A Prayer for Enemies
Psalm ix. 20 v.
“Put them in fear, 0 Lord, that the nations may know themselves to be but men.”
“Put them in fear” — is that a prayer for an inspired book? Is it humane to ask that my enemies may be put in fear? Yes, if it is to make them human. The Psalmist asks Grod to teach his enemies “that they are but men” — to teach them pity for others by showing them the weak point in themselves. He feels that they want sympathy because they want experience. No man can bring help to the clouded heart unless he has made the clouds his chariot. It is only through sorrow that I can comfort sorrow. The shut door of my experience is the door that shuts me in. The tears which I shed for my brother must be tears of memory. Their fountain must lie in the yesterday of my heart. If I have no yesterday, I have no tears. I cannot put myself in my brother’s place unless I have been in his place. My pity is an echo of my past, and where there is no past there is no pity. If the halls of memory are silent, the voice of sympathy is dead. The night that appeals to my compassion must be painted on the canvas of a vanished day.
Therefore, oh, my Father, I am not afraid to pray for the unsympathetic “put them in fear.” I am not afraid to say, “make them more humane, by teaching them to be more human.” I am not afraid to wish them the good gift of Thy chariot-clouds. I know that Thy clouds would enlarge them — give them more driving room. I know they would carry them further down the road of humanity, further up the steep of Calvary. I know they would bear them through gates that have long been closed — gates of the heart, that keepeth its own bitterness, and forbiddeth a stranger to intermeddle therewith. Shall I not wish such enlargement, even to my foe? Is not this the enlargement, my Father, that Thou wishest for Thy foe — this heart of mine, alien to love? It is for this Thou sendest into my days so many pillars of cloud; Thou wouldest make me a pillar to the clouded. It is for this Thou puttest fear within me — that I may know myself to be only a man. It is for this Thou spreadest the canvas of sorrow — that my brother’s night may be pictured in my soul. It is for this Thou lendest the labour and the ladenness — that I may learn the secret of giving rest. I bless Thee for Thy gift of sympathetic fear.