The Glory of Suffering

u For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory” — 2 Cor. iv. 17.

“Affliction worketh glory;” “our light affliction worketh an exceeding weight of glory;” “our affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh an eternal weight of glory.” Every word is a marked and beautiful antithesis.

The mind of the apostle is overwhelmed by the contrast between the seen and the unseen, and as he rises in his flight of contemplation, the calamities of earth dwindle into insignificant smallness till there is nothing visible but glory. Yet, strange to say, he describes the glory by an old earthly metaphor, nay, by the very metaphor he used to apply to his afflictions; he calls it a weight. We speak of a weight of care, a weight of sorrow, a weight of anxiety; but a weight of glory! surely that is a startling symbol. We do not think of a man as being crushed, overwhelmed, weighed down by glory. We should have thought that the old metaphor of care would have been repulsive, that it would have been cast off like a worn-out garment and remembered no more for ever. Nay, but the old garment is not worn out when the glory comes, it is only transfigured; that wdiich made thy weight of care is that which makes thy weight of glory. Thou needest not a new object but a new light — to see by day what thou hast only seen in darkness. Often have I pondered that prayer of the Psalmist, “0 send out Thy light and Thy truth; let them lead me.” He does not ask for new circumstances, but for a new light on the old circumstances. Thou who art weighted with some heavy burden, pause ere thou askest its removal; thy weight of present care may be thy weight of future glory — may be, nay, must be when light shall dawn. When thou wert a child, study was a weight of care to thee; now that thou art a man, it is a weight of glory; thou comfortest thyself that thou wert able to endure. So shall it be with the tasks of the larger school. One day thou shalt look back and find them to have been all very good. From the light of thy seventh morning thou shalt look back, from the summit of the finished creation thou shalt behold thy six days of toil, and there shall be no night there. Thy past shall, be glorious when it is past. Thou shalt retrace the steps of thy way, and find them to have been the steps to thy Sabbath of rest. Thou shalt weigh in the balance the former days, and they shall weigh even heavier than of yore; but that which was once a weight of care shall be then a weight of glory.