The Problem of Pain

Pain is as common in life as salt in the sea, and has the same bitter tang and the same power to purify. It stands with hungry hawk eyes at both ends of a man’s life; it comes ahead of him at birth, is usually felt at death, and keeps close by, with haunting vigilance, all the way between.

It has all the qualities of the fire that burns, of the knife that cuts, of the bitter drink that makes you shrink back, and of the acid that eats its way insistently in. And some have found that it has other companion qualities; for fire cleanses, the surgeon’s knife cuts out the bad, the bitter drink tones up, and the acid neutralizes the evil.

Everybody has suffered pain, and does, and will. It is as common as sin, and has the same biting taste. One can scarcely walk the streets, or attend a church service without seeing the badge of pain in face, or form, or dress. The mail coming in, and the calling cards, contain the same dark reminder. Ever since Eden the broken sob of its music has sounded through time as a minor dirge, but with the constant interruption of discord, and of loss of all sense of rhythm.

In some lives the problem of pain pushes its keen edge in early; in some not for a long while; but sooner or later it comes, demanding imperiously to be considered and explained. No problem has been more puzzling, or more puzzled over, and none more acute, because it edges its sharp way so very close into the life, and so near to the most tender and sacred relationships. It has baflied much study, and embittered the lives of thousands. But other thousands, though not understanding fully, have learned the secret of extracting sweets in the place where bitter grows. Many have found in it, or, better, through it, the elixir of a new life.

Sorts of Pain.

Pain is of two general sorts, pain of body and pain of spirit. At the time of that first break in Eden, Eve was told that there would be pain of body in the natural course of her life, quite apart from sickness or disease, and that prophetic word has had continuous fulfilment through all the centuries since. Pain through disease which disturbs the body, and through the weakness that keeps it from its full stint of work, has been as common. Then pain of body through violence, through man’s inhumanity to his brothers, and through the ravages of war, has added intensity to the sum of suffering.

Pain of spirit is keener, harder to bear, and lasts longer than pain of body. It comes through bitter remorse or regret over one’s own conduct. through disappointed hopes and plans, through lack of being appreciated, and through lack of a return love. It comes through the subjection of our immature powers to discipline, which need not be painful but most often is, in proportion to the strength of the character so being matured; it comes through the chafing of an unwilling spirit against the simple, natural discipHne of life, which brings out fully our strength and beauty.

Then in our relation to others pain comes through failure in those we love, through being deceived by them, and through the wounding of family pride. The pain suffered by our loved ones brings keen pain to us, and the pain of having them slip from our grasp out of life may be shorter, but- is always sharper and severer, vdth the dull throbbing that so often follows.

There is a sharp pain through culture, proportioned in its sharpness to the extent of the culture, and softened in its expression by the warmth of one’s sympathy with others. The ear trained to finest harmonies is keenly sensitive to poor music. The eye trained to fine blending of colors is pained by immature and untaught work. The mind drilled to the discriminating use of simple, strong language suffers a bit at contact with the reverse. The heart made pure through contact with God, and through painful heroic discipHne, is pained at the sight and touch of sin.

The heart grown tender through the Spirit of Jesus within is hurt by the suffering of the distressed. The spirit made eager for the highest ideals in life through the study of the Bible, the classic of ideals, is pained over the conditions prevalent in all walks of life. The man who knows the blessedness of knowing God bleeds at heart for those ignorant of Him.

The emergency that the whole world is in through sin calls for sacrifices that bring great pain of spirit. A young man in a small church college in the middle West was stirred by the needs of the foreign mission fields. He determined to offer his life and service to help meet that need. But before committing himself actively with his church authorities he wrote to her who had given him life, telling her of the burning desire in his heart, and asking her consent. By and by the answering letter came. It was blotted with tears. Its pages brought up a vivid picture of that mother’s face and heart. She replied, in effect giving her consent, and then writing down these words: “I never knew until now how much it cost God to give His Son.”

Many a one has suffered all these different sorts of pain at some time, and many of them at the same time. They all gather within the human spirit, incased temporarily in a human body. Job suffered pocket pain through loss of property, heart pain through loss of his children, pain of body through disease, pain to his pride through loss of prestige and the criticism of his friends, pain of spirit in puzzling over why it all came to him; then the hardest bodily pain in continued pain, and at the last the severest spirit pain in realizing how different he was from the God he worshipped.

The Source of Pain.

Pain is the distressed outcry of a broken order; pain of body comes through some breaking of nature’s arrangements there; pain of spirit through consciousness of elements within or without that strain and jar, and clash and break. All pain is a result of sin, somebody’s sin, sometime, somewhere. The connection can rarely be traced, and never traced fully, but it is there.

That connection may be direct, where a man’s own actions cause the break that cries out its distress in pain. Through ignorance of the body’s nature and needs, or through thoughtlessness or passionate desire where we do know, the break is made. The pain does not always come at once. Nature is very patient and long-suffering, but come it will, however long the wait, for she is likewise very exacting. Countless instances of so called “mysterious providences” are a result of hardships we thoughtlessly or wilfully inflict upon our bodies.

For a number of years I have been trying to observe closely instances where sickness and death have come, causing a great shock and deep sorrow, and either criticisms of God or a long drawn sob over the strange dispensations of providence. Yet from the bits of information available it was, in each instance, clearly evident that the death that seemed so untimely and strange could be traced directly to the person’s own acts done in ignorance; but most times, if not always, a thoughtless ignorance that a bit of thinking could have prevented.

Then there is the indirect or more remote connection. Whatever we believe about original sin as a teaching of moral truth, we are all compelled to believe in a transmission, through the blood, of traits that are a result of sin in those who have lived before us, either near or remote. That physical traiits and ailments pass faithfully and ruthlessly on through generations is familiar enough. Most men come into life with the story of somebody’s sin, whether through carelessness or wilfulness, written down on the tablet of their bodies.

It is extremely common to hear work spoken of as a curse, as though a punishment for man’s sin, or a result of his sin. Yet work itself is in no sense a curse, but a positive delight, and a help. But the conditions that sin has woven around work have made much of it a straining, grinding drudgery. The break of sin left and leaves man with less than his normal strength. It has affected the earth so that it does not yield so readily to his efforts, and further increases his stint of work by producing thorns and such growths as must be fought and overcome. And so with less than nature’s allowance of strength, and more than nature’s allotted task, very much work becomes to thousands a grinding, slaving, cheerless round that brings pain. It can all be traced to sin, the break in the natural order.

Job’s friends, or critics, supposed that his pain and numerous distresses were a punishment sent by God because of his sin. Job resents such talk. He felt instinctively that he had been on such terms with God as to shut out any such thought as punishment. Let it be remembered that God is not punishing men in the sending of pain and affliction. God is not dealing with men in judgment; if He were the case would be settled at once for all of us. Judgment is reserved for future final settlement. And even then punishment is not a thing that God chooses to be meted out to us as a judgment for our misdeeds. It is something included in the sin itself. The worst thing God could do to any man would be to leave him utterly alone to the working out of his sin. In great graciousness He does not do that. But He does keep hands off in part, and permits much of the result of sin to work its way out. And so pain comes through the break in the natural order.

The first mention of pam m the Bible is in connection with the difiiculty with which woman would perform the most difficult and delicate task entrusted to her. All the life of the body is from God. The natural life is lived in full contact with Him. That first sin was a break with God. Any break interrupts partially the flow of life from Him to us. The bodily duties are then done with difficulty, for some of its vitality has been cut off. In the most difficult duty the lack is most keenly felt.

Had we fulness of knowledge, and subtlety of insight, every bit of pain could be traced clearly, logically, step by step back to some act of sin. And the tracing would be thought a strangely interwoven network of sin and that which sin causes. This does not necessarily mean that the pain is the result of the sin of the man who suffers the pain. Clearly there is a vast amount of pain on account of others’ acts.

Life is such an intricate network that no man can move or breathe without affecting somebody else. How terribly selfish sin is. Every act of sin brings pain to somebody else, to those nearest and most tenderly loved, and those at the farthest reach of influence. Jesus suffered severest, keenest pain of both body and spirit through sin — the sin of others. Every bit of pain that came to Him came either through particular acts of sin, or through the whole fog of sin that enveloped His life as an atmosphere.

There seems to be on record in the Bible just one exception to this. Jacob was lamed in his body by the strange touch in the night wrestle, in the dark, done by Jabbok’s narrow waters. A direct act of God afflicted the natural order of his body. Yet this seems to be the only instance of the sort mentioned in the long list of Bible biographies. And, too, there may not have been actual bodily pain, though there was a crippled body hindering and hampering his activity. The condition of his body gave his spirit keen pain, no doubt; yet that was because it reminded him at every step of his wilful stubbornness against God, and God’s plan.

And mark keenly that here this unusual thing was done for service sake. God’s plan for a world centred at this stage in this one man. In His passionate outreach for a race, He was shut in to using Jacob. The unusual act told the greatness and the acuteness of the emergency.

So there may be in rare cases a direct touch of God when some great purpose requires it. But clearly that is very rare. God does not need to resort to such measures, as a rule. There are always enough doorways opened through sin’s breaks to give all the opportunity needed for disciplinary work. The rareness of such action gives peculiar emphasis to the general principle that pain comes through the natural channel of a break in the natural order.

The vast, intricate, subtly intangible, but terribly real network of sin envelops all life. One cannot move without touching and being touched by its meshes. The atmosphere of life has become affected by sin as by a pervasive gray fog. One cannot draw the breath of Hf e, however lacking in mental or spirit culture, without suffering pain, however little he may think of it. The very stupidness to pain at times spells out the commonness of it, and its hardening, dulling effect upon the spirit.

Jesus and Pain.

But it has been said that Jesus came to bear our sins, and all of their results; that through His sacrifice not only are our sins forgiven, but our bodies are to be healed, and all sickness and pain to be removed. It is said that Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil, and this has been taken to mean to destroy both sin and all of its results. And all of this is true, blessedly and wondrously true. Yet simply to say that much is not to tell the whole of the truth. There is more to be added to make clear how sweeping Jesus’ work is, not only for all the life of a man, but for all men.

The salvation from sin, and all its results, that Jesus came to work out is not completed. It is completed so far as He is concerned, but not so far as the world is concerned. It is complete in His dying and rising, but not in its application. The ‘’finished work of Christ” for the world is finished by Him, but not finished in it. The salvation worked out on the cross is to be worked out among men. Each man’s salvation is worked out for him, but not yet fully worked out in him.

The present is a transition period, a long period, it is true, now counted into the twentieth century, yet a transition period, preparing the way for a period of fulness. It is a time of working and waiting and looking forward to something much better. Those who stood closest to Jesus preached that He would remain away until His dying for all men had been made known to all men, then He would return to carry out the fulness of His plan of saving men.

Paul says that then Jesus will put down all our enemies including the last — death, the culmination of all. The fulness of our salvation waits upon the spreading of the news of Jesus to all men. Here is a strong inner motive for world-wide evangelization. The carrying out fully of the Master’s plan in that will bring to us the fulness of our freeness from sin and all its results.

But, we are reminded, Jesus healed disease when here, and relieved every form of bodily distress. Yes, He did. The Gospel days were sample days of the Kingdom. Jesus had not yet been accepted, and so the Kingdom was not set up. He had not yet been finally rejected, but was wooing the nation, and so He gave illustrations of Kingdom days and of Kingdom power. We live in the Church period. The Church occupies the gap in the Kingdom. When the Church mission is completed the Kingdom will come in, with the Church itself as a part of the larger movement. Healing, removal of pain, is a law for all in the Kingdom; it is a prililege in the Church for those who will accept it; and a gift to be exercised by the very few who can be entrusted with it.

Acts 3:21; Romans 8: 20-23; I.Corinthians 15:23-26, with Matthew 24: 14.

The Mission of Pain.

This leads at once to the question of the mission of pain. Pain has a great mission. While God does not send pain, He lets it stay, though He might intervene and take it away. While as a rule, with possibly rare exceptions, it comes through sin, it remains through the deliberate purpose of God. God has a great purpose of love in pain. He uses it as His teacher. It is the greatest of all His great teachers. It charges the very highest rates, insists upon the severest discipline, will tolerate nothing short of the highest ideal, needs our sympathetic help in working, and produces the very finest results.

God’s greatest struggle has been with the human will. He made man a sovereign in his will, and right well man has proven his sovereignty. All of the great wealth of God’s love and planning can be given only by our own free consent. Sin has twisted our eyes. We prefer something else to God’s way. Our preference is not good; it is bad; only His is good. He insists upon giving His best. It can be given only through our consent. So His greatest task has been with man’s will, to get man’s consent to live on God’s plan, and receive the wealth of God’s planning. A great task it has been; God’s hardest task; sometimes an impossible task; some men won’t yield. It has been a stupendous task, for man’s will has in it the strength of God’s will. And sin has swung the will’s natural strength over to the extreme of obstinacy.

And so God has had to use the greatest thing He could find to overcome the bad, weak obstinacy in man’s will. Pain is His severest, most thorough, oftentimes his only successful agent. He does not make it. Sin made it. He uses it. It is a bit of the diplomacy of love that takes a result of bad, and uses it to offset the bad, and get good. His lole must be very great to hold Him steady to His purpose; for what pains any man pains God too, because it pains the man.

There is nothing that so breaks the stubbornness of a man’s spirit, and bends the obstinacy of his will, as pain. It comes eating its way in so subtly, so cuttingly, so relentlessly and insistently, that all the footing sHps out from under a man, his jaws relax, and his fist loosens into a hand again. Frequently the stiffest-set jaws will consent to relax only under the peculiarly persuasive edge of the knife of pain.

In that old rare gem of literature, the book of Job, the evil that came to Job came through natural channels, at the secret instigation of the evil one, by permission of God, and strictly within the limits He set. WTien the purpose of God in the moulding of Job’s character was secured, the pain was quickly removed, and greater blessings than ever he had known were poured out lavishly upon him.

There is an intensely vivid picture of God’s love, its yearningness, and strong patience, and dissatisfaction with less than the best. It is in Malachi’s prophecy. The expert workman in refining metals sits patiently over the pot of liquid metal, picking out the dross sent up to the surface by the intense fire, watching keenly for every speck and spot, until by and by his own face is clearly reflected in that over which he is working. Then, the process complete, the metal pure, the fire is withdrawn. Its work is done.

So, we are told, God does. Pain is a fire, sometimes heated seven times hotter than usual. God’s love and great ideal for us hold Him steady while the dross is being removed. He is not content until He sees again clearly reflected that great likeness of Himself in which we were originally made. When the likeness is clear and full the fire is withdrawn. And in the after-glory that shall come the pain will seem light, and the time only a moment; yet how impossible that often seems at the time of suffering.

The last time I heard Mrs. Margaret Bottome she told of meeting an old friend in Europe. This friend was an unusually gifted woman, who knew much of the world’s culture and prestige. She had had a bad break in health, and was seeking to find recovery abroad. As Mrs. Bottome met her, so great was the change in her friend’s appearance through the [illness that she involuntarily exclaimed, “What a wreck!” And the friend quickly replied, with her soul in her voice, ‘’Any wreck for such a shore!” She was already getting a taste of the after-glory. Yet had she gone to school to God with her will earlier, her bark would have reached the same shore by straight sailing instead of by stranding.

Compensations.

Pain has great compensations. Its power to purify and refine is very great. It shakes loose, and sifts carefully out, the coarse and poor and bad. It weaves over the texture of one’s life into a much finer fabric. The fire that burns also cleanses; the knife that hurts so is remoling that which will hurt more seriously; the bitter draught from which we draw back so btrongly has great tonic power. But the pain needs help to do its best work. There needs to be a looking steadily through the pain up to the great purpose of God, and on to the compensations, if it is to produce the finest results. To be made pure and fine is a full compensation for great pain.

Then there is the sympathy of Jesus. To use the word sympathy of Him in this way is to say that He knew pain. He knew it with a greater intimacy than any other human that has trodden the earth, for He was more keenly sensitive to it. Every pain that man has suffered Jesus suffered, except of course that coming through remorse or regret. Every pain that man knows was intensified in Jesus; the purity of His nature, the sinlessness of His life, the sensitiveness of His great spirit made Him more keenly alive to pain, and so made it the greater as experienced by Him.

But more than that. He went through the trying and maturing experiences of His life that so He might have a perfect sympathy with our humanity. He was made perfect in His humanity by the experiences He went through. Only so can a man learn. Jesus was perfectly human in going through human experiences. He did it purposely, with a great, strong purpose, that He might be one with us. So He becomes our keen, warm sympathizer.

He suffered pain that so He might help us in our suffering of pain. He can come near because He knows by touch what we know. There is marvellous compensation in this, the sympathy of such a one as Jesus.

A man who knows anything at all of the winsomeness and attractiveness of Jesus would be glad to go anywhere for the chance of getting closer to Him. He doesn’t mind a rough road if in it the Master draws nearer; doesn’t mind it! — he prefers it under such circumstances. The wild storm on the sea is welcomed if so you feel His arm tighter around you, and His presence more tenderly near, and His face almost seen by your outer eyes.

Jesus relieved suffering when down here long ago. He seemed to delight in relieving it. He would fairly wear Himself out in caring for men, though He had rare wisdom to avoid the bad extremes that we know so well. He seemed to forget His own needs as long as there was any needy body waiting a chance to be healed. Those great miracles of healing were not done to prove His divinity; they were done because

He was divine; it was the love of divinity going out eagerly to His needy race of men. They did prove His divinity, incidentally; but were not done for that purpose, but to relieve men. So He reveals to us His feeling towards pain. He knows its sharp, cutting edge. He has power to remove it. He will remove it for us now if so the higher thing in mind can be reached too. He could, and would, remove it for more if there were more reaching up after the highest. When the pain remains, so does He. When it seems sharpest He comes nearest. And amid the tugging twinges His presence makes one sing joyously, though often with a tremor in the voice, —

“E’en though it be a cross
That raiseth me,
Still all my song shall be,
Nearer, my God, to Thee.”

Then there is the compensation of being Jesus’ messenger to others. Suffering qualifies us for ministering to those who suffer. Without doubt God permits some experiences to come to us that so He may use us to help others passing through just such experiences. I recall an English clergyman speaking of this at a conference in Boston. He had gone through a most trying experience. For days, he said, all was dark to him. He could not understand the way he was being led. At last light broke in through a particular passage of Scripture, and all cleared up. He preached on that passage the next Sabbath morning.

At the close of the serlice one of his members came up with eyes aglow, and surprise in her voice, and said, ‘’How did you know what I have been passing through?” He said he didn’t know. Then she explained that he had spoken of her identical experience, and through his message the light and peace had come anew to her. Others spoke in surprise of the same thing happening to them. Then he understood, and was grateful indeed to be God’s messenger. And more than grateful, he was willing to go through any experience the Master might send if so he could better serve Him among his own fellows. Even so must God do in teaching men. We can tell to others only what we know personally. He can use in telling the truth only those who know it. Experience is equipment for service. Grief qualifies us to help those with like grief.

There is a right use of grief and a wrong, weak use of it. Its right use is to let it be a motive impelling us to help those who have had the same trying experience. Its wrong and weak use is to let it remain simply an emotion draining our strength. In the midst of his great sorrow Tennyson wrote —

“Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more.”

We should ring it out, and resolutely keep it out, as a mere emotion that saps and wears.

Activity in service is a help in bearing what comes. Pain has its temptations. One of them is the use of moral chloroform; the dulling of our sense of pain in a round of dissipation, or of distracting gayety. It only puts off the evil hour of feeling it more keenly than ever, with less of moral strength with which to bear it.

There are, too, some wondrous compensations in that keen pain of having the one who has been by your side, a bit of your very self, slip from your grasp, out of reach, into the other life. To have known love, to have loved and been loved, is to have known the sweetest and most lasting of all life’s joys. It makes one the stronger and gentler. The love that has stood the test of time weaves the finest threads into the life web. To love is to live. The life is richer and deeper, finer and more fragrant, for the love that has come in, and that has been drawn out, even though for a time the one loved and loving has slipped from your side upwards.

Then there is the heritage of a memory that will grow in its fragrance and richness with the passing days. That is one of the cushions to ease the heart,, for the bit of time in between now and the future meeting. And then we must not be forgetting that the loss is of companionship down here; all of that; yet only that. That is much, yet it is only for a while, that the old Book calls little, ‘’how little! how little 1” ’

“A day and you will meet;
A night and you will greet.”

Hebrews 10:37, literally, “for yet a little while — how little, how little, and He” etc. 2 Mahbie D. Babcock.

But when you miss present companionship, there is great joy in thinking over the wondrous companionship enjoyed by the one loved, and now gone. The companionship of Jesus now makes that face all alight with the radiance from His, while the marvellous music of the homeland fills ears and heart. Your loved one, side by side with the Master, thinks of you, and is quiet and glad for all the joy coming to you, and all the loving sovereignty of Jesus over your life. He is enjoying the fulness of life.

“This is the death of death,
To breathe away a breath,
And know the end of strife,
And taste the endless life.
And joy without a fear,
And smile without a tear.
And work, nor care, nor rest.
And find the last the best.” ’

And if it be the one of closest tie who has gone, a husband or wife, leaving a child in your care, there is more yet of sweet, hallowed compensation. It is the highest relation of life that yields the finest fragrance. For there is the fine fruit of your love, a precious new life, God’s gift to you revealing and cementing earth’s highest, human love. In your child, his or hers likewise who has gone, that loved one comes again to you, and abides ever with you. And yours is the unspeakable privilege of moulding into finest character this bit of your loved one’s life left behind with you This is a great compensation.

Maltbie D. Babcock.

H7

And so in the midst of greatest pain there may come the sweetest rest of spirit, because of these great compensations. And, more than all else, because of the presence of the greatest Sufferer and greatest Sympathizer as our closest Friend. Through Him is rest in pain of any sort.

“There is a rest that deeper grows

In midst of pain and strife;
A mighty conscious willed repose

In depth of deepest life.
To have and hold the precious prize

No need of jealous fear;
But windows open to the skies,

And skill to read the stars.

Who dwelleth in that secret place,

Where tumult enters not,
Is never cold with terror base,

Never with anger hot.
For if an evil past should dare

His very heart invest,
God is his deeper heart, and there

He enters into rest.

When mighty sea winds madly blow.

And tear the scattered waves,
Peaceful as summer woods below

Lie darkling ocean caves.
The wind of words may toss my heart,

But what is that to me!
‘Tis but a surface storm — Thou art

My deep, still, resting sea.”

Victory.

But there is a gladder message yet for the bells to ring out tunefully to all men. It is this — there

George MacDonald.

is to be victory over pain. It will be a full victory too, with the flags flying, and the music filling all the air, and sweetest in its filling of all the heart.

There are certain foretastes of victory. The nearer we come to living in full touch with God, with intelligent knowledge of the nature and needs of our bodies, the nearer shall we come to a life free from bodily pain. This will not remove bodily pain and discomfort wholly, for we are a bit of all that has gone before. Each man is a connecting link between two generations. He may change the stream of life flowing into the next generation, and he may change a good bit (the stream of life he received from his fathers, but never wholly.

Neither does this affect the pain of spirit through the contact of culture with men and conditions around us. The nearer God one gets and the closer to His ideal for us he grows, the greater is the pain over the ravages of sin, but the steadier too is the faith that sees through to the end of victory.

There is, through Jesus, victory in pain over pain. The hurt remains, but the sting has been extracted. With Him alongside, close up, and the clearer vision of the great purpose, and through to the end, the pain of pain lessens and softens, even while the outer pain remains.

Then there is the final victory. Jesus’ resurrection is called a first fruits by Paul. It is a wondrous conception of a winsome truth. First fruits is the language of harvest. The first fruits is the beginning of the harvest; the great crop remains to be gathered.

There has been a harvest of pain; there is to be a harvest of painlessness. There has been a harvest of sorrow; there will be one of joy. There has been a great harvest of death, of separation, of breakings; there is to be a greater harvest of life, of reunion, of tying up all the old breaks into knots that no fingers will ever undo.

The harvest of pain and sorrow, of death and breakings, has been the result of sin’s sowing. The new harvest of painless, joyous, reunited life is through the sowing by Jesus of His own life down among men. Jesus is greater than sin. The coming harvest will be so great as to make the Others forgotten. The work that Jesus finished on the cross and the resurrection morning is to be finished in all the earth. The first fruits is to be followed by a great full fruits.

The Bible reaches a thrilhng climax in the closing chapter of its closing book. One can believe anew in the divine guidance of the men who put these books of the Bible together as he comes to the climax of surpassing splendor at its close.

The new glory is revealed as a new city. The city has been the superlative of human life. There bad has been worse, and good best. The momentum of man’s activities has drawn to the city centre the leadership of life. On the bad side the city has become a condensed epitome of darkness and poverty, of pain and misery, of sin and distress. Here in John’s great ^ision it becomes the glorified condensation of all that God’s love has planned for man.

The presence of God is its glorifying, transforming, radiating atmosphere. ‘’The Lamb is the light thereof.” Death has been cast out. There is no mourning, nor crying, nor pain. All the former things are passed away. And in a fine touch it is said that God Himself “shall wipe away every tear from their eyes.” That word “away” might better read “out”; “shall wipe out every tear.” The tear forced out under pain’s pressure shall be annihilated, for pain itself has been wiped completely out.

“And there shall be no curse any more, and the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be therein; and His servants shall serve Him; and they shall see His face; and His name shall be on their foreheads. And there shall be night no more; and they need no light of lamp, neither light of sun; for the Lord God shall give them light; and they shall reign unto the ages of the ages.”

The old order has completely passed away. The victory over pain is final and full through Jesus.

A Guide Over Life’s Trail.

God Plans Every Life.

God Tells us His Plan for us.

Accepting God’s Plan.

A Disciplined Judgment

Unhurried Waiting.

Guided in Judgment.

The Boys and the Tramps.

Instructed in the Night Seasons.

Finding the Life-plan.

“My Sheep Hear My Voice.”