T HE K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S suasiveness and a patience, a solicitude and a sympathy that might tax the noblest powers. An infant’s sorrow in deed is easily assuaged; but let a few years pass, and you may try, and haply try in vain, to chase the sadness of a thoughtful child. The troubles of im pulsive and impassioned youth often present a harder task. But life has deeper sorrows, the strength of man hood’s grief, the anguish of a mother’s bosom, the hardly wrung tears of old age. Who has not been baffled here? The heart you seek to bind up still aches on. The wound you fain would close still bleeds inwardly. Yet I grant you there are some whose vocation it seems to be to cheer and comfort oth ers: they move among their fellows like the Good Samaritan, pouring oil and wine into stricken souls: no home ever receives them but a track of brightness is there. But such characters are few; and the sufferers are many. And there are sorrows that no human skill has ever touched, anguish of conscience, bitterness of soul, remorse for the ir recoverable past. Who of men would propose himself as a comforter for all mourners in all lands? Ere he had waded a foot-breadth into the tide of grief, he would be beyond his depth. Yet here is One who has all tender counsel and consolation for all who ap ply to Him. Is not this the prerogative of Jehovah? “ I, even I, am he that comforteth you.” This office demands omniscience, omnipotence, omnipres ence, eternity: and He who fulfills it must needs be “ the God of all com fort.” This blessed Comforter prepares the soul afore unto glory: this is God’s prerogative: but this in the Divine economy is the especial office of the Holy Ghost, for, “We all with unveiled face beholding in a glass the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory as by the Lord the Spirit.”
48 sublime challenge of the prophet, “Who hath measured the waters In the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with the span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance? Who hath directed the Spirit of the Lord, or being his coun sellor hath taught him?” He who made all things is God. He holds the Issues of life and death In His hands. If there is one thing more than another which God claims as His own prerogative, it is this, “ God, that made the world and all things therein . . . giveth to all life and breath and all things.” Yet herein the immediate agency is that of the Al mighty Spirit. “ Thou sendest forth thy Spirit; they are created.” And again, “ All flesh is grass . . . the grass withereth, the flower fadeth; be cause the Spirit of the Lord bloweth up on it.” In whom, if not in God, do we thus live and move and have our-being? He is the Author and Finisher of Spiritual Life. He quickens the soul to life: this is God’s prerogative: but no one enters the kingdom who is not “ born of the Spirit.” He dwells in the heart as in His tem ple: this is God’s prerogative: but we read, “ Your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you.” He produces celestial fruits in man: this is God’s prerogative: but it is writ ten, “ The fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, and righteousness, and truth.” He educates the children of the king dom: this is God’s prerogative: but our Lord promises, “ The Comforter shall teach you all things . . . the Spirit of truth shall guide you into all truth.” Yes, He is THE COMFORTER. What a world of thought is condensed in this name. A comforter,— it is a delicate and difficult office among men: often requiring rare tact, nice discrimination, a firm and yet a gentle hand, a per-
Made with FlippingBook Annual report