed were all the deeper, richer, and intenser, from the very fact of their perfect purity, their entire sinlessness.How perfect, then, must be his love, how tender his compassion, how exquisite his sympathy, since it flows from a humanity, all immaculate as his Godhead. Thus formed for human sensibility, are we surprised to find the Son of man, in the hour of his mysterious soul-anguish, when bearing our curse, sin and sorrow, casting himself upon the soothing and the solace of human sympathy? Listen to his plaintive appeal! O how touching!"
Tarry here, and watch with me." O no! this was like himself. He was woe-oppressed, and he needed support—lonely, and he sighed for companionship, in grief, and he yearned for soothing—in sorrow, and he panted for sympathy. And to whom does he appeal? Not to angels, though at that awful moment they were clustering around him, eagerly bent upon strengthening him in his passion—not to his Father, for He had now veiled from him the light of his countenance.
He appeals to man! It was a human, not angelic nor divine sympathy that he asked. "Watch with me." How precious and how soothing at that awful moment of lonely mental grief would have been to him their sleepless vigils, their anxious watchings, their tender, wakeful, affectionate sympathy with his overwhelming anguish! But it failed him.
"What! could you not watch with me one hour?" O exquisite picture in a life of surpassing marvels! Suffering Christian! surely it were no sin and no weakness to cast yourself, all sad and sorrowful and clinging, upon the bosom of human sympathy, since Christ your Lord has stamped it with a value so costly, and has invested it with a dignity so great.
But it may be interesting to contemplate a few of the features of Jonathan's kindness to David, as illustrating some of the forms which Christian sympathy generally assumes.
And first, let us remark, it was a sympathy in a time of persecution. David may be regarded, in his existing circumstances of trial, as presenting a type of God's Church, driven into the wilderness before the storm of a religious and relentless despotism. Is there no demand for a like expression of sympathy now? Casting the eye over the world, find we no parts where the truth is crushed, where the Church of God is proscribed, and where the saints of the Most High are enduring confiscation, exile, imprisonment, and even death itself, for liberty of conscience, and for the higher liberty of God's Word?
O yes, our own beloved land—ever the asylum of the oppressed, and the home of the exile—at this moment affords its shelter and its sympathy to Italy's banished sons. And when from Italy we pass to other parts of the Continent, to Prussia, Germany, and France, the existence and the workings of the same spirit, hostile to religious liberty and evangelical propagandism, confront us at every step, and force upon us the unwelcome conviction that the age of persecution for truth's sake, for conscience' sake, for Christ's sake, has not yet fled away before the advancing light of liberty, intelligence, and truth.
There are multitudes of the Lord's people at this moment enduring imprisonment, sickness, and poverty, immured in loathsome cells, pining in sadness and solitude, because they obey God rather than man. O let us in sympathy, in faith, and in prayer, go and strengthen their hands in God. Let . . .
our influence,
our wealth,
our time,
and above all, our prayers, be devoted,
to the amelioration of their sufferings,
to the supporting of their faith,
and to the soothing of their spirit.Jonathan's sympathy, too, was expressed in a time of sorrowful loneliness. May we not manifest a similar kindness? Are there no lone and suffering ones of Christ's flock to whom we may minister:
no bed of sickness,
no couch of languor,
no house of mourning,
no case of pressing poverty
where we may bend our steps, as a ministering angel, diffusing over the scene the tranquillizing influence of a sympathy itself trained in the school of suffering and purified in the furnace of adversity? O think, saint of God, what a power and a charm you bear about you:
to lift the pressure from a bowed spirit,
to administer balm to a bleeding heart,
to chase the gloom from a beclouded mind, and
to turn into sunshine and gladness, the darkness and despondency brooding over some sensitive child of sorrow.A timely visit,
a kind word,
gentle tone,
a trifling offering of love—
has often pencilled a rainbow of brightness and hope upon the night-cloud;
has infused a sweet ingredient into the nauseous cup;
has chased away a thousand agonizing thoughts and feelings entwining round the heart of some lone and desolate sufferer.You spoke of JESUS—and there was a magic power and divine potency in that dear name, that instantly charmed away every fear.
You spoke of a covenant God—that God, a loving, faithful Father—and it was a lever that lifted off the load; and the spirit, recovering its elasticity, was free.
You quoted a promise—it was a Divine and precious promise—and it fell upon the sad, sick heart, as music does upon the ear, and every fiber thrilled and quivered with an ecstasy of joy.
You breathed a sentence of affectionate sympathy, and gentle, yet warm as a sunbeam—it darted in upon the soul, and every jeweled chamber sparkled with a thousand glories.
And thus was confirmed the truth of God's holy Word, concerning the power and the charm of human sympathy when timely and tenderly expressed, "Heaviness in the heart of man makes it stoop: but a good word makes it glad." Proverbs 12:25.
And where shall we find so true and beautiful a definition of Christian sympathy as that which the Holy Spirit has given us? "Whether one member suffers, all the members suffer with it." 1 Corinthians 12:26.
There is an essential unity in the Church of Christ. It is but One Church. Many members, but one body, holding and dependent upon One Head. Such is the Church of God, and no difference of ecclesiastical polity—no varying shades of creed—no denominational form whatever, can touch or destroy her essential unity. And for this reason—because it is one Spirit, and one life, and one hope that dwells in and pervades the whole body; thus essentially one, and eternally indivisible, a perfect bond of sympathy knits each to the other, and all to Christ.
But it is proper that we should now advert to the mode by which the sympathy of Jonathan was expressed towards his suffering friend, as illustrating a medium by which the God of all comfort often comforts those who are cast down. "And Jonathan Saul's son arose, and went to David into the forest, and strengthened his hand in God."
Rich and spiritual is the instruction conveyed to us here. O for the Spirit's grace to receive it! Jonathan had no secret misgivings as to his own feelings towards David. They were too personal, too real, and too intense to admit a single doubt. He felt in his heart the glow of an affection, the inspiration of a friendship, the stirring of a sympathy for his persecuted friend, which the gentlest and most susceptible of our species might have envied, but could not equal. His love to David "surpassed the love of woman." And yet with this intense kindling of affection in his soul, how powerful was the conviction that the sorrow of his friend was too profound for a human sympathy to fathom, and was too tender for a human hand to touch. Passing by the warm, gushing spring of a creature's affection, he leads the stricken heart to God.
And such is the lesson God wills that we should learn. Loving us too well to allow us to rest short of Himself, He retains the prerogative of comforting us in His own hands. He will allow no creature to usurp His place, no love and no sympathy to eclipse and rival His. Kindly and considerately He provides friends for us, affectionate and sympathizing—yet they are given as instruments only of conducting us to Himself. They are as polished stones by which we ascend to the Divine temple of love—God's own heart. They are as beams of light upon whose wings we travel to the Infinite Sun and Source of sympathy.
Beloved child of sorrow! none but God, your God, can meet your case, staunch your tears and charm away your grief. It may be that He alone, is in the secret of your sorrow. Its nature inexplicable and its existence unsuspected, you are entirely severed from human sympathy, shut up exclusively to Him. In silence you possess, and in loneliness you nurse your grief—the unheard sigh—the unseen tear—the secret prayer, your sole relief. But there is One to whom your sorrow is not veiled, and from whose sympathy you are not excluded. He who at the moment of Hagar's dark despair, unsealed her eyes to behold the well of water springing at her side—
knows your sorrow,
sees your tears,
hears your sighs, and
makes your sorrow all his own.In a more privileged, enviable position as a suffering saint, you can scarcely be placed—shut up to God alone, you are now cast entirely upon the bosom of your Heavenly Father. All the attributes of Deity are interested in your sorrow and are engaged for your comfort. "I, even I, am He who comforts you!" says the great Jehovah. Privileged being! is there an angel in Heaven brought so near to God as you are—the suffering member of a suffering Head, ever dwelling in the bosom of the Father? O the unspeakable mercy of being cast wholly and entirely upon God!
But in the case of David the Lord employs a human sympathy as the channel of a Divine consolation. How wise and how kind of God thus to arrange for the administration of our comfort! He commissions no angel—how could angels sympathize with human woe? But he employs a human comforter, one himself encompassed with infirmity, and who has tasted sorrow's cup.
"And strengthened his hand in God." Let us endeavor to understand the full purpose of these words. David was in deep affliction, and a time of affliction is always a season when unbelief makes its fierce and bold assault upon the soul. Would not Jonathan's first effort, then, be directed to the strengthening of David's hand of faith to take hold upon God as his God in covenant, and as his Father? And would not this be the most effective sympathy he could offer? The moment David laid his trembling hand of faith upon JEHOVAH—on His love, His promises, His faithfulness, His power—would not his heart be at rest? Most assuredly.
In this same near and dear relation you stand to David's God, O tried believer! You cannot be lost in the gloom, and solitude, and depth of your adversity, since God has His hand and eye upon you, even though you have not your eye nor your hand upon God. Have faith in God and all will be well. Implicit confidence, which is nothing more nor less than the simplest and most childlike faith, is all that your Heavenly Father now asks at your hands. Believe that all things are possible with Him, but that He should lie—that there is but one thing that He cannot do, "He cannot deny Himself"—believe that if now you honor Him, by a simple, unfaltering, unquestioning repose . . .
in His wisdom to guide you,
in His power to protect you,
in His love to soothe you,
in His faithfulness to stand by you
—believe, I say, all this, and your faith shall receive a present and a rich recompense of reward. Lay your hand of faith upon God, and it is strengthened.Jonathan would strengthen David in God by reminding him, that the Divine power was uplifted as an invulnerable shield for his defense. That between his persecuting parent and his persecuted friend—all the attributes of Deity were interposed. And what a soothing, heart-cheering, and soul-strengthening assurance would this be to David! Equally is this precious truth yours, child of God, trembling, it may be, in the anticipation of some impending evil. Between you and every threatening foe, God places Himself. His perfections encircle you as a wall of fire, His name is your tower, and His heart is your pavilion. With David, you, too, may exclaim, "The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower."
God has bounded the proud waves of man's wrath. "Your God, whom you serve, is able to deliver you from the lions." Only believe. Recall to memory what was said of the prophet: "So Daniel was taken up out of the den, and no manner of hurt was found upon him, because he believed in his God."
And God can, and God will, if you only believe, shut the lion's mouth in your case, and no being shall hurt a hair of your head. All hearts are in his hands; all wills are under His control. If God is for you, who can be against you? Satan cannot hurt you—sin cannot condemn you—man cannot injure you. If God gives you quietness, then who then can make trouble? Christ will destroy every plot, and foil every attempt to hurt you, if beneath his wing you believingly and quietly repose. The wicked shall fall into their own trap, and the crafty shall be ensnared in their own device, while that you withal escape. No weapon formed against you shall prosper. The sun shall not smite you by day, nor the moon by night—only put your trust in God. Hope in God, and you shall yet praise Him.
Nor would Jonathan fail to strengthen the hand of his friend in God, by reminding him of the Divine promises, and of the faithfulness of God in their fulfillment. No effort of sympathy would more effectually meet his peculiar case than this. God had promised David that he would sit upon the throne of his fathers—that the kingdom of Israel, torn from Saul, should be transferred to his government. But the crown and the scepter, thus promised, loomed in the distance, almost enshrouded from view by dark intervening clouds. The promise seemed as a dead letter. The providence of God appeared to clash with, and to contradict, the promise of God. But in the history of his Church the providences of the Divine government are not the index of the promises of the Divine Governor. It is not so much by what God does, as by what God has said—that He is to be judged. However gloomy and portentous were the providences now weaving their sable robe about the person of God's beloved servant; and yet, in all these circumstances, so trying to faith, the unseen hand of the Eternal One was moving. They were but the veiling, not the extinguishing clouds, that obscured for a "little moment" the purposes of Him who is "wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working," around whose throne clouds and darkness gather; who "gives no account of any of his matters," and yet who causes all things to work together for good to those who love Him.
Christian mourner, in the Divine promises you have an equal proprietorship. They are as much yours as they were David's, of whose "sure mercies" you are the possessor. These promises are exceedingly great and precious in their nature- -they are personal and particular in their application—they are absolute and infallible in their fulfillment. Death may appear to be written upon the promise, and upon all the means leading to its accomplishment, but there is a life in the promise that cannot die. See how God wrote the sentence of death upon the promise, as in the case of the age of Abraham—the sterility of Sarah—the abduction of Joseph—the demand for Benjamin—the banishment of David; and yet in all these instances, the word upon which God caused those waiting souls to hope was made good to the letter; and the promise that appeared to be dead, rose again with a life all the more vigorous and glorious from its long and gloomy entombment. It is the believer's mercy to know that he has to do with a Divine Promiser whose faithfulness has been proved, and with a promise whose power has been tested. There is not a promise with which the Holy Spirit the Comforter seeks to support and console you but has passed through the crucible, and has been "tried as silver is tried." "The word of the Lord is tried." And if it is a fearful sin to doubt what God has declared, it is a tenfold aggravation of that sin not to believe, when a thousand times over He has made good what He has promised, and when a great cloud of witnesses testify that He has never once falsified his word.
And if, tried Christian, others, wading, perhaps, through deeper and darker waters than those through which you are now passing, found the promises of God to be "Yes and Amen in Christ Jesus!" and proved their buoyant and upholding power bearing them through the flood and in safety to the shore—then why should you fear?
Are you in trial? The promise is: "Call upon me in the day of trouble, and I will answer you, and deliver you, and you shall glorify me."
Are you in sorrow? The promise is: "As one whom his mother comforts, so will I comfort you."
Are you a widow? The promise is: "Let your widows trust in me." Are you an orphan? The promise is: "In me the fatherless finds mercy."
Are you homeless? The promise is: "God sets the solitary in families."
Are you friendless? The promise is: "A friend loves at all times, and there is a Friend that sticks closer than a brother."
Are you bowed down beneath the burden of sin? The promise is: "Come unto me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."
O embrace these precious promises of Him who "cannot lie," and give to the winds all your unbelieving fears. Thus will your hand be strengthened in God.
But this truth is too momentous and too precious thus to be dismissed. Gladly, dear reader, would I concentrate your whole soul upon its vastness—JEHOVAH, the strength, the consolation, and the hope of His people! There is no case of adversity, of grief, of embarrassment, of peril—peculiar, dark, and desperate as it may be—to which I would not, without the least reservation, and without a solitary misgiving, exclaim, "Hope in God!"
All other hope may now be cut off, every star hidden, every ray extinguished—no hope in friends, no hope in kindred, no hope in saints; least of all, no hope in yourself—yet I would say, there is hope in God! Your case cannot exceed His power, His wisdom, His mercy.
It may have confounded human wisdom,
it may have exceeded human might,
it may have wearied human patience,
it may have exhausted human sympathy
—yet have faith and hope in God, and you shall yet praise Him! Believe that He will help you.Or, if your faith staggers at His willingness—then believe that He is able to help you.
Or, if that is too great a grasp for your faith—then believe that it is possible that there is help for you in God, and acting upon the bare possibility, go to Him in lowliness, confessing sin, reminding Him of His own word, pleading the name of Jesus—and you shall joyfully and gratefully exclaim, "The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in him, and I am helped therefore my heart greatly rejoices; and with my song will I praise him."
On another memorable and subsequent occasion of David's straits, when the people talked of stoning him, it is said that, "David strengthened himself in God." This lesson he had doubtless learned in the wilderness of Ziph, when Jonathan went to him, and by sympathy, and by exhortation and prayer, strengthened his feeble hand in God. It is just this simple, patient waiting upon God in all our straits, that certainly and effectually issues in our deliverance. In all circumstances of faith's trial, of prayer's delay, of hope deferred, the most proper and graceful posture of the soul—that which ensures the largest revenue of blessing to us, and of glory to God—is a patient waiting on the Lord. Although our impatience will not cause God to break His covenant, nor violate His oath—yet a patient waiting will bring down larger and richer blessings.
The moral discipline of patience is most costly. It keeps the soul humble, believing, and prayerful. The mercy in which it results is all the more prized and precious from the long season of hopeful expectation. "Behold, the gardener waits for the precious fruit of the earth, and has patience for it, until he receive the early and the latter rain. Be also patient."
It is possible to receive a return too speedily. In our eagerness to grasp the mercy with one hand—we may loose our hold on faith and prayer and God with the other. A patient waiting on the Lord's time and mode of appearing in our behalf, will tend to check all unworthy and unwise expedients and attempts at self-rescue. An immediate deliverance may be purchased at a price too costly. Its present taste may be sweet, but afterwards it may be bitter—God embittering the blessing that was not sought with a single eye to His glory. God's time, though it tarry, and God's deliverance, though delayed—when it comes, proves always to have been the best: "My soul, wait only upon God, for my expectation is from Him."
Thus, O believer, let your hand be strengthened in God: your hand of faith, your hand of labor, your hand of love, your hand of suffering.
Is your hand of toil weary and ready to hang down? Lay it upon Jehovah's strength.
Is your hand of faith feeble and ready to droop? Lay it upon your Father's faithfulness.
Is your hand, uplifted in confession, supplication and prayer, tremulous and ready to fail? Lay it upon Jesus, your Savior, your Intercessor, your High Priest!
What a strengthening of the soul in sorrow, is the sympathy of Christ! It is a marvelous truth—the sympathy of the Lord Jesus in all our human sorrows! It seems a fact almost incredible—and yet most true it is. There never ascended from the altar of the most sacred and precious friendship—the incense of a human sympathy so pure, so fragrant, so intense, as that which ascends from his heart!
If early training in the school of trial,
if personal acquaintance with adversity in its every form,
if a keen susceptibility to human suffering,
if love the most tender,
if patience the most infinite,
if power the most illimitable,
constitute essential elements of the only sympathy that can really reach our sorrow—then the sympathy of the Lord Jesus just meets our case. "For we do not have a High Priest who cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities." Thus is Jesus our fellow-sufferer.See, too, the exquisite tenderness and compassion of Jesus—his boundless, inconceivable love to his people. See the language of God expressing the tenderness of His love: "Is not Ephraim my dear son, the child in whom I delight? Though I often speak against him, I still remember him. Therefore my heart yearns for him; I have great compassion for him!" Jeremiah 31:20.
Penitent backslider! Such is the out-gushing sympathy of God's forgiving heart towards you!
Look at the sympathy of Christ:
There is not a path we tread, which he treads not with us.
There is not a burden we bear, which he divides not with us.
There is not a sorrow we feel, which he shares not with us.
If driven into the wilderness—then he is there to cheer and sweeten its solitude.
If tossed from billow to billow on the stormy sea—then he is there to still the tempest and calm the surge.
If begirt by clamorous accusers—then he is there as our Friend and Advocate.
If we go to the grave to weep—then he is there to mingle his tears with ours.If a restless bed of sickness and suffering is our couch—then he is there to pillow our head upon his bosom.
And when approaching the last dreadful hour, we descend into the valley of the shadow of death—he is there encircling us with his everlasting arms, and waving over us the banner of his love.Thus have we the pure stream of human sympathy in the closest alliance with Divine support, flowing at our side all our journey to Heaven!
Oh, who can embosom himself in our every grief as He can, in whose life suffering was an essential element, and to whom sorrow is a sacred and precious thing?
Who can heal the wounded spirit, and bind up the broken heart with a touch so gentle, and with a hand so skillful, as Jesus?
Mourning reader, has every other spring of soothing dried? Flee then, to this well-spring of sympathy, that soothes, satisfies always, and fails never!
But, perhaps, to some whose tearful eye may bedew these pages the most touching and endearing chapter in our Lord's life of varied and affecting incident, is that which portrays him in Bethany's house of mourning, and bending over the grave of Lazarus—thus illustrating his peculiar sympathy with the bereaved. It would seem as if Jesus loved to visit the haunts of human woe.
"Lord, if you had been here, my brother had not died," were words bursting from the lips of the two bereaved sisters, which seemed to chide the delay of an interposition which might have averted their sad calamity. And why that delay? Would it not seem as if one reason was that the cup of woe was not yet full, and thus the time for the richest display of his human sympathy and divine power had not yet come? But, when death had invaded that happy circle, had cast its shadow over the sunny home, and the sorrow of bereavement was now bursting each heart; Behold! Jesus appears, gently lifts the latch, and enters! And who has passed within that dark abode of sorrow? The Creator of all worlds, the Lord of angels and of men, robed in a real, a suffering, and a sympathizing humanity, to mingle with the daughters of sorrow.
Returning from the house of mourning, we follow him to the grave. Groaning in soul, he asks, "Where have you laid him?" And then it is written—and O, never were words more full of meaning, "JESUS WEPT!" The incarnate God in tears! O marvelous sympathy! Such as earth never before saw, and such as Heaven in astonishment looked down to see.
But why did Jesus weep? Was such an expression of sensibility in keeping with the occasion? Was he not about to recall his friend to life again? And did he not know that, before the sun had declined an hour, he will have robbed Death of his victim, and the grave of its prey, restoring gladness to those bereaved sisters, and the sunshine of joy to that desolate home? Most assuredly.
And yet, "Jesus wept!" Oh, it was SYMPATHY! Those tears were the out-gushing of a sensibility he could not repress, nor wished to veil. Moved by his own loss, he was yet more deeply moved with the loss of Martha and Mary. He stood at that grave as though he were the chief mourner, upon whom the brunt of the calamity had fallen. There were no tears so flowing at that moment like his. He wept because he was human—he wept because he was bereaved—he wept because others wept. It was a sympathetic emotion that now agitated to its center his whole soul. Behold him who makes his people's sorrows all his own! "O most blessed mourner, with whose tears your Savior mingles his! O sympathy most unparalleled! To each of the two stricken and afflicted ones the Lord addressed the very consolations that were most congenial: to Martha he gave exceeding great and precious assurance in words such as never any man spoke. To Mary he communicated the groanings of his spirit, in language more expressive to the heart than any spoken words can be.
With Martha, Jesus discoursed and reasoned.
With Mary, Jesus wept.What a friend is this! What a brother! Yes, far more than a brother. And how confidently may you come to him, you Christian mourners, in every season of trial! For truly, he will give you the very cordial, the very refreshment, of which you stand in need. He is a patient hearer, if you have anything to say to him; and he will speak to you, and enable you to hear it. Your afflictions, your regrets, your expectations, your very remonstrances and upbraidings—may all be expressed to him. He will pity. He will comfort. His Holy Spirit will bring to your remembrance what Christ has said suitable to your case. He will recall to you the Savior's gracious words of eternal life, and suggest to you considerations fitted to dissipate your gloom, and put a new song in your mouth.
And even if you cannot collect your thoughts, and order your words aright, if you are dumb with silence when your sorrow is stirred, and as you mourn your heart is hot within you—oh remember, that, with these very groanings, which cannot be uttered, the Spirit makes intercession for you! And they are not hid from him who, when he saw Mary weeping—groaned, and was troubled, and wept.
There is indeed enough of all sacred consolation in that blessed Book, which all throughout testifies of Jesus! For the sorrow that seeks rest in words, and desires by words also to be soothed—there is the Savior's open ear, there are the Savior's lips, into which grace was poured. For the grief thus dumb and silent, there are the Savior's tears!"
Bereaved one! That speaking, weeping Brother was born for your adversity! Though now in glory, where no tears are shed—he still sympathizes with the sorrows of the bereaved on earth—yes, sympathizes with your sorrows. Into all the circumstances of your present calamity:
the irreparable loss it has entailed,
the deep void it has created,
the profound grief it has awakened,
the painful changes it involves,
the sable gloom with which, to your bedimmed eyes, it drapes and enshrouds all the future of life
—he fully enters.And though, when the storm-cloud of Divine vengeance was darkling above his head, Gethsemane and Calvary fully in view, not a nerve quivered, nor a tear fell—yet, lo! he comes, and weeps with you, and breathes the soothing, balmy, influence of a human sympathy over the scene and the sadness of your sorrow. Christian mourner! the Weeping One of Bethany is near you! Christ is with you, Christ is in your sorrow!
"Jesus wept at Bethany,
By the grave where Lazarus lay;
A pitying tear he shed while here,
'Twas for his friends at Bethany."In anguish in Gethsemane,
He prayed the cup might pass away;
Yet even here, he dropped no tear,
Like that which fell at Bethany."On the cross at Calvary,
For his murderers hear him pray;
Though death is near, it brings no tear,
Like that blessed tear at Bethany."Then let us imitate our Lord,
To others' woes a tear afford;
For, though on high, Christ still is near,
And yet remembers Bethany."It were deep dishonor done to one of the sweetest sources of sacred comfort, often flowing through a human channel—were we to overlook the sympathy of the Spirit. He is truly and emphatically the Comforter. It is as much his delight as it is his office to administer soothing and support to the sorrowful and the disconsolate. Our earliest acquaintance with true joy was when the Holy Spirit first revealed Jesus to the eye of our faith, as a sin-pardoning, soul-justifying Savior! O the bliss of that moment when he turned our godly sorrow into godly joy! When, with his own gentle voice, he pronounced our sins forgiven, and bade us go in peace, and sin no more!
And still he sympathizes, and still he comforts. Knowing our griefs, cognizant of our sorrow, its cause and its consequence; he hastens to soothe, to sanctify, and to remove it. It is he who tempers our grief, restrains its power, and limits its bounds—else every spark of reason might be extinguished, and every heart-string break.
He takes our sorrow for sin, and leads it to the blood of atonement, and it is gone.
He takes our grief of affliction, our sadness of trial, and leads it to the sympathy of Christ—and it is removed.
Dwelling in our heart of love, he dwells in our heart of sorrow. By his grace he calms its grief, hushes its murmur, and bows it in meek, lowly, filial submission to the Divine will.
Christian mourner! I cite you as a witness. You can testify how often he has insinuated himself into your hidden sorrow, has gently forced from you the secret of your tears; and then, with a delicacy, a tenderness, and a power all his own—has charmed it quite away. Thus again and again has he given us beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.
O blessed Spirit! though we have so often wounded you, grieved you, slighted you—you still come and make our sad and desolate heart your home? Ah, yes! that is like yourself, Divine and Holy Comforter! And is not this the fulfillment of just what Jesus promised?
"It is expedient for you that I go away; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but, if I depart, I will send him unto you." Jesus is gone, the Comforter is come, and now there is a river, the streams whereof make glad the City of God, the suffering Church of Christ. It is the river of Divine comfort, flowing through the channels of human sympathy.
"And Jonathan went unto David in the forest, and strengthened his hand in God." And, O, if, in this time of your sadness, the Blessed and Eternal Spirit shall open to you more fully the fullness of Jesus—shall lead you more deeply into the depths of his loving heart, his sympathizing nature—shall reveal to you more clearly the character of God, as the God of all comfort, your Father and your Friend—will he not indeed have comforted you?
A few reflections must conduct our subject to its close.
The power of human kindness is beautifully and impressively illustrated by this touching incident in the friendship of David and Jonathan. It is true there was no anger to disarm, and no enmity to dislodge; yet there were fears to allay, and sadness to soothe, and the simple instrument which accomplished both was—the sympathy of kindness. And yet, had the case been otherwise, kindness would still have conquered. The Word of God teaches us, that a soft answer turns away wrath. And, again, it is said, By patience a prince is persuaded, and a soft tongue breaks the bone. It was by kindness that David calmed down the enraged temper of Saul, obtaining thus a twofold victory—a victory over himself, and a victory over the wrathful king.
Kindness is the great law of the Divine government; and in man it is the strongest element of human power. How does God overcome an evil; is it not by good? And based upon this is a like precept, enforced upon us: "If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good!"
There is no weapon so powerful as kindness. It is by the love of the cross, that the enmity of the carnal mind is subdued, and its inbred evils overcome. If we must be severe to the faults and delinquencies of the erring and the hardened—then we must be exquisitely kind. The very severity of love will more quickly and effectually subdue, win, and reclaim—than all the harsh, cruel treatment, unfeeling upbraiding, and cruel threats that sternness ever invented. The human heart expands to the looks, and words, and actions of human kindness and sympathy, just as the delicate flowers nurtured in our gardens, open to the light and warmth of the morning's sun.
There is sympathy in a look,
there is sympathy in a word,
there is sympathy in the offer of a flower,
there is sympathy in a visit of kindness,
there is sympathy in a note of inquiry,
there is sympathy in a card,
there is a silent expression of sympathy,
there is sympathy in a thousand delicate and nameless forms, which kindle an electric spark in the human heart, and which sends a tide of happiness circulating and thrilling through the whole soul!The true disciple of Christ-like the beloved John, who leaned on the bosom of Jesus, and felt and imbibed the throbbings and the warmth of its gentleness, tenderness, and love—will ever desire to exhibit the loving, sympathizing, forgiving spirit of his Lord and Master, from whose lips no words of harshness ever breathed.
Napoleon once said, "I win nothing but battles; but Josephine, by her goodness and gentleness, wins all hearts." And what armed force, what fortified mind, what obdurate heart—can repel the power of human kindness? It is irresistible and invincible! It overcomes when all other weapons fail.
O let us then, imbibing more deeply the spirit of Christianity, which is the fountain of love, inexhaustible and immense—speak kindly, look kindly, act kindly, write kindly. Thus gliding gently, softly, usefully through the world, like "silent streams watering fairest meadows." And in her tongue is the law of kindness.
But, precious as is human sympathy, and frequently as it is a medium of Divine comfort to our hearts, we should yet remember, that, because it is human, it is therefore limited, and should not be pressed beyond its capacity.
"There are few sources of consolation," remarks one of the holiest and most sympathizing of men, "of so exalted, so close, so endearing an order, as those which spring from human sympathy. To have one who enters into our care and circumstances, our sorrows and our joys, our hopes and our fears, what we dread and what we endure, who feels when we feel in a measure as we feel, who rejoices when we rejoice, and weeps when we weep, is surely one of our costly, yes, our very costliest, mercies. Sympathy is . . .
a choice flower in the midst of weeds,
a garden amidst a desert,
a shelter when the storm rages around us.But it is in this, as in everything human—human sympathy has its limit, and oftentimes a very narrow limit beyond which it cannot pass. If we attempt to force it beyond this limit, we may weaken, perhaps destroy it. Human sympathy can fully enter into but few of our real circumstances. It cannot deeply feel, in the absence of all personal experience of those things which concern another's sorrow; it cannot really enter into that of which practically it knows nothing—where it feels it the most, yet there are ever some of the finest springs which it cannot touch. Even could it touch them, yet the very presence of our own individual trouble necessarily places a limit to our sympathy. And even where it enters the most fully—yet, in the vast majority of instances, human sympathy has little power to give effectual relief under trouble—still less to remove it. Such is the limit which is fixed to the choicest earthly good. The very nature of man fixes it. But this is of Divine appointment, that we rest, not in human sympathy, but in that sympathy of Jesus himself.
This suggests another and a kindred reflection. There are occasions in life when God would have us cultivate a proper independence of human sympathy. The value of this lesson—hard and difficult to learn, though it may appear—is incalculable. Circumstances in our history will, yes, must occur, in which we shall be made to feel the entire failure of human sympathy in our case. Indeed, there will exist occasions when we can scarcely expect, much less ask it. For example: You have conceived some bold enterprise of Christian benevolence; to your reflective mind it is important, clear, and practical. You present it, expound it, press it, and lo!—the cold look, the listless ear, the discouraging word, the ridicule, the sneer—too plainly testify that your plan has inspired no corresponding interest, and has awakened no responsive sympathy in the mind of others. Your friends look coldly at you, and think your scheme Utopian, and yourself an enthusiast.
But what are you to do? Abandon your project? Relinquish your enterprise? By no means! You must now act independent of human sympathy. You must go forward, as Columbus did, when, in the face of discouragement and scorn, he launched forth in search of a new hemisphere. You must go forward as Howard did, when, confronted by almost insurmountable obstacles, he resolutely started in his career of boundless philanthropy. You must go forward as Carey did, when, covered with sarcasm and ridicule, he embarked on his sublime mission of converting India to Christ. You must go forward as Layard did, when, despite the lukewarmness of government, he conceived and executed the splendid idea of untombing Nineveh. Had any one of these noble, daring, enterprising spirits tarried until a friend, an association, a government, had been inspired with a like generous impulse with their own—would any of their brilliant conceptions have ever been realized? No! We must not wait for human sympathy in our plans for doing good; but, acting independently, go right on, strengthening our hands alone in God.
Again, you have experienced a loss, or are the subject of a calamity which bows you to the earth, and for which you would gladly bespeak the sympathy of friendship. But it comes not. Your friends are not, perhaps, wholly apathetic, or entirely indifferent to your circumstances; but their condolence falls immeasurably short of your case. The aid they offer is wholly inadequate to meet your position.
To your excited sensibilities, it is tame;
to your warm and generous feelings, it is frigid;
to your bleeding heart, it is unsympathizing.It rather irritates than soothes, aggravates than lessens, your woe. It is polite, it is graceful, it is even sincere—but it falls upon your spirit as the snow-flake upon the ground—beautiful, frost-like, and cold.
And yet, as painful as it is, a nobler and more dignified position there cannot be, than a sublime independence of human sympathy. There are few positions in life more favorable to the formation and development of true greatness of character than this. It not only commands the respect, and receives the confidence, denied to a weak and importunate reliance upon others, but it places the individual himself in an attitude which calls forth the native powers of self-communion, of self-culture, and of self-government with which God has endowed him—and brings him into a more direct and close fellowship with God himself. Severed from the human, he is more exclusively shut up to the Divine! Few individuals ever arrive at any high attainments in great force of character, originality of conception, or boldness of achievement—who do not act in a manly independence of the opinion, and sympathy, and cooperation of their fellows. If confident that our cause is just, our object good, and our hearts honest—we may safely forego all human aid, and, in child-like faith, cast ourselves upon God—all whose resources are infinite, boundless, and inexhaustible!
Oh, it is a sublime spectacle, that of an individual passing meekly by the support of a mortal like himself, and bearing his adversity, his perplexity, his want—to God alone! The very act ennobles him. He stands peerless among his fellows. He has attached himself to Infinity, and he is great. He has honored God, and God honors him.
I ask you not, my reader, to withdraw from man; but I do earnestly invite you to draw nearer to God. I would not that you should repel with coldness the least expression of human kindness, or treat with indifference the lowliest offering of human sympathy, or sunder with rashness the slightest tie, as slender though as a gossamer thread—that connects you with a human friendship. But this would I urge: cultivate closer, more simple, confidential fellowship with God. Endeavor to feel that His presence is a reality. Realize Jesus to be your Friend, your Brother, your Counselor. What though all other love were to expire, and all other sympathy were to fail—Christ should be to you all and in all.
That, in the path we tread in life, there are but few individuals whom we may admit to the warm, close confidence of a sacred friendship; and that in consequence, we narrow our own sources of sympathy, should not be allowed to sicken the heart with disappointment, or congeal its sympathy for others. Chilled by indifference, and wounded by unkindness—we may retire within ourselves, and become almost misanthropic. Nursing in lonely sadness our unsatisfied yearning for human sympathy, brooding over the slight and fickleness of a hollow friendship—we may forget that we have a mission to perform.
Created not for ourselves alone—we ought to live and labor for the well-being of others. If we cannot find sympathy—we yet can sympathize. If our sorrow, too sacred to be invaded, is buried deep within our own bosom—we yet can go and share another's grief, and thus, perhaps find soothing for our own. In attempting to administer to another's distress, or to bear another's burden—how often have we unexpectedly administered a balm to our own concealed wounds, and lightened the pressure upon our own hearts? "Fellowship in woe, does woe assuage."
O methinks that, second to the unburdening of our full heart, to the tender, loving, and sympathizing Christ—the most effectual cure of sorrow is to embosom ourselves in the sorrow of another, to repair to some bed of sickness or couch of languor, to the house of mourning or the abode of misery and want—and make another's grief our own. There is a reflex influence in human sympathy. Its exercise wins its own reward. Sympathy cannot stir in the human heart, without exerting a silent, almost imperceptible influence through the soul in which it dwells.
As the incense offered for the people enveloped with its fragrant cloud the person of the officiating priest—so the sweet incense of Christian sympathy, pouring forth from the censer of a feeling heart for another's woe, is wafted back again, to soothe with its aroma the bosom that breathed it. As the moisture which the sunbeams drink from the earth, returns again to fructify it with gentle dew by night, and with refreshing showers by day—so every particle of human sympathy absorbed in another's sorrow shall, when most we need it, come back again to breathe its tenfold blessing on ourselves. "He who waters shall be watered himself." Proverbs 11:25.
Ah! it is impossible to speak of the preciousness of Christ to another, and not, while we speak, feel him precious to our own souls.
It is impossible to lead another to the cross, and not find ourselves overshadowed by its glory.
It is impossible to establish another in the being, character, and truth of God, and not feel our own minds fortified and confirmed.
It is impossible to quote the promises and unfold the consolations of the Gospel to another, and not be sensible of their tranquillizing and soothing influence stealing softly over our own hearts.
It is impossible to break the alabaster box, and not fill the house with the fragrance of the ointment.
Ah! who can tell the secret strength, fortitude, and comfort which Jesus experienced in view of his approaching passion, while "going about doing good." We recur again to the thought upon which we have thus expatiated: there are but few kindred spirits on earth to whom we can look for that full outflow of perfect sympathy for which in secret we yearn. Or, should that kindred heart, that human sympathy exist—it may please God, in the inscrutability of His all-wise, all-righteous, all-loving providence—to deny us, for a season, its possession and enjoyment—just that our hearts may find their full satisfaction and perfect repose in Him!
"My son, give me your heart," is the still small voice of love, whispered by each fading beam, breathing from each blighted flower, of human hope. "Not my will, O my Father, but may your will be done!"
There are several unfoldings of sympathy which may be deemed worthy of our especial notice:
1. The first to which we refer, is the sympathy of home. There are few places which present a more beautiful and appropriate sphere for the development, cultivation, and play of this exquisite attribute of our nature, than the domestic circle. Home! what a charm is there in that word! What magic power it possesses! If on earth there be one spot more bright, more verdant, and more sunny than another—an oasis in the heart of the desert—it is, a holy home.
There the divinest flowers of our nature grow.
There the most precious and exquisite affections of the heart are nurtured.
There the sweetest, loveliest character unfolds.
There our strongest, purest sympathies find play.
All that is ennobling in intellect, purifying in affection, expansive in soul, lofty, unselfish, and generous—finds its home, and commences its earliest flow, in the bosom of a Christian family.
And yet, alas! through the many and clinging infirmities of our fallen and polluted nature, is there no danger of a gall-drop distilling into this cup of sweets—of a cloud casting its shadow over the brightness of this spot of sunshine? May there not, in some homes, exist a lack of mutual affection and confidence, of sympathy and fellowship, which, weakening the bonds which cement, and relaxing the springs which keep in harmony, all the members and movements of the domestic circle—gives rise to that coldness, distrust, and discord, which entail so much unhappiness, and produce so much misery, in so many homes of our land?
It is to prevent the introduction of so unholy and pernicious a leaven, or, if already introduced, to arrest its progress and secure its annihilation, that we earnestly press the assiduous and prayerful cultivation of this essential and precious element of domestic happiness—home sympathy.
The first step to this is, the erection of a family altar, around which, in holy devotion, all gather for the morning and evening sacrifice. O there is no engagement which breathes so uniting, so hallowing, and so brightening an influence over a household, as family prayer. Thus, drawn closer to each other by the greater nearness of all to God, let each one feel that, by mutual acts of kindness—by those little yet delicate attentions, which, to a susceptible heart, are so grateful and expressive—by a mutual understanding and forbearance—by studiously avoiding all thoughtless infliction of pain, harshness of tone, and unsympathizing manner—by kindness to the sick, by attention to the infirm, by reverence to the aged, by sisterly, brotherly, and filial duty and affection—perpetual sunshine may bathe in its golden beams this the holiest, sweetest of all earthly associations—our HAPPY HOMES!
2. We may next allude to what we would term, the sympathy of the sanctuary. It is a lovely and impressive spectacle—an assembly worshiping God; the rich and the poor meeting together prostrate before one common Maker and Father! The sanctuary has ever been a source of the holiest and sweetest sympathy to the tried and afflicted, the disconsolate and the lonely.
The praises that float there,
the petitions that are breathed there,
the Gospel that is preached there,
the impressions that are produced there
—have often proved channels of heaven-born, heaven-sent, and heaven-attracting messages of consolation, and joy, and hope, to many a sad and weary spirit. What a desolate wilderness would earth be without this sacred fountain of Divine and precious sympathy?But this sympathy depends much for its power and diffusion upon individual influence. Divine though the comfort of the sanctuary is, the medium through which it flows is human. How many an individual, solitary, depressed, and desolate, within whose breast a stranger's sad and lone heart throbbed, has repaired to some sanctuary of God, for weeks and months—and no friendly hand has been extended, and no kindly lips have opened to bid him welcome, or breathe a word of sympathy in his ear. The stranger has come and gone, unnoticed, unpitied, and unknown. "In how many little acts," remarks a feeling writer, can we show kindness! By a look, a word, a grasp of the hand. From the gushings of a truly kind heart, it is one continual stream of kind words and works, like a little rivulet gently meandering its way through field and grove, sometimes so still that you would almost pass it by, were it not that some little thing draws your attention to it. So it is with one of a kindly nature. It is an old, but, like many of the old, is a true saying, that 'love begets love.'
How often in this weary pilgrimage we meet those who are strangers to us! But, even in our first greetings, we have thoughts and feelings come over us, that this one, whose face we look upon, whose hand we grasp, whose kindling eye answers quick response to our own eager look—is not a stranger but a friend.
Never shall I forget when, now more than three years ago, I for the first time for many long years entered the house of God. In a remote corner, I sat unknown, and, as I then thought, unnoticed. The words which that man of God used on that occasion were those of the prodigal son: 'I will arise and go to my Father!' Every word he uttered was a direct appeal to myself. The service over, I quickly left the house; no one looked at, no one spoke to me. I felt more lonely than ever. The next evening I returned again to the same place: another person occupied the sacred desk. That evening as I looked upon the countenances of those around, I felt, If I could possess the happiness that I see depicted upon your faces, I should be indeed blessed! As I was about to leave, I felt a hand gently laid upon my arm. Turning quickly round, I met the earnest look and extended hand of him who is now my pastor. The words of sympathy then, and of counsel since, were the means of bringing me to see myself as I was in the sight of Almighty God.
Touching testimony this! Ah! how many a soul has been won to Christ, and how many a soul may still be won—by the Christian sympathy of the sanctuary! We little know what an avenue is opened to a stranger's heart by the softening, expanding, unearthly influences of that holy place. Reader, make it your study to search out the stranger who occasionally or statedly joins you in the same house and act of worship. Speak kindly to him; bring him to the pastor—bring him to Christ. Imitate the example of Andrew, who took Simon by the hand, and "brought him to Jesus." John 1:42.
And among these little acts of kindness which speak so powerfully to the heart, and which often are the first steps in winning it to the Savior, are those delicate courtesies of the sanctuary, too frequently and generally overlooked. There is sympathy in the opening of a door to a stranger, there is sympathy in the offer of a book, there is sympathy in the meeting glance of the eye—"The answering look of sympathy and love;" there is sympathy in the interchange of a word. Thus some simple and silent, but expressive token of sacred interest in the sanctuary, may be instrumental of the first dawn of celestial day to a soul; may give to the life of an individual all its future form and complexion; may send some stranger back to his lone and cheerless abode with a sunbeam playing around his heart, inspired by the thought that there yet is one who recognizes him, who cares for, and who sympathizes with him, in this "wide, wide world." Oh! the privilege of thus alluring one soul to Christ! If holy envy could possibly find place in an angel's heart, it would be awakened by a bliss such as this.
3. There is one other expression of sympathy to which we would refer—sympathy with Christ's holy laborers. The Lord's vineyard is a large one, and the departments of labor are many and varied. And if, in this world of activity—where so many agencies, evil and good, are at work—where so many influences, for weal and for woe, are in constant and untiring operation—there is one class which demands our warmest interest, our most fervent prayers, and our most affectionate sympathy and support. It is those who are actively and devotedly employed in the kingdom and service of Jesus. It is needless to enumerate or specify them:
those who are preaching Christ's Gospel;
those who are teaching the little ones;
those who are instructing and training the young about to enter upon life;
those who disseminate God's holy Word, and promote religious literature;
those who visit the sick and the dying, the stranger and the prisoner;
—all have especial and strong claims upon our Christian sympathy. A little expression of kind interest in their self-denying labors—oh, how often has it inspirited, cheered, and encouraged them! What a privilege to return to the scene of their toil, anxiety, and discouragement, and by a visit, a word, a donation, "strengthen their hand in God"—that hand often so feeble, tremulous, and ready to fall.Is there not a lamentable lack of sympathy for the Christian missionary? Who so much demands, and who so worthy of the support, the prayers, the sympathy of the Christian church, as those who are her messengers and almoners to the far distant heathen? How much do they need that, by our petitions, our zealous cooperation, and our consecrated substance—we strengthen their hand in God!
Let us, then, cheer all Christ's true laborers, remembering that thus, indirectly, we are urging forward his truth and kingdom in the world.
Never let us withhold our sympathy from any case of sorrow, Christian effort, or individual labor, on the plea that its expression and its source are feeble, uncostly, and obscure. Ah! from many a darkened chamber, from many a sleepless pillow, from many a couch of languor—there has gone up the secret, silent, but fervent and believing wrestle with the angel of the covenant in behalf of some Christian laborer, or some Christian enterprise, that has brought down from Heaven the grace, and might, and smile of Omnipotence; to support, strengthen, and bless.
Thus sympathy has its home in every holy heart, and in every lowly dwelling. There is no individual, however straitened by poverty, or veiled by obscurity, or oppressed by trial, or enfeebled by sickness—from the altar of whose heart there may not ascend the sweetest, holiest, most precious and powerful of all human offerings—the offering and the incense of a true and prayerful sympathy.
Nor let it be forgotten that human sympathy shall never go unrewarded. How beautifully and impressively our Lord has taught us this in his solemn description of the last great day!
"I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat,
I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink,
I was a stranger, and you invited me in,
I needed clothes, and you clothed me,
I was sick, and you looked after me,
I was in prison, and you came to visit me.
Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?'
The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'" Matthew 25:35-40Ah! No effort, no toil, no act of self-denial, no expression of love, no offering of sympathy for Christ—shall ever pass unrewarded. He has said it, and faith believes it: "Whoever shall give you a cup of water to drink in my name, because you belong to Christ, truly I say unto you, he shall not lose his reward!" Mark 9:41.
With two remarks, we will conclude.
1. In the offer of Christian sympathy we should guard with godly jealousy the prerogative and the honor of our Lord and Master. Care should be taken that the object of our sympathy should not be allowed to rest in ourselves. Jonathan strengthened David's hand in God.
The power of human sympathy is amazing—if it leads the heart to Christ.
Sympathy is paralyzed—if it leads only to ourselves.
Oh, how feeble and inadequate are we to administer to a mind diseased, to heal a heart broken, to strengthen the feeble hand, and to confirm the trembling knees! Our mute sympathy, our prayerful silence, is often the best exponent of our affection, and the most effectual expression of our aid. But if, taking the object of our solicitude by the hand, we gently lead him to God. If we conduct him to Jesus, portraying to his view:
the depth of his love,
the perfection of his sin-atoning work,
the sufficiency of his grace,
his readiness to pardon,
his power to save,
the exquisite sensibility of his nature,
and his perfect sympathy with every human sorrow
—we have then most truly and most effectually . . .
soothed the sorrow,
staunched the wound, and
strengthened the hand in God!Earnestly would I endeavor to impress upon the reader what Henry Martyn beautifully terms, "The pleasure of doing good." Next to direct communion with God, the loftiest and purest source of enjoyment opened to us on earth is found in the expression of human sympathy, and in the exercise of Christian benevolence. No selfish pleasure ever brought to the heart the peace, the joy, the happiness, which one solitary act of kindness to another did. God is happy in the exercise of His boundless love. Angels are happy in the discharge of their beneficent mission, and man is happy as his affections and sympathies travel forth in quest of objects upon which they may repose. Oh! the luxury of effacing . . .
one sorrow from the heart,
one shadow from the brow,
one tear from the eye!Be it a temporal or a spiritual benefit you have conferred, yet . . .
to have lifted a burden that was crushing,
to have stanched a wound that was bleeding,
to have dissipated a cloud that was darkening,
to have supplied a need that was pressing,
to have extricated from a difficulty that was embarrassing,
to have saved from a temptation that was threatening,
to have made the widow's heart sing and the orphan glad,
to have let in a little sunshine upon a gloomy chamber,
to have adjusted a sick pillow,
to have smoothed a languid couch,
to have breathed a heart-cheering promise to a departing spirit
—O this is bliss indeed! It is in this living for the good of others, especially in seeking their spiritual and eternal happiness—that we have found a most powerful means of advancing vital godliness in our own souls!The religion of many of the Lord's people is sickly and feeble, cold and gloomy, just because it is so selfish.
Would they be more vigorous in their souls?
Would they make greater progress in the Divine life?
Would they combat more successfully the many doubts and fears that assail them?
Would they have a happier, sunnier religion, walking more fully in the light of the Lord's countenance?
Then let them be up and doing in their Lord's vineyard!
Let them seek . . .
The conversion of lost sinners,
the comforting of poor saints,
the amelioration of human misery in some of its many forms
—thus, like their Master, going about doing good, and then would be fulfilled in their soul's happy experience the precious promise: "You meet him who rejoices and works righteousness, those who remember You in Your ways. Isaiah 64:5."There is yet one thought more—the crowning one of all—and with this we will conclude.
4. We refer to the perpetuity in Heaven of Christian friendship. No single truth is more clearly revealed than this. What to the heathen philosophers was but a cold conjecture, is, to the Christian, a glowing fact; what they but vaguely dreamed of, the believer in Jesus blessedly realizes—the immortality of human friendship. Surely it cannot be for a moment reasonably supposed, that hearts wedded in sacred affection and sympathy here, and from that union deriving the sweetest and purest earthly enjoyment—shall in Heaven be so severed and separated as to be sensible of the absence of a bliss which even earth supplied. O no! the sacred friendships we form in our present state enter deeply into our future happiness. A bosom friend—and we now speak only of the sympathy which a mutual hope in Christ inspires-we feel to be a part of our own existence, an essential element of our intellectual and moral being. Such a friend is identified with our immortality. The affection inspired, the fellowship maintained, the communion enjoyed here, surely form but the embryo—the form of that friendship which, in its fullness and perfection, awaits us on high.
The very character of earth's sacred friendships points us to a fuller development. Is the fellowship, the communion, the reciprocation of feeling springing from a warm, confidential, and exclusive friendship—at all commensurate with the depth and intensity of the affection that inspires it? Alas! not so. How little and how imperfect here, is the fellowship of kindred hearts! Places, oceans, circumstances separate—and it is but now and then that we sip the sweets of a full and unalloyed communion. And, then, how frequently does Death step in, and cast its shadow and its blight over the heart's fondest treasure! The thread is broken, and our bosom friend is gone! "A little while, and you shall not see me," gently whispers each holy, precious friendship of the heart. It is but 'a little while' we enjoy the friends God gives us, and then, disappearing within the veil of eternity, we see them no more. But are they lost? O no! Another voice is heard it is as a voice from Heaven speaking, "And again in a little while, you shall see me, because I go to the Father." Yes! it is but a 'little while' and we shall see them again, because they are safe in the house, and reposing in the bosom, of their Father!
And what is Heaven? It is not a place of solitude and loneliness. There is society there—there is companionship there. And the life of the blessed will be a life of the closest personal fellowship, and of the highest social enjoyment. And what beings in the Father's house will be more likely to participate with us, and, by participation, heighten the joys of Heaven? Surely those who, in this lower world, were more closely than all others endeared and assimilated to us, by affection, providence, fellowship, and time.
When we have passed through the portal of death, and find ourselves in glory, who, amidst the bright throng of redeemed spirits, will be the first objects of our eager search? Will it not be those who on earth we knew, and loved better than others; whose associations were so interwoven with our earthly and former life, that not to renew the same peculiar friendship, freed from all the imperfections of sin, and not to enjoy again the same hallowed communion, would be like the destruction of our consciousness and memory?
Yes! a little while, and we shall see them again! O blessed reunion of the holy dead! Then the widowed wife shall meet the husband of her love, and the husband, the wife of his youth; and though neither marrying nor giving in marriage, but as the angels of God—yet the tie and the affection that were so close and so precious on earth are now more close and precious than ever—and in spirit they twain are eternally one. Then the mother will meet the babe she lost in infancy, now improved and matured by heavenly culture, and listen to the voice which in the days of its childhood was the sweetest music she ever heard. Then the brother and the sister meet again, and again renew the tender love that bound them here below. And then the friend will meet the friend again, and once more, and in deeper, holier, nobler fellowship—exchange the love, the confidence, and the sympathy, which blended their hearts in one on earth. And then the dearest and brightest and sweetest of all—then we shall . . .
see JESUS,
and be like him,
and be near him,
and be with him forever!Beloved, in a 'little while' and we shall see them all again, because they are with the Father.
Lastly, if this feeble expression of a human sympathy shall but lead the heart it has sought to soothe to a reliance upon a deeper, a higher, sympathy—even the sympathy of the incarnate God—the end will be accomplished for which the writer has traced these pages. There is no sympathy—even as there is no love, no gentleness, no tenderness, no patience—like Christ's! O how sweet, how encouraging to know, that in all my afflictions, he is afflicted; that in all my temptations, he is tempted; that in all my assaults, he is assailed; that in all my joys, he rejoices. That he . . .
weeps when I weep,
sighs when I sigh,
suffers when I suffer,
rejoices when I rejoice.May this truth endear him to our souls! May it constrain us to unveil our whole heart to him, in the fullest confidence of the closest, most sacred, and precious friendship. May it urge us to do those things which always are most pleasing in his sight. Beloved, never forget and let these last words linger upon your ear as the echoes of music that never die:
in all your sorrows,
in all your trials,
in all your wants,
in all your assaults,
in all your conscious wanderings,
in life,
in death,
and at the day of judgment
—that you possess a Friend that sticks closer than a brother! That Friend is, JESUS!"When gathering clouds around I view,
And days are dark, and friends are few,
On Him I lean, who, not in vain,
Experienced every human pain.
He sees my wants, allays my fears,
And counts and treasures up my tears!
"If wounded love my bosom swell,
Deceived by those I prized too well,
He shall his pitying aid bestow,
Who felt on earth severer woe:
At once betrayed, denied, or fled,
By those who shared his daily bread."When vexing thoughts within me rise,
And, sore dismayed, my spirit dies;
Yet He who once given to bear
The sickening anguish of despair,
Shall sweetly soothe, shall gently dry
The throbbing heart, the streaming eye!"When sorrowing o'er some stone I bend,
Which covers all that was a friend;
And from his hand, his voice, his smile,
Divides me for a little while:
You, Savior, see the tears I shed,
For you did weep o'er Lazarus dead."And oh, when I have safely passed
through every conflict but the last,
Still, still unchanging, watch beside
My dying bed—for you have died;
Then point to realms of cloudless day,
And wipe the last poor tear away!"