Passing by on the Other Side

Who fain would help in this world of ours,

Where sorrowful steps must fall, Bring help in time to the waning powers

Ere the bier is spread with the pall; Nor send reserves when the flags are furled,

And the dead beyond your call.

Margaret E. Sangster.

No lesson is harder to learn than the lesson of love. It may be found, too, that of love’s lessons those which refer to our fellow-men are harder to get into our life than those which refer to God. It is easier to love one infinitely above us than the one who walks beside us every day. We find it difficult enough to love our close personal friends in the full, deep, rich, constant, unselfish way that the divine teaching requires. Even in the tenderest relations it is hard to be always patient, thoughtful, gentle, helpful, and free from enly and jealousy and all irritation.

Yet still more difficult is it to learn the larger lesson of loving our neighbor as ourself. We like to settle for ourself who our neighbor is; and then we like to decide upon just the way in which we shall show our love to him. But we really have nothing to do with either of these matters; we cannot select our neighbor, nor can we take our own way of loving him.

Many of us would like to write out love’s duty to one’s neighbor in a series of “Thou shalt nots.” This would make it much easier. It is not so hard to refrain from doing our neighbor harm as it is to reach out our hand to do him good. With a little effort at self-control we can resist the impulse to return blow for blow, to demand tooth for tooth, to repay unkindness with unkindness; but it requires very much more grace to give a kiss for a blow, to return kindness for unkindness, to repay wrong and injustice with meekness and mercy.

In one of our Lord’s wonderful parables we have an example of loving by not doing harm, and set over against it, the true ideal of loving by doing good and serving. The story is familiar. Neither the priest nor the Levite did the wounded man any harm. It was the robbers who hurt him almost to death. The men who passed by were good men, with kind hearts and gentle feelings. They felt sorry for the poor man. One of them lingered a moment, and told the sufferer that he was very sorry he had been hurt so badly. They would not have done him any injury for the world, — this good priest fresh from his sacred functions, and this Levite with hands consecrated to holy service.

No; and yet somehow the story reads as if they had done something not just right, as if they had injured the wounded man in some way. When we think the matter through, we find that the Master means to teach us that we may do sore wrong to others by not doing love’s duties to them.

We do not think much of this kind of sins. At the close of the day we examine ourselves, and review our record to find wherein wq should confess sin. We remember the hasty word we spoke, which gave pain to a tender heart, and also grieved the Holy Spirit. We recall our self-indulgence, our unkind feelings, our selfish acts, our envyings and jealousies, our impatience and anger, and we make confession of all these sins, asking forgiveness. But do we make confession of the things we did not do which we ought to have done y Are we penitent for our failures to do deeds of kindness .? During the day we have passed by on the other side of many a human need and want and danger; do we confess these neglects among the day’s sins.’* The “other side” is too well trodden by many of us. The path is beaten hard by our feet.

Some people talk a great deal about perfection. They mean really only a life free from positive and wilful sins. They do not think of that whole hemisphere of life which in them is almost empty. Love is not doing others no harm; it is doing them all the good that it is in our power to do. We are taught to pray, not “Forgive us our crimes,” but “Forgive us our debts.” Debts are what we owe. It is not supposed that respectable people will commit crimes against their neighs bors; but when we look into the matter closely, we shall find that most of our days leave unpaid debts — debts of love; kindnesses or services due to others, but not paid, certainly not paid in full. The priest and the Levite did not hurt the wounded man, but they failed to pay him the debt they owed him. What they owed and did not pay was the difference between their passing by in harmless neglect and the noble service which the good Samaritan rendered.

It is well to press the application of the lesson very closely. All along life’s dusty wayside lie wounded men and women, robbed and left to die. We are continually passing by them. Which role are we playing, — the priest’s and Levite’s, or the good Samaritan’s t Take a single day’s life, and see how many times we pass by on the other side. You learned of a neighbor in trouble. It was in your thought to go to him to offer him help. But you did

PASSING BY ON THE OTHER SIDE. l6l

not do it. The day closed, and there was that brotherly kindness which you ought to have done left undone. Yonder, at the ending of the day, your neighbor is still bowing in the darkness beneath his burden. He might have been rejoicing had it not been for your sin of omission.

Here is one who has failed, and fallen into the dust. There he lies, wounded in his soul, unable to rise. You know of him — he was an old neighbor of yours, a schoolmate perhaps. You have a vision of the possibilities that are in your old friend’s soul, under sin’s ruin, and you feel impelled to go to him in Christ’s name. But you do not follow the good impulse — you pass by on the other side, and let him lie where he fell. Listen to the word of the Lord: “When I say unto the wicked, O wicked man, thou shalt surely die; if thou dost not speak to warn the wicked from his way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand.” You were not his tempter. The wounds in his soul you did not inflict. You did nothing to lead him into sin. Yet you knew of his wounding, his fall, his peril, and had it in your power at least to try to save him. But you offered no helping hand, spoke no word of love to warn him. You simply passed by on the other side.

All about us evermore are human needs and sorrows which make their mute appeal to us. We are our brother’s keeper. It will not avail as excuse for us that we did our brother no harm. That was not what he needed from us, — security against being hurt by us. A little kindness shown to him would have proved a wonderful blessing to him. The struggle was too much for his strengthp and even a word of cheer would have helped him. He was facing the world’s cold blasts, and a moment’s shelter in love’s warmth would have renewed his courage for what was yet before him. Susan Coolidge writes: —

If you were toiling up a weary hill,

Bearing a load beyond your strength to bear,

Straining each nerve untiringly, and still

Stumbling and losing foothold here and there;

And each one passing by would do so much As give one upward lift and go his way,

Would not the slight, reiterated touch Of help and kindness lighten all the day?

If you were breasting a keen wind, which tossed

And buffeted and chilled you as you strove, Till, baffled and bewildered quite, you lost

The power to see the way and aim and move; And one, if only for a moment’s space,

Gave you shelter from the bitter blast. Would you not find it easier to face

The storm again when the brief rest was past?

It looks as if the priest, when he came near the wounded man, kept his face turned away so that he could not see him. There are many people who do the same in these days. They refuse to see the misery and sorrow about them. But keeping ourselves ignorant of human needs will never excuse us for not relieving them. The Levite turned aside, and looked at the wounded sufferer, and said, “Poor fellow, I am very sorry for you. Are you much hurt y I hope some of your friends will come to help you.” Then he went on. There is much of this kind of sympathy in the world. People express interest in those who are suffering, telling them how sorry they are for them. Perhaps they promise to pray for them. Then they pass by on the other side. Such sympathy is very cheap, and is as valueless as cheap. It costs to do good to others. We cannot love our neighbor as ourself, and then save ourself from self-denial and sacrifice. He that will save his life shall lose it. The way to save our life in reality is to give it out in love as the good Samaritan gave out his life. It may seem a waste, a failure; but nothing emptied out in love is wasted.

“Long, long centuries
Agone One walked the earth, his life
A seeming failure:
Dying, he gave the world a gift

That will outlast eternities.”

But whatever the cost, we should never fail in a duty of love. We do grievous wrong to others by withholding from them what we owe to them. There is a sin of not doing. We shall be judged, not alone by what we do, but also by what we leave undone. We need to give more heed to the active side of our life. We cannot cut ourselves off from our brothers. It is not enough to think of getting on in the world; we dare not seek to get on and pay no heed to those who are journeying with us. There is a startling saying of Amiel’s which we would do well to ponder: “It is better to be lost than to be saved alone.” One writes: —

We go our ways in life too much alone;

We hold ourselves too far from all our kind; Too often we are dead to sigh and moan;

Too often to the weak and helpless blind; Too often, where distress and want abide, We turn, and pass upon the other side.

The other side is trodden smooth, and worn By footsteps passing idly all the day;

Where lie the bruised ones that faint and mourn Is seldom more than an untrodden way.

Our selfish hearts are for our feet the guide —

They lead us by upon the other side.

It should be ours the oil and wine to pour Into the bleeding wounds of stricken ones;

To take the smitten and the sick and sore,

And bear them where a stream of blessing runs.

Instead we look about — the way is wide, And so we pass upon the other side.

Oh, friends and brothers, gliding down the years,

Humanity is calling each and all In tender accents, born of grief and tears:

I pray you listen to the thrilling call! You cannot in your cold and selfish pride Pass guiltlessly by on the other side.