There are many rooms in the House of Pain.
The mere telling of how a need was met is often like telling of a need, which is asking crookedly instead of straight out. But this much I will say – with every fresh need has come a fresh supply.
If Thy dear home be fuller, Lord, For that a little emptier. My house on earth, what rich rewards. That guerdon were.
The best training is to learn to accept everything as it comes, as from Him whom our soul loves. The tests are always unexpected things, not great things that can be written up, but the common little rubs of life, silly little nothings, things you are ashamed of minding one scrap.
If I am content to heal a hurt slightly, saying “Peace, peace,” where is no peace; if I forget the poignant word “Let love be without dissimulation” and blunt the edge of truth, speaking not right things but smooth things, then I know nothing of Calvary love.
I wish thy way. And when in me myself should rise, and long for something otherwise, Then Lord, take sword and spear And slay.
Strength of my heart, I need not fail, Not mind to fear but to obey, With such a Leader, who could quail? Thou art as Thou wert yesterday. Strength of my heart, I rest in Thee, Fulfil Thy purposes through me.
I believe truly that Satan cannot endure it and so slips out of the room – more or less – when there is a true song.
If I put my own good name before the other’s highest good, then I know nothing of Calvary’s love.
I don’t wonder apostolic miracles have died. Apostolic living certainly has.
We have one crystal clear reason apart from the blessed happiness of this way of life. It is this: prayer is the core of our day. Take prayer out, and the day would collapse, would be pithless, a straw blown in the wind. But how can you pray – really pray, I mean – with one against who you have a grudge or whom you have been discussing critically with another? Try it. You will find it cannot be done.
If I can write an unkind letter, speak an unkind work, think an unkind thought without grief and shame, then I know nothing of Calvary love.
There are times when nothing holds the heart but a long, long look at Calvary. How very small anything that we are allowed to endure seems beside that Cross.
The Calvinists illustrate their belief by a single illuminating word, Cat-hold, and the Arminians by another, Monkey-hold. Could you find better illustrations? The cat takes up the kitten and carries it in its mouth; the kitten is passive, the cat does everything. But the little monkey holds on to its mother, and clings with might and main. Those who have watched the “cat-hold” in the house, and the “monkey-hold” out in the jungle, can appreciate the accuracy of these two illustrations.
God forgive us! God arouse us! Shame us out of our callousness! Shame us out of our sin!
So whether our message is welcomed or not, the fact remains we must go to all; and the worse they are and the harder they are, the more evident is it that, wanted or not, it is needed by them.
Be earnest, earnest, earnest; mad if thou wilt: Do what thou dost as if the stake were heaven, And that thy last deed ere the judgment day.
If I cannot catch ‘the sound of noise of rain’ long before the rain falls, and, going to some hilltop of the spirit, as near to my God as I can, have not faith to wait there with my face between my knees, though six times or sixty times I am told ‘there is nothing,’ till at last ‘there arises a little cloud out of the sea,’ then I know nothing of Calvary love.
Humdrum we have called the work, and humdrum it is. There is nothing romantic about potters except in poetry, nor is there much of romance about missions except on platforms and in books. Yet “though it’s dull at whiles,” there is joy in the doing of it, there is joy in just obeying. He said “Go, tell,” and we have come and are telling, and we meet Him as we “go and tell.
Can you find a promise that if we follow the Lord Jesus Christ, life is going to be fairly easy? I do not think we shall find even one. But we shall find ever so many promises assuring us that however things are, we may count on strength to make us brave and peace to keep our hearts at rest.