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THE K I N G ' S BUS I NE S S
January, 1938
"This Brightening Path of Pain"
Intimate Letters from a Sufferer Who Rejoices
I N THE November, 1934, issue of T he K ing ’ s B usiness there was pub lished anonymously a remarkable arti cle entitled, “ Twenty Years of Pain and Thankfulness.” At the request of grateful readers, this message has been re printed more than once, and has been a blessing to thousands of readers. In con nection with sending the article, the author made this explanation: “ You see, I broke down very early in young womanhood and have had twenty years of illness, the; first seven in bed most of the time— seven oper ations besides fifteen minor ‘carvings.’ A l most every disease has had a try at me.” But in spite of the writer’s suffering, the article bore this radiant testimony-: “ I am looking back over twenty years of illness and thanking God for them. Does that sound strange? Ah, they have brought me gifts, those weary years . . . God has a way of taking away our toys, and after we have cried a while like disappointed chil dren, He fills our hands with jewels which ‘cannot be valued with the gold of Ophir, with the precious onyx, or the sapphire.’ . . .
His strength is made perfect in my weak ness,'^and He can supply all my need ‘ac cording to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.’ It is one thing to think so— it is an other thing to have found out by actual ex perience that it is so, to know beyond the shadow of a doubt that when you go down into the v a lle ^ you can clasp His hand— that you never need to be alone nor afraid, for He will go ,with you on all your paths • • • it is blessed beyond words to know these things.” Although severe pain and weakness have continued to be the portion of this saint of God, her testimony of faith in Christ grows brighter and brighter, as the follow ing excerpts from letters will attest. From a personal letter written in Sep tember of this year to the Managing Edi tor of T he K ing ’ s B usiness . On Monday I am to have a surgeon’s verdict concerning a condition that is troubling me . . . I am hardly in condi tion now for another operation. But will you pray that whatever comes, I may hold it .precious because it is from and through His hands ? It was good of you to write me, and I greatly appreciated it, even though I could not answer . . . The condition of which I wrote proved to be one that is not immedi ately serious. But the doctor was horri fied at my general condition. . . I sit up so much of the night with asthma that I hardly see how I could get along after an operation, when I couldn’t sit up then at all. And of course, since most of my spine has ankylosed, together with a good many of the rest of my bones, any operation would aggravate that condition. And I always have trouble with “t.b.” after an operation anyhow. . . Perhaps the Lord will come soon and take us both (you and me) Home together, which is our “blessed hope.” You see, I am not always very brave. When I heard the doctor’s verdict that I A message a few weeks later, written to the same person:
probably will become more and more crip pled until I am helpless, and when he said, “The case is too far advanced to re spond to treatment,” there came to me those lovely words from John’s Gospel: “When he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them.” And I wrote these lines which are the testimony of my heart: I could not walk this darkening path of pain alone. The years have taken toll of me. Sometimes my banners droop, my arms have grown too tired, And laughter comes less easily. And often these my shrinking, cowardly eyes refuse T o face the thing that is ahead of me, The certainty of growing pain and help lessness . . . But oh, my Lord is good, for He Comes quickly to me as I lie there in the dust O f my defeat and shame and fear. He stoops and raises me, and sets me on my feet, And softly whispers in my ear That He will never leave me—nay, that He will go Before me all the way. And so, My hand in His, along this brightening path of pain, My Lord and I together go! Still later, in response to a request for more of the precious lessons learned from her experience of pain, she wrote: Every one needs to work in order to re main normal, and it is such a comfort that none of us are too ill to know the joy of accomplishment, the opportunity to win crowns, sheaves to lay at the feet of the Lord of the harvest. Years ago I was reading the Bible to a little boy of nine who had recently given his heart to Christ. He had had no Christian up-bringing, and thus the truth of th®Word of God was all . [Continued on page 36]
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