September, 1941
T H E K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S
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can find solace 1ft Christian fellowship and in kind deeds for others. Margaret Ogilvy, in that beautiful tribute of a famous son to his mother, was the one to whom all the-women in the village went in their time of trouble and of sorrow. The son used to wonder at it. Then he remembered the great sorrow that had come into his mother’s life in the death of her first-born, and he understood how it was that she got her soft voice and tender ways. It is always good to think of the sor row of others. A. poem entitled “The Bridge,” tells of a man whose heart was hot and restless, and who thought to end his life. Ue .went out on the parapet of a bridge to do so. But hear ing a. clock/ in the steeple strike the hour, he began to think of the great number of burdened and sorrowing souls whp had passed over that bridge before’ him. As he thought of the sorrows of others, the burden of his own sorrow fell from him. In the time of sorrow, let us fall back upon the friendship of God. 'We often use the words, “T h o u God seest me,” as words to warn ourselves and others from temptation and sin. But that is not the way in which those words were rfirst used. Hagar, the handmaiden of Abraham, had been driven out from Abraham’s home by the jealousy and :anger of the barren Sarah. The unfor tunate girl lay in despair in a lonely place in the wilderness. And it was there that the angel of the Lord came to speak to her, to comfort and cheer her, and to t$ll her of the coming birth of Ishmael. So moved and so grateful was Hagar, that she called the name of that place where God spoke to her, "Thou God
seest me: For she said, Have I also here looked after him that seeth me?” And the well by which she was resting when the angel appeared unto her was called “Beer-lahai-roi,” 'which means “the well of the Living One who seetlL me.” Never forget that in the desert of your sorrow is the refreshing well of the presence and comfort of God. The Loneliness o f Temptation This is the most powerful and danger ous kind of loneliness. -Our Saviour knew what that kind of loneliness was. When lie was tempted of the devil, He was alone in the wilderness. And again at Gethsemane, He left'the eight disciples near the entrance, and took the remain ing three a little farther with Him into the garden. Then He separated Himself even from these by. the distance of a stone’s cast, and there He entered into His agony and trial. The _experience of temptation is one that wç cannot share with others. A1-. ways there is a stone’s cast between the soul and the nearest and the dearest friend, when wë enter thé garden Of temptation.' There may be warnings and prayers and sympathy, but when the hour of battle strikes, we fight alone. We are as solitary as Christ was when Satan assailed Him in the wilderness. The spene of the temptation may be a busy office, a remote study, a crowded thoroughfare on the street, or a lonely country lape,. but always the name of that place is desert. But we have the divine recipe and the divine example às to how to get the best of temptation. It is by watch ing and by prayer. That was the method of Christ, and He offers you that same,
weakness and cowardice, he heard the cock crow and went out into the night to weep bitterly. That was the kind of loneliness that Judas knew, when, hav ing received the sop, he went immedi ately out and "it was night,” a dark and lonely night of sin. How cam the soul get the best of that kind of loneliness ? There is only one way—it is by repentance, by returning to God and by receiving His forgive ness. How the loving voice of Christ sounds out through the dark and lonely night of sin, calling the sinner back to Him! “Let the wicked forsake his way,' and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.” The final penalty upon sin is un broken loneliness, separation of our soul from God. But Christ on the cross tasted that Cup o f bitterness and separation for you and me wjien He cried out, “My God! my God! why hast thou forsaken me!” He passed out into that awful loneliness that you and I might- never enter its eternal gloom. The one loneli ness to fear and to dread is the loneli ness of' sin, and for that there is the great; remedy of repentance and for giveness. The Loneliness o f Virtue But there is a noble loneliness of the soul, the loneliness that sometimes comes in the path of duty, the loneliness that comes as a price of conviction, the lone liness of dissent from what is sinful. I imagine that Vashti, the queen of Ahasu- erus, was lonely after she had been de posed from her high office and sep arated from the Persian court because she refused to expose herself on the night of that drunken banquet,- when Ahasuerus entertained a thousand of his lords. But ft was a queenly and honor able and immortal loneliness, the price of honor and of self-respect. Every one has some kind of burden. Loneliness may be yours, the one that God has chosen for you. It is a part of your discipline and probation in life. Therefore, do’ not complain about it, but bear it with courage and patience and fortitude. Remember, too, that you are , not the only lonely person who has passed through this world. Some of the greatest benefactors of mankind have been lonely men. Christ Himself was the Man of sorrows, the Man who said, “I have trodden the winepress alone.” , /. It was Christ, too, who said, “And yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me.” He came that we might realize to the full the friendship of God. It was said of Abraham of old that he was the friend of God. What was true of Abraham, through Jesus Christ can be true of you. You, too, can be the friend of God. And where the friend ship of God is, -there we can pass tri umphantly through every lonely valley and drink every appointed cup.
• C r u c i f i e d between two thieve«, the Son of God on that central cross “ pasted out into that awful loneliness of separation from God, that you and I might never enter its eternal gloom." ■ But what about those who have failed to find victory, those who have not availed themselves of the spiritual weapons which were at their command and, conquered by temptation, have fallen into sin?. Ah, t h e r e is t h e deepest and darkest kind of loneliness. T h a t was the loneliness that P e t e r knew, when, having cursed his Lord in a m o m e n t of sacred Sword, with which, by obedience to God, and by strong a n d earnest prayer He got the v i c t o r y over temptation.
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